The Overseer

by Jonathan Rabb

  VIII. HOW A STATE MAY BE MADE READY FOR TRUE SUPREMACY

  Men are governed by their own wills and by the will of fortune, and it is the battle that rages between these two that determines the well-being of states. The extent to which one of these wills may dominate is of central importance to us. Messer Niccolò would have us believe that the two fight an equal battle. To be fair, he is the first to give men an honest chance in the struggle, even if, by his own examples, he proves all too well that fortune is history’s victor. Even he must admit, though, that men cannot win because they cannot adapt with sufficient speed to the demands of time. Long-lasting stability (the core of true supremacy) remains a golden dream.

  But certain men are more capable than we might believe, even more capable than Messer Niccolò’s prince. Their capacity lies not in their virtù or Thesian cunning. Unlike Messer Niccolò’s prince, these men need have no superhuman quality. Nor do they do battle with fortune as their single nemesis. Rather, their strength lies in their faith in the state itself, in the state’s capacity to achieve permanence in the face of fortune’s whim. Underneath all its many changes, the state keeps an enduring quality, an immortality. Yet most men are unaware of this durability. For this reason, they are reluctant to tear down the faulty structures on which the state rests for fear that they will be left with nothing but anarchy. So great is their fear that they choose to amend the flawed structure and produce the same errors over and over again rather than attempt to build something of worth. What they fail to grasp is that only in the chaos of destruction can strong foundations be established. And only those who place their trust in the capacity of states (and not of men) understand how stability may be achieved.

  It follows, then, that leaders who wish to create a stable and long-lasting state must first be willing to throw the present state into chaos. In short, there must always be a place for sacrifice. My purpose here is not to shock but to reveal plain truths. Messer Niccolò certainly understood this point, albeit less completely. His prince reached the heights of power because he knew how to take advantage of a situation mired in chaos. Yet the prince had no cause to know how to instigate such chaos. That task was left to the caprice of fortune. In that way, Messer Niccolò yielded greater power to fortune than to men. But those willing to take the bolder step and to send the state into the chasm wrest such power from the fickle goddess and thus shape their own destinies.

  The choice is not so drastic as it might appear. Take, for example, the mathematician who struggles to create an indisputable proof. He clutters the slate with theorem upon theorem, axiom upon axiom, but to no avail. His calculations do not lead to certainty. And so he cleans the slate, save for the one or two statements he considers absolutely necessary for the ultimate proof. And yet, over and over again he arrives at uncertainty. What can he do? His fellow scholars believe that the few statements he has kept are essential to the task. Without these basic statements, they argue, he would not know where to begin. But he is wiser than they and has real vision. And so he wipes the slate clean and begins unencumbered by their outmoded wisdom. He trusts the science and not the men, thus showing his courage to plumb the depths into which the others dare not venture.

  So is it with states. To elicit real change, leaders must be willing to tear down every structure that has been built on faulty foundations. For two thousand years, men have erected and destroyed cities, states, even civilizations in the hopes of constructing one perfect realm. But their efforts have been in vain for the simple reason that they have never had the courage, nor the insight, to begin from nothing. The slate must be clean if the new state is to be unaffected by the cankers and disease of the previous regime. It is not enough to replace a tyrant with a legislature, a mob with a king. The facade may be different, but the core remains the same. A smooth transformation from one form of governance to another merely reveals the underlying decay. To put it slightly differently, it is but a stay of execution. That which eroded the first regime lingers to undermine the next, and the next, and the next.

  The problem is due to men’s lack of imagination. They cannot see beyond the walls of the past, and thus find security only in what has come before them. Yet real courage asserts itself when faced with possible failure. The unknown provides such a test. To retreat to a flawed but well-tried structure displays only a weak will and an utter resignation to mediocrity.

  There can be no easy way to the state I have described. For I have asked that leaders see not only themselves but the state they hope to rule in an entirely new fashion. There is nothing from history to which they might cling so as to make the change more palatable. Nor is there anything from the past that can explain how they might establish the realms and the Overseer. As with all things novel, attack is the best path. It follows that those who hope to rule must seek the total destruction of the standing regime.

  But only at a certain moment. It would be folly to create chaos if these leaders were not prepared to build new structures to replace the old, to fill the void created by the destruction they themselves will have caused. I need pause only briefly to explain the craft of such a tactic. It is difficult, if not impossible, to provoke sweeping change in a state that has but the slightest residue of comfort and familiarity; that is, in one that reeks of the same mediocrity for decade after decade. Eliminate quietude and complacence and the specters of uncertainty and disorder will rush the people eagerly into the arms of a new leadership. In that way, the bold few will contrive a vacuum that they can fill with their own brand of supremacy so as to replace the vanquished regime.

  The task is not as Herculean as it might appear, for much of the preparation will depend merely on four men; one above all who has the wisdom both to instruct and to choose his three disciples so that they have access to the three realms. I will not deny that this is the longest and hardest portion of the process: the three men must be plucked up at an early age, when their minds are open to innovation, and when they do not shy away from that which seems impossible. Aristotle’s tutelage of Alexander proves that, if given sufficient direction from an early age, and if inspired with a passion for innovation, young men can grow to conquerors. The world has not seen the likes of an Alexander since, nor have there been such tutors as Aristotle to set down the course for such remarkable invention. But if a select few are given a glimpse of what might be, a glimpse into the limitless power to be won through a strict division of the realms, it will not be hard for the Overseer to gain their undying commitment. The burden shall be his to choose his pupils wisely.

  Furthermore, the Overseer need not worry that each of these boys will be overwhelmed by the vastness of the ultimate task, because each will be limited only to that field, that realm which is to be his domain when the new state emerges. At the same time, though, each will be aware of the larger goal, confident that his two colleagues have engaged themselves as rigorously as he. The finer details of this initial stage will be determined by the way the Overseer interprets the few words of counsel I have set down here. For that reason, I will not attempt to describe the course of that training. I cannot anticipate circumstances, nor can I determine the future demands of any of the realms. Suffice it to say, each man must become an expert in his given realm, so much so that he is in a position of considerable influence when the moment to provoke chaos arrives. That the Overseer should choose from men who have the capacity to arrive at such positions is obvious. Yet certain aspects of the instruction will become clearer as I depict the later stages of this enterprise.

  IX. THE ROADS TO CHAOS

  Any one of the realms can, by itself, plunge a state into chaos. Political upheaval due to rebellion or assassination, economic ruin caused by failed ventures or a drain on goods, or social disorder prompted by plague, famine, or other disasters can cause temporary havoc. Events in England of the past eighty years are sufficient illustration of how political intrigue can shake the very foundations of a state. The various murders and plots before the arrival of Henry
Tudor brought chaos to England on more than one occasion, the worst after Richard Plantagenet’s accession to the throne. The country was at war with itself, and in the end found salvation in a conquering prince. But did the English make the most of that chaos? Did they seek to expunge from the state those traits that had made all the devastation possible? Probably not. The Tudors have restored a peace, but one must wonder how long lasting that security will be, since the current Henry has no male heir. Will these battered English be forced to fight the same battles once again?

  As to economic ruin, you will recall that following its war with the Numantines, the Roman Republic experienced vast difficulties brought about by the thousands of peasant workers who were unable to find land to till. Food began to grow scarce, with only corn brought from abroad warding off rebellion. So great was the economic strain that the tribunes led popular agitation against the senate and consuls. The danger began to spread to the military, and the entire state, already descending toward chaos, seemed on the brink of total collapse. Had it not been for Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, men of extraordinary gifts, whose reforms restored order to commerce and agriculture, Rome might very well have fallen long before any scheming dictator could bring her to her knees.

  For social disasters I need only remind the reader of the plague in Athens as evidence of the devastation of such phenomena.

  In each of these cases, the advent of chaos did not suffice to dissuade men from erecting the same institutions that had made the state so weak in the first place. Thus, for chaos to serve its proper end, all three realms must erupt together. The question naturally arises: How? In the examples we have cited, the catastrophes were not wished for, nor were they the product of human design. Perhaps Richard Plantagenet recognized the usefulness of the chaos his actions provoked, but it would be foolhardy to ascribe a human cause to the economic failure in Rome, and blasphemous to do so in the case of the Plague. Yet if a stable state is to emerge, the few must take it upon themselves to create chaos; they must destroy all power so as to create power.

  X. THE ROAD TO POLITICAL CHAOS

  The roles of each realm are distinct and any one may lead the way in the move toward chaos. Yet it would be wise to explain how difficulties are most likely to arise in each realm before we consider their united efforts. For the political realm, there are three roads to chaos: first, by assassination; next, by military or foreign threat; and third, by a popular demagogue. History is too full of instances of the first to warrant long discussion, but a few stand out among the many. The most obvious is Caesar, whose death at the hands of the twenty-two left Rome in the midst of a bloody civil war, which ended with the loss of the Republic and the rise of Imperial rule. The few years of confusion and uncertainty as Brutus and Octavian fought for dominion were the immediate consequence of the assassination. A less effective example, but one which occurred within the memory of our own fathers, was the partially successful attempt upon the lives of Guiliano and Lorenzo de’ Medici. The Pazzi conspired to rid the city of its two leading citizens and, during the holy Easter Mass, set upon the two brothers, killing the first but allowing the second to flee with his life. Until word of Lorenzo’s escape became known, a panic flew throughout the city and, had it not been for a few words of assurance on the steps of the Cathedral from the young Lorenzo, the Medici might have seen all order abandon Florence. So cunning a member of that illustrious family was Lorenzo that he turned the failed attempt to his advantage, making changes that strengthened his control over the government. But in truth, such an outcome is highly uncommon, and resulted more from Lorenzo’s own qualities than from his circumstances after the attempted assassination.

  Even when successful, assassination places states only temporarily into chaos, from which an altered, though equally weak sovereignty emerges. For those who win sovereignty through conspiracy and assassination, there is little to look forward to save fear, envy, and the terrifying possibility of revenge. Princes raised by assassination inspire others to seize power in the same way, and thus soon fall prey to the very means that brought them to the fore. To build a government on such foundations is to condemn the state to retribution upon retribution. While such events will bring cities into a continuous state of chaos, it is not a chaos from which true supremacy may emerge.

  The second road may lead to more stable leadership than the first, but it is equally suspect, and far more difficult to follow. For military men (of whom I will speak in greater detail) are not easy to control, nor are they likely to yield sovereignty to a leader once they themselves have tasted the sweet fruits of power. Too much has been made of the loyalty of such armies for their generals, and for the leaders who direct those generals. In a time of true heroism, perhaps such esteem held sway. But we live in an age of mercenary troops who fight for a day’s pay, no matter who holds the purse strings. Soldiers switch sides in the heat of battle if they are given sufficient reward. To trust military men—even those of a city’s own militia (again Messer Niccolò displays an unsuspected naïveté)—is to allow a fickle crowd to determine the course of events. Loyalty is no match for power’s subtle lure. Thus, to create political chaos through military force is to doom the state to martial law (no matter how sweetly that law be imposed). It cannot be denied that military rule offers some stability, but only for a while. Ambition is the driving quality of all soldiers and too many have the means (a regiment here, a garrison there) to seize power. No state stands long that must endure the constant struggles of military intrigue.

  Foreign threat is even more difficult to predict and nearly impossible to control. Furthermore, the only men in history who have won power through conquests made by others have been spies and traitors. These are the worst sorts of men and deserve any and all vengeful reprisals that fall upon them. There is nothing more to say on the possibilities created by foreign threats.

  The first two roads to political upheaval share a basic shortcoming: Neither takes seriously the need to contrive with stealth the opinion of the people. Assassination is alone a tool of the few or of the lunatic. Military upheaval takes place in a small portion of the state. Those who follow either of these two roads fail to recognize that, although incapable of rule on their own, the people are the most powerful force in a state, and thus any change in power must ride upon the wave of their passions. The people would not willingly bring the state into chaos, but they must be led to do so. There is but one way to accomplish that end: A demagogue must rise who captures their devotion and who recognizes the need to catapult the state into ruin so that he (and others) may create stability from the rubble.

  Once again, Florence provides a fitting example in the person of Savonarola, who became the city’s leading citizen during the last days of its first republic. Only last year, Signore Michelangelo Buonarroti told me that to this day, thirty years later, he could still hear the sound of Savonarola’s voice as he preached. Driven by his desire for sweeping change both in the church and in his fellow citizens, Savonarola filled his sermons with prophecies of the purifying scourge ready to descend upon Italy. When his prophecy was given truth by the invasion of the French in the year of our Lord 1494, he won control of the city and the opportunity to create his holy realm out of the upheaval. But he was a man of narrow vision, who desired little more than a strengthened republic guided by the motto “Christ King in Florence.” His body soon burned on a pyre in the Piazza della Signoria, a testament both to his influence and to his limits.

  Among the many demagogues over the centuries few (if any) have taken this role with the sort of foresight necessary to prepare for the state I envision. Our demagogue must be a man ready to take the reins within the political realm once chaos erupts. Therefore, he must be well aware of the other realms, and see his role as one of limited importance. It is crucial that he play the demagogue, rather than be one. For if he were to take on all of the attributes of such a leader, he would never be able to slake his own thirst once the new foundations of the state were set
. Thus he must not appear on the political stage simply by happenstance; that is, by the good fortune of a few ringing sermons. No. He must study the temper of the people, understand what they crave or disparage in the current state, and then use that knowledge to cater to their desires. He must speak as if he speaks for them all. He must be a shrewd observer of men, and he must know when to enter the fray. He need not strike with a bold blow; but rather, he should build slowly from small beginnings. Let word of his deeds and of his opinions give rise to his popularity. Let the people call on him, not he on them. Then, when the moment is right, when the Overseer has counseled a sudden movement from all realms, let him take his people into chaos. They will not flinch. They will have given him their trust and their devotion. It will take time to conjure such loyalty, and it will be the circumstances that determine his progress. But all that is required of both demagogue (the political Prefect) and Overseer is that they be able to read men’s hearts, a skill honed through years of study.

  XI. THE ROAD TO ECONOMIC CHAOS

  Such are the paths to upheaval in the political realm. Within the economic realm, there are also three paths: first, by natural depletion; next, by foreign blockade; and third, by designed ill-use. The first is most likely to cause strife among the various groups within a state; that is, setting the landed wealthy against artisans and merchants, and against the peasants and the poor. When goods are insufficient to meet the needs of each group, those who are deprived will find cause to revolt and send the state toward ruin. Oft the fault lies with the peasantry, for they are unable to recognize the ebb and flow of commerce and trade. When food or other necessities are scarce, they blame the landed, who are no more to blame than the peasants themselves, for it is nature, not greed, that causes the dearth of grain, wood, metals, and the like.