One of These Days. . .

"This raises the question whether it is better to be loved or feared, or the reverse. The answer is, that one would like to be both; but since it is difficult to combine the two, it is much safer to be feared than loved, if you have to choose. For it can be said of mankind generally, that they are ungrateful, inconstant, pretenderes to virtue and concealers of vice, avoiders of danger and lovers of gain; as long as you help them they are all yours, and will offer you their blood, their property, their lives, and their children. . . provided that the crisis is a long way off; when it comes closer, they soon turn their backs on you. "
- Machiavelli