“That the aim of this Courtiership is difficult and sometimes impossible, and that even when the Courtier attains it, he ought not to be called a Courtier, but deserves a greater name,—I say that I do not deny this difficulty, since it is not less difficult to find so excellent a Courtier than to attain such an end. Yet methinks there is no impossibility, even in the case that you cited: for if the Courtier is too young to know that which we have said he ought to know, we need not speak of him, since he is not the Courtier we are presupposing, nor is it possible that one who has to know so many things should be very young. “And if, indeed, the prince shall chance to be so wise and good by nature that he has no need of precepts and counsel from others (although everyone knows how difficult this is), it will be enough for the Courtier to be such a man as could make the prince virtuous if he had need of it. And then the Courtier will be at least able to perform the other part of his duty,—not to allow his prince to be deceived, always to make known the truth about everything, and to set himself against flatterers and slanderers and all those who plot to debase his prince’s mind with unworthy pleasures. And in this way he will also attain his end in great part, although he cannot put everything in practice: which will not be a reason for finding fault with him, since he refrains therefrom for so good a cause. For if an excellent physician were to find himself in a place where everyone was in health, it would not for that reason be right to say that this physician failed in his aim, although he healed no sick. Thus, just as the physician’s aim ought to be men’s health, so the Courtier’s ought to be his prince’s virtue; and it is enough for them both to have their aim latent within their power, if their failure to attain it openly in acts arises from the subject to which the aim is directed. “But if the Courtier were so old that it would not become him to practise music, festivals, games, arms, and the other personal accomplishments, still we cannot say that it is impossible for him to win his prince’s favour by that road. For if his age prevents his practising those things, it does not prevent his understanding them, and if he has practised them in his youth, it does not prevent his having the more perfect judgment regarding them, and his knowing the more perfectly how to teach them to his prince, in proportion as years and experience bring more knowledge of everything. Thus, although the old Courtier does not practise the accomplishments ascribed to him, he will yet attain his aim of instructing his prince rightly.