Book Review: Machiavelli’s Florentine Republic, by Michelle T. Clarke

• DOI: 10.1177/0090591718817842
• Date: 01 October 2019
• Published date: 01 October 2019
• Subject Matter: Book Reviews

Book Reviews 751

that Schliesser accurately identifies between Smith’s projects and the other

connections that this enlightening exposition opens to continued exploration;

despite the fact that the epistemological foundations underlying both spheres

are homogenous and facilitate his systemic vision, Smith clearly differenti-

ates between objects of study and the appropriate methodologies for each of

these. It is epistemic humility in full swing: to not be blinded by the success

of a single method of analysis and expand it to all of reality; to not try to

adjust reality to the theory but rather allow it to have the last word; to address

the exceptions, the deviations from the expected pattern, the diverse com-

plexities of the different phenomena, and so on. As the wise and virtuous of

the TMS, the philosopher Smith believes there is always space for improve-

ment and revision, because—to paraphrase—the longest life is very seldom

sufficient to bring knowledge to complete perfection (cf. TMS III.3.22).

This book addresses many more issues, and there are even more issues

that it only suggests and leaves open for others to investigate. The influence

of Hume on Smith’s theories, the notion of freedom as the possibility to make

significant choices, superstition as a constituent part of moral life, the exis-

tence of God as a condition of science, and the success of Smith as a public

thinker only account for some of these issues. This is a book with novel ideas

and controversial theses which, forty years after the revival of the study of

this philosopher, demonstrates that, far from having been exhausted, Adam

Smith still has much to say to the philosophers and legislators of the twenty-

first century.1

Note

1. I would like to acknowledge the support of Fondecyt, project 1170260.

Machiavelli’s Florentine Republic, by Michelle T. Clarke. Oxford: Oxford University

Press, 2018, 376 pp.

Reviewed by: Brian Harding, Professor, Department of Psychology and Philosophy,

Texas Woman’s University, Denton, TX, USA

DOI: 10.1177/0090591718817842

Niccolò Machiavelli’s immediate concern throughout his work is the fate of

Florence. Even when not explicitly discussing it, Florentine affairs are argu-

ably at the back of his mind, and even if his thoughts have reverberations that

go far beyond Florence, they begin and end there. With that in mind, for her

new book Michelle T. Clarke uses as its central text neither The Prince nor