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Who really said it

This is no time to be making new enemies

Not Machiavelli — an anonymous joke from 1795 Unknown Anonymous · first in print 13 June 1795
Disputed Rights unconfirmed

Quote Investigator traces this deathbed gag to an unnamed condemned prisoner at Newgate in the Staffordshire Advertiser of 13 June 1795, and concludes the anecdote is probably fictional. It was fastened onto Machiavelli only in 1981, over four centuries after his death, and appears nowhere in his own writings.

Last verified 4 Aug 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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Disputed credit — copy with the correction

“This is no time to be making new enemies” Not Machiavelli. This deathbed joke first appears in print on 13 June 1795 in the Staffordshire Advertiser, told of an anonymous prisoner under sentence of death at Newgate who, asked whether he renounced the devil, "begged to be excused, for, as he was going to a strange country, he did not wish to make himself any enemies." It was told of an Irishman by 1856 and a Scotsman by 1900, attached to Wilson Mizner in 1952, to Voltaire by 1974, and to Machiavelli only in 1981. Quote Investigator judges the anecdote probably fictional. — Quotle.info

The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to Niccolò Machiavelli. Use the credit shown above instead.

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We couldn’t verify where this wording comes from, so there’s no rights status to give. Safe to present as an unverified or anonymous line — just don’t assert a specific author or source.

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In context

Evoking the themes of humility and wisdom. Theme: "This is no time to be making new enemies". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Minimalist

Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "This is no time to be making new enemies". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

The 1795 original — no philosopher in sight

Earliest known printing
Staffordshire Advertiser, 13 June 1795
Speaker in that version
An unnamed man under sentence of death at Newgate
Machiavelli first credited
1981, in a conference paper by the economist Robert Lekachman
In Machiavelli’s own writings
No trace

One of the criminals lately under sentence of death in Newgate, was visited by the Ordinary, who gravely urged him to acknowledge the justice of his sentence, &c. to which the culprit answering—the Divine demanded to know whether he renounced the D—l and all his works?—to which the poor fellow shrugging his shoulders, replied—that he begged to be excused, for, as he was going to a strange country, he did not wish to make himself any enemies. Newgate, 1795

The oldest version Quote Investigator can find. Note what is missing: no Machiavelli, no Voltaire, no cardinal — and not yet the snappy modern wording. The punchline is a shrug from a nameless convict.

Quote Investigator: Origin of Deathbed Remark — This Is No Time To Be Making New Enemies

How the joke traveled

  • The oldest telling has no famous name in it at all. The Staffordshire Advertiser of 13 June 1795 tells it of an anonymous prisoner under sentence of death in Newgate who, asked whether he renounced the devil, “begged to be excused, for, as he was going to a strange country, he did not wish to make himself any enemies” (Quote Investigator ↗).
  • Through the nineteenth century the speaker is a stock character rather than a person. The Springfield Republican of 30 April 1856 gives it to a dying Irishman called Pat — “I’m going into a strange country, and I don’t want to make myself enemies!” — and by 1900 the Washington News Letter has reassigned it to a Scotsman (Quote Investigator ↗). Stephen Goranson had mapped the same 1856 Irishman versions for the American Dialect Society list in February 2012 (ADS-L ↗).
  • A named person finally attaches in 1952, and it is not a philosopher: Harry Hershfield’s New York Times column has the wit Wilson Mizner say it about a dying friend, not on his own deathbed. Voltaire only inherits the line by 1974, in a column in The Gleaner of Kingston, Jamaica (Quote Investigator ↗).
  • Machiavelli is last in the queue. The earliest version Quote Investigator finds is a 1981 paper by the economist Robert Lekachman, in which a cardinal at the bedside gets the answer “Now is not the time to make new enemies” — Lekachman introduces it as a story he recalls, not as a document. A 1990 Manila Standard column repeats it with the same hedges (“It is said that… Machiavelli is said to have replied”), and Quote Investigator’s verdict on the whole family is that it is “probably fictional” (Quote Investigator ↗).

The 1795 newspaper anecdote is long out of copyright, but it does not contain the modern sentence. The wording people actually circulate has no identified author at all, and the printings closest to it sit in twentieth-century, still-copyrighted sources — a 1952 New York Times column, a 1974 Gleaner piece, Robert Lekachman’s 1981 conference paper — so we assert no rights status for it.

Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.

Fact-check

A joke with a revolving cast

This is not one misattribution but a chain of them. The anecdote is a portable joke that has been re-cast roughly every generation, each time onto whoever seemed the most deliciously unrepentant figure available. Quote Investigator lays out the sequence.

Niccolò Machiavelli from 1981

The earliest Machiavelli telling Quote Investigator locates is a 1981 paper by the economist Robert Lekachman, where a cardinal at the bedside is answered “Now is not the time to make new enemies.” Lekachman offers it as a story he recalls, and a 1990 Manila Standard column repeats it as something Machiavelli “is said to have replied” (Quote Investigator ↗). Wikiquote’s Machiavelli page does not carry the line in any section (Wikiquote ↗).

Voltaire from 1974

The Voltaire telling is only seven years older than the Machiavelli one. Quote Investigator’s earliest instance is a 1974 column in The Gleaner of Kingston, Jamaica: “I don’t think at this time of life I should start making enemies” (Quote Investigator ↗).

Wilson Mizner 1952

Harry Hershfield’s New York Times column of 21 September 1952 has Mizner deliver the line at someone else’s bedside — “This is no time for him to antagonize anybody” — so even here the dying man is not the wit (Quote Investigator ↗).

A dying Irishman, then a Scotsman 1856, 1900

Before any celebrity was involved the speaker was an ethnic stock character: “Pat” in the Springfield Republican of 30 April 1856, a Scotsman in the Washington News Letter by 1900 (Quote Investigator ↗).

Nobody famous said it. The oldest version on record, from 1795, is told of a man whose name the newspaper did not bother to print — and Quote Investigator’s conclusion is that the anecdote is “probably fictional” in every version, including that one (Quote Investigator ↗).

Context

Why it stuck to him

A joke needs a plausible mouth to come out of, and Machiavelli’s is close to perfect. His name has been shorthand for cheerful amorality for five centuries, so a story in which he declines, with his last breath, to burn a bridge with the devil does not need evidence to feel true. That is exactly the mechanism to distrust: the more characteristic a quotation sounds, the less anyone checks it.

The chronology gives the game away. The line was already two centuries old and had been told about a Newgate convict, an Irishman and a Scotsman before any famous person got near it — and when the celebrities finally arrived, Voltaire in the 1970s and Machiavelli in the 1980s, they arrived last, in retellings that hedge with “it is said” and “I recall the story.”

The joke is older than the attribution by nearly two centuries — and it was funny when nobody was attached to it at all.

There is a real Machiavelli deathbed story — and it is also disputed

Machiavelli does have a celebrated deathbed legend, but it is a different one. In it he describes a vision of two crowds: the ragged poor of paradise, and a company of the damned that includes Plato, Aristotle, Seneca, Plutarch and Tacitus. Asked which he would rather join, he says he would much rather be in Hell with those great geniuses, talking politics, than shut up with the other lot.

Wikiquote files that story under Disputed too. It was first published by Étienne Binet in Du salut d’Origène in 1629, a century after Machiavelli died, with an earlier and more oblique reference to his “famous dream” in a letter of Giovanni Battista Busini in 1549 (Wikiquote ↗). Deathbeds are where quotations go to be invented.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Humility Wisdom

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Origin of Deathbed Remark: This Is No Time To Be Making New Enemiesquoteinvestigator.com

The definitive investigation. Dated citations from 1795 onward showing the joke pass from a Newgate convict to an Irishman, a Scotsman, Wilson Mizner, Voltaire and finally Machiavelli in 1981.
Deathbed Quote: This Is No Time for Making New Enemies (ADS-L)listserv.linguistlist.org

Stephen Goranson’s February 2012 post to the American Dialect Society list, tracing the 1856 “dying Irishman” versions and asking whether anyone can find a Machiavelli attribution earlier than 1981.
Niccolò Machiavelli — Wikiquoteen.wikiquote.org

Sourced, Disputed and Misattributed sections. This line appears in none of them; the Disputed section does carry the other Machiavelli deathbed legend, the dream of Hell and Paradise.
Niccolò Machiavelli — Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophyplato.stanford.edu

Scholarly life and works: born 3 May 1469, died 21 June 1527, Second Chancellor of the Republic of Florence from 1498, The Prince written 1513 and published posthumously in 1532.
The Prince, translated by W. K. Marriottgutenberg.org

The full English text, free and searchable — useful for confirming for yourself that no sentence resembling this one is in it.
Machiavellian Misquotesianchadwick.com

Ian Chadwick’s catalogue of fifteen lines wrongly hung on Machiavelli, including “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.” The deathbed joke is not among them, which is a measure of how many others there are.

The name the joke landed on

Who Machiavelli actually was

Niccolò Machiavelli

3 May 1469 – 21 June 1527 · Florentine diplomat and political theorist

Machiavelli was appointed Second Chancellor of the Republic of Florence in 1498 and spent his working life as a diplomat and administrator, not as a court intriguer. The Prince, the book that turned his surname into an adjective, was written in 1513 and published only in 1532 — after his death — as were the Discourses in 1531. Five centuries of reputation as literature’s great cynic have made him one of the internet’s most reliable magnets for clever lines he never wrote.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Earliest documented instance

“Postscript: London,” Staffordshire Advertiser (England), 13 June 1795, quote page 3, column 5; chronology documented in “Origin of Deathbed Remark: This Is No Time To Be Making New Enemies,” Quote Investigator, 13 August 2013, https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/08/13/no-enemies/.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘This is no time to be making new enemies’?” Last verified 4 Aug 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/this-is-no-time-to-be-making-new-enemies/

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