“If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change”

Tancredi Falconeri’s maxim, “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change,” condenses the political strategy and historical irony at the heart of his departure for the hills at Ficuzza. First offered as an argument for joining the revolution, it later returns in Don Fabrizio Corbera, Prince of Salina’s expectation that upheaval will change the forms of power without transforming Sicily’s persistent realities.

The Maxim in Tancredi’s Argument

Tancredi speaks the maxim while explaining why he is joining the insurgents rather than remaining at home. He warns that unless his side intervenes, others will impose a republic; taking part in the struggle, he suggests, is the way to prevent a worse political outcome and preserve what matters. The sentence therefore makes change sound less like a rejection of the old order than a tactic for defending it.

Its force also lies in the contradiction it openly contains: preserving things as they are requires changing them. The maxim gives revolutionary participation a conservative purpose, fitting Tancredi’s ability to speak in the language of political principle while keeping his intentions difficult to read. He embraces his uncle and promises to return with the tricolour, but the speech’s apparent conviction is undercut by a tone that leaves Don Fabrizio unsure how seriously to take it.

Don Fabrizio’s Recognition

After Tancredi leaves, Don Fabrizio initially thinks of the danger: his vision of a guerrilla skirmish leaves his nephew wounded in the woods. He nevertheless gives Tancredi gold before he goes, making his response more than private alarm. The money materially supports the very revolution that Don Fabrizio has just condemned, while the maxim helps him understand the political logic behind that choice.

Later, as he considers the promises of a new Sicily, Don Fabrizio expects negotiations punctuated by limited shooting, followed by a result in which everything will be the same though changed. He recognizes Tancredi’s earlier words in this forecast. The echo shifts the maxim from a young man’s justification for action into the older prince’s diagnosis of what that action is likely to accomplish.

Political Irony and Sicilian Stasis

The maxim’s later force depends on the gap between visible political change and durable social conditions. Don Fabrizio doubts that the latest promises of renewal will be fulfilled, recalling that successive invasions have also promised better days for Sicily without delivering them. In that setting, the maxim describes not simply a maneuver by Tancredi but a recurring pattern: power may change hands while the island’s deeper condition persists.

Don Fabrizio’s conversation with Don Pietro Russo sharpens the pattern. Russo sympathizes with the young men and complains of searches, questioning, and police surveillance, yet his own conduct includes hiding the prince’s lemons. His mixture of grievance, opportunism, and friendliness gives the coming change a social face: those who stand to gain power are not necessarily agents of a transformed order. The maxim thus holds together Tancredi’s immediate political calculation and the novel’s broader irony that a revolution can rearrange appearances while renewing continuity beneath them.