Chapter seventeen ranks rulers, and the ranking is the book's most quoted political statement.
The best is one whose existence is barely noticed. Next comes one who is loved and praised. Then one who is feared. Then one who is despised.
The placement of the second is the interesting one. A ruler who is loved and praised is doing well by any ordinary measure, and the chapter puts him second, below one who is not noticed at all. The reason is implied rather than stated: being loved requires being visible, being visible requires acting conspicuously, and conspicuous action is exactly what chapters two, three and twenty-nine identify as the source of the problems it is meant to solve.
The chapter adds a line about trust that works in both directions: where trust is insufficient, there is a want of trust. A ruler who does not trust the people will not be trusted by them, and the shortfall is self-inflicted.
The scheme is descriptive rather than aspirational in one important respect. It assumes there will be a ruler. Nothing in the book proposes doing without one, and its political chapters are addressed to whoever is in charge rather than to anyone seeking to remove them. That has made it usable by rulers as well as by their critics, which is a large part of its reception history.