Chuang Tzu: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer

Stay in the background, and you shall be put in front. Stay out of things, and you shall be kept safely within.

What the world respects must not be treated with disrespect.

Good words shall gain you honor in the marketplace. Good deeds shall gain you friends among all people.

He who is aware of being strong, but is content to be weak—he shall be a cynosure original: "cynosure"; a person or thing that is the center of attention or admiration of men.

The Empire is a sacred trust and must not be ruled by force. He who tries to rule it, ruins it. He who tries to hold it by force, loses it.

Mighty is the person who conquers themselves.

He who is satisfied already has enough.

To those who are good, I would be good. To those who are not good, I would also be good, in order to make them good.

If the government is tolerant, the people will be honest and without deceit. If the government is meddling, there will be constant breaking of the law.

Repay injury with kindness.

The wise person’s freedom from grievance is because they refuse to see grievances as such.

Such were the pure and simple teachings of Lao Tzu. But it is upon the remarkable doctrine of Inaction original: "Inaction"; refers to the Taoist concept of Wu Wei, or "effortless action," suggesting that one should act in harmony with the natural flow of the universe rather than through forced ambition that his claim to lasting fame is founded:

Do nothing, and everything will be accomplished.
I do nothing, and my people become good on their own.
Abandon conventional wisdom and discard intellectual knowledge, and the people will benefit a hundred times over.
The weak overcomes the strong; the soft overcomes the hard. The whole world knows this, yet no one is able to put it into practice.