Ability will never catch up with the demand for it.

Guide them by edicts, keep them in line with punishments, and the common people will stay out of trouble but will have no sense of shame. Guide them by virtue, keep them in line with the rites, and they will, besides having a sense of shame, reform themselves.

The highest kind of man is the one who does before talking and practices what he professes.

You do not understand even life. How can you understand death?

Things have their roots and branches. Affairs have their beginnings and their ends. To know what is first and what is last will lead one near the Way.

Faithfulness and sincerity first of all.

He who fails to prepare, prepares to fail