The Tao's principle is spontaneity.

If you want to become full, let yourself be empty.

A government can be compared to our lungs. Our lungs are best when we don't realize they are helping us breathe. It is when we are constantly aware of our lungs that we know they have come down with an illness.

The leader's main job is to make themselves obsolete.

The truest sayings are paradoxical.

Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere. Those who are skilled (in the Tao) do not dispute (about it); the disputatious are not skilled in it. Those who know (the Tao) are not extensively learned; the extensively learned do not know it.

People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.