When the government is quite unobtrusive, people are indeed pure. When the government is quite prying, people are indeed conniving.
Governing a large country is like frying a small fish. You spoil it with too much poking.
Manifest plainness, embrace simplicity, reduce selfishness, have few desires.
Where there is no conflict, there is no fault.
Sometimes gain comes from losing, and sometimes loss comes from gaining.
The mark of a moderate man is freedom from his own ideas. Tolerant like the sky, all-pervading like sunlight, firm like a mountain, supple like a tree in the wind, he has no destination in view and makes use of anything life happens to bring his way.