With gifts, you may gather your enemies about you. When giving nothing, even your own family will leave.

It may be doubtful, at first, whether a person is an enemy or friend. Meat, if not properly digested, becomes poison; But poison, if used rightly, may turn medicinal.

Much talking is the cause of danger. Silence is the means of avoiding misfortune. The talkative parrot is shut up in a cage. Other birds, without speech, fly freely about.

By depending on the great, The small may rise high. See: the little plant ascending the tall tree Has climbed to the top.

When a broken tank is filled with water, It certainly will leak on every side. Weak men who grow rich Seldom leave an inheritance.

If one is intelligent and applies himself well, what can he not accomplish? Even small bands of people, I have heard, have defeated whole armies.

Even in decline, a virtuous man increases the beauty of his behavior. A burning stick, though turned to the ground, has its flame drawn upwards.