If the enemy has occupied them before you, do not follow him, but retreat and try to entice him away.

Kill one, terrify a thousand.

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

To see victory only when it is within the ken of the common herd is not the acme of excellence.

When you shoot a bow and arrow, you aim at the clouds, not because you expect to hit them, but so that you may reach the distant target on the ground.

When he utilizes combined energy, his fighting men become as it were like unto rolling logs or stones. For it is the nature of a log or stone to remain motionless on level ground, and to move when on a slope; if four-cornered, to come to a standstill, but if round-shaped to go rolling down.

If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented. The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it nor the wise make plans against it.