Concentrate your energy and hoard your strength.

Someone unfamiliar with the mountains and forests cannot advance [the team]. One who does not employ local guides cannot gain the advantage.

Ground which can be freely traversed by both sides is called accessible.

Be subtle! be subtle! and use your spies for every kind of business.

The good fighter is able to secure himself against defeat, but cannot make certain of defeating the enemy.

In all fighting, the direct method may be used for joining battle, but indirect methods will be needed in order to secure victory. Indirect tactics, efficiently applied, are inexhaustible as Heaven and Earth, unending as the flow of rivers and streams; like the sun and moon, they end but to begin anew; like the four seasons, they pass away to return once more.

Subjugating the enemy's army without fighting is the true pinnacle of excellence.