Light matters should be dealt with seriously. Serious matters should be dealt with lightly.
Yamamoto TsunetomoIt is bad when one thing becomes two. One should not look for anything else in the Way of the Samurai. If one understands things in this manner, he should be able to hear about all Ways and be more and more in accord with his own.
Yamamoto TsunetomoCalculating people are contemptable. The reason for this is that calculation deals with loss and gain, and the loss and gain mind never stops. Death is considered loss and life is considered gain. Thus, death is something that such a person does not care for, and he is contemptable. Furthermore, scholars and their like are men who with wit and speech hide their own true cowardice and greed. People often misjudge this.
Yamamoto TsunetomoThere is not a man who does not get senile by the time he reaches sixty. And when one thinks that he will not be senile, he is already so.
Yamamoto Tsunetomo