Treat [the people] as slaves, guard them against brigands, and they will come to regard themselves as slaves and brigands.

If one leads them with administrative measures and uses punishments to make them conform, the people will be evasive, but if one leads them with virtue, they will come up to expectations.

Intelligence dies for want of nourishment under a machinery of government which leaves nothing to the initiative of the citizen.

Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you, or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in the desert.