He should be mindful of producing disunion among the
leaders of sects and of conciliating those that are dear to him. He
should protect his ministers from disunion and destructions. If the king
becomes mild, the people disregard him. If he becomes stern, the people
feel it as an affliction. The rule is that he should be stern when the
occasion requires sternness, and mild when the occasion requires
mildness. By mildness should the mild be cut. By mildness one may destroy
that which is fierce. There is nothing that mildness cannot effect. For
this reason, mildness is said to be sharper than fierceness. That king
who becomes mild when the occasion requires mildness and who becomes
stern when sternness is required, succeeds in accomplishing all his
objects, and in putting down his foes. Having incurred the animosity of a
person possessed of knowledge and wisdom, one should not draw comfort
from the conviction that one is at a distance (from one's foe).
Far-reaching are the arms of an intelligent man by which he injures when
injured. That should not be sought to be crossed which is really
uncrossable. That should not be snatched from the foe which the foe would
be able to recover. One should not seek to dig at all if by digging one
would not succeed in getting at the root of the thing for which one digs.
One should never strike him whose head one would not cut off. A king
should not always act in this way. This course of conduct that I have
laid down should be pursued only in seasons of distress.
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