外內

Of the people's external affairs, none is more difficult than warfare. Therefore lenient law cannot compel them. What is meant by lenient law? Rewards are few, authority is weak, and the dissolute channels are not blocked. What are the dissolute channels? Honoring the eloquent and clever, appointing wandering office-seekers, and allowing literary figures with private reputations to become prominent.

If these three are not blocked, the people will not fight and affairs will fail. When rewards are few, those who obey gain no benefit. When authority is weak, those who transgress suffer no harm. Opening dissolute channels to lure the people while using lenient law to make them fight — this is like setting a mousetrap and baiting it with a wildcat. How could it possibly work!

Therefore if you wish to make the people fight, you must employ stern law. Rewards must be generous, authority must be severe, and the dissolute channels must be blocked — the eloquent and clever must not be honored, wandering office-seekers must not be appointed, literary figures with private reputations must not be made prominent. With generous rewards and severe authority, when the people see the abundance of war rewards they forget death, and when they see the disgrace of not fighting they find life bitter. Reward makes them forget death; authority makes them find life bitter; and the dissolute channels are blocked. Meeting the enemy under these conditions is like shooting a drifting leaf with a crossbow of a hundred stone — what could possibly not be pierced?

Of the people's internal affairs, none is more burdensome than agriculture. Therefore lenient governance cannot compel them. What is meant by lenient governance? Farmers are poor while merchants are wealthy. When food is cheap, currency is dear; when food is cheap, farmers are poor; when currency is dear, merchants are wealthy. When non-essential activities are not prohibited, the technically skilled profit and the idle eaters are many. Thus farmers exert the most toilsome effort yet gain the least profit — they cannot compete with merchants and the technically skilled. If you can simply prevent the merchants and technically skilled from proliferating, then it would be impossible for the state not to become wealthy. Therefore it is said: if you wish agriculture to enrich the state, food within the borders must be made expensive, taxes on non-agricultural occupations must be made heavy, and rents on market profits must be made steep. Then the people cannot avoid needing fields; without fields they cannot avoid working to obtain food. When food is expensive, farmers profit; when farmers profit, those who farm are numerous. When food is expensive, buying grain is unprofitable — and with heavy taxes added besides — the people cannot avoid abandoning commerce and technical crafts to engage in the profits of the land. Therefore the people's strength is entirely directed to the profits of the land.

Therefore in governing the state: the profits of the border should all go to the army; the profits of the market should all go to agriculture. When border profits go to the army, the state is strong; when market profits go to agriculture, the state is wealthy. A state that is strong when it marches to war and wealthy when it rests at home — that is kingship.