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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Art of War by Sun Tzu: that, you may crush him."]
Do not press a desperate foe too hard.
[Ch`en Hao quotes the saying: "Birds and beasts when
brought to bay will use their claws and teeth." Chang Yu says:
"If your adversary has burned his boats and destroyed his
cooking-pots, and is ready to stake all on the issue of a battle,
he must not be pushed to extremities." Ho Shih illustrates the
meaning by a story taken from the life of Yen-ch`ing. That
general, together with his colleague Tu Chung-wei was surrounded
by a vastly superior army of Khitans in the year 945 A.D. The
country was bare and desert-like, and the little Chinese force
The Art of War |
