93 quotes
Despise the enemy strategically, but take him seriously tactically.
It is evident that to read too many books is harmful.
Except in the deserts, at every place of human habitation there is the left, the centre, and the right. This will continue to be so 10,000 years hence.
Directives on the Cultural Revolution (1966)
Ours is a people's democratic dictatorship, led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant alliance.
Can a Communist, who is an internationalist, at the same time be a patriot? We hold that he not only can be but must be.
Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War (1938)
The fact is that no contradictory aspect can exist in isolation. Without its opposite aspect, each loses the condition for its existence.
On Contradiction (1937)
All reactionaries are paper tigers. In appearance, the reactionaries are terrifying, but in reality they are not so powerful. From a long-term point of view, it is not the reactionaries but the people who are really powerful.
"War is the continuation of politics." In this sense war is politics and war itself is a political action; since ancient times there has never been a war that did not have a political character.
On Protracted Warfare (1938)
The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue.
A communist must never stay aloof from or above the masses like a bureaucrat. He ought to be like an ordinary worker in the presence of the masses, join them, and become one of them.
Directives on the Cultural Revolution (1966)
If the U.S. monopoly capitalist groups persist in pushing their policies of aggression and war, the day is bound to come when they will be hanged by the people of the whole world. The same fate awaits the accomplices of the United States.
We should support whatever our enemies oppose and oppose whatever our enemies support.
Maybe you're afraid of sinking. Don't think about it. If you don't think about it, you won't sink. If you do, you will.
Swimming advice to physician Zhisui Li (1966)
It is difficult to avoid mistakes, the point is to correct them honestly. Too many people have been arrested in Szechwan and many mass organizations are branded as reactionary. All these are wrong, but they have been quickly rectified.
Directives Regarding the Cultural Revolution (1966)
Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is a question of the first importance for the revolution.
We communists are like seeds and the people are the soil. Wherever we go, we must unite with the people, take root and blossom among them.
In class society, everyone lives as a member of a particular class, and every kind of thinking, without exception, is stamped with the brand of a class.
The cardinal responsibility of leadership is to identify the dominant contradiction at each point of the historical process and to work out a central line to resolve it.
Qualitatively different contradictions can only be resolved by qualitatively different methods.
On Contradiction (1937)
Who are our enemies and who are our friends? This is the first and foremost question of a revolution and it is also the first and foremost question of the great Cultural Revolution.
Directives Regarding the Cultural Revolution (1966)