- Lived:
- c. 390–338 BCE · born in the small state of Wey; made his name — and met his death — in the western state of Qin
- Tradition:
- Chinese Legalism (fajia, "the school of law") — statecraft over sagehood
- The Big Idea:
- People respond to rewards and punishments, not to sermons — so a strong state is built not on virtue but on clear, ruthless, absolutely uniform law.
- In their words:
- "A weak people means a strong state, and a strong state means a weak people."
- If you remember one thing:
- He built the legal machine that would one day unify China — and the machine, following his own laws to the letter, destroyed him.