"When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly."

Not even the emperor of Rome was immune from Sturgeon's law.

    人之初
    性本善
    性相近
    習相遠

("When people are born, they all start good, but even though they all start out about the same, you ought to see them after they have had time to become different from one another by picking up habits here and there!". Translation Dr. Linebarger, aka Cordwainer Smith)

If anybody is thinking of getting this the Hayes translation is probably the easiest to read.