Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) 東國李相國集 · Yi Gyubo · Compiled 1241 (Goryeo, 28th year of King Gojong); revised and enlarged 1251 · 2 passages · 143 Chinese characters · reading time 1.4 min
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 4 The collected writings of Yi Gyubo of Goryeo, gathered and cut in woodblock by his son Yi Ham in 1241 and revised and enlarged by his grandson Yi Ikbae in 1251. It holds poems and rhapsodies, memorials and reports sent up to the king, records written for temples and pagodas, stele and tomb inscriptions, letters and prefaces, and the state letters that passed to and from the Mongols during the invasions. The Lay of King Dongmyeong, which sings the founder of Goguryeo, stands in volume 3 of the first collection, and the daily life of a man who called himself the White Cloud Layman — with his wine, his zither and his verse — fills the later collection. The book closes with the last poem he wrote as his eyes failed and he laid down the brush, and with the dirge and tomb inscription others made for him after his death.
The Tangshu says: The Emperor built a house in the capital for Lushan. He set a palace eunuch to oversee the work and admonished him, saying, "Lay it out well. Lushan's eye-sockets are large; do not let him laugh at me." The locks and doors, the lattices and towers and pond were splendid, and the hangings were all of red brocade embroidery. Baskets and strainers were made of gold and silver. In general, even the Emperor's own clothes and carriages could not go beyond them. When the Emperor went up to the Qinzheng Tower, he had a great screen painted with a golden cockerel set at the left of the curtained seat and a special chair placed there, and by edict bade Lushan be seated, to show how he raised and favored him. The Crown Prince remonstrated, saying, "The curtained seat is no place for a subject to sit," and the Emperor said, "The barbarian has an uncommon physiognomy (相), and I mean to hold it down." The Emperor also said, "The barbarian has the look of one who will rebel."
胡奴反相帝曾知。斥去猶遲更寵爲。眼孔已容天下大。區區第宅若爲支。
The Emperor knew long before of the barbarian slave's look of rebellion,
yet he was slow to drive him off and even went on favoring him.
His eye-sockets already held the whole world within them —
how should one paltry house ever be enough for him?