Having Pawned My Coat and Been Moved by It, I Showed This to Choe Jongbeon典衣有感。示崔君宗藩。
季春十一日。廚竈無晨炊。妻將典衣裘。我初訶止之。若言寒已退。人亦奚此爲。若言寒復至。來冬我何資。妻却恚而言。子何一至癡。裘雖未鮮麗。是妾手中絲。愛惜固倍子。口腹急於斯。一日不再食。古人謂之飢。飢則旦暮死。寧有來冬期。呼僮卽遣售。謂可數日支。所得不相直。疑僮或容私。僮顔有憤色。告以買者辭。殘春已侵夏。此豈賣裘時。早爲禦寒計。緣我有餘貲。如非有餘者。斗粟不汝貽。我聞慙且恧。有淚空沾頤。三冬織紝功。一旦棄如遺。尙未救大歉。立竹羅飢兒。反思少壯日。世事百不知。讀書數千卷。科第若摘髭。居然常自負。好爵謂易縻。胡爲賦命薄。抱此窮途悲。端心反省己。亦豈無瑕疵。嗜酒不自檢。飮輒傾千巵。平日心所蓄。及醉不能持。盡吐而後已。不知讒謗隨。行身一如此。窮餓亮其宜。下不爲人喜。上不爲天毗。觸地皆玷纇。無事不參差。是我所自取。嗟哉又怨誰。屈指自數罪。擧鞭而三笞。旣往悔何及。來者儻可追。
On the eleventh day of late spring there was no morning fire in the kitchen. My wife would pawn the fur coat, and I at first scolded her and stopped her. If you say the cold has already gone, then why would other people do such a thing? And if the cold should come again, what shall I lean on in the winter to come? My wife grew angry instead and said: How can you be as foolish as this? The fur coat is neither fine nor splendid, but the thread of it came out of your handmaid's hands. I treasure it truly twice as much as you do, but mouth and belly are more pressing than this. Not to eat twice in one day — the ancients called that hunger. If we hunger we shall die by morning or by evening, so where is the promise of a winter to come? She called the boy and sent him off at once to sell it, thinking we might hold out for some days. What he got did not match its worth, and I suspected the boy had served himself. There was a look of resentment on the boy's face, and he reported the buyer's words: What is left of spring already encroaches on summer; is this any time to be selling a fur coat? If I laid plans early against the cold, it is because I have goods to spare. Were I not a man with something to spare, I would not give you so much as a measure of grain. I heard it and was ashamed and abashed, and tears idly wet my chin. The labor of three winters at the loom became in one morning as a thing thrown away. Even so it cannot save us from a great lean year, and the hungry children stand in a row like bamboo. I think back instead to the days when I was young and stout, when I did not know a hundred of the world's affairs. I read some thousands of books, and took the examination as easily as plucking a whisker. And so I always thought well of myself, reckoning I should easily be bound to a good office. How is it that the lot I was born with is thin, and I have taken to my breast this grief of a blocked road? Setting my heart straight, I turn and look into myself: and how should I be without a flaw? I loved wine and could not hold myself in check, and drinking I would tip off a thousand cups at once. What in quiet times I had stored up in my heart I could not keep hold of once I was drunk, and I stopped only when I had spat it all out. I did not know that slander and blame would follow. My bearing being all of a piece like this, want and hunger are truly what I deserve. Below, I have not become a joy to men; above, I have not become one whom Heaven helps. Every ground I touch is all mote and flaw, and there is nothing that does not go awry. This is what I have brought upon myself, so ah, whom else should I blame? I count my faults off on my fingers, and taking up the whip I flog myself three times. What is already past — what good is repenting it? What is to come I may yet perhaps keep up with.