A Discourse Written on Seeing a Bribe aboard a Boat舟賂說
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 · 1 passages · 139 Chinese characters · reading time 1.3 min
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 21 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.
When Master Yi (李子) was crossing a certain river southward, there was another who crossed with his boat alongside. The two boats were the same in size, the boatmen even in number, and the people and horses aboard almost alike. But presently, as I looked, that boat had drawn away as if flying and had already reached the far bank, while my boat was still turning in circles and could not go forward. When I asked the reason, a man in the boat said: "They had wine over there and gave it to the boatmen to drink. It is because the boatmen put out all their strength at the oars."
I could not but have a look of shame upon me. And from this I sighed: "Alas, even in the passage of this trifling single reed-leaf there is still a fast and a slow, a first and a last in getting on, according to whether there is a bribe or not. How much more in the midst of the striving crossing of the sea of office! Looking back, I have no money in my hand, and it is only fitting that to this day I have not so much as wetted a single office." I set this down to be looked at in days to come.