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On Thunder雷說

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 · 154 Chinese characters · reading time 1.5 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.

天鼓震時。人心同畏。故曰雷同。予之聞雷。始焉喪膽。及反覆省非。未覓所嫌。然後稍肆體矣。但一事有略嫌者。予嘗讀左傳。見華父目逆事。未嘗不非之。故於行路中。遇美色則意不欲相目。迺低頭背面而走。然其所以低頭背面。是迺不能無心者。此獨自疑者耳。又有一事未免人情者。人有譽己則不得不喜。有毀之則不能無變色。此雖非雷時所懼。亦不可不戒也。古人有暗室不欺者。予何足以及之。

When the drum of Heaven shakes, the hearts of men are alike afraid. Therefore it is called noedong (雷同), thundering the same. When I hear the sound of thunder, at the first my liver and gall go cold; and only after I have turned my wrongs over and examined them and found nothing that might be held against me do I unbend my body a little.

There is one matter only in which I feel a little that might be held against me. I once read the Zuozhuan (左傳) and saw there the matter of Huafu (華父) meeting her with his eyes, and I never failed to think it wrong. And so, when I go along the road and meet a beautiful woman, I do not wish in my heart that our eyes should meet, and I bend my head and turn my face away and pass on. Yet this very bending of the head and turning away of the face cannot be without a mind in it, and this alone is what I doubt in myself.

And there is one more matter in which I do not escape the common feelings of men. When a man praises me I cannot but be glad, and when he slanders me I cannot but change color. This, though it is not what one fears at the hour of thunder, is yet not to be left unguarded against. Among the men of old there were those who did not deceive even in a dark room; how should I be fit to reach them?

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