A Letter Sent to Me on Behalf of the Immortals代仙人寄予書
月日。紫微宮使某甲，丹元眞人某乙等。謹遣金童。奉書于東國李春卿座右。人間喧雜。甚苦甚苦。伏惟道用何似。傾佇罔極。吾二人。居帝之左右。出納天命者也。昔者。吾子亦爲上帝之文臣。掌帝之制勅。凡春而布和氣。煦育草木。冬而振寒令。肅殺萬物。其或雷霆也風雨也霜雪也雲霧也。是皆帝之所以號令於天下者。制勅一出子手。無不稱之。帝用德之。圖有以報爾之勞者。俯詢於臣等。臣等議曰。暫虛天上之文官。遣作人間之學士。西掖北門。快草紅泥之誥。紫微黃閣。穩調金鼎之羹。澤潤生民。名振環宇。然後勅還天上。更綴仙班。如是儻可以償其勞矣。帝卽肯允。於是輔子以沖和之氣。益爾以峻爽之資。凡載錄。車百兩馬萬蹄。踵隨于後。遣生於東海扶桑隅日始出之邦矣。子去幾年。尙未聞調一官除一名。著一奇跡。撰一大冊。以聞于帝耳者。吾等甚訝之。方欲使使詰其所然。適有自人間來者。問之則曰。所謂春卿者困。躓窮塗。阻霑一命。謫仙杯酒。頗事狂顚。元結溪山。空稱漫浪。腰未垂尺五之組。頭未峙三梁之冠。失水之龍耶。喪家之狗耶。特纍纍貿貿一布褐之窮士耳。公卿搢紳。非不知名也。豈以其迂闊不切事。而不容揀採歟。言未終。吾等愕然彈指。尋讞爾國之嫉賢忌能者之罪。緘奏于上帝。帝已頷可。將大錮其人。而信爾之屈也。則子之翼將奮矣。子之步將高矣。玉堂有路。何深不入。鳳閣非天。何高不陟。紅塵下界。方酣一餉之榮。碧落故人。空望九還之就。瑤瑟兮生塵。將待子而弄。玉室兮無人。將待子而開。紫皇所賜丹露之漿。金霞之液。獨吾等日厭飫耳。久矣不得與吾子共酌也。宜速償於素志。復超躡於玄都。噫。功名不可不遂。富貴不可久貪。吾等所以勖子者此耳。勉旃。頓首再拜謹白。
On a certain day of a certain month, so-and-so, Commissioner of the Jami Palace (紫微宮使), and so-and-so, Perfected Man of Danwon (丹元眞人), reverently send a golden lad (金童) to submit this letter to the side of Yi Chungyeong (李春卿) of the Eastern Country.
The world of men is clamorous and disordered, and it must be most wearisome, most wearisome. How, pray, does it fare with you? Our hearts lean toward you in waiting without end.
We two stand at the left and right of the High Emperor and are those who send out and take in the commands of Heaven. Long ago you too became a civil officer of the High Emperor and were charged with his edicts. Now in spring you spread the mild breath and warmly reared the grasses and trees; in winter you shook out the cold command and coolly put all things to death. And thunder and lightning, wind and rain, frost and snow, cloud and mist — these are all the High Emperor's proclamations to the world below. Once an edict came forth from your hand, there was none who did not praise it.
The High Emperor was grateful for this and planned a way to repay your labor, and he stooped to ask us. We took counsel and declared: "Leave the post of the civil officer above the heavens empty for a time and send him down to be an academician in the world of men. In the Western Hall and at the Northern Gate he will draft at his ease the edicts sealed with red clay; in Jami and the Yellow Pavilion he will calmly bring to balance the broth of the golden cauldron. When his bounty has wetted the people and his name has rung through the whole world, then summon him up to heaven by command and join him again to the ranks of the immortals. Doing thus, his labor may perhaps be repaid." The High Emperor at once held it right and granted it.
Thereupon we lodged in you a mild and gentle breath and added to you a lofty and clear substance. And all that was loaded and written down we had follow behind you with a hundred carts and ten thousand hooves of horses, and sent you to be born in the land where the sun first rises, at the corner of Buyang (扶桑) in the Eastern Sea.
It is some years since you went, and we have not yet heard that you have got a single office or risen to a single name or shown forth a single marvelous trace or made a single great book that has reached the High Emperor's ear; and we think it most strange. We were just about to send a man to look into the cause of it, when there happened to be one come from the world of men, and we asked him, and he said this:
"The one called Chungyeong has fallen in his suffering upon a road that ends, and has not been so much as wetted by a single office. Like a banished immortal he takes up the wine cup and makes a business of madness, and as Yuan Jie (元結) was among streams and hills, he is called a man drifting idly upon the waves. At his waist he has hung no cord of a foot and five inches, and upon his head he has set no cap of three lines. Is he a dragon that has lost its water, or a dog that has lost its house? He is only a wasted, dull-seeming poor scholar in hempen clothes. Nor is it that the ministers and the officials do not know his name. It is likely that they called him impractical and unfit for affairs, and so he was not picked out and used."
Before his words were done, we were startled and snapped our fingers. We then looked into the guilt of those in your country who envy the worthy and begrudge the talented, and sealed it up and declared it to the High Emperor; and the High Emperor has already nodded and held it right, and means to bar and shut those men away utterly. And he puts his trust in the bending you have undergone; so your wings shall soon be shaken out and your steps shall soon be lifted high. There is a road to the Jade Hall (玉堂): how should it be too deep to enter? The Phoenix Pavilion (鳳閣) is not the sky: how should it be too high to climb?
Down in the world of red dust men are just now drunk upon the glory of a single meal, while your old friends in the blue heaven look in vain for the work that is accomplished by nine turnings. Dust rises on the jade zither, which waits for you to play it; there is no one in the jade house, which waits for you to open it. The drink of red dew and the juice of golden mist that the Purple Sovereign (紫皇) has bestowed, we eat our fill of by ourselves day after day. It is long since we shared a cup with you. You should swiftly repay your original purpose and leap up again to Hyeondo (玄都).
Ah — fame and merit cannot be left unaccomplished, and wealth and rank cannot be coveted long. This is what we urge upon you. Exert yourself. Bowing our heads and bowing twice, we reverently declare it.
Interlinear notes 2
漫浪 — Reading it by the style Yuan Jie gave himself, 漫浪叟, it may also be rendered "is called in vain the Old Man Drifting Idly." Since the source could not be confirmed, it has been rendered as the characters stand. — Translator
九還 — It may also be read as the elixir refined by nine turnings, 九還丹. Since the source could not be confirmed, it has been rendered as the characters stand. — Translator