A Letter in Reply to the Censor Pak Inseok (朴仁碩)答朴雜端仁碩手簡
某啓。奉今月初五日手緘。備悉動止康豫。頗慰深渴。所寄金橻城鐙裝戎靴等二事。一一祇領。已付姊氏家督送。然姊氏近理裝向橻城。恐此行方齎去耳。昨承辱召。緣事幹未卽趨造。尋聞有同產服。又未詣弔。此甚不近人情。雖萬被戮。固所甘受。僕已爲明時所棄。顧疏慢尤於世。邇來杜門守拙。亦不以人間請謁問候爲心久矣。惟閣下原之。方有微恙。益憚出入。迨瘳當。負荊詣門謝罪。想服制亦無幾日。惟冀爲時自愛。不至憂瘠耳。不宣。某頓首。
So-and-so declares. On the fifth day of this month I received the letter you sealed with your own hand, and learned in full that your circumstances are at peace. My deeply thirsting heart was not a little comforted.
The two things you sent, the stirrup ornaments of Geumhwiseong (金橻城) and the army boots, I have reverently received one by one. I have already given them in charge to my elder sister's house to be sent on. But my sister is making ready her baggage of late and means to go to Hwiseong (橻城), and so it seems likely that they will be carried there on this very journey.
Yesterday I was summoned, but being bound by business I could not hurry at once to see you. I then heard that you had suffered the loss of a brother or sister, and yet I did not go to offer condolence either. This is a thing very far from human feeling, and though I were put to death ten thousand times I should truly take it as my due.
I am one already cast away by this bright age, and looking back, I grow the more distant and idle toward the world. Of late I have shut my door and kept to my clumsiness, and it is long since I have given any thought to asking to be received or inquiring after people. May Your Excellency alone forgive me.
I happen besides to have a small ailment and shrink the more from going out and coming in. I shall wait until I mend, and then shall surely bear thorns upon my back and come to your gate and beg your pardon.
The period of mourning dress, I think, has not many days left either. I only pray that for the sake of the times you will cherish yourself and not come to waste away with grief. Here I leave off. So-and-so knocks his brow upon the ground.