Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 30

Memorial of thanks from the Princess for the bounty bestowed when the sovereign came forth to the hall公主謝御殿表

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 · 162 Chinese characters · reading time 1.9 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 30 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.

云云。賜書狎至。溫然曲諭之辭。禮冊驟加。厚矣不貲之惠。無由遜避。徒極銘藏。伏念妾質謝柔嘉。儀非婉孌。因心資孝。但知君父之嚴。受性無良。罔服保阿之訓。況甫免於髫齔。猶未勝於衣裳。豈意宸衷。尙加褒典。旣峻宮闈之號。仍疏脂澤之田。此蓋伏遇聖上陛下。德務展親。義敦立愛。念椒房之弱息。勢可哀矜。崇銅縷之盛儀。恩宣優渥。妾謹當勉循內職。益激愚悰。草木之微。雖絶謝生之路。岡陵之祝。誓輸歸美之誠。云云。

And so forth. The writing you sent down has come again and again, words bending warmly to admonish me; and a patent of investiture furnished with full ritual has been added all at once, a grace thick and beyond measuring. Having no way to decline and get out of the way, I can only engrave it and keep it in my breast.

Prostrate, I consider that your handmaid's stuff does not reach to gentleness and beauty, and her bearing is neither fine nor lovely. Following my heart and taking filial piety for my ground, I know only the sternness of him who is at once my sovereign and my father; and my inborn nature not being worthy, I never mastered the teaching of my nurse. How much more when I have barely come out of the years of tufted hair and changing teeth, and cannot yet bear my clothes.

How could I have thought that the sovereign's heart would yet add the favor of praise, exalting already the title of a palace and then setting apart besides the fields for the cost of rouge and oil?

This is because, prostrate, I have met with Your Majesty the Holy Sovereign, who in virtue strives to extend himself to his kin and in righteousness is thick in establishing affection, who, thinking upon a tender child of the Pepper Chamber (椒房), said that her case was fit to be pitied, and who, exalting the full ceremony strung with copper thread, has unfolded his grace amply.

Your handmaid will reverently strive to follow the charge of the inner household and will rouse her foolish heart the more. Slight as grass and trees, the road by which I might repay the grace of being born is cut off; yet with a heart that prays you may be as the hill and the great mountain, I swear to offer up the sincerity that turns all beauty back to you.

Interlinear notes 1

中謝。

Here the words of thanks (中謝) are inserted.

‹ Memorial of thanks from the Princess for the flowers and wine bestowed when the sovereign came forth to the hall Contents Report of thanks submitted by His Excellency (令公) to the Crown Prince ›Listen to this piece