Memorial thanking for the posts of Vice Director of the Ministry of Rites, Court Diarist, and Drafter of Edicts謝禮部郞中起居注知制誥表
云云。命出宸居。優畀與縻之爵。恩霑江郡。召還謫宦之臣。傴僂拜榮。周章失措。伏念臣性資椎薄。器局庸虛。文章不能以潤色綸言。謨議不足以彌縫衮職。端遇文明之代。方參侍從之聯。衆爍橫生。孤根易拔。果陷風波之謗。出司嵐瘴之鄕。政拙心勞。食貧口衆。雖官閑而事簡。奈地瘠而民殘。皮腊僅存。鬢毛渾白。朝天路阻。難跳一箇之身。戀闕情深。空灑千行之淚。豈圖宸眷許復朝聯。崇緊秩於禮曹。擢華資於諫掖。申甄制職。增耀士林。淸與要俱。本是待賢之地。恩兼幸際。反加無用之軀。徒極銘藏。莫知報稱。此蓋伏遇聖上陛下滌瑕蕩垢。棄短取長。謂言涓滴之微。儻補江湖之廣。肆宣寵渥。過賁頑蒙。臣謹當夷險不渝。益礪懷霜之節。始終自誓。永堅匪石之心。臣無任云云。
And so forth. The command came forth from the sovereign's dwelling and amply granted me an office that binds a man fast; and the favour steeped even a riverside district, summoning back an official who had gone into banishment. Bending my waist I bow to receive this glory, and in my flurry I do not know what to do.
Prostrate I consider that your servant is plain and thin in nature and stuff, and mean and empty in vessel and capacity. My writing cannot give polish to the sovereign's words, and my plans and arguments are not such as can fill out and aid the sovereign's duties.
It happened that I met a civilized and enlightened age, and was just then taking part in the ranks that attend upon the sovereign. Then many slanders arose in confusion, and a solitary root is easily pulled out. At last I sank under slander like wind and wave, and went out to take charge of affairs in a countryside wrapped in miasmal vapours (瘴氣).
My governing was clumsy and my mind laboured; my food was poor and my household large. The office was idle and its business brief, yet what was to be done with land gone barren and a people worn out? My skin dried until barely any was left, and the hair at my temples turned wholly white. The road for attending court in heaven was blocked, so that it was hard even to move this one body there; and my longing for the palace was deep, so that in vain I scattered a thousand streams of tears.
How should I have reckoned that by the royal regard I should again be allowed to return to the ranks of the court? You raised me to an essential grade in the Ministry of Rites and chose me for a shining place among the remonstrance officials. Again you picked me for the office of composing rescripts, making the company of scholars shine the brighter. These are places that hold purity and essential weight together, posts that of themselves wait upon a worthy man; yet the favour, along with a fortunate hour, was laid instead upon a useless body. I merely keep it graven upon my heart utterly, and know no way to repay it as befits.
This is, in the main, that prostrate I have met with Your Sage Majesty's washing away of flaws and shaking off of filth, your casting aside what is wanting and taking what is better; holding that even the smallness of a single drop may perhaps help the breadth of river and lake, you at last granted a thick grace and adorned beyond measure a stubborn and benighted man.
Your servant will reverently and rightly be unchanging whether the road be level or steep, and will whet the keener a constancy that holds frost within it; swearing to himself to be one and the same from first to last, he will long make firm a heart that, not being a stone, cannot be rolled about. Your servant cannot contain, and so forth.
Interlinear notes 1
中謝。
Here the words of thanks (中謝) are inserted.