Third Memorial Begging Leave to Retire三度乞退表
云云。昨再具封章。乞解機務。蒙降敎書復不允者。芻言再貢。淵聽靡廻。敢將三黷之煩。覬荷一言之肯。俯伏以俟。凌兢罔寧。伏念臣事莫通變而蔽于執方。文不據古而失在率意。徒以遭逢之幸。謬參寅亮之司。門地之孤寒也。人所素輕。言行之燥辨也。世亦備識。暴起而相。衆噪孔多。但憑聖主之至仁。粗保人臣之卓位。恩命之優渥厚矣。朝廷之寄託重焉。固當耗竭筋骸。憂勤寤寐。罄例一身之有。少酬萬乘之知。然本惟鈍蒙。申以衰耗。夙心尙在。雖不移金石之堅。淺器易盈。訖莫效㳙埃之益。宜告休而早退。尙緣督以剩居。寵祿大過而災由是生。疾病交侵而身至漸殆。故自去冬而哀訴。莫蒙寬詔之遣歸。玆敢復陳期於得請。何久鬱江河之決。未遽捐草芥之微。顧若負其片能。理或存於少補。寧不作安身之計。猶不妨爲國而留。然才之譾譾也旣若玆。而老益昏昏也又如彼。豈可以尫殘無用之狀。乃敢有貪冒竊位之情。伏望云云。特垂從欲之慈。俾就養痾之地。優游化日。得爲閑適之人。歌詠聖功。助播泰平之頌。云云。
And so forth. Yesterday I made ready once more a sealed writing and begged to be released from the business of state, but You sent down a rescript and again did not grant it. Twice I have offered up the words of a grass-cutter, and Your deep hearing has not turned toward them. I dare, with the vexation of defiling You a third time, to hope for the leave of a single word. Prostrate I wait, afraid and trembling and ill at ease.
Prostrate I consider that Your servant does not reach through to the changes in affairs and is blinded by holding fast to one corner, and that his writing does not rest upon the ancients, his fault lying in going his own way. Merely by the good fortune of meeting a fair age, he was wrongly numbered in the charge of reverent elucidation. That his lineage is solitary and obscure is what men have always made light of; that his words and his conduct are hasty and fond of disputing, the age also knows entire. Rising of a sudden to be a minister, he has drawn very much clamor from the many. Only by leaning upon the utmost benevolence of a sage ruler does he barely keep a subject's high place.
The soaking of Your gracious commands is thick, and the trust the court lays upon him is heavy. Truly he ought to wear out sinew and bone, to be anxious and diligent waking and sleeping, and to pour out utterly all that is in his one body, so as to repay a little the recognition of a lord of ten thousand chariots. But he was dull and foolish from the first, and is worn and decayed besides. His settled mind is with him still, and he has not shifted from a firmness like metal and stone; yet a shallow vessel is easily filled, and in the end he has offered up no help so great as a drop of water or a mote of dust.
He ought to have reported his rest and retired early, yet still he says that he follows the middle course, and improperly remains. Favor and salary greatly exceed him, and from this calamity arises; sickness invades him by turns, and his body grows ever more precarious. Therefore since last winter he has pleaded in sorrow, but has not been granted the indulgent rescript that would send him home. So he dares to report it again, appointing himself to obtain his request. Why do You long dam up what is like a river bursting its banks, and not readily cast away a body as worthless as a straw?
Looking back, if Your servant had but a sliver of ability, reason might hold that he would be of some small help; then he would make no plans for his own ease, and his remaining for the state's sake would do no harm. But the shallowness of his talent is already such as this, and the dimness of his age-darkened mind is such as that besides. How should one so gaunt and useless dare to hold a mind that steals and covets a place?
Prostrate I beg, and so forth. Let fall in particular the affection that follows what is asked, and let him go to the place where sickness is nursed. If in the bright days of Your transforming rule You make him one who wanders at ease and lives in quiet, he will help in the singing of Your sage merit and the spreading abroad of praise for a time of great peace. And so forth.
Interlinear notes 1
中謝。
Jungsa (中謝). This is the place where the words of thanks go. — Translator