Letter of Congratulation Presented to the Earl of Changhwa at the Winter Solstice冬至賀狀 昌化伯
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 · 76 Chinese characters · reading time 0.9 min
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 32 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.
Recording the season by the first month of heaven, we know for the first time that the day the pitch-pipes point to has grown longer. In the village of the royal kin we think of raising a cup and praying for a span of years like the great chun tree's (大椿).
In reverence I consider that Your Highness, my Lord (令公), nurtures purity at a numinous source and was born with a bearing like auspicious jade. Settling in gravity, You stroke Your fief and keep firm the fair hedge of the realm; harmonious and generous, You delight in goodness, and in reverencing and loving Your guests You forget weariness. Now, meeting the day on which the yang grows, You hold doubled the blessing that is new day by day.
We, improperly holding the seals of a district, cannot be numbered among the guests.