Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Latter Collection, Book 1

On Hearing the State Decree Forbidding Clear Wine and White Rice in the Farmers' Meals聞國令禁農餉淸酒白飯

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 · 190 Chinese characters · reading time 1.9 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 1 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.

長安豪俠家。珠貝堆如阜。舂粒瑩如珠。或飼馬與狗。碧醪湛若油。霑洽童僕咮。是皆出於農。非乃本所受。假他手上勞。妄謂能自富。力穡奉君子。是之謂田父。赤身掩短褐。一日耕幾畝。才及稻芽靑。辛苦鋤稂莠。假饒得千鍾。徒爲官家守。無何遭奪歸。一介非所有。乃反掘鳧茈。飢仆不自救。除却作勞時。何人餉汝厚。所要賭其力。非必愛爾口。粲粲白玉飯。澄澄綠波酒。是汝力所生。天亦不之咎。爲報勸農使。國令容或謬。可矣卿與相。酒食猒腐朽。野人亦有之。每飮必醇酎。游手尙如此。農餉安可後。

The powerful and swaggering houses of the capital have pearls and shells heaped up like hills. Their hulled grains of rice shine like pearls, and some of it they feed to horses and dogs. Their green unstrained wine is thick as oil, soaking even the snouts of their boy servants. All of this came out of farming; it was never theirs by right to begin with. They borrow the toil of other men's hands and rashly say they grew rich by their own strength.

Toiling at the harvest to support those above them — these are the ones we call farmers. Covering their bare bodies with short hempen clothes, how many furrows do they plow in a day? No sooner are the rice shoots green than they weed out the darnel until it hurts. Even should they get a thousand jong (鍾), they merely keep it for the government office. Before they know it, it is taken, and they come home without a single grain of their own. Instead they go out to dig water chestnuts, and though they drop from hunger they cannot save themselves.

Take away the season of hard labor, and who would feed you generously? What is wanted is to get your strength, not necessarily to begrudge your mouth. Rice dazzling like white jade and wine clear as a green wave — these came out of your own strength, and heaven itself does not fault you for them.

I say this to the Commissioner for the Encouragement of Agriculture (勸農使): the decree of the state may perhaps be mistaken. Let the ministers and chancellors be as they are — they are so sated with wine and food that it is left over to rot. Even country people have their share, and whenever they drink it is always strong wine. If even idle guests who eat without working are like this, how can the farmers' meal be put last?

‹ Written a Few Days Later Contents Written at the Session for Examining the Papers of the Gamsi (監試) of the Eulyu Year ›Listen to this piece