Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) 桂苑筆耕集 · Choe Chiwon · 886 (Tang, 6th year of the Zhonghe era · Silla, 12th year of King Heongang) · 1 passages · 139 Chinese characters · reading time 0.6 min
Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) Book 8 — Enclosures A collection Choe Chiwon made by choosing out of the writings of his four years in the headquarters of Gao Pian, military commissioner of Huainan under the Tang, binding them into twenty volumes and presenting them to King Heongang of Silla in 886. It holds 366 pieces — memorials and reports sent up to the emperor, the proclamation denouncing Huang Chao, letters to the several military commissioners, orders and dispatches issued to those under him, Daoist and Buddhist texts for services, funeral offerings, records written for the outer wall of Chengdu and for a painting of Annam, and the reports and poems he sent up to Gao Pian. Here is the first report, which begins "I am a man of Silla," and the proclamation against Huang Chao with its line, "Not only do all the men of the world think to kill you openly; the ghosts under the earth have already discussed cutting you down in secret." The last volume holds the poems he made on the voyage home to the country he had left at twelve. It is the oldest collection by a Korean that survives, and when Hong Seokju and Seo Yugu printed it with movable type in 1834 they called it "the root and the beginning of the writing of our Eastern Country." Their two prefaces are translated with it.
1To one who rests a while in a low place in a perilous time
From afar he troubled a messenger of his own and sent me a splendid letter. Opening the seal, I saw a trace that does not fade; filling it to the brim, he showed a purpose of shared concern. What words can carry the kindness I bear? Moreover the steps of the state are still hard and the mind of heaven is hard to fathom. The loyal and upright hide their voice and draw in their shadow; the crooked and false wag their tongues and toss their lips. Those men have their hour; these must be cast out three times. There is only the giving of one's whole duty; what is there worth saying? The Minister has met a perilous time by chance, and his fine repute rests a while. He looks to be tried in every office without limit. To roost low and yet be startled at favor and disgrace — the Historian under the Pillar of Zhou was not without his meaning in that. To keep oneself whether going forth or hiding — the Minister of Justice of Lu had such a word. He thanks an old friend deeply and strives to repay the sagely lord. To share the ruler's cares and to heal the sores of the people is no light governing. His will and his hold are not worn away, and honor and favor lie in that. I humbly ask that he weigh it and look upon it, and so on.