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Another letter又狀

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 · 191 Chinese characters · reading time 0.8 min

Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) Book 18 — Letters and Reports 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.

1Heaven sends down a worthy man to save the men of the world

某啓。某聆天降賢人。濟天下之人也。是以材合地寶。性契天和。高闢德門。深匡帝室。伏惟太尉相公漢師仙格。魯聖儒機。推心於三代之英。鍊氣於五行之秀。今者正融韶景。共慶誕辰。四方飽開閤之恩。萬族獻稱觴之懇。伏惟龍韜暫展。靜卷妖氛。鳳輦遄歸。永興淸運。然後誡白石生之妙術。從赤松子之勝遊。鼇頭擎五色之雲。久勞西望。豹尾指二京之路。暫事北征。佇揚滅寇之勳。便擧朝眞之禮。某棲身大厦。祝壽中春。下情無任禱祠歌詠欣躍之至。謹具別狀。輒申微誠。伏惟恩慈俯賜念察。謹狀。

I submit this. I have heard that heaven sends down a worthy man in order to save the men of the world. So his timber matches the treasure of earth, and his nature accords with the harmony of heaven. He opens his gate of virtue high and sets the imperial house right to its depths. I humbly consider that His Excellency the Grand Commandant has the immortal rank of the teacher of Han and the scholar's frame of the sage of Lu. He pushes his heart out to the heroes of the three dynasties and refines his breath in the finest of the five elements. Now the fair light of spring is at its mildest, and we join in keeping his birthday. The four quarters are filled with the kindness of his opened gate, and the ten thousand clans offer the earnest wish that lifts the cup. I humbly wish that he may unfold the arts of war for a while and quietly furl up the baleful vapors, that the phoenix carriage may soon return and raise a clear fortune forever, and that afterward he may take warning from the fine arts of Master Baishi and follow the excellent wanderings of Master Chisong. The turtle's head holds up clouds of five colors, and has long been wearied with looking west. The leopard tail points to the road of the two capitals, and he takes up a northern campaign for a time. Waiting to raise high the merit of destroying the rebels, he will then perform the rite of paying court to the True. I have lodged my body in his great house, and I pray for his long life in mid spring. My humble heart cannot bear the fullness of its praying, its singing, and its glad leaping. I respectfully set out a separate letter and offer my small sincerity. I humbly beg your kindness to bend down and consider it. Respectfully submitted.

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