Letter to the Hamgyeong Inspector and the Southern Army Commander移咸鏡道巡察使及南兵使文
自古爲政寬猛相濟務在得宜不可偏廢然若亂離之後小民蕩析流離之際則必須弔死問生慈祥惻怛使民心懷再生之意邦本無動搖之憂然後他餘措置之事可以次第擧行况本道則道里隔遠。王化不沾如南道三水甲山等處北道六鎭列邑接連山戎風俗强勁龍蛇赤子在於撫綏之如何變生以後些少人民死於兵戎死於飢饉者固已十八九矣當此之時守令邊將若不進心撫輯視之如傷而更以煩苛之政繩之則非徒塞下之民怨咨必深而藩胡叛服之形亦將因此而有異機關所係至爲關重朝廷遠於千里之外雖有仁民之令愛物之澤而無路可究使遠方赤子嗷嗷於邊鎭剝割侵毒之中則邦本何自而固民弊何自而去哉道內之事有監司兵使自當隨所聞見便宜處置以紓民瘼然守令邊將一日之間所以弊及於民者如牛毛蠶絲監司兵使或有未能盡知者。朝廷雖別遣。御史而耳目多未導達皆爲可憂當職承此重任遠處措置之事難以懸度亦必自本道所已施行無煩於告說若邊塞軍民弊瘼未能盡無則雖欲責之以親上死長之事其道無由爲此先爲知委更加申勅列邑遵依施行
From of old, in the conduct of government, leniency and severity help one another, and the effort must be to get what is fitting; neither side can be cast away. Yet in a time after the upheaval, when the people are scattered and wandering, we must first mourn the dead and console the living, and be tender and loving to them, so that the hearts of the people may hold the thought that they are coming to life again and the root of the state may have no fear of being shaken; only then can the other matters to be disposed of be carried out in their turn.
How much more so in this province, where the road is far and the royal teaching does not reach. Samsu, Gapsan and those parts in the southern circuit, and the several counties of the Six Garrisons (六鎭) in the northern circuit, lie against the barbarians of the mountains and are stubborn in custom; and whether the little people who have passed through the Imjin and Gyesa years are soothed and made easy hangs upon how it is done. Since the trouble broke out, of what were but few people, those who have died in the fighting and died of hunger are truly already eight or nine in ten.
At such a time, if the magistrates and the frontier officers do not give their whole hearts to soothing and gathering them and look upon them as upon the wounded, but bind them again with vexatious and harsh government, then not only will the resentment of the people beneath the frontier be deep, but the posture of the barbarian settlements (藩胡) in rebelling or submitting will hereafter be altered through this; what hangs upon that turning point is of the gravest. The court is far off a thousand ri, and though there be commands to deal kindly with the people and a bounty that is sparing of their goods, there is no way to reach to the bottom of it. If the little people of a far place be left to cry out amid the flaying and shaving and encroaching and harming of the frontier garrisons, by what shall the root of the state be made firm, and by what shall the people's hardships be done away?
For the business within the province there are the Governor and the Army Commander, who should of themselves dispose of it as is convenient, following what they hear and see, and so loosen what the people suffer. Yet what the magistrates and the frontier officers do in a single day to burden the people is as many as the hairs of an ox and the threads of a silkworm, so that there are things the Governor and the Army Commander may not know at all; and though the court send a censor down apart, there is much that its ears and eyes do not reach. All of it is cause for worry.
I, the Inspector-General, have received this weighty charge; but matters to be disposed of in a far place are hard to reckon from afar, and besides there must already be things this province has put in practice, so there is no need to vex you with many words. If the hardships of the soldiers and people of the frontier be not all done away, then though one would call them to account for cleaving to their superiors and dying for their elders, there is no way to it. For this reason I make it known beforehand: charge them with it again, and have the several counties follow it and put it in practice.