Preface序

What heaven and earth cover and carry is very great; what the sun and moon shine down upon is very wide. Yet among the ten thousand things the people are few and the birds and beasts are many; between the two principles the Central Land is narrow and the lands of the many customs are broad. Seek this in the sayings of Zou Yan, and the strange and monstrous traces are indeed many; look for it in the Shan hai jing, and the odd and twisted words are not one alone. The Duke of Zhou and Confucius let these things stand and did not discuss them, so right and wrong are tangled and cannot be told apart.

The First Emperor of Qin whipped the world and used arms wantonly in far regions. Emperor Wu of Han, strong in soldiers and horses, gave rein to his will in distant designs. The Xiongnu were driven off, but his own state was already empty; the heavenly horses came, but his people too were brought low. This shows that Yanhai and Longdui are how heaven cut off the Yi from the Xia, and that the hot south and the northern desert are how earth set a bound between inside and outside. How much more so when the times are not those of Qin and Han, and the ambition is deeper than that of Ying Zheng and Liu Che. To go against the way of heaven in seeking merit, and to use up the strength of the people in following one's desires — the ruin of a fall truly comes before one can turn on one's heel. Therefore the former kings, in setting up their teaching, kept the Zhuxia (諸夏) within and the Yi and the Di without, and the worthies of old, in leaving a model, called the planting of virtue fine and the widening of land mean. Though the traces of Yu spread east and reached west, they did not pass beyond the sea and the Liusha (流沙); and the Wang zhi (王制), from north to south, named no more than the cave dwellers and Jiaozhi. Is this not a way that runs through the Three Antiquities (三古) and a rightness that stands high over a hundred generations?

The Zhou came after ruin and disorder and met with days of war. It settled the four quarters by force of arms and quieted the three frontiers by expedient means. While Zhao and Wei still blocked the way, it made marriage ties with the Northern Di; while its stables and storehouses were not yet full, it opened friendly relations with the Western Rong. By this, virtue and punishment were both carried out and its fame reached far. Those in grass clothes and felt furs flocked to the dependent states like spokes to a hub, and Hu merchants and trading guests filled the market pavilions. Though its designs in the east let slip the land of the Three Wu (三吳) and its progress south was barred at the borders of the Hundred Yue, what the majesty of the state brought to solemn submission and what its civilizing influence spread over may also be called broad. Those of the four Yi who came to court and to present gifts are all recorded below. As for the distances of the roads, the products and the customs, these are set out fully in the earlier histories, and some of them do not agree. All of this sets down what was written at the time, so as to fill in what was left out.