Anshu — Examining the Books案書篇
儒家之宗，孔子也。墨家之祖，墨翟也。且案儒道傳而墨法廢者，儒之道義可為，而墨之法議難從也。何以驗之？墨家薄葬、右鬼，道乖相反違其實，宜以難從也。乖違如何？使鬼非死人之精也，右之未可知。今墨家謂鬼審〔死〕人之精也，厚其精而薄其屍，此於其神厚而於其體薄也。薄厚不相勝，華實不相副，則怒而降禍，雖有其鬼，終以死恨。人情慾厚惡薄，神心猶然。用墨子之法，事鬼求福，福罕至而禍常來也。以一況百，而墨家為法，皆若此類也。廢而不傳，蓋有以也。
The head of the Confucians is Confucius. The ancestor of the Mohists is Mo Di. Now consider that the Way of the Confucians is handed down while the rules of the Mohists have fallen away. It is because the Way and the right of the Confucians can be carried out, while the rules and the counsels of the Mohists are hard to follow. How is this proved? The Mohists bury thinly and hold ghosts high. Their Way is crooked and turns against itself and goes against the truth of things, so it is fitting that it is hard to follow. How is it crooked and against itself? If ghosts were not the essence of dead men, then holding them high could not be understood. Now the Mohists say that ghosts are truly the essence of dead men, yet they make the essence rich and the corpse poor. This is to be rich toward the spirit and poor toward the body. When poor and rich do not match each other and blossom and fruit do not answer each other, then the ghost is angered and sends down disaster. Though the ghost is there, in the end it holds the grudge of its death. It is the way of a man's feeling to want the rich and to hate the poor, and the mind of a spirit is the same. Use the rules of Mozi, serve ghosts and seek blessing, and blessing comes seldom while disaster comes all the time. Take one case and match a hundred to it, and the rules the Mohists make are all of this kind. That they have fallen away and are not handed down has its reason.
《春秋左氏傳》者，蓋出孔子壁中。孝武皇帝時，魯共王壞孔子教授堂以為宮，得佚《春秋》三十篇，《左氏傳》也。公羊高、穀梁、胡母氏皆傳《春秋》，各門異戶，獨《左氏傳》為近得實。何以驗之？《禮記》造於孔子之堂，太史公。漢之通人也，左氏之言與二書合，公羊高、穀梁寘、胡母氏不相合。又諸家去孔子遠，遠不如近，聞不如見。劉子政玩弄《左氏》，僮僕妻子皆呻吟之。光武皇帝之時，陳元、范淑上書連屬，條事是非，《左氏》遂立。范叔尋因罪罷。元、叔天下極才，講論是非，有餘力矣。陳元言訥，范叔章詘，左氏得實，明矣。言多怪，頗與孔子「不語怪力」相違返也。《呂氏春秋》亦如此焉。《國語》，《左氏》之外傳也，左氏傳經，辭語尚略，故複選錄《國語》之辭以實。然則《左氏》《國語》，世儒之實書也。
The Zuo Commentary on the Spring and Autumn came, it seems, out of the wall of Confucius's house. In the time of the filial Emperor Wu, King Gong of Lu pulled down the hall where Confucius taught to make a palace of it, and got thirty lost chapters of the Spring and Autumn, which are the Zuo Commentary. Gongyang Gao, Guliang and Master Humu all handed down the Spring and Autumn, each by his own gate and his own door, but the Zuo Commentary alone comes near to getting the truth. How is this proved? The Book of Rites was made in the hall of Confucius, and the Grand Historian was a man of thorough learning in Han. The words of the Zuo agree with these two books, while Gongyang Gao, Guliang Zhi and Master Humu do not agree with them. Again, the other schools are far from Confucius, and far is not so good as near, and hearing is not so good as seeing. Liu Zizheng took such delight in the Zuo that his servants and his wife and children all chanted it. In the time of Emperor Guangwu, Chen Yuan and Fan Shu sent up writings one after another, setting out point by point what was right and what was wrong in the matter, and the Zuo was at last set up. Fan Shu was soon dismissed for an offense. Yuan and Shu were the utmost talents of the empire, and in arguing what was right and wrong they had strength to spare. Chen Yuan's speech was halting and Fan Shu's writing was bent, yet it is plain that the Zuo gets the truth. There is much of the strange in its words, and in this it goes rather against Confucius, who did not speak of the strange and of force. The Spring and Autumn of Lü Buwei is like this too. The Guoyu is the outer commentary of the Zuo. The Zuo hands down the classic, and its wording is still spare, so words from the Guoyu were chosen and set down as well to fill it out. So the Zuo and the Guoyu are the solid books of the scholars of the age.
公孫龍著堅白之論，析言剖辭，務折曲之言，無道理之較，無益於治。齊有三鄒衍之書，瀇洋無涯，其文少驗，多驚耳之言。案大才之人，率多侈縱，無實是之驗；華虛誇誕，無審察之實。商鞅相秦，作耕戰之術；管仲相齊，造輕重之篇。富民豐國，強主弱敵，公賞罰，與鄒衍之書並言。
Gongsun Long wrote the discourse of the hard and the white, splitting words and cutting phrases, striving to break bent speech. There is no weighing of reason in it and no gain for government. In Qi there were the books of the three Zou Yan, wide as a flood without a shore, but there is little proof in their writing and much in it to startle the ear. Consider that men of great talent are for the most part lavish and unrestrained and have no proof of what is truly so; they are showy and empty, boastful and extravagant, and have nothing of the substance that comes of close examination. Shang Yang aided Qin and made the arts of plowing and fighting. Guan Zhong aided Qi and made the chapters on the light and the heavy. To make the people rich and the state full, to strengthen the ruler and weaken the enemy, and to keep reward and punishment fair: these are spoken of side by side with the books of Zou Yan.
而太史公兩紀，世人疑惑，不知所從。案張儀與蘇秦同時，蘇秦之死，儀固知之。儀知〔秦〕審，宜從儀言以定其實，而說不明，兩傳其文。東海張商亦作列傳，豈蘇秦商之所為邪？何文相違甚也？《三代世表》言五帝、三王皆黃帝子孫，自黃帝轉相生，不更稟氣於天。作《殷本紀》，言契母簡狄浴於川，遇玄鳥墜卵，吞之，遂生契焉。及《周本紀》言后稷之母姜嫄野出，見大人跡，履之，則妊身，生后稷焉。夫觀《世表》，則契與后稷，黃帝之子孫也；讀《殷》、《周本紀》，則玄鳥、大人之精氣也。二者不可兩傳，而太史公兼紀不別。案帝王之妃，不宜野出、浴於川水。今言浴於川，吞玄鳥之卵；出於野，履大人之跡：違尊貴之節，誤是非之言也。
Yet the Grand Historian recorded both, and men of the age are in doubt and bewildered and do not know which to follow. Consider that Zhang Yi was of the same time as Su Qin, and Yi certainly knew of Su Qin's death. Yi's knowledge of Su Qin was sure, so the truth should have been settled by following Yi's words. But the account was left unclear, and both forms of the writing were handed down. Zhang Shang of Donghai also made arrayed traditions. How can what Su Qin did be what Shang did? How is it that the writings go against each other so far? The Table of the Generations of the Three Dynasties says that the Five Emperors and the Three Kings were all the descendants of the Yellow Emperor, begotten one from another down from the Yellow Emperor, and that they did not receive their breath afresh from heaven. In making the Basic Annals of Yin, it says that Jiandi, the mother of Xie, was bathing in a stream and met a swallow that dropped an egg, and she swallowed it and so bore Xie. And in the Basic Annals of Zhou it says that Jiang Yuan, the mother of Houji, went out into the wilds and saw the footprint of a big man and trod on it, and then she was with child and bore Houji. Now look at the Table of the Generations, and Xie and Houji are the descendants of the Yellow Emperor. Read the Basic Annals of Yin and of Zhou, and they are the essence and breath of a swallow and of a big man. The two cannot both be handed down, yet the Grand Historian recorded them together and did not tell them apart. Consider that it is not fitting for the consort of an emperor or a king to go out into the wilds or to bathe in the water of a stream. Now it is said that one bathed in a stream and swallowed the egg of a swallow, and that the other went out into the wilds and trod on the footprint of a big man. This goes against the measure of the honored and the noble, and these are words that mistake the right and the wrong.
《新語》，陸賈所造，蓋董仲舒相被服焉，皆言君臣政治得失，言可採行，事美足觀。鴻知所言，參貳經傳，雖古聖之言，不能過增。陸賈之言，未見遺闕，而仲舒之言雩祭可以應天，土龍可以致雨，頗難曉也。夫致旱者以雩祭，不夏郊之祀，豈晉候之過邪？以政失道，陰陽不和也。晉廢夏郊之祀，晉侯寢疾，用鄭子產之言，祀夏郊而疾愈。如審雩不修，龍不治，與晉同禍，為之再也。以政致旱，宜復以政。政虧而復修雩治龍，其何益哉！《春秋公羊氏》之說，亢陽之節，足以復政。陰陽相渾，旱湛相報，天道然也，何乃修雩設龍乎？雩祀神喜哉？或雨至，亢陽不改，旱禍不除，變復之義，安所施哉！且夫寒溫與旱湛同，俱政所致，其咎在人。獨為亢旱求福，不為寒溫求佑，未曉其故。如當複報寒溫，宜為雩、龍之事。鴻材巨識，第兩疑焉！
The Xinyu was made by Lu Jia, and Dong Zhongshu, it seems, put it on and followed it. All of it speaks of the gains and the losses of rulers and ministers in government, and its words can be picked up and carried out, and its matters are fine and worth looking at. What that great knowledge said takes its place beside the classics and their commentaries, and even the words of the sages of old could not go beyond it and add to it. In Lu Jia's words nothing is seen to be left out. But Zhongshu's saying that the rain sacrifice can answer heaven and that an earthen dragon can bring rain is rather hard to understand. He says that drought is met with the rain sacrifice, and that it came because the Xia suburban sacrifice was not performed. How can it be the fault of the marquis of Jin? It was because the government lost the Way that the yin and the yang were out of harmony. Jin did away with the Xia suburban sacrifice, and the marquis of Jin lay ill. He used the words of Zichan of Zheng and performed the Xia suburban sacrifice, and his illness was cured. To say that if the rain sacrifice is truly not kept up and the dragon is not tended there will be the same disaster as in Jin is to do the thing twice over. If the government brought on the drought, then it should be met with government again. When the government is flawed and men set about keeping up the rain sacrifice and tending the dragon, what good is it! In the teaching of the Gongyang on the Spring and Autumn, the season of unyielding yang is enough to bring the government back. The yin and the yang mingle with each other, and drought and flood answer each other in turn. This is the way of heaven. Why then keep up the rain sacrifice and set out a dragon? Is the spirit made glad by the rain sacrifice? Even if rain comes, while the unyielding yang is not corrected the disaster of drought is not removed. Where then is the meaning of turning a portent back to be applied! And further, cold and warmth are the same as drought and flood, for all of them are brought on by government and the blame for them lies with men. Only for a hard drought do men seek blessing, and for cold and warmth they do not seek help, and I do not understand the reason for it. If cold and warmth are to be answered in turn as well, then the business of the rain sacrifice and of the dragon ought to be done for them. Great talent and vast knowledge, and yet in these two things there is doubt!
董仲舒著書，不稱子者，意殆自謂過諸子也。漢作書者多，司馬子長、揚子雲，河、漢也，其餘涇、渭也。然而子長少臆中之說，子雲無世俗之論。仲舒說道術奇矣，北方三家尚矣。讖書雲「董仲舒亂我書」，蓋孔子言也。讀之者或為亂我書者，煩亂孔子之書也，或以為亂者，理也，理孔子之書也。共一「亂」字，理之與亂，相去甚遠。然而讀者用心不同，不省本實，故說誤也。夫言「煩亂孔子之書，才高之語也。其言理孔子之書，亦知奇之言也。出入聖人之門，亂理孔子之書，子長、子雲無此言焉。世俗用心不實，省事失情，二語不定，轉側不安。案仲舒之書不違儒家，不〔反〕孔子，其言「煩亂孔子之書者」，非也。孔子之書不亂，其言理孔子之書者，亦非也。孔子曰「師摯之始，《關雎》之亂，洋洋乎盈耳哉！」亂者，〔終〕孔子言也。孔子生週，始其本；仲舒在漢終其末。班叔皮續太史公書，蓋其義也。賦頌篇下其有「亂曰」章，蓋其類也。孔子終論，定於仲舒之言，其修雩始龍，必將有義，未可怪也。
That Dong Zhongshu wrote a book and did not call himself Master was, in intent, because he all but held himself to be beyond the masters. Many men in Han made books, but Sima Zichang and Yang Ziyun are the Yellow River and the Han River, and the rest are the Jing and the Wei rivers. Yet Zichang has few sayings that hit the mark by guess, and Yang Ziyun has no discourse of the common world. Zhongshu's exposition of the arts of the Way is strange, and the three houses of the north were held in honor. The prophecy books say, "Dong Zhongshu disorders my writings," and this, it seems, is a saying of Confucius. Of those who read it, some take "disorders my writings" to mean that he muddles and disorders the writings of Confucius, and some take the disordering to be a putting in order, that he puts the writings of Confucius in order. It is one and the same word luan, yet to put in order and to throw into disorder are very far apart. But those who read do not put their minds to it in the same way and do not look into the root and the truth, so their explanations go wrong. To say that he muddles and disorders the writings of Confucius is a saying about high talent. To say that he puts the writings of Confucius in order is also a saying about strange knowledge. To go in and out of the gate of the sage and to disorder or to order the writings of Confucius: of Zichang and Yang Ziyun there is no such saying. The common world does not put its mind to what is real and loses the true feeling when it looks into a matter, so the two readings are not settled and men toss about and are not at rest. Consider that Zhongshu's book does not go against the Confucians and does not turn against Confucius, and so to say that he muddles and disorders the writings of Confucius is wrong. The writings of Confucius are not in disorder, and so to say that he puts the writings of Confucius in order is also wrong. Confucius said, "The beginning of Master Zhi and the close of the Guanju, how they fill the ear with their fullness!" Luan here is the close, and this is Confucius's own word. Confucius was born in Zhou and began the root of it; Zhongshu was in Han and closed the end of it. Ban Shupi carried on the book of the Grand Historian, and this, it seems, is that same meaning. At the foot of the pieces of rhapsody and hymn there is a section that says "the close", and this, it seems, is of that same kind. The closing discourse of Confucius is settled in the words of Zhongshu, and so in his keeping up of the rain sacrifice and his setting out of the dragon there must be a meaning, and it cannot be thought strange.
顏淵曰：「舜何人也？予何人也？」五帝、三王，顏淵獨慕舜者，知己步騶有同也。知德所慕，默識所追，同一實也。仲舒之言道德政治，可嘉美也。質定世事，論說世疑，桓君山莫上也。故仲舒之文可及，而君山之論難追也。驥與眾馬絕跡，或蹈驥哉？有馬於此，足行千里，終不名驥者，與驥毛色異也。有人於此，文偶仲舒，論次君山，終不同於二子者，姓名殊也。故馬效千里，不必驥；人期賢知，不必孔、墨。何以驗之？君山之論難追也。兩刃相割，利鈍乃知；二論相訂，是非乃見。是故韓非之《四難》，桓寬之《鹽鐵》，君山《新論》類也。世人或疑，言非是偽，論者實之，故難為也。卿決疑訟，獄定嫌罪，是非不決，曲直不立，世人必謂卿獄之吏才不任職。至於論，不務全疑，兩傳並紀，不宜明處，孰與剖破渾沌，解決亂絲，言無不可知，文無不可曉哉？案孔子作《春秋》，採毫毛之善，貶纖介之惡。可褒，則義以明其行善；可貶，則明其惡以譏其操。《新論》之義，與《春秋》會一也。
Yan Yuan said, "What kind of man was Shun? What kind of man am I?" Among the Five Emperors and the Three Kings, Yan Yuan longed for Shun alone, because he knew that his own step and pace had something in common with him. To know what one's virtue longs for and to know in silence what one pursues are one and the same thing. Zhongshu's words on virtue and on government are fine and to be praised. But in settling the affairs of the age on their substance and in discussing and explaining the doubts of the age, there is none above Huan Junshan. So Zhongshu's writing can be reached, while Junshan's discourse is hard to follow after. The courser leaves the other horses without a trace of him. Can any of them tread where the courser trod? Suppose there is a horse here whose feet go a thousand li, and still it is never called a courser: it is because its hair and color differ from the courser's. Suppose there is a man here whose writing matches Zhongshu's and whose discourse ranks next to Junshan's, and still he is never held to be the same as those two men: it is because his name is another name. So a horse may prove itself over a thousand li and yet not be a courser, and a man may aim at being worthy and wise and yet not be a Confucius or a Mozi. How is this proved? Junshan's discourse is hard to follow after. When two blades cut against each other, the sharp and the blunt are known. When two discourses set each other right, the true and the false are seen. This is why the Four Difficulties of Han Fei and the Salt and Iron of Huan Kuan are of the same kind as Junshan's Xinlun. Men of the age are sometimes in doubt, and the words are wrong and false, and it is the one who discusses them who makes them solid, and that is why it is hard to do. When a minister decides a doubtful suit and a court settles a crime under suspicion, if right and wrong are not decided and crooked and straight are not made to stand, men of the age will surely say that the minister and the clerks of the court have not the talent to bear their office. But when it comes to discourse, men do not strive to make the doubt whole; they hand down both forms and record them together and do not set the matter out plainly. How does that stand beside splitting the lump open and untangling and cutting the snarled thread, so that there is no word that cannot be known and no writing that cannot be understood? Consider that when Confucius made the Spring and Autumn he gathered up good as small as a hair and cut down evil as slight as a thread. Where a man could be praised, he made the goodness of his conduct plain by the right of it. Where a man could be cut down, he made his evil plain and rebuked his bearing. The meaning of the Xinlun and the meaning of the Spring and Autumn come together as one.
夫俗好珍古不貴今，謂今之文不如古書。夫古今一也，才有高下，言有是非，不論善惡而徒貴古，是謂古人賢今人也。案東番鄒伯奇、臨淮袁太伯、袁文術、會稽吳君高、周長生之輩，位雖不至公卿，誠能知之囊橐，文雅之英雄也。觀伯奇之《元思》，太伯之《易〔章〕句》，文術之《咸銘》，君高之《越紐錄》，長生之《洞歷》，劉子政、揚子雲不能過也。〔蓋〕才有淺深，無有古今；文有偽真，無有故新。廣陵陳子回、顏方，今尚書郎班固，蘭台令楊終、傅毅之徒，雖無篇章，賦頌記奏，文辭斐炳，賦象屈原、賈生，奏象唐林、谷永，並比以觀好，其美一也。當今未顯，使在百世之後，則子政、子雲之黨也。韓非著書，李斯採以言事；揚子雲作《太玄》，侯鋪子隨而宣之。非斯同門，雲、鋪共朝，睹奇見益，不為古今變心易意；實事貪善，不遠為術並肩以跡相輕，好奇無已，故奇名無窮。揚子雲反《離騷》之經，非能盡反，一篇文往往見非，反而奪之。《六略》之錄，萬三千篇，雖不盡見，指趣可知，略借不合義者，案而論之。
It is the way of the common taste to prize what is old and not to value what is now, and to say that the writing of today is not the equal of the books of old. Old and now are one. Talent has its high and its low, and words have their right and their wrong. To leave the good and the bad undiscussed and merely to prize what is old is to say that the men of old are worthier than the men of today. Consider Zou Boqi of Dongfan, Yuan Taibo and Yuan Wenshu of Linhuai, Wu Jungao of Kuaiji, Zhou Changsheng and their like. Their places did not reach to the high ministers, but they were truly the bag and the sack of knowledge, the heroes of letters and refinement. Look at Boqi's Yuansi, Taibo's Chapter and Verse on the Changes, Wenshu's Xianming, Jungao's Yueniu lu and Changsheng's Dongli, and Liu Zizheng and Yang Ziyun could not go beyond them. It seems that talent has its shallow and its deep and has no old and now, and that writing has its false and its true and has no former and later. Chen Zihui and Yan Fang of Guangling, and Ban Gu who is now gentleman of the Imperial Secretariat, and Yang Zhong the prefect of the Orchid Terrace, and Fu Yi and their like, have no chapters of their own, but their rhapsodies and hymns, their records and memorials, are brilliant in writing and phrase. Their rhapsodies take after Qu Yuan and Master Jia, and their memorials take after Tang Lin and Gu Yong. Set them side by side and look at what is fine in them, and their beauty is one. They are not known yet today, but put them a hundred generations later and they are of the party of Zizheng and Yang Ziyun. Han Fei wrote a book, and Li Si picked it up to speak of affairs. Yang Ziyun made the Taixuan, and Master Hou Pu followed him and spread it abroad. Fei and Si were of the same gate, and Yun and Pu were at the same court. They saw what was strange and saw the gain in it, and did not change their minds and shift their thoughts for old or for now. They took solid matters and coveted what was good, and did not put their art far off, and stood shoulder to shoulder and did not make light of each other over their traces. They loved the strange without end, and so their strange names are without end. Yang Ziyun turned the classic of the Lisao around, and he could not turn all of it around; here and there in a single piece he found a fault, and turned it and took it away. The record of the Six Summaries has thirteen thousand pieces. Though they cannot all be seen, what they point to can be known, and so I take up roughly those that do not fit with right meaning and consider them and discuss them.