Kim Yusin, part three金庾信下

In the third month of the first year of Linde, the year gapja, the remnant host of Baekje gathered again at the fortress of Sabiseong and rebelled. The dodok of Ungju sent out the soldiers under his hand and attacked them. For several days a fog shut them in so that they could not tell men from things, and for this reason they could not fight. They sent Baeksan to bring word, and Yusin gave him a secret plan and so they won.

In the second year of Linde, Gaozong sent the envoys Liang Dongbi and Ren Zhigao and the rest on a courtesy visit. He also invested Yusin as chief minister of ceremonies and founding duke of Pyongyang Commandery, and gave him a fief of two thousand households.

In the first year of Qianfeng, the emperor by his order called Yusin's eldest son Samgwang, of the rank of daeachan, and made him court gentleman-general of the assisting office of the militant guard of the left, and had him stay on to serve in the guard.

In the first year of Zongzhang, the year mujin, the emperor Gaozong of Tang sent Li Ji, Duke of Ying, to raise an army and attack Goguryeo, and then he called up troops from Silla. King Munmu the Great wished to send out soldiers and answer him, and so he commanded Heumsun and Inmun to be generals.

Heumsun said to the king, "If I do not go together with Yusin, I fear there will be regret afterward."

The king said, "You three subjects are the treasures of the country. If you all turn toward the enemy's field, and something happens that none could look for so that you cannot come back, what will become of the country? For this reason I would keep Yusin here to guard the country. Then he will be like a long wall, quietly standing, and in the end there will be nothing to fear."

Heumsun was Yusin's younger brother, and Inmun was Yusin's sister's son, and so they honored and served him and did not dare go against him.

When it came to this, they said to Yusin, "We are men of no ability, and now we follow the great king and go toward a land that cannot be measured. What shall we do? We beg you to teach us."

He answered, "He who is a general becomes the shield and the wall of the country and the claw and the tooth of his lord. He decides victory and defeat among the arrows and the stones. He must first gain the way of heaven above, and the profit of the earth below, and the hearts of men in between; only then can merit be made. Now our country stands by loyalty and good faith, while Baekje fell by its arrogance and Goguryeo is in danger by its pride and conceit. If we now strike their crookedness with our straightness, our purpose can be gained. How much more when we lean on the awe and might of the bright son of heaven of the great country. Go and put out your strength, and do not let your work fall."

The two lords bowed and said, "We will hold to this in all we do, and we will not dare let it fall."

When King Munmu the Great had broken Pyongyang with the Duke of Ying, he came back to Namhanju and said to his many subjects:

"In the old days, when King Myeongnong of Baekje was at Gorisan and planned to invade our country, Yusin's grandfather Muryeok the gakgan was general and met and struck him, and riding the victory he took the king and four of his ministers and their soldiers captive, and so he broke their point. His father Seohyeon too was chonggwan of Yangju, and he fought Baekje many times and blunted their edge so that they could not touch our borders. Therefore the people of the border were at peace in the work of farming and silkworms, and lord and subject had no cares that kept them up from dawn to dark. Now Yusin has taken up the work of his grandfather and his father and become a subject of the altars of the land, a general when he goes out and a minister when he comes in, and his merits are thick upon him.

If we had not leaned upon this one house of yours, the rise and fall of the country could not be known. What then should be done about his office and his reward?"

The many subjects said, "It is truly as the king's mind holds." Then he gave him the office of taedaeseobalhan and a fief of five hundred households. He also gave him a carriage and a staff, and let him go up into the hall without hurrying his steps; and to the officers who watched over him and to his aides he gave each one step of rank.

In the first year of Zongzhang, the emperor of Tang, having invested the Duke of Ying for his merit, sent envoys to speak his comfort, added soldiers to help in the fighting, and gave gold and silk besides. He also gave an edict to Yusin to praise and encourage him, and he told him to come to court; but it did not come about. The edict was handed down in the house until it was lost in the time of his fifth-generation descendant.

The fourth year of Xianheng, the year gyeyu, was the thirteenth year of King Munmu the Great. In spring an ill-boding star appeared and the earth shook, and the great king was troubled by it.

Yusin came forward and said, "The strange things of this time are a misfortune that lies upon your old subject; they are not a calamity of the country. I beg the king not to be troubled."

The great king said, "If it is so, then this is what troubles me most." He commanded the office in charge to pray and turn it away.

In summer, the sixth month, someone saw several tens of men in armor and carrying weapons go out weeping from Yusin's house, and in a moment they were not to be seen. Yusin heard of it and said, "These must be the hidden soldiers who guarded me. They have seen that my fortune is spent, and for this reason they have gone. I shall die."

After this, a little more than ten days later, he fell ill and took to his bed. The great king came in person to comfort him, and Yusin said, "Your subject wished to spend the strength of my arms and legs in serving the head of us all, but the sickness of a dog or a horse has come to this. After this day I shall not see the dragon face again."

The great king wept and said, "To have you is to me as a fish has water. If that which cannot be spoken of should come, what will become of the people, and what of the altars of the land?"

Yusin answered, "Your subject is foolish and of no worth; how could I have been of any profit to the country? What was fortunate was that the bright lord used me without doubting and gave me charge without a second mind. So I could hold to the king's brightness and make a merit of an inch or a foot, and the three Han became one house and the people have no two minds. Though we have not come to a great peace, it may still be said that we are a little at ease.

As your subject sees it, from of old there has been no ruler who took up the line and did not have a beginning, but few have been able to have an end, so that the merits of many reigns crumble away in a single morning. It is a very painful thing. I bow and beg: let Your Highness know that to make merit is not easy, and remember that to keep what is made is hard as well. Keep small men far off and hold men of worth near. Let the court above be at peace and the people and the things below be at rest, so that trouble and disorder do not arise and the work of the foundation has no end. Then your subject will die without regret."

The king wept and received his words.

On the first day of the seventh month of autumn he died in the main room of his own house, in his seventy-ninth year. The great king heard the word of his death and was shaken with grief. He sent a thousand bolts of colored silk and two thousand seom of grain for the funeral, and gave a hundred men of the military band with drums and pipes, and had him buried on the plain of Geumsan. He commanded the office in charge to set up a stone and write down his merit and his name, and he fixed households and put them there to guard the tomb.

His wife, Lady Jiso, was the third daughter of King Taejong the Great.

She bore five sons. The eldest was Samgwang the ichan, the next Wonsul the sopan, the next Wonjeong the haegan, the next Jangi the daeachan, the next Wonmang the daeachan. There were four daughters. There was also a son by a concubine, Gunseung the achan, and his mother's surname is lost.

Afterward Lady Jiso shaved her head, put on coarse cloth, and became a nun. At that time the great king said to the lady, "Now that within and without are at peace, and lord and subject lie with their pillows high and without care, this is the gift of the taedaegakgan. It was you alone, my lady, who kept his house well, warning him and helping him to what he became, and your hidden merit is thick upon us. I have wished to repay that virtue, and not one day has it gone from my mind." He had a thousand seom of grain from Namseong sent to her every year.

Afterward King Heungdeok the Great invested the lord as King Heungmu the Great (興武大王).

At first, King Beopmin took in the rebel host of Goguryeo and held the old land of Baekje as well, and Gaozong of Tang was greatly angered and sent an army to attack. The Tang army and the Malgal camped on the plain of Seokmun, and so the king sent the generals Uibok and Chunjang and the rest to hold them off, and they camped on the plain of Daebang.

At that time the jangchangdang camped by itself apart, and it met more than three thousand Tang soldiers, took them, and sent them to the camp of the great general. Then the several dang all said, "The camp of the Jangchang has made merit by itself and will surely get a thick reward. We should not be gathered here together; we only wear ourselves out for nothing." So they each took their troops apart and scattered.

The Tang soldiers and the Malgal took the moment before they had drawn up their lines and struck them, and the men of Silla were badly beaten, and the generals Hyocheon and Uimun and the rest died there.

Yusin's son Wonsul was a vice general, and he too wished to die fighting. His aide Damneung stopped him and said, "For a great man the hard thing is not to die; the hard thing is to choose the place of his death. If you die and make nothing of it, that is not so good as living and planning the fruit of a later day."

He answered, "If a man lives on for mere life, with what face shall I see my father?" He was about to whip his horse and ride off, but Damneung caught the reins and would not let go, and so at last he could not die.

He followed the senior general out by Muiryeong, and the Tang soldiers came up with them. Ajinham the ilgilgan, daegam of Geoyeolju, said to the senior general, "Put out your strength, my lords, and go quickly. My years are already seventy; how much longer can I live? This is the day of my death." Then he held his halberd crosswise, charged into the line, and died, and his son died after him as well.

The great generals and the rest went secretly and came into the capital. The great king heard of it and asked Yusin, "The army has been beaten like this. What shall we do?"

He answered, "The plans of the men of Tang cannot be measured. Let the generals and the soldiers each hold the places of importance. But Wonsul not only put the king's command to shame, he turned his back on the teaching of his house as well. He should be beheaded."

The great king said, "Wonsul was a vice general. He alone cannot be given the heavy punishment." So he pardoned him.

Wonsul was ashamed and afraid and did not dare see his father. He hid his way and fled to the fields and gardens, and when his father had died he sought to see his mother.

His mother said, "A woman has the right of the three obediences. Now that I am a widow, I should follow my son. But one such as Wonsul could not be a son to his late father. How then can I be his mother?" And she would not see him.

Wonsul wailed and beat his breast and stamped his feet and could not go away, but the lady would not see him to the end. Wonsul sighed and said, "I was led astray by Damneung, and it has come to this extremity." Then he went into Taebaeksan.

When the year eulhae came, the Tang soldiers came and attacked the fortress of Maesocheonseong. Wonsul heard of it and wished to die there and wipe away his former shame, and so he fought with all his strength and had merit and reward. But because he had not been received by his father and mother, he was bitter and full of regret, and he did not take office, and so he ended his days.

His eldest grandson Yunjung served King Seongdeok the Great and became a daeachan, and he received the king's favor and care many times, so that the king's kinsmen were quite jealous of him and hated him.

At that time it happened to be the full moon of mid-autumn. The king went up to the peak of Wolseong and looked out, and then with the officers who attended him he set out wine and made merry, and he commanded that Yunjung be called.

One who remonstrated said, "Are there no good men now among the royal house and the queen's kin, that you should call a distant subject alone? How is this the loving of one's own that men speak of?"

The king said, "That I and you, my lords, are now at peace and quiet and without trouble is the virtue of Yunjung's grandfather. If it were as you say and we forgot him and cast him off, that would not be the right of holding the good to be good down to their children and grandchildren."

So he gave Yunjung a seat close by, and his talk came round to the life of his grandfather. When the day grew late Yunjung asked leave to withdraw, and the king gave him a horse of Jeoryeongsan; and the many subjects could only be put out by it.

In the twenty-first year of Kaiyuan the great Tang sent an envoy with an edict of instruction: "The Malgal and Balhae call themselves a hedge without, but within they harbor cunning. Now I would send out troops and call them to account, and you too must send out troops and take them front and rear with me. I hear that Yunjung, the grandson of the old general Kim Yusin, is living. You must choose this man and make him general." He also gave Yunjung a quantity of gold and silk.

Then the great king commanded Yunjung and his younger brother Yunmun and four generals in all to lead troops and meet the Tang army and attack Balhae.

Yunjung's grandson by a concubine, Am (巖), was clever and quick by nature, and he loved to study the arts of magic. While still young he became an ichan, and he went into Tang to serve in the guard. In his free time he went to a master and learned the methods of the yin-yang school, and when he heard one corner he turned it over and knew the other three. He himself wrote out a method of dungap ipseong and offered it to his master, and the master stroked him and said in wonder, "I did not reckon that your brightness and understanding would come to this." From then on he did not dare treat him as a disciple.

In the years of Dali he came home and became sacheon dae baksa (司天大博士), and he served as taesu of the three ju of Yangju, Gangju and Hanju, and then became sirang of the jipsa and dusang of the Paegang garrison. Wherever he came he gave his whole mind to soothing and loving the people, and in the leisure left over from the three seasons of farming he taught them the art of war of the six formations, and all the people found it easy.

Once there were locusts that came into the borders of the Paegang from the west, crawling thick and covering the fields, and the people were troubled and afraid. Am went up to a mountaintop, burned incense, and prayed to heaven, and of a sudden wind and rain rose greatly, and the locusts all died.

In the fourteenth year of Dali, the year gimi, he took the command and went on a courtesy visit to the state of Japan. The king of that country knew that he was worthy and wished to keep him there by force. Just then Gao Helin, an envoy of the great Tang, came, and they met and were very glad. The Wa took Am for a man known to the great country, and so they did not dare keep him, and he came home.

In summer, the fourth month, a whirlwind rose in billows and went from Yusin's tomb to the tomb of the founding great king, and the dust and the mist were dark and black so that men could not be told from things. The keeper of the tomb heard within it what seemed to be a sound of weeping and of sad sighing.

King Hyegong the Great heard of it and was afraid, and he sent the great minister Kim Gyeongsin to hold a sacrifice and beg pardon for the fault, and he gave thirty gyeol of field to the temple of Chwiseonsa to help his fortune in the world below. This temple was built and set up by Yusin when he had brought the two countries of Goguryeo and Baekje to order.

Yusin's fourth-generation descendant Jangcheong, a jipsarang of Silla, made the Haengnok in ten scrolls, and it goes about in the world. It has a good many made-up words in it, and so they have been cut away, and what may be written down has been taken to make this account.

Kim Busik comments.

Li Jiang of Tang answered Xianzong and said, "Keep the crooked and the flattering far off and bring forward the loyal and the straight. When you speak with your great ministers, be respectful and trust them, and do not let small men have a part in it. When you keep company with men of worth, be close to them and treat them with courtesy, and do not let the unworthy take part."

True indeed are these words. They are truly the chief way of one who is a ruler. Therefore the Book of Documents says, "Give charge to the worthy and have no second mind; put away the crooked and do not doubt."

Looking at how Silla treated Yusin — near to him with no gap between, giving him charge with no second mind, acting when he planned and listening when he spoke, so that there was never a grievance of not being used — it may be said that they gained the good fortune of the six-five line, the young and untaught.

Therefore Yusin was able to carry out his purpose, to join his plans with the higher country, to make the three lands one house, and to end his days with merit and a name.

Even with the wisdom and the strategy of Eulji Mundeok and the right feeling and courage of Jang Bogo, without the writings of China they would have been blotted out and never heard of. But one like Yusin the people of this land praise and tell of, and to this day he is not lost. That the gentry know of him is to be looked for; but when even the boys who cut grass and the lads who herd oxen are able to know of him, then there must surely have been something in the man that was other than other men.