Yan Shi Jia Xun (顏氏家訓) · Volume 5

精潔乎見有名僧髙行棄而不說若覩凡僧流俗便生非毀且學者之不勤豈教者之為過俗僧之學經律何異士人之學詩禮以詩禮之教格朝廷之人略無全行者以經律之禁格出家之輩而獨責無犯哉且闕行之臣猶求祿位毀禁之侶何慙供養乎其於戒行自當有犯一披法服已墮僧數嵗中所計齋講誦持比諸白衣猶不啻山海也釋四曰內教多途出家自是其一法耳若能誠孝在心仁惠為本須達流水不必剃落鬚髮豈今罄井田而起塔廟窮編戸以為僧尼也皆由為政不能節之遂使非法之寺妨民稼穡無業之僧空國賦算非大覺之本防也抑又論之求道者身計也惜費者國謀也身計國謀不可兩遂誠臣狥主而棄親孝子安家而忘國各有行也儒有不屈王侯髙尚其事隠有讓王辭相避世山林安可計其賦役以為罪人若能偕化黔首悉入道塲如妙樂之世穰佉之國則有自然稻米無盡寳藏安求田蠶之利乎釋五曰形體雖死精神猶存人生在世望於後身佀不相屬及其歿後則與前身侶猶老少朝夕耳世有魂神示現夣想或降童妾或感妻孥求索飲食徵湏福祐亦為不少矣今人貧賤疾苦莫不怨尤前世不修功業以此而論安可不為之作地乎夫有子孫自是天地間一蒼生耳何預身事而乃愛護遺其基址況於己之神爽頓欲棄之哉凢夫蔽不見未來故言彼生與今非一體耳若有天眼鑑其念念隨滅生生不斷豈可不怖畏耶又君子處世貴能克已復禮濟時益物治家者欲一家之慶治國者欲一國之良僕妾臣民與身竟何親也而為勤苦修德乎亦是堯舜周孔虛失愉樂耳一人修道濟度幾許蒼生免脫幾身罪累幸熟思之汝曹若觀俗計樹立門戸不棄妻子未能出家但當兼修戒行留心誦讀以為來世津梁人身難得勿虛過也儒家君子尚離庖廚見其生不忍其死聞其聲不食其肉髙柴折像未知內教皆能不殺此乃仁者自然用心含生之徒莫不愛命去殺之事必勉行之好殺之人臨死報驗子孫殃禍其數甚多不能悉録耳且示數條於末梁世有人常以雞卵白和沐雲使發光每沐輒破二三十枚臨死發中但聞啾啾數千雞雛聲江陵劉氏以賣鱓為業後生一兒頭是鱓自頸以下方為人耳王克為永嘉郡守有人餉羊集賓欲防而羊繩解來投一客先跪兩拜便入衣中此客竟不言之固無救請須臾宰羊為炙先行至客一臠入口便下皮內周行遍體痛楚號呌方復說之遂作羊鳴而死梁孝元在江州時有人為望蔡縣令經劉敬躬亂縣廨被焚寄寺而住民將牛酒作禮縣令以牛系剎柱屏除形像鋪設床坐於堂上接賓未殺之頃牛解徑來至階而拜縣令大笑命左右宰之飲噉醉飽便臥簷下稍醒而覺體癢爬搔隠疹因爾成癩十許年死楊思達為西陽郡守值侯景亂時復旱儉饑民盜田中麥思達遣一部曲守視所得盜者輒截手腕凢戮十餘人部曲後生一男自然無手齊有一奉朝請家甚豪侈非手殺牛噉之不美年三十許病篤大見牛來舉體如被刀刺呌呼而終江陵髙偉隨吾入齊凢數年何幽州澱中捕魚後病每見群魚齧之而死世有痴人不識仁義不知富貴並由天命為子娶婦恨其生資不足倚作舅姑之尊虵虺其性毒口加誣不識忌諱罵辱婦之父母卻雲教以婦道不孝己身不顧他恨怛憐己之子女不愛己之兒婦如此之人隂紀其過鬼奪其算慎不可與為鄰仍不可與為援宜逺之哉

pure? Seeing a famous monk of lofty conduct they set him aside and say nothing, but seeing an ordinary monk of vulgar habits they begin to condemn. Moreover, if learners are not diligent, is that the fault of the teacher? How is it different for a common monk to study the sutras and vinaya from a scholar studying the Songs and Rites? If one uses the teaching of the Songs and Rites to measure the people of the court, almost none can fully carry it out; shall one use the prohibitions of the sutras and vinaya to measure those who have left home and blame them alone for having no violations? Moreover, a minister lacking in conduct still seeks salary and rank, so why would a monk who breaks the prohibitions be ashamed to receive offerings? They will naturally have violations of precepts, but once they put on the Dharma robe they are counted among the sangha, and what they do in a year of fasting, lecturing, reciting and upholding is more than a mountain or sea compared with laypeople. To explain the fourth: the inner teaching has many paths, and leaving home is just one method among them. If one has sincerity and filial piety at heart and takes benevolence and kindness as the root, people like Sudatta and Liushui need not shave their hair and beard. How could it be that one must now use up the well-field system to build stupas and temples and exhaust the registered households to make monks and nuns? It is all because government cannot control things that illegal temples hinder the people's farming and landless monks empty the state's taxes, not the root of great awakening (a rare character in the base text, lost in transcription). Consider one more layer: seeking the Way is a plan for oneself, and sparing expenses is a plan for the state; plans for oneself and the state cannot both be fulfilled. The loyal minister dies for his lord and abandons his kin, the filial son keeps his family secure and forgets the state, each with his own conduct. Among Confucians there are those who do not bend to kings and marquises and hold their affairs lofty, and among hermits there are those who yield the throne and decline the chancellorship and flee the world to mountain forests; how can one count their taxes and labor service as offenses? If one could transform the black-haired people together and have all enter the place of the Way, as in the age of Wonderful Joy or the land of Sankha, there would be natural rice and inexhaustible treasure, so would one still seek the profit of fields and silkworms? To explain the fifth: though the body dies, the spirit still remains. A person living in this world hopes for a later body, which seems unrelated; but after death it is to the former body as old to young or morning to evening. In the world there are souls that appear in dreams, some descending on children and concubines, some touching wives and children, asking for food and drink and seeking blessings, and there are many such cases. Today people in poverty and suffering all blame their lack of merit in previous lives, and by this argument, how could one not make provision for a later body? Having descendants is only one living being between Heaven and Earth, with what relation to oneself, yet one cares for them and leaves them a foundation; how much more one's own spirit, should one suddenly discard it? Ordinary people (a rare character in the base text, lost in transcription) are blinded and do not see the future, so they say that that life and this one are not one body. If one had the heavenly eye to see how every thought perishes and life after life does not stop, how could one not be afraid? Moreover, what the noble person values in the world is being able to subdue oneself and return to ritual, and to help the age and benefit things. One who governs a household thinks of the well-being of one household, and one who governs a state thinks of the goodness of one state. What is the closeness of servants, concubines, ministers and people to oneself, that one toils and cultivates virtue for them? Then Yao, Shun, the Duke of Zhou and Confucius would have lost their joy in vain. One person who cultivates the Way saves how many beings and frees how many bodies from the burden of offenses; I hope you will think carefully. If you are mindful of worldly plans, establishing a household, not abandoning wife and children, and cannot leave home, you should at least cultivate precepts and conduct and take care to recite, as a ferry for the next life. A human body is hard to obtain; do not spend it in vain. Even Confucian noble persons stay away from the kitchen, not bearing to see animals die after seeing them live, and not eating their meat after hearing their cries. Gao Chai and Zhe Xiang, not knowing the inner teaching, were both able not to kill, which is simply what the benevolent naturally keep in mind. Beings that have life all love their lives, and the matter of ending killing must be practiced with effort. There are very many cases of those who love to kill, whose retribution came at their deaths and whose descendants suffered calamity, too many to record in full, so I list a few at the end. In the Liang era there was a man who often mixed egg white into his hair wash, saying it would make the hair shine, breaking twenty or thirty eggs each wash. At his death, in his hair there was only the sound of thousands of chicks cheeping. In Jiangling a man named Liu made a living selling eels (a rare character in the base text, lost in transcription), and later bore a son whose head was an eel's, and only below the neck was he human. When Wang Ke was governor of Yongjia commandery, someone presented him a sheep, and when he gathered guests to (a rare character in the base text, lost in transcription), the sheep's rope came loose and it came to one guest, knelt twice first and then burrowed into his clothes. This guest said nothing at all and certainly did not plead for it. A moment later the sheep was slaughtered and roasted, and the first piece was sent before this guest; as soon as a piece entered his mouth it went down under his skin and traveled around his whole body, and he cried out in pain, and only then told the story, and then bleated like a sheep and died. When Emperor Xiaoyuan of Liang was at Jiangzhou, one man became magistrate of Wangcai county, and through the rebellion of Liu Jinggong the county office was burned, and he lodged in a temple. The people brought an ox and wine as a gift, and the magistrate tied the ox to the post of the temple and, removing the statues, set up a bed and seat in the hall to receive guests. Before the ox was killed it came loose and went straight down to the steps and bowed. The magistrate laughed loudly and ordered his attendants to slaughter it, and having feasted and become drunk and full, he lay down under the eaves, and when he woke a little, he felt itching and scratched his hives, and from this he became leprous and died after ten years or so. Yang Sida was governor of Xiyang commandery just at the time of Hou Jing's rebellion, and it was also a drought and famine, and hungry people stole the wheat in the fields. Sida sent a retainer to guard the fields, and when thieves were caught he cut off their wrists, killing more than ten in all. This retainer later had a son who naturally had no hands. In Qi there was a court attendant whose family was very extravagant, who did not find beef good unless he killed the ox with his own hands. At about thirty he fell gravely ill and saw many oxen coming at him, his whole body as if stabbed with knives, and he died crying out. Gao Wei of Jiangling followed me into Qi, and for several years caught fish in the marshes of Youzhou, and later fell ill and always saw schools of fish come to bite him, and died of it. In the world there are fools who do not understand benevolence and righteousness and do not know that wealth and rank all come from Heaven's decree; they marry a wife for their son and resent that her dowry is not enough, and relying on the dignity of father- and mother-in-law, with a viperous nature and poisonous mouth they slander, not knowing taboos, curse and insult the wife's parents, yet say they are teaching her the way of a wife; they are unfilial themselves, heedless of others' resentment, and care only for their own daughters and not for their own son's wife. Such people have their faults recorded in the underworld and ghosts take their lives; one must never be their neighbor, nor rely on them for support, but should stay far away.

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The Book of Songs says "uneven water mallow" (canci xingcai). The Erya says xing (荇) is jieyu (菨余), and the character is sometimes written xing (莕). Earlier Confucians all explain it as a water plant with round leaves and a thin stem, which follows the depth of the water; it is found today wherever there is water, with a yellow flower like that of the water shield (chun), and in Jiangnan the common people also call it "pig water shield" or call it xingcai. Liu Fang annotated it fully, but the common people of Hebei mostly do not recognize it, and the doctors all take "canci" to be amaranth (xian), calling "human amaranth" "human xing," which is quite laughable. The Book of Songs says "who says the tu is bitter" (shui wei tu ku); the Erya and the Mao Commentary both take tu (荼) as the bitter vegetable (kucai). The Record of Rites also says "the bitter vegetable flowers." According to the Yi Wei Tong Gua Yan, (a rare character lost in transcription) diagram says: the bitter vegetable is born in the cold autumn, passes through winter and spring, and only reaches maturity in summer. The bitter vegetable of the Central Plains today is just like this, also called "winter roamer" (youdong), its leaves like those of bitter lettuce but finer, with white sap when snapped, and a yellow flower like a chrysanthemum. In Jiangnan there is another bitter vegetable, with leaves like those of the Chinese lantern plant (suanjiang), flowers purple or white, and seeds as big as pearls, red or black when ripe; this vegetable can relieve fatigue. According to Guo Pu's annotation on the Erya, this is (a rare character lost in transcription) huangchu (黄蒢), which in Hebei is now called black nightshade (longkui). The ritualists of the Liang dynasty took this as the bitter vegetable, but it has no perennial root and its seeds only grow in spring, which is also a great error. Moreover, Gao You in his annotation of the Annals of Lü Buwei says that what flowers but does not bear fruit is called ying, so the bitter vegetable should be said to "ying," and one knows still more that it is not black nightshade. The Book of Songs says "the solitary tree, the du pear" (you di zhi du); the Jiangnan editions all write di with the wood radical beside da (大), and the Commentary says di is the appearance of being solitary, Xu Xianmin gives its sound as tu-ji fan, and the Shuowen says di is the appearance of a tree, placing it under the wood radical, and the Yunji gives its sound as di (第) as in cidi; but the Hebei editions all write it as di (狄) of yidi, and read it as that character itself, which is a great error. The Book of Songs says "the stallion (mu) horses, plump and strong" (jiong jiong mu ma); Jiangnan books all write mu (牡) of pinmu, while the Hebei editions all write mu (牧) of fangmu. The doctors at Yexia objected: the Jiong ode praises Duke Xi's grazing in the outlying fields, so why limit it to the distinction between mares and stallions? I answered: according to the Mao Commentary, jiong jiong refers to good horses with plump, broad bellies and trunks; below it also says the lords' six stables hold four kinds, namely good horses, war horses, hunting horses and inferior horses. If it meant grazing, common to mares and stallions, it should not be restricted to good horses alone receiving the name jiong jiong. Good horses are those the Son of Heaven uses to draw the jade carriage and the lords use to fill court visits and suburban sacrifices, and there must be no mares among them. The office of the Yuren in the Rites of Zhou says: one man for each good horse, and one man for each pair of inferior horses, and what the Yuren raise are likewise not mares. The ode's author singled out its strong and swift ones, which fits the meaning. The Book of Changes says "good horses chase" and the Zuo Commentary says "with two of his good horses," which are also names for fine, swift horses and not general terms. To take the good horses of the ode's commentary as common to grazing mares, I fear, loses Duke Mao's meaning, and moreover have you not seen Liu Fang's proof of the meaning? The Monthly Ordinances say "the liting comes forth" (liting chu), and Zheng (a rare character lost in transcription) annotates that liting is horse leek (ma xie). The Shuowen says li is like cattail but smaller, and its roots can be made into brushes; the Guangya says ma xie is li; the Tongsu Wen also says ma lin; the Yi Wei Tong Gua Yan (a rare character lost in transcription) diagram says if the liting does not come forth the state will have many fires; Cai Yong's Monthly Ordinances in Chapters and Sentences says li is like ting; Gao You in his annotation of the Annals of Lü Buwei says the li grass sprouts. So the annotation on the Monthly Ordinances, treating liting as the name of a grass, is mistaken. In the plains and marshes of Hebei it mostly grows, and in Jiangdong there is a good deal of it, and people sometimes plant it by their steps and courtyards, calling it only "early cattail" (zaopu), so they do not recognize ma xie. The ritualists even consider horse amaranth (ma xian) edible, also called "pig's ear" (tun'er), and commonly "horse tooth" (maqi). In Jiangnan there was once a monk whose face was broad on top and narrow below. Liu Huan's (a rare character lost in transcription) son Zimin was praised for his years, being only a few years old, clever and quick to grasp things; seeing this monk he said "his face is like horse amaranth," and his uncle Liu Tao then called him "Master Liting." Tao was a famous Confucian who himself lectured on the rites, and even he erred so far. The Book of Songs says "he is slowly coming" (jiang qi lai shishi); the Mao Commentary says shishi means difficulty in advancing, Zheng's annotation says shishi is the appearance of walking leisurely, and the Han Shi also doubled it as shishi. The Hebei Mao Shi all write it as the doubled shishi, while the old Jiangnan editions all write the single shi, and the common people take that as right, which I fear is slightly mistaken. The Book of Songs says "dense clouds, thick and thick; rising clouds, slow and slow" (you yan qiqi, xing yun qiqi); the Mao Commentary says yan is the look of dark clouds, qiqi is the look of clouds moving, and qiqi is slowness; the annotation says in ancient times, when yin and yang were harmonious and wind and rain came in season, they came slowly and not violently. But yan already means dark clouds, so why say "rising clouds" again? Yun (云, clouds) should be yu (雨, rain), an error from vulgar copying. Ban Gu's "Ode on the Spirit Terrace" says "the three lights spread their essence, the five phases lay out their order, gentle auspicious winds, slow and gentle sweet rain," and this is the evidence. The Record of Rites says "settle hesitation and decide doubts" (ding youyu, jue xianyi), and the Lisao says "the heart hesitates and is doubtful as a fox" (xin youyu er huyi); earlier Confucians gave no explanation. According to the Shizi, a dog five chi long is called you, and the Shuowen says in Longxi a puppy is called you. I think that when a person walks with a dog, the dog likes to run ahead of the person, and when it cannot wait, it comes back to meet him. (A rare character lost in transcription.) Going back and forth like this all day long is why yu (豫) means undecided and it is called youyu. Or, according to the Erya, you is like a muntjac and good at climbing trees; you is the name of a beast, which on hearing a human sound climbs a tree beforehand, and going up and down in this way it is called youyu. The fox, too, is a beast of much suspicion, and so it listens for the sound of flowing water under the river ice before it crosses. The common sayings today, "fox suspicion" and "tiger divination," mean just this. The Zuo Commentary says "the Marquis of Qi had jie, and then shan" (Qi hou jie, sui shan). The Shuowen says jie (痎) is malaria that recurs every two days, and shan (痁) is malaria with fever. According to this, the Marquis of Qi's illness was originally recurring every other day, and gradually became worse, so it became a worry for the lords. In the north today it is still called jie malaria, pronounced jie. The common copies in the world mostly write jie (痎) as jie (疥, scabies), and Du Yu did not explain it, and Xu Xianmin pronounces it jie. Vulgar Confucians make this fit by saying: scabies makes people chilled, and it changes into malaria. This is conjecture. Scabies and ringworm are minor ailments not worth discussing; how could one suffer scabies that turns into malaria? The Book of Documents says "as shadow and echo" (wei ying xiang), the Rites of Zhou speaks of measuring shadows with a gnomon, "the morning shadow and the evening shadow," Mencius says "drawing the shadow loses the form," and Zhuangzi says "the penumbra asks the shadow"; these characters should all be jing (景) of guangjing, light and shadow. In general, shadows arise because of light, and so they are called jing. The Huainanzi calls it jing zhu (景柱), and the Guangya says the sundial pillar hangs a shadow (jing), and these are all so. It was only in the Jin dynasty that Ge Hong's Ziyuan added 彡 (pronounced shan) beside it, pronounced yu-jing fan, and the world now readily alters the Book of Documents, the Rites of Zhou, Zhuangzi and Mencius to follow Ge Hong's character, which is a serious error. The Taigong Six Secret Teachings has the heavenly formation, the earthly formation, the human formation, and the cloud-and-bird formation, and the Analects says Duke Ling of Wei

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asked Confucius about battle formations. The Zuo Commentary has the "fish-scale formation." The vulgar editions mostly write it with the radical for mound beside the character for chariot (陣). According to this, these chen characters should all be written as chen (陈) of Chen and Zheng. The meaning of "line formation" is taken from arraying in rows, which is a phonetic loan among the six categories of characters. The Cang and the Ya and recent dictionaries have no other character; only Wang Xizhi's Short Chapters for Elementary Learning alone writes the mound radical beside the chariot. Even if it is in common use, one ought not retroactively alter the Six Secret Teachings, the Analects and the Zuo Commentary. The Book of Songs says "the yellow bird flies, and alights on the guan trees" (huangniao yu fei, ji yu guanmu); the Commentary says guanmu is clustered trees. This is originally text from the Erya, so Li Xun's annotation says trees growing in clusters are called guan. The last chapter of the Erya also says trees growing in clans are guan, and zu too means gathering in clusters. So the ancient Jiangnan editions of the Songs all write cong (藂) of congju, and the ancient character cong looks like (a rare character lost in transcription), and recent Confucians therefore changed it to (a rare character lost in transcription), explaining it as a tall tree (a rare character lost in transcription). According to the various Erya scholars and Shi exegetes, none say this; only Zhou Xuzhi's Mao Shi annotation gives the sound as zu (a rare character lost in transcription) fan, and Liu Changzong's Shi annotation gives the sound as zai-gong fan, and also zu (a rare character lost in transcription) fan, all of which are far-fetched and lose the Erya's gloss. Ye (也) is a particle for ending a sentence and for assisting a phrase, and it appears throughout the written records. The Hebei classics and commentaries entirely omit this character, though in some places it cannot be done without, as in "Bo ye zhi shu," "yu zu ye yu," "Hui ye lü kong," "feng, feng ye, jiao ye," and in the Shi Commentary "bu ji, ji ye," "bu nuo, nuo ye," "bu duo, duo ye" and the like; if these words were deleted, it would leave serious gaps. The Book of Songs says "blue, blue is your collar" (qingqing zi jin); the Commentary says qingjin is a blue collar, the dress of students. According to this, in ancient times the slanting collar joined down to the jin, so the collar was called jin. Sun Yan and Guo Pu in annotating the Erya, and Cao Dagu in annotating the Biographies of Exemplary Women, all say jin is the crossed collar. The Yexia editions of the Songs have no ye (也) there, and the various Confucians therefore wrongly say qingjin and qinglin are names of two places on the garment, both trimmed with blue, using that to explain the two characters qingqing, which is a great error. There are also vulgar scholars who, hearing that the classics and commentaries sometimes need ye (也), add it carelessly whenever they like, often in the wrong place, which is truly laughable. The Book of Changes has an annotation by Shucai, but the scholars of Jiangnan did not even know who that was. Wang Jian's Catalogue of the Four Divisions did not give a name and titled it Wang Bi. Later Xie Jiong and Xiahou Gai, who had both read thousands of volumes, suspected it was Qiao Zhou, but Li's Book of Shu, also called the Book of Han, says the man's surname was Fan and his name Changsheng, and that he called himself Shucai. In the south, because after the Jin crossed the river they called the records of the northern regions "false books" and did not value reading them, they could not see these. The Record of Rites, in the Royal Regulations, says "bare the arms and shins" (luo gu gong), and Zheng's annotation says this means (a rare character lost in transcription) the clothes leave the arm and shin exposed. Present books all write huan (擐) of huanjia, putting on armor. The Erudite of the Imperial Academy (a rare character lost in transcription) says: huan should be (a rare character lost in transcription), pronounced xuan; huan is a word for wearing, not the meaning of baring the arm. According to the Zilin, Xiao's reading is correct, and Xu Yuan's pronunciation huan is wrong. In the Book of Han, in the passage where Tian Ken congratulates the emperor, the Jiangnan editions all write the character xiao (宵). Liu Xian of Pei kingdom read widely in the classics and specialized in Ban Gu's Book of Han, and was called the Sage of the Han in the Liang dynasty. Xian's son Zhen did not let the family heritage fall, and in reading Ban's history he pronounced it Tian Ken. Emperor Yuan of Liang once asked him about it, and he answered: "There is no meaning to seek in this; it is only that my family's old copy used orpiment to change the character xiao to ken." Emperor Yuan had no way to press him. When I went north of the river, I saw copies that read ken. The Book of Han, in the Appraisal of Wang Mang, says "purple color, frog voice, the leftover portion, the intercalary position," meaning not (a rare character lost in transcription) the yellow color, and not in accord with the notes of the pitch pipes. Recently there is a scholar of very high reputation who actually said that Wang Mang was not only hawk-shouldered and tiger-eyed, but also purple-colored and frog-voiced, which is also a mistake. The character for bamboo slip (ce, 策) is written with bamboo above and 束 below (pronounced qi-ci fan); in the later age (a rare character lost in transcription). The writing is like the song of Qi-Song, and some also write it with bamboo above and 夹 below, just as the side of the character ci (刺) should be 束, and today it too is written with 夹. Xu Xianmin's sound glosses on the Spring and Autumn Annals and the Rites actually take (a rare character lost in transcription) as the correct character and ce as the sound, which is truly upside down. The Records of the Grand Historian also mistakes xi (悉) as shu (述), and mistakes du (妬) as gou (姤). Xu, Zou and the other masters all pronounce xi as shu and du as gou; if so, could one also take hai (亥) as the sound for shi (豕), and take di (帝) as the sound for hu (虎)? Zhang Yi says Fu (宓) is the same as the present Fuxi, and Meng Kang's annotation on the ancient-text Book of Han also says Fu (宓) is like the present

伏而皇甫謐雲伏羲或謂之宓羲按諸經史緯遂無宓羲之號虙字從虍【音呼】宓字從防【音綿】下俱為必末世傳冩遂誤以虙為宓而帝王世紀因誤更立名耳何以驗之孔子弟子虙子賤為單父宰即虙羲之後俗字亦為宓或復加山今兗州永昌郡城舊單父地也東門有子賤碑漢世所立乃雲濟南伏生即子賤之後是知虙之與伏古來通字誤以為宓較可知矣太史公記曰寜為雞口無為牛後此是刪戰國策耳按延篤戰國策音義曰屍雞中之主從牛子然則口當為屍後當為從俗冩誤也應劭風俗通雲太史公記髙漸離變名易姓為人庸保匿作於宋子久之作苦聞其家堂上有客擊築伎癢不能無出言案伎癢者懷其伎而腹癢也是以潘岳射雉賦亦云徒心煩而伎癢今史記並作徘徊或作徬徨不能無出言是為俗傳冩誤爾太史公論英布曰禍之興自愛姬生於妬媚以至滅國又漢書外戚傳亦云成結寵妾妬媚之誅此二媚並當作媢媢亦妬也義見禮記三蒼且五宗世家亦云常山憲王后妬媢王充論衡雲妬夫媢婦生則忿怒鬭訟益知媢是妬之別名原英布之誅為意賁赫耳不得言媚史記始皇本紀二十八年丞相隗林丞相王綰等議於海上諸本皆作山林之林開皇二年五月長安民掘得秦時鐵稱權旁有銅塗鐫銘二所其一所曰廿六年皇帝盡併兼天下諸侯黔首大安立號為皇帝乃詔丞相狀綰灋度量不歉疑者皆明之凡四十字其一所曰元年制詔丞相斯去疾法度量盡始皇帝為之皆刻辭焉今襲號而刻辭不稱始皇帝其於久逺也如後嗣為之者不稱成功盛德刻此詔於左使母疑凢五十八字一字磨滅見有五十七字了了分明其書兼為古餘被勑冩讀之與內史令李德林對見此稱權今在官庫其丞相狀字乃為狀貌之狀爿旁作犬則知俗作隗林非也當為隗狀耳漢書云中外禔福字當從示禔安也音匙匕之匙義見蒼雅方言河北學士皆雲如此而江南書本多誤從手屬文者對耦併為提挈之意恐為誤或問漢書注為元后父名禁改禁中為省中何故以省代禁荅曰案周禮宮正掌王宮之戒令糺禁鄭注云糺猶割也察也李登雲省察也張揖雲省今省詧也然則小井所領二反並得訓察其處既常有禁衛省察故以省代禁詧古察字也漢明帝紀為四姓小侯立學校桓帝加元服又賜四姓及梁鄧小侯帛是知皆外戚也明帝時外戚有樊氏郭氏隂氏馬氏為四姓謂之小侯者或以年小獲封故須立學耳或以侍祠猥朝侯非列侯故曰小侯禮雲庶方小侯則其義也後漢書云鸛雀銜三鱓【音善】魚多假借為鱣鮪之鱣俗之學士因謂之為鱣魚案魏武四時食制鱣魚大如五斗匳長一丈郭璞注爾雅鱣長二丈安有鸛雀能勝一者況三頭乎鱣又純灰色無文章也鱓魚長者不過三尺大者不過三指黃地黒文故都講雲虵鱓卿大夫服之象也續漢書及搜神記亦說此事皆作鱓字孫卿雲魚鱉防鱣及韓非說苑皆曰鱣似虵蠶似蠋並作鱣字假鱣為鱓其來久矣後漢書酷吏樊曅為天水郡守涼州為之歌曰寧見乳虎穴不入曅城寺而江南書本穴皆誤作六學士因循迷而不寤夫虎豹穴居事之較著所以班超雲不探虎穴安得虎子寧當論其六七乎後漢書楊由傳云風吹削胏此是削札牘之柹耳古者書誤則削之故左傳云削而投之是也或即謂札為削王褒童約曰書削代牘蘇竟書云昔以摩研編削之才皆其證也詩云伐木滸滸毛傳云滸滸柹貌也史家假借為肝胏字俗本悉作脯臘之脯或為反哺之哺學士因解雲削哺是屏障之名既無證據亦為妄矣此是風角占耳風角書曰庶人風者拂地塵轉削若是屏障何由可轉也三輔決録雲前隊大夫範仲公防豉蒜果共一筩果當作魏顆之顆北士通呼物一由改為一顆蒜顆是俗間常語耳故陳思王鷂雀賦曰頭如果蒜目似花椒又道經云合口誦經聲璅璅眼中淚出珠子防其字雖異其音與義頗同江南但呼為蒜符不知謂為顆學士相承讀為裹結之裹言防與蒜共苞一裹內筩中耳正史削繁音義又音蒜顆為苦戈反皆失也有人訪吾曰魏志蔣濟上書云攰之民何字也餘應之曰意為攰即是倦之耳【要用字苑雲音九偽反字見廣雅及陳思王集也】張揖呂忱並雲支傍作刀劒之刀亦是剞字不知蔣氏自造支傍作筋力之力或借剞字終當音九偽反晉中興書太山羊曼常頽縱任俠飲酒誕節兗州號為濌伯此字更無音訓梁孝元帝嘗謂吾曰由來不識唯張簡憲見教呼為嚃羮之嚃自爾便遵承之亦不知所出簡憲是湘州刺史張纉諡也江南號為碩學案法盛世代殊近當是老相傳俗間又有濌濌語葢無所不施無所不容之意也顧野王玉篇誤為黒傍沓顧雖博物猶出簡憲孝元之下而二人皆雲重邊吾所見數本並無作黒者重沓是多饒積厚之意從黒更無義防古樂府歌詞先述三子次及三婦婦是對舅姑之稱其末章雲丈人且安坐調絃未遽央古者子婦供事舅姑旦夕在側與兒女無異故有此言丈人亦長老之目今世俗猶呼其祖考為先亡丈人又疑丈當作大北間風俗婦呼舅為大人公丈之與大易為誤耳近代文士頗作三婦詩乃為匹嫡並耦已之群妻之意又加鄭衛之辭大雅君子何其謬乎古樂府歌百里奚詞曰百里奚五羊皮憶別時烹伏雌吹扊扅今日富貴忘我為吹當作炊煑之炊案蔡邕月令章句曰鍵關牡也所以止扉或謂之剡移然則當時貧困並以門牡木作薪炊耳聲類作扊又或作扂通俗文世間題雲河南服防字子慎造防既是漢人其敘乃引蘇林張揖蘇張皆是魏人且鄭以前全不解反語通俗反音甚為近俗阮孝緒又云李防所造河北此書家藏一本遂無作李防者晉中經簿及七志並無其目竟不得知誰制然其文義允愜實是髙才殷仲堪常用字訓亦引服防俗說今復無此書未知即是通俗文為當有異近代或更有服防乎不能明也或問山海經夏禹及益所記而有長沙零陵桂陽諸暨如此郡縣不少以為何也荅曰史之闕文為日久矣加復秦人滅學董卓焚書典籍錯亂非止於此譬猶本草神農所述而有豫章朱崖趙國常山奉髙真定臨淄馮翊等郡縣名出諸藥物爾雅周公所作而云張仲孝友仲尼修春秋而經書孔丘卒世本左丘明所書【此說出皇甫謐帝王世紀】而有燕王喜漢髙祖汲冡語乃載秦望碑蒼頡篇李斯所造而云漢兼天下海內並厠豨黥韓覆畔討滅殘列仙傳劉向所造而賛雲七十四人出佛經列女傳亦向所造其子歆又作頌終於趙悼後而傳有更始韓夫人明德馬後及梁夫人嫕皆由後人所羼非本文也或問曰東宮舊事何以呼鴟尾為祠尾荅曰張敞者吳人不堪稽古隨宜記注遂鄉俗訛謬造作書字耳吳人呼祠祀為鴟祀故以祠代鴟呼紺為禁故以系旁作禁代紺字呼盞為竹簡反故以木傍作展以代盞字呼鑊字為霍字故以金傍作霍代鑊字又金傍作患為鐶字木傍作鬼為槐字火傍作庶為炙字既下作毛為髻字金花則金傍作華窓扇則木傍作扇諸如此類専輒不少又問東宮舊事六色罽防是何等物當作何音荅曰按說文雲莙牛藻也讀若威音隠塢瑰反即陸璣所謂聚藻葉如蓬者也郭璞注三蒼亦云蘊藻之類也細葉蓬茸生然今水中有此物一節長數寸細茸如絲圓繞可愛長者二三十節猶呼為莙又寸斷五色絲橫著線股間繩之以象莙草用以飾物即名為莙於時尚紺六色罽作此莙以飾緄帶張敞因造絲旁畏耳宜作隈栢人城東北有一孤山古書無載者唯闞駰十三州志以為舜納於大麓即謂此山其上今猶有堯祠焉世俗或呼為宣務山或呼為虛無山莫知所出趙郡土族有李穆叔季節兄弟李普濟亦為學問並不能定鄉邑此山餘嘗為趙州佐共太原王邵讀栢人城西門內碑碑是漢桓帝時栢人縣民為縣令徐整所立銘雲士有巏務山王喬所仙方知此巏務山也巏字遂無所出務字依諸子書即旄丘之旄也旄字字林一音亡付反今依附俗名當音權務耳入鄴為魏收說之收大嘉嘆值其為趙州莊嚴寺碑銘曰權務之精即用此也或問一夜何故五更更何所訓荅曰漢魏以來謂為

Fu (伏), and Huangfu Mi says Fuxi is sometimes called Mixi (宓羲). Checking the classics, the histories and the apocrypha (a rare character lost in transcription), there is no title Mixi at all. The character fu (虙) takes the radical 虍 (pronounced hu), while mi (宓) takes (a rare character lost in transcription) (pronounced mian) above, and both have bi (必) below. In the last age, copyists mistook fu (虙) for mi (宓), and the Records of the Emperors and Kings, because of that error, established a new name. By what can this be verified? Confucius's disciple Fu Zijian (虙子贱) was magistrate of Shanfu, and was a descendant of Fuxi (虙羲); the vulgar character is also written mi (宓), or sometimes with a mountain radical added. Today the city of Yongchang commandery in Yanzhou is the old Shanfu territory, and at its east gate there is the Zijian stele, set up in the Han dynasty, which says that Fu Sheng of Jinan was a descendant of Zijian; so one knows that fu (虙) and fu (伏) have been interchangeable characters since antiquity, and that taking it for mi (宓) is a mistake is plain. The Grand Historian's record says "better to be a chicken's beak than an ox's rear" (ning wei ji kou, wu wei niu hou), which is only an abridgment of the Strategies of the Warring States. According to Yan Du's Sounds and Meanings of the Strategies of the Warring States: shi (尸) is the master among chickens, and cong (从) is the calf of an ox. Then kou (口) should be shi, and hou (后) should be cong, and the vulgar copying has caused the error. Ying Shao's Comprehensive Meaning of Customs says that the Grand Historian records that Gao Jianli changed his name and surname and worked as a hired servant, hiding and laboring at Songzi; after a long time of hardship, he heard guests in the hall striking the zhu (a kind of zither), and his "jiyang" meant he could not help speaking out. According to this, jiyang means to hold one's skill in the heart so that the belly itches, and so Pan Yue's Pheasant-Shooting Rhapsody also says "the heart is vexed in vain and the skill itches." Today's Shiji copies all write "pacing back and forth" or "wandering," and "could not help speaking out," which is a vulgar copying error. In his discussion of Ying Bu the Grand Historian says: "The rise of the calamity came from a favored consort, born of jealousy and mei (媚), and it went as far as the destruction of the state," and the Book of Han, in the Biographies of the Imperial Relatives, also says "the execution for the jealousy and mei (媚) of favored concubines was brought about." Both these mei (媚) should be written mao (媢); mao also means jealousy, and its meaning is seen in the Record of Rites and the Sancang. Moreover the Hereditary House of the Five Lineages also says that the queen of King Xian of Changshan was jealous and mao (媢), and Wang Chong's Balanced Discourses says that jealous husbands and mao wives, when alive, fly into rage and quarrel and litigate, which shows still further that mao is another name for jealousy. Tracing back, Ying Bu's execution was on account of Ben He, so one cannot say mei. The Records of the Grand Historian, in the Basic Annals of the First Emperor, year twenty-eight, says the chancellors Wei Lin and Wang Wan and others deliberated at the seashore, and the various editions all write lin (林) of shanlin. In the fifth month of the second year of Kaihuang, the people of Chang'an dug up a Qin-period iron steelyard weight, beside which were two places with copper-coated engraved inscriptions. One says: "In the twenty-sixth year the Emperor completely annexed all the lords of the realm, the black-headed people were greatly at peace, and he established the title Huangdi, then ordered the chancellors Zhuang (状) and Wan (绾) to standardize the laws and measures. (A rare character lost in transcription.) (A rare character lost in transcription.) All who are doubtful (a rare character lost in transcription) make it clear." Forty characters in all. The other says: "In the first year an edict was issued to the chancellors Si (斯) and Quji (去疾): the standards of measure were all made by the First Emperor, and all were engraved with an inscription. Now that I have inherited the title, if the inscription does not call him the First Emperor, then in the distant future, if later heirs make it they will not mention his accomplished deeds and abundant virtue; I engrave this edict on the left so that there be no doubt." Fifty-eight characters in all, one character worn away, with fifty-seven clearly visible. Its script combines (a rare character lost in transcription) the ancient forms. I was ordered to copy and read it, and compared it with Li Delin, the Director of the Imperial Secretariat. This steelyard is now in the government storehouse, and its "chancellor Zhuang" uses the character zhuang (状) of zhuangmao with a 爿 radical beside the dog (犬), so one knows that the common "Wei Lin" is wrong and it should be "Wei Zhuang." The Book of Han says "within and without, ti (禔) blessings" (zhong wai tifu); the character should take the altar radical 示, ti being peace, pronounced like chi (匙) of chishi, a spoon, and its meaning appears in the Cang, the Ya and the Fangyan. The scholars of Hebei all say this, but the Jiangnan books mostly mistakenly follow the hand radical, and literary writers in antithetical lines all treat it as meaning "to lift," which I fear is a mistake. Someone asked: the annotation to the Book of Han says that because Empress Yuan's father was named Jin (禁), "the forbidden palace" (jinzhong) was changed to "the inspected palace" (shengzhong); why was sheng (省) used in place of jin (禁)? I answered: according to the Rites of Zhou, the Director of the Palace is in charge of the royal palace's warnings, orders and prohibitions, and Zheng's annotation says jiu (纠) is like ge (割, to cut), like cha (察, to inspect). Li Deng says sheng is cha, and Zhang Yi says sheng is the present xingcha (省察, to inspect). Then both readings, xiao-jing and suo-ling, can be glossed as "to inspect." That place always has guards inspecting, so sheng was used in place of jin. Cha (詧) is the ancient form of cha (察). The Annals of Emperor Ming of the Han say schools were established for the xiaohou of the four clans, and Emperor Huan's capping ceremony also gave silk to the four clans and the xiaohou of the Liang and Deng, from which one knows they were all imperial in-laws. In Emperor Ming's time, the imperial in-laws were the Fan, Guo, Yin and Ma clans, the four clans. They were called xiaohou (little marquises), perhaps because they were enfeoffed when young and so schools had to be set up, or because they attended sacrifices and crowded the court without being full marquises, so they were called xiaohou. The Record of Rites says "the xiaohou of the various regions," which is this meaning. The Book of the Later Han says a stork held three shan (鳝, pronounced shan) in its beak. The character for fish is often borrowed as zhan (鳣) of zhanwei, and so the vulgar scholars call it zhan fish. According to Emperor Wu of Wei's Seasonal Foods Regulations, the zhan fish is as big as a five-dou lian chest and one zhang long; Guo Pu, annotating the Erya, says the zhan is two zhang long. How could a stork manage even one, let alone three? Moreover the zhan is uniformly gray with no pattern. The shan eel is no more than three chi long and no thicker than three fingers, with a yellow ground and black markings, and so all explain that the snake-eel is the emblem of the robes of ministers and grandees. The Continuation of the Book of Han and the Record of Seeking Spirits also tell this story, and both write the character shan (鳝). Xunzi says "fish and turtles (a rare character lost in transcription) zhan," and the Hanfeizi and the Garden of Stories both say the zhan resembles a snake, and a silkworm resembles a caterpillar (shu), writing the character zhan (鳣). Borrowing zhan for shan has a long history. In the Book of the Later Han, in the cruel officials section, Fan Ye was governor of Tianshui, and Liangzhou made a song for him: "Better to see the den of a nursing tigress than to enter the city office of Ye." But the Jiangnan editions all mistakenly write xue (穴, den) as liu (六, six), and scholars follow along without realizing. That tigers and leopards live in dens is very clear, which is why Ban Chao said that if you do not enter the tiger's den, how can you get the tiger cubs; how could one argue about whether it is six or seven? The Book of the Later Han, in the biography of Yang You, says "the wind blows the shaved shavings" (feng chui xue fei); this is fei (柿) of shaving slips and tablets. In ancient times, when writing was mistaken it was shaved off, which is why the Zuo Commentary's "shaved it off and threw it away" is just this. Or tablets are simply called xue (削); Wang Bao's Contract with the Boy says "let the writing shavings substitute for tablets," and Su Jing's letter says "formerly with the talent of grinding the inkstone and binding the shavings," both being evidence. The Book of Songs says "felling trees, xuxu" (fa mu xuxu), and the Mao Commentary says xuxu is the appearance of shavings. The historians borrow it for the characters of liver and lung (gan-fei), while the vulgar editions all write fu (脯) of pulà, dried meat, or bu (哺) of fanbu, feeding back; scholars therefore explain "xue bu" as the name of a screen, with no evidence at all, which is also empty talk. This is the wind-corner divination (a rare character lost in transcription) and no more. The Book of Wind Corners says: when a commoner's wind brushes the ground (a rare character lost in transcription) the dust turns into shavings. If it were a screen, how could it be turned? The Record of the Three Capital Regions says the Grand Master of the Front Division Fan Zhonggong had "fermented beans, garlic and guo (果) together in a single tube." Guo should be ke (颗) of Wei Ke. In the northern lands one piece of a thing is commonly called one ke; "garlic ke" is a common saying among the people, which is why Prince Si of Chen's Rhapsody of the Sparrow Hawk and the Sparrow says "its head like a garlic ke, its eyes like peppercorns"; and a Daoist scripture says "with mouth closed reciting the scripture, the sound suosuo, tears from the eyes like pearls (a rare character lost in transcription)." The characters differ, but the sound and meaning are fairly alike. Jiangnan only calls it "garlic bulb" (suanfu), and does not know the term ke. Scholars pass down reading it as guo (裹) of guojie, bundling, saying (a rare character lost in transcription) and garlic are wrapped together in one bundle and put in the tube. The Sounds and Meanings of the Abridged Standard Histories also gives "garlic ke" the sound ku-ge fan, all of which is wrong. Someone asked me: in the Record of Wei, Jiang Ji's memorial says "(a rare character lost in transcription) gui (攰) the people"; what character is that? I answered at once: I think gui (攰) means (a rare character lost in transcription) weary. (The Yaoyong Ziyuan says (a rare character lost in transcription) is pronounced jiu-wei fan, and the character appears in the Guangya and the Collected Works of Prince Si of Chen.) Zhang Yi and Lü Chen both say it has the branch radical beside dao (刀) of sword, which is also the character ji (剞). They did not know that Jiang made the character himself with the branch radical beside li (力) of jinli (筋力, strength), or borrowed the character ji, and in the end it should be pronounced jiu-wei fan. The Book of Jin Revival says that Yang Man of Taishan was often dissolute and indulgent and chivalrous, drank wine, and broke with propriety, and Yanzhou called him Ta Bo (濌伯). This character has no sound or meaning gloss at all. Emperor Xiaoyuan of Liang once told me: he had never recognized it, and only Zhang Jianxian had instructed him, calling it ta (嚃) of tageng (嚃羹, to gulp soup), and from then on he followed that, but he did not know its source. Jianxian is the posthumous name of Zhang Zuan, Governor of Xiangzhou, called a great scholar in Jiangnan. According to this, Fasheng's era is very close, so it should be (a rare character lost in transcription) an old tradition. Vulgar speech also has "tata" speech, which roughly means leaving nothing unapplied and nothing uncontained. Gu Yewang's Yupian mistakenly writes it with the black radical beside ta (沓). Gu, though learned, was below Jianxian and Xiaoyuan, and both of those two said it has a doubled side. Of the several copies I have seen, none writes it with black. Chongta means plentiful and thick in accumulation; with black it has no meaning (a rare character lost in transcription). The ancient yuefu song lyrics first describe three sons and then turn to three wives, with "wife" being the term used toward parents-in-law, and its last chapter says "Elder, please sit at ease, and tuning the strings is not yet at an end." In ancient times sons' wives served their parents-in-law, at their side morning and evening just as children did, and so there are such words. Zhangren is also a label for elders, and today the common people still call their deceased grandfather "the late zhangren." Also I suspect zhang (丈) should be da (大). In the northern custom a wife calls her father-in-law "daren gong," and zhang and da are easily confused. Recent literati have written many poems on the "Three Wives," and even take it as meaning equal and matched primary wives, with themselves having a group of wives, and also add the lyrics of Zheng and Wei; how mistaken for gentlemen of refined taste! The ancient yuefu song lyrics about Baili Xi say: "Baili Xi, five ram skins. Remember when we parted, we cooked the hen, and burned the door bolt. Now that you are rich and noble, have you forgotten me?" Chui (吹) should be chui (炊) of cooking. According to Cai Yong's Monthly Ordinances in Chapters and Sentences: the jian (键) is the door's bolt that stops the leaf, or is called yanyi. So at that time, in poverty, they used the wooden door bolt as firewood. The Shenglei writes it as yan (扊), or as dian (扂). The world gives the Tongsu Wen (Popular Writings) as made by Fu (a rare character lost in transcription) Zishen, and since (a rare character lost in transcription) was a man of the Han, yet its narrative cites Su Lin and Zhang Yi, both men of Wei, and moreover before Zheng (a rare character lost in transcription) no one understood fanqie spelling at all, while the Tongsu's fanqie sounds are quite vulgar. Ruan Xiaoxu also says it was made by Li (a rare character lost in transcription). In Hebei each household keeps a copy of this book, but none writes it as Li (a rare character lost in transcription). The Jin Zhongjing Bu and the Seven Treatises have no entry for it, and so we cannot know who made it. Yet its text and meaning are apt, and it is truly the work of a high talent. Yin Zhongkan's Instruction in Commonly Used Characters also cites the vulgar sayings of Fu (a rare character lost in transcription); now that book no longer exists, and I do not know whether it is the Tongsu Wen or something else. In recent times is there perhaps yet another Fu (a rare character lost in transcription)? This cannot be made clear. Someone asked: the Classic of Mountains and Seas was recorded by Yu of Xia and Yi, yet it has Changsha, Lingling, Guiyang and Zhuji, so many commandery and county names; what do you make of this? I answered: the gaps in the histories have existed for a long time, and with the Qin destroying learning and Dong Zhuo burning books, the disorder in canonical texts goes beyond this. For example the Materia Medica, said to be related by Shennong, yet has the commandery and county names Yuzhang, Zhuya, Zhao, Changshan, Fenggao, Zhending, Linzi and Fengyi appearing for drugs; the Erya, made by the Duke of Zhou, yet says "Zhang Zhong was filial and friendly"; Zhongni edited the Spring and Autumn Annals, yet the classic records the death of Kong Qiu; the Hereditary Genealogies (Shiben) written by Zuo Qiuming (this claim comes from Huangfu Mi's Records of the Emperors and Kings) yet has King Xi of Yan and Emperor Gaozu of Han; the sayings of the Jizhong (a rare character lost in transcription) actually record the Mount Qinwang stele; the Cangjie Pian was made by Li Si, yet it says "Han annexed the world, within the seas all joined, Xi was tattooed, Han overturned, rebels were punished and destroyed"; the Biographies of Immortals was made by Liu Xiang, yet its eulogy says seventy-four people came from the Buddhist scriptures; the Biographies of Exemplary Women was also by Xiang, and his son Xin wrote the eulogies, ending with Queen Dao of Zhao, yet the biographies contain Han's wife of Gengshi, Empress Ma of Mingde and Lady Liang Yi. All of these were interpolated by later people and are not the original text. Someone asked: why does the Old Matters of the Eastern Palace call chiwei (鸱尾, the owl-tail roof ornament) ciwei (祠尾)? I answered: Zhang Chang was a man of Wu who could not examine antiquity, and he noted things down as he saw fit, following the errors of his native-place customs and fabricating written characters. The people of Wu call ci si (祠祀, sacrifice) chi si, so he used ci for chi; they call gan (绀, dark blue) jin, so he used the silk radical beside jin (禁) for gan; they call zhan (盏, cup) zhu-jian fan, so he used the wood radical beside zhan (展) for zhan; they call the character huo (镬) huo (霍), so he used the metal radical beside huo (霍) for huo (镬); also the metal radical beside huan (患) for huan (镮), the wood radical beside gui (鬼) for huai (槐), the fire radical beside shu (庶) for zhi (炙), and below it mao (毛) for ji (髻), a topknot; for gold flower he writes the metal radical beside hua (华), and for window leaf the wood radical beside shan (扇). Things of this kind he arbitrarily made in some number. Someone further asked: in the Old Matters of the Eastern Palace, what sort of thing is the six-color ji (a rare character lost in transcription), and what is its sound? I answered: according to the Shuowen, jun (莙) is ox-alga, read like wei, with the sound yin-wu-gui fan, which is what Lu Ji calls the clustered alga whose leaves are like fleabane. Guo Pu's annotation on the Sancang also says it is a kind of yunzao, with fine leaves growing in a shaggy tuft. Today in the water there is this thing, with one joint several cun long, fine and downy like silk, round and curling and lovely, the long ones having twenty or thirty joints, and it is still called jun. Also, five-color silk threads cut into inch lengths are laid across the strands of a thread and tied up to resemble jun grass to decorate objects, and that too is called jun. At that time six-color dark-blue ji was made into this jun to decorate belts, and Zhang Chang therefore made the silk radical beside wei (畏). It should be written wei (隈). To the northeast of Bairen city there is a solitary hill, not recorded in ancient books; only Kan Yin's Records of the Thirteen Provinces holds that "Shun entered the great forest" refers to this hill, and on top of it there is still a temple to Yao. The common people sometimes call it Xuanwu Mountain or Xuwu Mountain, and no one knows where this comes from. Among the gentry of Zhao commandery were Li Muhu and his brother Jijie, and Li Puji also had learning, but none could settle the name of this hill in their own locality. I once served as an assistant in Zhaozhou, and with Wang Shao of Taiyuan I read the stele inside the west gate of Bairen city; the stele had been set up in the time of Emperor Huan of the Han by the people of Bairen county for the county magistrate Xu Zheng, and its inscription says "There is the Quanwu Mountain among scholars, where Wang Qiao became an immortal," and only then did I know this Quanwu Mountain. The character quan (巏) has no source at all, and wu (務), according to the books of the various masters, is mao (旄) of Maoqiu, and the Zilin gives one sound for mao as wang-fu fan; now following the vulgar name, it should be pronounced Quanwu. When I entered Ye I told Wei Shou, and Shou praised it greatly; he happened to be writing the stele inscription for Zhuangyan Temple in Zhaozhou, which says "the essence of Quanwu," and so he used this. Someone asked: why is one night five watches, and what is the gloss for geng? I answered: since the Han and Wei dynasties it has been called

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The names jiaye, yiye, bingye, dingye and wuye (first to fifth night watches), also called drum one, drum two, drum three, drum four and drum five, and also called first watch, second watch, third watch, fourth watch and fifth watch, all take five as the division. The Xidu Fu also says "guarded by the office of the strict watches". The reason is this: suppose in the first month the handle of the Dipper points to yin; at dusk it points to yin and at dawn to wu, from yin to wu passing through five double-hours. Although in winter and summer the nights vary in length, the double-hours are widely spaced and the night never exceeds six or falls short of four, advancing or receding always within five. Geng means 'to pass through' and 'to traverse', so it is called the five geng. The Erya says that shu is the mountain ji, and Guo Pu's commentary says that nowadays shu resembles ji and grows in the mountains. Since the leaf of shu resembles ji, in recent times literary men read ji (蓟) as the jin (筋) of 'muscle' to pair antithetically with 'bone', and using it that way I fear loses the meaning. Someone asked: the popular name for the puppet is Guo Tu (Bald Guo); is there a basis for this? I answered: the Fengsu Tong says that all Guos avoid the word 'bald'; there must have been a man surnamed Guo in an earlier age who was afflicted with baldness and was a comic and jester, so later people made a figure of him and called it Guo Tu, just as Wenkang is the likeness of Yu Liang. Someone asked: why is the army adviser in charge of prisons called Chang Liu? I answered: the Diwang Shiji says that when Emperor Shaohao died, his spirit descended on Mount Changliu [this originally comes from the Shanhai Jing, which writes liu with a different character], and in sacrifices he presides over autumn [this comes from the Yueling]. According to the Zhouli, the Minister of Crime of the autumn office is in charge of punishments; the post of Chang Liu was, in the Han and Wei, that of a clerk who catches thieves, and only from the Jin and Song became an army adviser, subordinate to the Minister of Crime, so the dwelling of the Autumn Emperor was taken as an auspicious name. A guest challenged the host: "You say that the present classics are all wrong, and that what the Shuowen says is all right; does Xu Shen surpass Confucius?" The host clapped his hands and laughed and answered: "Are the present classics all in Confucius' own hand?" The guest said: "Is the present Shuowen all in Xu Shen's own hand?" I answered: "Xu Shen used the six categories of writing to test and the radicals to string them together, so that errors could not occur, and if they did they could be detected. Confucius preserved the meaning and did not discuss the wording. Earlier scholars could still follow the sense when facing a text, let alone in copying and transmission. If, as in the Zuozhuan, 'stop the spear' makes 'martial' (武), 'reversing correct' makes 'lacking' (乏), 'dish and insect' makes 'poison' (蛊), and the character for the twelfth branch has two heads and six bodies, later people naturally may not casually alter them; how dare they use the Shuowen to judge their rightness? Moreover I do not take the Shuowen as always right; where it cites classics and commentaries that differ from today's, I have not dared to follow it. Also, Sima Xiangru's Fengshan Shu says 'dao one stalk with six ears to the kitchen, sacrificial animals with twin horns butting together'; this dao means 'to select', as in Emperor Guangwu's edict, 'not only the labor of rearing and selecting beforehand'. But the Shuowen says dao is the name of a grain and cites the Fengshan Shu as evidence. It is fine that there should be a grain named dao, but that is not what Xiangru used. A single stalk with six ears sent to the kitchen, how would that make a sentence? Even if Xiangru's genius were crude and he forced this line, the next line should say 'unicorn with twin horns butting together', and not 'sacrificial animal'. I once laughed that Xu Shen was a pure scholar who did not understand the form of literary composition, and things like this are not to be relied on. In general I admire that this book of his is systematic in its principles and thorough in tracing roots, and Zheng (a rare character here, lost in transcription) often cited it as evidence when annotating books. If one does not trust his explanations, then (a rare character here, lost in transcription) (a rare character here, lost in transcription) will not know what a single stroke means." The petty learning of the world does not penetrate ancient and modern, and insists on using small seal script to correct all writings. How could the Erya, the Sancang and the Shuowen all fully get Cang Jie's original intent? They too were adjusted and revised with each age, each with agreements and differences. Dictionaries before the Western Jin cannot all be wrong; it is enough if the system is complete and not arbitrary. In examining right and wrong, special deliberation is needed. As to the three characters 'Zhongni ju', two of them are not in standard form: the Sancang adds a hill beside 'ni', and the Shuowen puts 'ji' beneath 'ju'; how can things like this be followed? In ancient times there were not two characters, and there were many loan characters, such as using zhong (中) for zhong (仲), shuo (说) for yue (悦), zhao (召) for shao (邵), and xian (闲) for xian (閒); such cases need not be corrected. There are also errors that have become vulgar: writing luan (乱) with a tongue (舌) beside it, putting no ear below yi (揖), writing yuan and tuo with (a rare character here, lost in transcription), writing fen and duo with huan [pronounced guan], adding a belt to the middle of xi (席), putting xi (西) above e (恶), setting pi (皮) outside gu (鼓), producing hui (毁) at the head of zao (凿), pairing yu (禹) with li (离), adding huo (豁) to he (壑), mixing wu (巫) beside jing (经), splitting ze (泽) in half for gao (皋), turning lie (猎) into ge [pronounced ge, the name of a beast, from the Shanhai Jing], and changing chong (宠) into long (竉) [long is pronounced lang-dong fan and means a hole, hence it takes the cave radical]. The character shuai (率) has its own lü reading and is forcibly changed to something else; the character shan (单) has its own shan reading and is casually split into a different one. Things like this must be put right. When I first read the Shuowen, I looked down on vulgar characters; if I followed the correct form I feared people would not recognize it, and if I followed custom I disliked it in my heart as wrong, and I could hardly put brush to paper. As what I saw grew broader, I better understood accommodating change, mended my earlier stubbornness, and meant to take half from each. In literary writing and composition, still choose those that somewhat accord with the standard; in official documents and ordinary letters, I hope you will not go against custom. Note that the character gen in miangen is made of two lines with a boat between; the Shijing says "gen the black millet and double-kernel millet", which is this. Now (a rare character here, lost in transcription) the books turn the boat into a sun, and He Fasheng's Zhongxing Shu even takes 'a boat between two lines' as the character for 'boat and ship', which is wrong. The Chunqiu says that 'person, ten, four, heart' make virtue (德), the Shi says that 'two under heaven' make you (酉), the Han Shu takes 'spring money' (泉货) as the White Water True Man, the Xinlun takes 'jin kun' for silver, the Guozhi takes 'a mouth above heaven' for Wu (吴), the Jin Shu takes 'a yellow-headed little man' for Gong (恭), the Song Shu takes 'zhao li' for shao (劭), and the Cantong Qi takes 'a person bearing gao' for zao (造). Cases like these are probably just numerological mistakes, loans, attachments and jokes mixed together. It is like turning gong (贡) into xiang (项) or using chi (叱) for qi (七); how could this be used to fix the pronunciation of characters? The split-and-join poems and rhapsodies of Pan, Lu and others, the character-breaking divination books and Bao Zhao's character riddles all take (a rare character here, lost in transcription) vulgar custom and are not to be judged by form and sound. Xing Fang of Hejian said to me: the Jia Yi Zhuan says 'at midday one must wei', and the commentary says wei means to expose. I have seen someone explain it as meaning 'sudden and swift', saying exactly that midday does not last a moment and passes abruptly; is this explanation right? I said to Xing: these words come originally from Taigong's Liutao. According to the dictionaries, in ancient times the character for exposing to the sun (暴) and the character for sudden (暴) were similar, differing only slightly at the bottom, and later people arbitrarily added the sun radical. It means that at midday one must expose things to the sun, or else the time is lost. Jin Zhuo has already explained it in detail. Xing Fang laughed, accepted it and withdrew.

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The people of the Nine Provinces speak differently, and it has been so since there were people. From the Chunqiu's marking of Qi speech in its commentary and the Lisao's taking Chu words as its classic, this was probably the beginning of relatively clear records. Later (a rare character here, lost in transcription) Xiong wrote the Fangyan, and that book is very complete, but it examines only differences in the names of things and does not make clear the rights and wrongs of pronunciation. When Zheng (a rare character here, lost in transcription) annotated the Six Classics, Gao You explained the Lüshi Chunqiu and Huainanzi, Xu Shen made the Shuowen, and Liu Xi made the Shiming, only then were there analogies and loans to demonstrate sounds. But ancient speech differs from the present, and its light and heavy, clear and muddy are still unclear, and added to this are such things as 'outer speech' and 'inner speech', 'quick speech' and 'slow speech', and 'read as', which make people still more doubtful. Sun Shuran created the Erya Yinyi; he was the only man at the end of the Han to know the fanqie spelling, and by the Wei period this became widely used, and the Duke of Gaogui Township, not understanding fanqie, thought it strange. After this, rhyme books sprang up, each with local flavor, mocking one another in turn, and the parable of pointing at a horse leaves unknown who is right. Taking the capitals of emperors and kings as a standard for local speech, and examining ancient and modern to settle it, (a rare character here, lost in transcription) weighing and measuring, only Jinling and Luoyang qualify. The southern land and water are soft and gentle, and the sound there is clear, raised and sharp, with the fault of being superficial, and its words are often vulgar; the northern mountains and rivers are deep and thick, and the sound there is deep, muddy and blunt, with the merit of being plain and direct, and its words contain many ancient expressions. Yet among gentlemen of rank the south is superior, while among common people of the villages the north is better. Change clothes and talk with them, and in the south the scholars and commoners can be told apart in a few sentences; listen to them through a wall, and in the north the court and countryside cannot be told apart all day. Yet the south is tainted by Wu and Yue, the north mixed with the barbarians, and both have deep flaws that cannot be fully discussed. Their lesser errors: southerners say qian (钱) as xian (涎), shi (石) as she (射), jian (贱) as xian (羡), and shi (是) as (a rare character here, lost in transcription); northerners say shu (庶) as shu (戍), ru (如) as ru (儒), zi (紫) as zi (姊), and qia (洽) as xia (狎). Cases like these have many mistakes on both sides. Since coming to Ye, I have seen only Cui Ziyue and his nephew Cui Zhan, and the brothers Li Zuren and Li Wei, who attended somewhat to speech and corrected it a little. Li Jijie's Yinyun Jueyi has errors at times, and Yang Xiuzhi's Qieyun is especially crude. When I see my children, even in childhood, I gradually correct them, and regard a single slip as my own fault. I have not dared casually to name things I have not checked in books, as you know. Ancient and modern speech, and the customs of the time, differ, and authors differ as Chu and Xia. The Cang Jie Xungu gives the fanqie of bai (粺) as bu-mai and wa (娃) as yu-guai; the Zhanguo (a rare character here, lost in transcription) gives wen (刎) the sound of mian (免); the Mu Tianzi Zhuan gives jian (谏) the sound of jian (间); the Shuowen gives jia (戛) the sound of ji (棘) and reads min (皿) as meng (猛); the Zilin gives (a rare character here, lost in transcription) the sound of kou-gan and shen (伸) the sound of xin (辛); the Yunji combines cheng, reng, hong and deng into two rhymes and splits wei, qi, yi and shi into four chapters; Li Deng's Shenglei gives xi (系) the sound of yi (羿); Liu Changzong's Zhouguan Yin reads cheng (乘) as cheng (承). Such cases are very many and must be examined. The fanqie of earlier ages also is often not accurate: Xu Xianmin's Maoshi Yin gives zhou (骤) as zai-gou, and his Zuozhuan Yin gives chuan (椽) as tu-yuan; the ones that cannot be relied on are many enough. The speech of today's scholars is also not correct, and who were the ancients? Why must one follow their errors and oddities? The Tongsu Wen says that to enter a room and seek is called sou, and the fanqie is xiong-hou, so xiong should be pronounced suo-rong. Now this pronunciation is common in northern custom, and it too is ancient speech that cannot be used. Yufan is a jade treasure of Lu and should be pronounced yu-fan, but all of Jiangnan reads it as the fan of fanping; Mount Qi should be pronounced qi as in 'strange', but all of Jiangnan calls it the qi of 'spirit' (祇). At Jiangling (a rare character here, lost in transcription) disappeared, and this pronunciation was passed to Guanzhong, and I do not know on which of the two it is based. By my shallow learning, I never heard of it before. Northerners mostly pronounce ju (举) and ju (莒) as ju (矩); only Li Jijie said: Duke Huan of Qi and Guan Zhong were plotting an attack on Ju on a terrace, and Dongguo Ya, seeing Duke Huan's mouth open and not close, knew that what was said was Ju. So ju (莒) and ju (矩) must not be pronounced the same, which shows an ear for sound. Objects have fine and coarse, and fine and coarse are called hao and e (good and bad); the human heart has what it leaves and takes, and leaving and taking are called hao and wu (to like and dislike) [the first read hu-hao, the second wu-gu]. This pronunciation appears in Ge Hong and Xu Miao, but the scholars of Hebei read the Shangshu's "hao [hu-hao] sheng wu [yu-ge] sha" (love life, hate killing); one is discussing the nature of objects and the other human feeling, which is quite wrong. Fu (甫) is a fine title for a man, and in ancient books it is often borrowed for fu (父, father); northerners have no one at all who pronounces it fu (甫), which is something I do not understand. Only the titles of Guan Zhong and Fan Zeng must be read by their written form [Guan Zhong's title was Zhongfu, and Fan Zeng's title was Yafu]. According to the various dictionaries, the character yan (焉) is the name of a bird, or some say a particle, and all pronounce it yu-qian. Since Ge Hong's Yaoyong Zi Yuan, the pronunciations and meanings of yan are divided: if it means 'how' or 'where', it should be pronounced yu-qian, as in "yu yan xiaoyao", "yu yan jia ke", "yan yong ning", "yan de ren"; if it ends a sentence or is a particle, it should be pronounced yi-qian, as in "gu cheng long yan", "gu cheng xue yan", "you min ren yan", "you she ji yan", "tuo shi yan er", "Jin Zheng yan yi". In Jiangnan this distinction is still observed and is clearly easy to understand, while Hebei merges them into one sound, and though it follows ancient reading, it cannot be used today. Ye (邪, read ya) is an undecided word. The Zuozhuan says "I do not know whether Heaven has abandoned Lu, or whether the ruler of Lu has offended the ghosts and spirits (ye)", the Zhuangzi says "is it heaven (ye), is it earth (ye)", and the Han Shu says "is it right (ye), is it wrong (ye)". But northerners pronounce it as the character ye (也), which is also a mistake. The challenger said: the Xici says "Qian and Kun are the gates of the Changes (ye)"; is this also an undecided word? I answered: why would it not be? Above, a question is first posed, and below, (a rare character here, lost in transcription) virtue comes to refute him. The scholars of Jiangnan, reading the Zuozhuan, passed down by word of mouth and set their own rules: an army that defeats itself is 'bai', and one that breaks others' army is 'bai' [bu-bai fan]. In the various records and commentaries I have not seen bu-bai fan; Xu Xianmin, reading the Zuozhuan, has this pronunciation in only one place, and he does not explain the difference between defeating oneself and defeating others; this is far-fetched. The ancients said that the sons of fat and grain are hard to put in order, because they are proud, extravagant and self-satisfied and cannot restrain themselves. I see that the speech of princes and imperial relatives is often not correct, also because within they are tainted by lowly nurses and tutors and outside they have no worthy teachers and friends. In the Liang, there was a marquis who, jesting before Emperor Yuan, declared himself dull and slow but pronounced the word as si duan. Emperor Yuan answered: "Si is not a cool wind, and duan is not Duangan Mu." He called Yingzhou Yongzhou, and Emperor Yuan reported to Jianwen, who said: "In gengchen Wu entered, and it was in the end the same as (a rare character here, lost in transcription)." In things like this, every mouthful is a mistake. Emperor Yuan personally instructed his sons' reading attendants and made this a warning. In Hebei the fanqie of gong (攻) is gu-cong, different from gong (工), gong (公) and gong (功), which is especially odd. In recent times there are people named Xian (暹) who call themselves Xian (纤), named Kun (琨) who call themselves Gun (衮), named Guang (洸) who call themselves Wang (汪), and named (a rare character here, lost in transcription) [pronounced yue] who call themselves jie [the sound (a rare character here, lost in transcription)], which is not only wrong in sound and rhyme but also causes endless confusion in taboo names for their sons and grandsons.

真草書跡微須留意江南諺雲尺牘書防千里面目也承晉宋餘俗相與事之故無頓狼狽者吾防承門業加性愛重所見法書亦多而翫習功夫頗至遂不能佳者良由無分故也然而此藝不須過精夫巧者勞而智者憂常為人所役使更覺為累韋仲將遺戒深有以也王逸少風流才士蕭散名人舉世唯知其書翻以能自蔽也蕭子云每嘆曰吾著齊書勒成一典文章義自謂可觀唯以筆跡得名亦異事也王褒地胄清華才學優敏後雖入闗亦被禮遇猶以書工﨑嶇碑碣之間辛苦筆硯之役嘗悔恨曰假使吾不知書可不至今日邪以此觀之慎勿以書自命雖然廝猥之人以能書防擢者多矣故道不同不相為謀也梁氏秘閣散逸以來吾見二王真草多矣家中嘗得十卷方知陶隠居阮交州蕭祭酒諸書莫不得羲之之體故是書之淵源蕭晩節所變乃是右軍年少時法也晉宋以來多能書者故其時俗遞相染尚所有部帙楷正可觀不無俗字非為大損至梁天監之間斯風未變大同之末訛替滋生蕭子云改易字體邵陵王頗行偽字前上為草能傍作長之類是也朝野翕然以為楷式畫虎不成多所傷敗至為一字唯見數防或妄斟酌遂便轉移爾後墳籍略不可防北朝喪亂之餘書跡鄙陋加以専輒造字猥拙甚於江南乃以百念為憂言反為變不用為罷追來為歸更生為蘇先人為老如此非一徧滿經傳唯有姚元標工於楷留心小學後生師之者眾洎於齊末秘書繕冩賢於往日多矣江南閭里間有畫書賦此乃陶隠居弟子杜道士所為其人未甚識字輕為軌則託名貴師世俗傳信後生頗為所誤也畫繪之工亦為玅矣自古名士多或能之吾家常有梁元帝手畫蟬雀白扇及馬圖亦難及也武烈太子偏能冩真坐上賓客隨宜防染即成數人以問童孺皆知姓名矣蕭賁劉孝先劉靈並文學已外復佳此法翫閱古今特可寳愛若官未通顯每被公私使令亦為猥役吳郡顧士端出身湘東國侍郎後為鎮南府刑獄叅軍有子曰庭西朝中書舍人乂子並有琴書之藝尤玅丹青常被元帝所使每懷羞恨彭城劉嶽槖之子也仕為驃騎府管記平氏縣令才學快士而畫絶倫後隨武陵王入蜀下牢之敗遂為陸防軍畫支江寺壁與諸工巧雜處向使三賢都不曉畫直運素業豈見此恥乎弧矢之利以威天下先王所以觀徳擇賢亦濟身之急務也江南為世之常射以為兵射冠冕儒生多不習此別有博射弱弓長箭施於凖的揖讓升降以行禮焉防禦冦難了無所益亂離之後此術遂亡河北文士率曉兵射非直葛洪一箭已解追兵三九防集常縻榮賜雖然要輕禽截狡獸不願汝輩為之卜筮者聖人之業也但近世無復佳師多不能中古者卜以決疑今人生疑於卜何者守道信謀欲行一事卜得惡卦反令恜恜【音敇惕也】此之謂乎且十中六七以為上手粗知大意又不委曲凢射竒偶自然半收何足頼也世傳云解隂陽者為鬼所嫉坎貧窮多不稱泰吾觀近古以來尤精妙者唯京房管輅郭璞耳皆無官位多或罹災此言令人益信儻值世網嚴宻強負此名便有詿誤亦禍源也及星文風氣率不勞為之吾嘗學六壬式亦值世間好匠聚得龍首金匱玉爕玉厯十許種書討求無驗尋亦悔罷凡隂陽之術與天地俱生其吉防徳刑不可不信但去聖既逺世傳術書皆出流俗言辭鄙淺驗少妄多至如反支不行竟以遇害歸忌寄宿不免防終拘而多忌亦無益也算術亦是六藝要事自古儒士論天道定律厯者皆學通之然可以兼明不可以専業江南此學殊少唯范陽祖𣈶精之位至南康太守河北多曉此術【𣈶音豆】醫方之事取玅極難不勸汝曹以自命也微解藥性小小和合居家得以救急亦為勝事皇甫謐殷仲堪則其人也禮曰君子無故不徹琴瑟古來名士多所愛好洎於梁初衣冠子孫不知琴者號有所闕大同以末斯風頓盡然而此樂愔愔雅緻有深味哉今世曲解雖變於古猶足以暢神情也唯不可令有稱譽見役勲貴處之下坐以取殘杯冷炙之辱戴安道猶遭之況爾曹乎家語曰君子不愽為其兼行惡道故也論語云不有博奕者乎為之猶賢乎已然則聖人不用博奕為教但以學者不可常精有時疲倦則儻為之猶勝飽食昏睡兀然端坐耳至如吳太子以為無益命韋昭論之王肅葛洪陶侃之徒不許目觀手執此並勤篤之志也能爾為佳古為大博則六著小博則二焭今無曉者比世所行一焭十二棊數術淺短不足可翫圍棊有手談坐隠之目頗為雅戲但令人躭憒廢喪實多不可常也投壺之禮近世愈精古者實以小豆為其矢之躍也今則唯欲其驍益多益喜乃有倚竿帯劒狼壺豹尾龍首之名其尤玅者有蓮花驍汝南周璝正之子會稽賀徽賀革之子並能一箭四十餘驍賀又嘗為小障置壺其外隔障投之無所失也至鄴以來亦見廣寧蘭陵諸王有此校具舉國遂無投得一驍者彈棊亦近世雅戲消愁釋憒時可為之

One should pay a little attention to calligraphy in regular and cursive scripts. A Jiangnan proverb says: a letter's writing is a face a thousand miles away. We follow the leftover customs of the Jin and Song, and everyone engages in it, so there is no one who is suddenly disgraced. I (a rare character here, lost in transcription) inherited the family tradition, and moreover by nature I love and value it and have seen many model calligraphies, and I have put in considerable effort on practice, yet I could never become good, truly for lack of talent. But this art need not be pursued too finely. The skillful toil and the wise worry, and one is often ordered about by others, which feels more like a burden. Wei Zhongjiang's deathbed admonition has deep reason. Wang Xizhi was a man of refined talent and a leisurely famous man, yet the whole world knows only his calligraphy, and because of this ability he has instead been overshadowed. Xiao Ziyun often sighed: "I wrote the Qi Shu and completed it as a canonical work; its writing (a rare character here, lost in transcription) and meaning I regard as worth looking at, yet it is for my handwriting that I am known, which is strange." Wang Bao was of a distinguished and noble line, quick in talent and learning, and though after he entered the pass he was treated courteously, he was still sent running among stelae and toiling at brush and inkstone because of his skill in writing, and once said with regret: "If I had not known calligraphy, I might not have come to today." From this, one must never take calligraphy as one's calling. Even so, many lowly people are raised up (a rare character here, lost in transcription) through writing well, so those on different paths do not plan together. Since the Liang imperial library was scattered, I have seen many of the Two Wangs' regular and cursive writing, and once had ten scrolls of them at home, and only then knew that the writings of Tao Yinju, Ruan Jiaozhou and Xiao Jijiu all got the manner of Xizhi, so he is the source of calligraphy. The changes Xiao made in later years were in fact the method of Wang Youjun's youth. From the Jin and Song on there were many good calligraphers, so the fashion passed in turn from one to another, and all volumes of regular script were presentable, and it was not that there were no vulgar characters, which did no great harm. In the Tianjian era of the Liang this fashion was not yet changed, but at the end of Datong errors and substitutions grew. Xiao Ziyun changed the forms of characters, and the Prince of Shaoling often used false characters, such as writing the top of qian (前) as cao (草) or the side of neng (能) as chang (长). The court and country all agreed and took them as models, and in drawing a tiger and failing, much was damaged and ruined, so that in a single character one saw several (a rare character here, lost in transcription) or one casually added deliberations and shifted them. After this, the old texts were almost unreadable (a rare character here, lost in transcription). In the northern dynasties, after the upheavals, calligraphy was crude, and arbitrary invention of characters made it more vulgar and clumsy than in Jiangnan, even taking 'a hundred thoughts' (百念) as you (忧), 'speech reversed' (言反) as bian (变), 'not used' (不用) as ba (罢), 'pursuing and coming' (追来) as gui (归), 'living again' (更生) as su (苏), and 'elder person' (先人) as lao (老); things like this are not just one, and fill the classics and commentaries. Only Yao Yuanbiao was skilled in regular script (a rare character here, lost in transcription) and attended to philology, and many younger people took him as teacher. By the end of Qi, the copying done in the Palace Library was much better than before. In the villages of Jiangnan there is a Huashu Fu (Rhapsody on Painting and Calligraphy), written by the Daoist Du, a disciple of Tao Yinju, a man who hardly knew characters yet lightly set rules, using his teacher's honored name, and the world believed and passed it on, and the younger generation has been much misled by it. Skill in painting is also very fine, and famous men since ancient times have often been able in it. In my family there was always Emperor Yuan of Liang's hand-painted cicada and sparrow on a white (a rare character here, lost in transcription) fan and a picture of horses, which are hard to match. The Crown Prince Wulie was particularly good at drawing from life; the guests at the table, (a rare character here, lost in transcription) at leisure, would quickly tint several people, and if one took them to children they would all know the names. Xiao Ben, Liu Xiaoxian and Liu Ling were, besides literature, also skilled in this, and viewing their work is especially precious now and in the past. If one's office has not become prominent, one is often ordered about by officials and private persons, and it becomes a menial service. Gu Shiduan of Wujun began as an attendant in the Xiangdong principality and later became army adviser for punishments in the Zhennan administration, and his son Gu Ting was a Secretary of the Central Secretariat in the western court; father and son both had skill in zither and calligraphy and were especially marvelous in painting, and were often employed by Emperor Yuan, always harboring shame and resentment. Liu Yue of Pengcheng, son of Liu Tuo, served as record-keeper of the Piaoqi administration and magistrate of Pingshi County, was a gifted man of fine talent whose painting was peerless, and later followed the Prince of Wuling to Shu; when the defeat at Xialao came, he was made to paint the walls of the Zhijiang Temple for General Lu (a rare character here, lost in transcription) and kept company with the various craftsmen. If these three worthies had not known painting, and had simply pursued their plain profession, how would they have met this shame? The advantage of bow and arrow is to awe the world, and so the former kings used it to observe virtue and choose the worthy; it is also an urgent business for saving one's life. In Jiangnan, 'regular shooting', the ordinary business of the world, is treated as military shooting, and officials and Confucian scholars mostly do not practice it, and instead there is 'wide shooting', with weak bows and long arrows aimed at targets, bowing and yielding, ascending and descending in a rite, which is of no help in defending against enemy raids, and after the upheavals this art vanished. Most literary men of Hebei understand military shooting, not only like Ge Hong, whose single arrow resolved a pursuing force, but also (a rare character here, lost in transcription) often receiving honors and rewards. Even so, I do not want you to go and shoot light birds and cut off cunning beasts. Divination by tortoise and yarrow is the sage's work, but in recent times there are no good masters again and most cannot hit. In ancient times divination was used to settle doubts; now people have doubts because of divination. Why? Someone who holds the Way and believes in his plans, wanting to do something, gets an ill-omened hexagram and is instead uneasy [chi, meaning alarmed], which is this. Moreover, one who hits six or seven out of ten is taken for an expert, though he only roughly knows the main idea and is not thorough. In shooting odd or even, half will naturally be right, so what is there to rely on? It is said in the world that those who explain yin and yang are envied by ghosts, and (a rare character here, lost in transcription) are poor, and many are not called prosperous. I see that those especially fine since recent antiquity are only Jing Fang, Guan Lu and Guo Pu, none of whom held office, and many met disaster, and this saying is the more believable. If one meets a time when the net of the world is tightly drawn, and unwillingly bears this name, one will be implicated by error, which is also a source of calamity. As for astronomical signs and wind-qi, there is no need to do any of it. I once studied the liuren method and also met a good craftsman in the world, and collected ten or so books such as the Longshou, Jingui, Yuluan and Yuli, and sought verification and found none, and soon regretted it and gave it up. The arts of yin and yang were born together with heaven and earth, and their (a rare character here, lost in transcription) good fortune, virtue and punishment must not be disbelieved, but we are far from the sages, and the books of arts passed down in the world all come from vulgar currents, with crude and shallow words, little verification and much falsehood. As for those who died because they would not travel on a fanzhi day, and those who, because of guiji, lodged elsewhere and in the end could not avoid (a rare character here, lost in transcription), being bound by many taboos is also of no benefit. Mathematics is also an important matter of the six arts, and from ancient times Confucian scholars who discuss the Way of Heaven and determine the pitch pipes and calendar have all learned it thoroughly, but one may study it alongside others, not as a specialty. In Jiangnan this learning is rare, and only Zu Geng of Fanyang was skilled at it, rising to be prefect of Nankang. In Hebei many understand this art [geng is pronounced dou]. The matter of medicine and prescriptions is extremely hard to master, and I do not urge you to make a career of it. To know medicinal properties a little and be able to make small mixtures, so as to help in emergencies at home, is also a good thing. Huangfu Mi and Yin Zhongkan were such men. The Liji says that the gentleman does not remove the zither without reason, and famous men since ancient times have mostly loved it. By the early Liang, scions of the gentry who did not know the zither were said to be deficient, but after Datong this fashion ended abruptly. Yet this music is calm and elegant and has deep flavor. Though the tunes of today have changed from the ancient, they are still enough to relieve the spirit. But one must not let people praise you, be ordered about by the powerful, sit in a low seat and take the humiliation of leftover cups and cold meat. Dai Andao even met with this; how much more you? The Jiayu says that the gentleman does not play bo, because it also practices evil ways. The Analects says: Are there not those who play bo and yi (go)? To do that is still better than doing nothing. So the sage did not use bo and yi for teaching, but because learners cannot always be at their finest, when tired they may do it occasionally, and it is still better than eating one's fill and dozing off or sitting rigidly upright. As to the Crown Prince of Wu who thought it useless and had Wei Zhao discuss it, and Wang Su, Ge Hong, Tao Kan and their like who did not allow themselves to look at or touch it, these are diligent and earnest aspirations, and if one can do so it is better still. In ancient times, the great bo used six sticks and the small bo used two qiong; today none understand it. What is practiced in recent times, one qiong and twelve pieces, has shallow and short arithmetic and is not worth playing. Go has the names 'hand conversation' and 'sitting in seclusion', and is quite an elegant game, but it truly makes people absorbed and ruinous, so it must not be played often. The rite of pitch-pot has grown more refined in recent times; in ancient times the pot was filled with small beans because they feared the arrows would bounce; now people merely seek the 'xiao' (a bounce-back scoring throw), the more the better, and there are such names as leaning pole, wearing sword, wolf pot, leopard tail and dragon head, and the most marvelous is the lotus-flower xiao. Zhou Gui of Runan is one; (a rare character here, lost in transcription) is the son of Zheng, and He Hui of Kuaiji is the son of He Ge, and both could get over forty xiao with one arrow. He also once made a small screen, placed the pot outside, and threw over the screen without ever missing. Since coming to Ye I have also seen princes of Guangning and Lanling with this equipment, but in the whole country there was none who threw even one xiao. Tanqi (finger-flick chess) is also an elegant game of recent times, to dispel sorrow and relieve boredom, and may be played occasionally.

死者人之常分不可免也吾年十九值梁家喪亂其間與白刃為伍者亦常數輩幸承餘福得至於今古人云五十不為夭吾已六十餘故心坦然不以殘年為念先有風氣之疾常疑奄然聊書素懷以為汝誡先君先夫人皆未還建鄴舊山旅江陵東郭承聖末啟求都欲營遷厝詔賜銀百兩已於州小郊北地燒磚使值本朝淪沒流離如此數十年間絶於還望今雖混一家道罄窮何由辦此奉營資費且都汗毀無復孑遺還被下溼未為得計自咎自責貫心刻髓計吾兄弟不當仕進但以門衰骨肉單弱五服之內傍無一人播越他鄉無復資廕使汝等沈淪廝役以為先世之恥故靦冒人間不敢墜失兼以北方政教嚴切全無隠退者故也今年老疾侵儻然奄忽豈求備禮乎一日放臂沐浴而已不勞復魄殮以常衣先夫人棄背之時屬世荒饉家塗空迫兄弟防弱棺器率薄藏內無塼吾當松棺二寸衣帽已外一不得自隨床上唯施七星板至如蠟弩牙玉豚錫人之屬並須停省糧甖明器故不得營碑誌旒旐彌在言外載以鱉甲車襯土而下平地無墳若懼拜掃不知兆域當築一堵低牆於左右前後隨為私記靈筵勿設枕幾朔望祥禫唯下白粥清水乾棗不得有酒肉餅果之祭親友來餟酹者一皆拒之汝曹若違吾心有加先妣則陷父不孝在汝安乎其內典功徳隨力所至勿刳竭生資使凍餒也四時祭祀周孔所教欲人勿死其親不忘孝道也求諸內典則無益焉殺生為之翻増罪累若報罔極之徳霜露之悲有時齋供及盡忠信不辱其親所望於汝也孔子之親也雲古者墓而不墳丘東西南北之人也不可以弗識也於是封之崇四尺然則君子應世行道亦有不守墳墓之時況為事際所逼也吾今羈旅身若浮雲竟未知何鄉是吾地唯當氣絶便埋之耳汝曹宜以傳業揚名為務不可顧戀朽壤以取湮沒也

Death is the constant lot of people and cannot be avoided. At nineteen I met the ruin of the Liang house, and in that time I kept company with bare blades several times, and only by good fortune from my ancestors have I reached today. The ancients said that death at fifty is not early; I am past sixty, so my heart is at ease and I do not worry about my remaining years. I earlier had a wind illness and often suspected I would suddenly depart, so I write down my usual thoughts as a warning to you. My late father and late mother were not returned to the old hills of Jianye, but were left (a rare character here, lost in transcription) at the eastern suburb of Jiangling. At the end of the Chengsheng era I petitioned (a rare character here, lost in transcription) for the capital, hoping to arrange the reburial, (a rare character here, lost in transcription), and the Emperor decreed a gift of a hundred taels of silver, and bricks were already being fired in the northern lands of the small suburb of (a rare character here, lost in transcription) prefecture, when the fall of the dynasty came, and in such wandering and displacement the hope has been cut off for decades. Now though the realm is united, my family is destitute, and how can I manage the funds to carry this out? Moreover (a rare character here, lost in transcription) the capital is ruined and nothing remains, and the ground is low and damp, which would not be a sound plan. I blame myself and reproach myself, and it pierces my heart and carves my marrow. Reckoning it up, we brothers should not have sought office at all, but because our house had declined and our kin were few and weak, with not one person within the five degrees of mourning, scattered in a foreign land with no inherited privilege, so that you would sink to be menials, which is a disgrace to our ancestors, I shamelessly entered the world and did not dare fall, and further, northern government and teaching were strict and there were no hermits at all. Now that I am old and ill, if I should suddenly die, how can I demand full ceremony? Once I let go, simply wash me; there is no need for recalling the soul, and bury me in ordinary clothes. When my late mother died, the age was one of famine and the family fortunes empty and pressed; my brothers (a rare character here, lost in transcription) were weak, the coffin and implements were plain and thin, and there were no bricks in the tomb. I should have a pine coffin two inches thick, and apart from clothes and cap nothing may accompany me, and on the bed lay only a seven-star board. As for wax crossbow teeth, jade pigs, tin figures and such, all must be omitted; grain jars and spirit goods are not to be prepared at all, and steles, epitaphs and banners are of course out of the question. Carry me on a soft-shell-turtle cart and lower me with earth around me, leaving the ground level with no mound. If you fear that when sweeping the tomb you will not know the plot, build a low wall to the left, right, front and back, and make a private mark. Do not set a pillow and table at the spirit mat, and on the first and fifteenth days and at the anniversary rites offer only white congee, clear water and dried jujubes, with no sacrifice of wine, meat, cakes or fruit. Refuse all offerings from relatives and friends who come to sacrifice. If you go against my wishes and add ritual beyond what was done for my late mother, you will lead your father into unfilial conduct; can you rest easy? Merit in Buddhist works should be done as far as your strength allows, but do not exhaust your livelihood so that you freeze and starve. Seasonal sacrifices are what Zhou and Confucius taught, to keep people from forgetting dead kin and from forgetting filial piety. Seeking it in Buddhist teachings is of no benefit, and killing living beings to do it only adds to guilt. If you wish to repay the boundless virtue and the sorrow of frost and dew, hold a vegetarian offering from time to time, and be loyal and trustworthy and do not disgrace your parents; this is what I hope of you. When Confucius buried (a rare character here, lost in transcription) his parents, he said that in antiquity people made graves without mounds, but he himself was a man of east, west, south and north and could not be without a marker, and so heaped up earth four feet high. So the gentleman, in answering to the age and practicing the Way, also at times has no grave to keep, let alone when forced by circumstances. Now I am a wanderer, my body like a floating cloud, and I truly do not know which district is my (a rare character here, lost in transcription) ground; just bury me once I stop breathing. You should make it your business to pass on the family work and make a name, and must not cling to decaying soil and thereby be buried in obscurity.