INTRODUCTORY DECLARATION.

xv

FIRST PARAGRAPH.

WHICH BOOKS ARE CLASSICAL AND OF THE FIRST AUTHORITY.

Let us now descend to those matters which will serve as our foundation: first, the books and the principal monuments of this nation, their authors and their commentators. We do this so that Europeans may understand which books in this long-cultivated vineyard belong to the first class and which to the second. From among these, we shall see which may be read with confidence, which should be explored with a slow and cautious step, which are to be rejected like apocryphal works, and which are to be shunned as pestilential and impious, not to be greeted even from a distance. We shall do the same for the commentators (of whom there is a vast abundance, variety, and diversity)—which ones it is right to avoid and which to follow, how much faith and credit should be given to each, and in which specific matters.

For since the very times of Confucius, faith, piety, and the majesty of the Imperial family were neglected by many, and the customs of the ancestors had strayed significantly from their original path. Not long after, civil wars between local lords broke out one after another, in which nearly all the royal houses were eventually entangled. There also occurred a general and most terrible burning of books, the likes of which neither Alexandria nor any other part of the world ever experienced or heard of The author refers to the "Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars" in 213 BC under the First Emperor, Qin Shi Huang.. As usually happens, the laws were silent amid the clash of arms. Amid such great license for weapons and vices and lack of punishment, it is hard to believe how many sects, errors, and heresies—how many monsters of opinion and plagues of superstition—grew up like useless and harmful weeds in a neglected and deserted field within this "Garden at the Center of the Lands" original: medio terrarum horto; a Latin rendering of Zhongguo (the Middle Kingdom). (for so the Chinese call their Empire), as will be declared more fully below.

Among this people, there is no limit to the books already written, nor any end to the writing of new ones. Nevertheless, the most important of all, those of the first class, are and always have been partly those which are known by the title Wujing original: U kim; meaning the "Five Classics.", that is, the five volumes; and partly those called the Sishu original: Su xu; meaning the "Four Books.", or the Four-Fold Book. These are the four books we spoke of previously, the explanation of which we have translated into Latin. Furthermore, since these Four Books serve as commentaries on the Five Classics, although they are surpassed in authority and antiquity, they surpass them in practical use and utility. Now the first and most excellent among the five mentioned volumes is called the Shujing original: Xu kim; the "Classic of History" or "Book of Documents."; it consists of six books and encompasses the deeds of three great Kings: Yao, Shun, and Yu. Of these, Yu was the leader of the Xia original: Hia; the first traditional dynasty of Chinese historiography. family, the first of the Imperial families; the others were the Lawgivers and the true Solons original: Solones; the author compares the legendary sage-kings to Solon, the famous lawmaker of ancient Athens. of the Chinese nation.