Imperial Preface to the Pictures of Tilling and Weaving

I, the Emperor, have diligently and cautiously studied the principles of governance day and night. I have come to realize that for the sustenance of the people, food and clothing are of the utmost importance. This is the reason why works such as the "Odes of Bin" and "Against Luxurious Ease" These are classic texts from the Classic of Poetry and Classic of History that emphasize the hardships of farming and the dangers of laziness., as well as the Tang dynasty "Rhapsody on Sowing, Reaping, and Sericulture" original: Tianbao Jia Se Can Sang Fu, have been passed down to this day. Those who sought to strengthen the state through ancient codes and records studied these matters deeply. The governance of a nation must not be handled with negligence. Reflecting on the eras following the Three Dynasties The Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, considered the golden age of Chinese civilization., we can observe the traces of their history because the words of the edicts from the Western Capital Refers to the Western Han Dynasty (206 BCE – 9 CE) headquartered in Chang'an. were preserved. An ancient proverb says: "If one

man does not plow, someone may suffer from hunger; if one woman does not weave, someone may suffer from cold." This is the fundamental origin of food and clothing. It is also said: "When the elderly are provided with silk and the working people do not freeze, both the young and the old will reach a state of harmony." In ancient times, people abandoned secondary pursuits Refers to commerce or luxury trades. to focus on the fundamental work of the land. To uphold this, whenever I go on inspection tours to observe local customs, I inquire about the people’s contentment in their labor across both northern and southern territories. I gather information on the nature of the soil, the suitability of various seeds, and the differences in the timing of the seasons. I have brilliantly recorded these matters in the Hall of Linguistic Origins original: Yuyuantang, a hall in the Forbidden City or the Summer Palace used for study., inquiring into the essence of ancient strategies and remaining constantly attentive to the proper timing of the agricultural cycle.

Odes of Bin (豳風) — A section of the Classic of Poetry (Shijing) that describes the agricultural life and seasonal hardships of commoners in the ancient state of Bin.
Against Luxurious Ease (無逸) — A famous chapter from the Classic of History (Shujing) where the Duke of Zhou warns the King against falling into a life of leisure and forgetting the toil of the peasants.
Sowing and Reaping (稼穡) — A classical term (Jia Se) for the entirety of agricultural labor, specifically the planting and harvesting of grain.
Sericulture and Mulberry (蠶桑) — The process of raising silkworms (Can Sang) and growing mulberry trees to feed them, representing the production of clothing.
Fundamental and Secondary (本/末) — In Confucian economics, agriculture is the "fundamental" (ben) basis of the state, while commerce and crafts are "secondary" or "peripheral" (mo).