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Shi Jing Introduction Table of content – The Book of Odes

The oldest collection of Chinese poetry, more than three hundred songs, odes and hymns. Tr. Legge (en) and Granet (fr, incomplete).

Section III — Greater odes of the kingdom
1 2 3
Chapter 1 — Decade of Wen Wang

235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244

Shijing III. 1. (240)

Pure and reverent was Da-ren,
The mother of king Wen ;
Loving was she to Zhou Jiang ; –
A wife becoming the House of Zhou.
Da-si inherited her excellent fame,
And from her came a hundred sons.

He conformed to the example of his ancestors,
And their Spirits had no occasion for complaint.
Their Spirits had no occasion for dissatisfaction,
And his example acted on his wife,
Extended to his brethren,
And was felt by all the clans and States.

Full of harmony was he in his palace ;
Full of reverence in the ancestral temple.
Out of sight he still felt as under inspection ;
Unweariedly he maintained [his virtue].

Though he could not prevent [some] great calamities,
His brightness and magnanimity were without stain.
Without previous instruction he did what was right ;
Without admonition, he went on [in the path of goodness].

So, grown up men became virtuous [through him],
And young men made [constant] attainments.
[Our] ancient prince never felt weariness,
And from him were the fame and eminence of his officers.

Legge 240

Shi Jing III. 1. (240) IntroductionTable of content
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The Book of Odes – Shi Jing III. 1. (240) – Chinese off/onFrançais/English
Alias Shijing, Shi Jing, Book of Odes, Book of Songs, Classic of Odes, Classic of Poetry, Livre des Odes, Canon des Poèmes.

The Book of Odes, The Analects, Great Learning, Doctrine of the Mean, Three-characters book, The Book of Changes, The Way and its Power, 300 Tang Poems, The Art of War, Thirty-Six Strategies
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