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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 II — Minor odes of the kingdom
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Chapter 5 — Decade of Xiao Min

195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204

Shijing II. 5. (196)

Small is the cooing dove,
But it flies aloft up to heaven.
My heart is wounded with sorrow,
And I think of our forefathers.
When the dawn is breaking, and I cannot sleep,
The thoughts in my breast are of our parents.

Men who are grave and wise,
Though they drink, are mild and masters of themselves ;
But those who are benighted and ignorant,
Are devoted to drink, and more so daily.
Be careful, each of you, of your deportment ; –
What Heaven confers, [when once lost], is not regained.

In the midst of the plain there is pulse,
And the common people gather it.
The mulberry insect has young ones,
And the sphex carries them away.
Teach and train your sons,
And they will become good as you are.

Look at the wagtail,
Flying, and at the same time twittering.
My days are advancing ;
Your months are going on.
Rising early and going to sleep late,
Do not disgrace those who gave you birth.

The greenbeaks come and go,
Pecking up grain about the stack-yard.
Alas for the distressed and solitary,
Deemed fit inmates for the prisons !
With a handful of grain I go out and divine,
How I may be able to become good.

We must be mild, and humble,
As if we were perched on trees.
We must be anxious and careful,
As if we were on the brink of a valley.
We must be apprehensive and cautious,
As if we were treading upon thin ice.

Legge 196

Shi Jing II. 5. (196) IntroductionTable of content
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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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