Text of Confucianism Part 01

SR No.: 007675
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: James Legge
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1879
Total Pages: 2829
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 50 MB

Page 1371

288
THE LÎ xi.
BK. IV.
decaying and old; give them stools and staves, and distribute supplies of congee for food.
7. Orders are given to the superintendent of robes to have ready the upper and lower dresses with their various ornaments. For the figures and embroidery on them there are fixed patterns. Their size, length, and dimensions must all be according to the old examples. For the caps and girdles (also) there are regular rules.
8. Orders are given to the proper officers to revise with strict accuracy (the laws about) the various punishments. Beheading and (the other) capital executions must be according to (the crimes) without excess or defect. Excess or defect out of such proportion will bring on itself the judgment (of Heaven).
9. In this month orders are given to the officers of slaughter and prayer to go round among the victims for sacrifice, seeing that they are entire and complete, examining their fodder and grain, inspecting their condition as fat or thin, and judging of their looks. They must arrange them according to their classes. In measuring their size, and looking at the length (of their horns), they must have them according to the assigned) measures. When all these points are as they ought to be, God will accept the sacrifices?
10. The son of Heaven performs the ceremonies against pestilence, to secure development for the (healthy) airs of autumn.
11. He eats the hemp-seed (which is now pre
? Kang says here: 'And if God accept them, of course there is no other spirit that will not do so.'
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