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BOOK XXI. ki i
OR
THE MEANING OF SACRIFICES -.
Section I. 1. Sacrifices should not be frequently repeated. Such frequency is indicative of importunateness; and importunateness is inconsistent with reverence. Nor should they be at distant intervals. Such infrequency is indicative of indifference; and indifference leads to forgetting them altogether. Therefore the superior man, in harmony with the course of Heaven, offers the sacrifices of spring 2 and autumn. When he treads on the dew which has descended as hoar-frost he cannot help a feeling of sadness, which arises in his mind, and cannot be ascribed to the cold. In spring, when he treads on the ground, wet with the rains and dews that have fallen heavily, he cannot avoid being moved by a feeling as if he were seeing his departed friends. We meet the approach of our friends with music, and escort them away with sadness, and hence at the sacrifice in spring we use music, but not at the sacrifice in autumn.
2. The severest vigil and purification is maintained and carried on inwardly; while a looser vigil
1 See the introduction, vol. xxvii, pages 36, 37.
* The spring sacrifice is here called tí (s), probably by mistake for yo (1993), the proper name for it.
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