to write all charges of the king, and to do so in duplicate.' Of the duties of the Recorder of the Exterior it is said:—'He has charge of the histories of the states in all parts of the kingdom;' 'He has charge of the most ancient books;' 'It is his business to publish in all parts of the kingdom the books and the characters in them[1].’
These entries show that under the Kâu dynasty there was provision made for the recording and preservation of royal charges and ordinances, of the operations of the general government, and of the histories of the different states; and, moreover, for the preservation and interpretation of documents come down from more ancient times. Confucius himself tells us that in his early days a recorder would leave a blank in his text, rather than enter anything of which he had not sufficient evidence[2]. Mencius also mentions three works, the Shăng of Kin, the Thâo-wû of Khû, and the Khun Khiû of Lû, which must have come from the recorders of those states.
Of the existence of a similar class of officers under the previous dynasties of Shang or Yin (B.C. 1766–1123) and Hsiâ (B.C. 2205–1765), we have not such abundant evidence. Chapter 2 in the 10th Book of the 5th Part of our classic, however, seems to speak of them in the time of the former. Wû-ting (B.C. 1324–1264), the twentieth sovereign of it, is described as communicating, in writing, a dream which he had had, to his ministers[3]; and fully four hundred years earlier, Î Yin, the chief minister, remonstrates, in writing, with his young and careless sovereign Thâi Kiâ[4]. Going back to the dynasty of Hsiâ, we find the prince of Yin, during the reign of Kung Khang (B.C. 2159–2145), in addressing his troops, quotes the Statutes of Government in a manner which makes us conceive of him as referring to a well-known written compilation[5]. The grandsons of the great Yü, its founder (B.C. 2205–2196), likewise, make mention, in the Songs of the Five Sons, of his Lessons, in a style that suggests to us the formula that Mencius was- ↑ See for all these statements the Ritual or Official Book of Kâu, XXXI, 35–42.
- ↑ Analects, XV, xxv.
- ↑ Part IV, viii, section 1.
- ↑ Part IV, v, section 1.
- ↑ Part III, iv.
