the pieces in the Songs of the Kingdom and Praise Songs found all
their proper place [5].' To the Yi-ching he devoted much study, and
Sze-ma Ch'ien says that the leather thongs by which the tablets
of his copy were bound together were thrice worn out. 'If some
years were added to my life,' he said, 'I would give fifty to the
study of the Yi, and then I might come to be without great faults
[6].' During this time also, we may suppose that he supplied Tsang
Shan with the materials of the classic of Filial Piety. The same
year that he returned, Chi Kang sent Yen Yu to ask his opinion
about an

1 ¤Õ¤å¤l, the same who is mentioned in the Analects, V. xiv.
2 See the ¥ª¶Ç, «s¤½¤Q¤@¦~.
3 Ana. II. iv. 6.
4 See the ¥v°O, ¤Õ¤l¥@®a, p. 12.
5 Ana. IX. xiv.
6 Ana. VII. xvi.


additional impost which he wished to lay upon the people, but
Confucius refused to give any reply, telling the disciple privately
his disapproval of the proposed measure. It was carried out,
however, in the following year, by the agency of Yen, on which
occasion, I suppose, it was that Confucius said to the other
disciples, 'He is no disciple of mine; my little children, beat the
drum and assail him [1].' The year B.C. 483 was marked by the
death of his son Li, which he seems to have borne with more
equanimity than he did that of his disciple Yen Hui, which some
writers assign to the following year, though I have already
mentioned it under the year B.C. 489.