My son, if it be the wish of a ruler that you belong
to him, if you are entrusted with his closely guarded
seal, open his treasure house and enter it, for no one
but you may do it. Uncounted wealth you will find
inside, but do not covet any of that, nor set your
mind on a secret crime, for afterwards the matter
will be investigated and the secret crime which you
committed will be exposed.
Do not speak ill, speak only good. Do not say evil
things, speak well of people. He who speaks ill and says
evil—people will waylay him because of his debt to
Shamash. Do not talk too freely; watch what you say.
Do not express your innermost thoughts even when
you are alone. What you say in haste you may regret
later. Exert yourself to restrain your speech.
Worship your god every day. Sacrifi ce and pious
utterance are the proper accompaniment of incense.
Have a freewill off ering for your god, for this is proper
toward a god. Prayer, supplication, and prostration off er
him daily, then your prayer will be granted, and you will
be in harmony with god.From: Internet History Sourcebooks.
Available online. URL: http://www.
fordham.edu/halsall/.[A mother, Metrotimé, brings her truant son Cottalos to
his schoolmaster, Lampriscos, to receive a fl ogging.]
Metrotimé. Flog him Lampriscos, across the shoulders,
till his wicked soul is all but out of him. He’s spent my
all in playing odd and even; knucklebones are nothing
to him. Why, he hardly knows the door of the Letter
School. And yet the thirtieth comes round and I must
pay—tears no excuse.
His writing tablet, which I take the trouble to wax
anew each month, lies unregarded in the corner. If by
chance he deigns to touch it, he scowls like Hades and
then puts nothing right but smears it out and out. He
doesn’t know a letter till you scream it twenty times.
The other day his father made him spell “Maron”; the
rascal made it “Simon”: dolt I thought myself to send
him to a school! Ass-tending is his trade!—Another Herondas (Herodas): Th e Th ird Mime
excerpt, ca. third century b.c.e. Greece... Mang I asked what fi lial piety was. Th e Master said,
“It is not being disobedient.”
Soon after, as Fan Ch’ih was driving him, the
Master told him, saying, “Mang-sun asked me what
filial piety was, and I answered him, ‘not being
disobedient.’”
Fan Ch’ih said, “What did you mean?” Th e Master
replied, “Th at parents, when alive, be served according
to propriety; that, when dead, they should be buried
according to propriety; and that they should be
sacrifi ced to according to propriety.”
Mang Wu asked what fi lial piety was. Th e Master said,
“Parents are anxious lest their children should be sick.”
Tsze-y u asked what fi lial piety was. Th e Master said, “Th e
fi lial piety nowadays means the support of one’s parents.
But dogs and horses likewise are able to do something in
the way of support; without reverence, what is there to
distinguish the one support given from the other?”
Tsze-hsia asked what fi lial piety was. Th e Master said,
“Th e diffi culty is with the countenance. If, when their
elders have any troublesome aff airs, the young take
the toil of them, and if, when the young have wine and
food, they set them before their elders, is THIS to be
considered fi lial piety?”From: Th e Analects of Confucius,
translated by James Legge (Oxford, U.K:
Clarendon Press, 1893).Confucius: Analects, excerpt, ca. 479–221 b.c.e.
Asia and the Pacifi c(cont inued)children: primary source documents 199