Luoyang

Graceful as a startled swan, supple as a swimming dragon. Radiant as autumn chrysanthemums, luxuriant as pines in spring. Floating like light clouds veiling the moon, drifting like swirling snow before the wind.

A noble man sets his resolve across the four seas; ten thousand li are still as next-door neighbors. If affection and love suffer no decline, distance only deepens closeness each day. Why must we share the same bed-canopy to express warmth? Snatched apart in haste, how could kindred hearts not ache with bitter grief?

Lofty and vaulted is the Bright Hall, opening against the sky. Its four gates open and ten thousand nations come; it examines auspicious signs and brings forward worthy men. Majestic, the imperial abode stands firm for a thousand ages!

How painful it is, the way custom changes men!

The shallow learning of a latecomer who prizes what the ear hears and slights what the eye sees!

In a single bath I wring out my hair three times, and at a single meal I spit out my food three times, rising to receive men of service, and even so I fear I may lose the worthy men of the realm.

This is the same person; when he is rich and noble his kin fear him, when he is poor and lowly they despise him; how much more so other people!

Shao did not answer; he laid his sword across his body, bowed with joined hands and left.

Xuanwang then pleaded illness to keep out of Shuang's way.

I would rather meet disaster than dare to deceive Heaven.

His punishments were cruel and excessive, the slightest grudge meant death, and none of the officials, within the court or outside it, could feel safe.

Are there no strong men in the realm but Lord Dong!

Lord Sima is a corpse with a breath left in it; body and spirit have already parted. He is not worth worrying about.

His hair reaches the ground and his hands hang below his knees; these are not the features of a subject.

When the realm fell into chaos and the people were starving to death, the emperor said: "Why don't they eat minced meat?"

The emperor clapped his hands and sighed: "How is it that there are no carriages at all?"

Now 'Guangling San' is lost for ever!

Oh, what a lovely young lady!

So we know that the realm does not exist to serve one man; rather one man exists to rule the realm.

In battle dress, whip in hand, he rode out; the ministers knocked their heads before his horse, begging him to halt the southern campaign, and the emperor stopped. So the plan to move the capital was settled.

He let his troops loose to kill, and princes, lords and officials submitted to slaughter with folded hands: more than thirteen hundred died.

This is as easy as turning over one's hand.

This was the beginning of monks in the land of Han.

When the world comes to its end, the kalpa fire burns through it: these are its ashes.

The water in the river flows to the east; in Luoyang there is a girl named Mochou

This is for the Dharma; why should one grudge one's life? If none of you will go, I will go myself.

When one is poor, even one's parents do not treat one as a son; when one is rich and noble, even one's kin are in awe.

Is not the turning point between security and danger a matter of planning?

The succession ordained by Heaven rests in your person; hold sincerely to the mean, and Heaven's blessings will last for ever

Quan is practised in fighting on water; the reason he dares to leave his ships and attack by land is to catch us unprepared.

Zhang Jue of Julu called himself 'Yellow Heaven'; his followers numbered three hundred and sixty thousand, all wearing yellow turbans, and they rebelled on the same day.

If you do not enter the tiger's lair, you cannot catch the tiger's cub.

Bu always rode a fine horse called Red Hare, which could gallop over walls and leap moats

I am by origin the Prince of Langye; gentlemen, if you keep pressing me...!

Wang and Ma share the realm.

This boy is beyond my power to fathom.

That barbarian boy just now — I can see from his voice and look that he has an uncommon ambition; I fear he will become a calamity for the realm.

I mourn Master Ji's eternal parting, as he looked at the sun's shadow and played his qin.

Not to shun difficulty in service and not to flee punishment for a crime is the duty of a subject.

The people of Zhou fled east, and its treasures, the Nine Tripods, entered Qin. Zhou was at an end.

Wherever Jun and Bin went, Wu crumbled like earth and shattered like tiles, and no one resisted.

If we now ride this momentum and strike straight at the Yuan capital, we can have it without a battle.

I have orders to give; will you obey them?

From then on she assisted in governing the state from within the palace for several decades, her power no different from the emperor's, and the two were known at the time as the 'Two Sages'.

I am rescuing the dynasty from danger and hastening to the aid of my sovereign and father. If the deed succeeds, the blessing goes to the dynasty; if it fails, I die for loyalty and filial piety.

Not one Guizhen, nor a hundred Guizhens, could lead me astray.

That day the emperor, with the princes, consorts and empress, several hundred riders in all, left the inner city by the Hanguang Hall and the Jinguang Gate and fled to Shannan.

I would rather go three days without food than one day without hunting.

In giving office I always choose for talent and conduct.

From then on he had the ambition to set the whole realm in order.