廬山記 3.4

3.4

廬山豈獨水石能冠天下。由代有高賢隱居以傳。東林寺舊有十八賢傳。不知何人所作。文字淺近。以事驗諸前史。往往乖謬。讀者陋之。使古人風跡用無知者。惜哉。予既作山記。乃因舊本參質晉宋史及高僧傳。粗加刊正。或舊所脫略。今無有可考。亦未如之何也。

How could Mount Lu surpass the whole world merely on account of its waters and crags? It is because through the generations there have been lofty worthies living in seclusion here, by whom it has been transmitted. Donglin Temple formerly had Biographies of the Eighteen Worthies; it is not known who wrote it. The wording was shallow and pedestrian, and when its accounts were verified against previous histories, they were frequently erroneous, causing readers to disesteem it, so that the noble traces of the ancients were left unknown. What a pity! Having written this Mountain Record, I have accordingly used the old text, compared and verified it against the histories of Jin and Song as well as the Biographies of Eminent Monks, and roughly corrected and emended it. Where the old text had omissions and lacunae and there is now no evidence to be investigated, nothing could be done about it.