Book excerpt: Excerpt from The I-Li, Vol. 1: Or Book of Etiquette and Ceremonial The challenge thrown out by Dr. Legge in 1885 (vide L., Intro., p. 5, note 2), calling for a complete translation of the I-li, has not hitherto been responded to. Passages from the work have been reproduced, notably by Dr. De Groot in his monumental book on "The Religious System of China," but no one who had not a knowledge of Chinese character could read it as a whole. I have ventured here to present a complete translation of the I-li into English; annotating some of the parts which require elucidation; calling attention to parallel, and illustrative passages from other Chinese works; discussing the composition, age, and history of the transmission of it; and endeavouring to indicate its relation to the other two members of the Li group. No one had better right than Dr. Legge to call for workers in a territory through whose forests he had driven a royal road by his translation of the Li-chi. His introduction to that book leaves little to be done even upon the origins of the I-li. But there were points to be cleared up, facts to be correlated, and some mistakes in translation and annotation to be rectified, and this I have endeavoured to do in the interests of scholarship. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.