1. They pull the beans all o'er the ground, To place in baskets square, and round. So reap they what the fields produce, For present and for future use. When now themselves the princes show No stores have I gifts to bestow, Befitting their great worth. Yet a state carriage and its team Will well a feudal prince beseem;— Let such be all brought forth. And from the chambers let them bring The robes that princes wear. From duke to baron, I, the king, On them will these confer.

2. The water bubbles from the spring, And round it grows the cress. So when the princes see the king, Their coming they express In various ways. Now here I see Their flags, with dragon blazonry, All waving in the wind. The gentle tinkling of their bells Comes to my ear, and surely tells They in their chariots, grandly drawn By the four steeds of mighty brawn, Cannot be far behind.

3. The king soon gets a nearer view. The covers red he sees Upon their knees, of brilliant hue, And buskins 'neath the knees. A grave demeanor all display; The Son of Heaven approves. What to such princes can he say, Whose presence rapture moves? In admiration and delight, No grace can he withhold. To some he grants new honors bright, To some confirms the old.

4. The oaks their branches wide extend, With leaves thick covered o'er, Which thus the roots and trunk defend, And make them thrive the more. So do these princes service do, Throughout the land, while they pursue The charges to them given. The various regions well they guard, Nor think they any labor hard, To aid the Son of Heaven. All blessings on their heads collect. And now to court they've brought Their ministers who nought neglect, Strong both in act and thought.

5. The boat is by the rope held fast, Lest it should float away; So round the princes there is cast The king's protective stay. He looks on them with joy intense; He scans their merits to dispense His favors and rewards. He makes their happiness his charge; Their territories to enlarge, As duty he regards. To them it is a pleasure rare, A happy, joyous time, When from their states they here repair, To see his court sublime.

About this reader

What is Scripture?

Scripture is a browser-based reader for sixteen sacred texts spanning multiple religious and literary traditions. It provides chapter-by-chapter navigation, full-text search across all works, word concordance with frequency analysis, verse-linked notes, text-to-speech, and deep linking to any chapter or verse.

Traditions Represented

The collection spans Abrahamic, East Asian, Zoroastrian, Buddhist, and Nordic traditions. Christian texts include the King James Version Old and New Testaments (1611) and Apocrypha. The Quran uses Marmaduke Pickthall's 1930 English translation. Latter-day Saint scripture includes the Book of Mormon (1830), Doctrine and Covenants (1835), and Pearl of Great Price (1851).

Confucian works include James Legge's translations of The Four Books (1893) and the Book of Poetry (1876). The Tao Te Ching uses Legge's 1891 translation. The Kojiki uses Basil Hall Chamberlain's 1919 English translation. Zoroastrian texts include the Bundahishn (E. W. West, 1880) and the Arda Viraf (Haug & West, 1872). The Lotus Sutra uses Hendrik Kern's 1884 translation. The Finnish Kalevala uses John Martin Crawford's 1888 translation, and the Norse Poetic Edda uses Henry Adams Bellows' 1923 translation.

Public Domain Translations

Every translation in this collection is in the public domain. The most recent translation dates to 1930 (Pickthall's Quran). All texts are freely available for reading, study, quotation, and redistribution with no copyright restrictions.

Concordance and Related Passages

The concordance indexes every word across all sixteen works, showing frequency and distribution. TF-IDF (term frequency-inverse document frequency) scoring identifies passages with similar vocabulary across different traditions, enabling comparative study without requiring prior knowledge of each text's structure. TF-IDF weights words that are frequent in one chapter but rare across the corpus, surfacing meaningful thematic connections rather than common function words.

Deep Linking

Every chapter and verse has a permanent URL. Chapter links follow the pattern /scripture/{work}/{book}-{chapter} (e.g., /scripture/ot/gen-1 for Genesis 1). Verse links append the verse number (e.g., /scripture/ot/gen-1:26 for Genesis 1:26). These URLs can be shared, bookmarked, or cited directly.

Accessibility

Scripture supports keyboard navigation throughout: Tab moves between controls, Enter activates verse actions, and arrow keys navigate chapters. The reading pane has a skip-to-content link. All overlays (search, concordance) are focus-trapped ARIA dialogs. Dynamic content regions use aria-live for screen reader announcements. High-contrast mode is available via the theme toggle. Verse numbers are visible to assistive technology. No flashing content or motion hazards.

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