The sacrifices to heaven and earth; the services of the ancestral temple; the courses for father and son; and the righteousness between ruler and minister:—these are to be judged of as natural duties.
The services at the altars of the land and grain and of the hills and streams; and the sacrifices to spirits:—these are to be judged of by the material substance of the offerings. The use of the funeral rites and sacrifices; and the reciprocities of host and guest:—these are to be judged of by their appropriateness to circumstances.
Sacrificing with a lamb and a sucking pig, by the multitude of officers, when yet there was enough; and sacrificing with an ox, a ram, and a boar, when yet there was nothing to spare:—in these we have an instance of the proportioning.
6. The princes set great store by the tortoise, and consider their jade-tokens as the insignia of their rank, while the (chiefs of) clans have not the tortoises that are so precious, nor the jade-tokens to keep (by themselves), nor the towered gateways:—these (also) are instances of the proportioning.
7. In some ceremonial usages the multitude of things formed the mark of distinction. The son of Heaven had 7 shrines in his ancestral temple; the prince of a state, 5; Great officers, 3; and other officers, 1. The dishes of the son of Heaven on stands were 26; of a duke, 16; of another prince, 12; of a Great officer of the upper class, 8; of one of the lower class, 6. To a prince there were given 7 attendants and 7 oxen; and to a Great officer, 5 of each. The son of Heaven sat on 5 mats placed over one another; a prince, on 3; and a Great officer,
