Since youth, I have been fond of music. As I grew older, I came to appreciate it. I have always thought that all things flourish and decline, yet only music does not change. With all types of flavors, one could grow surfeited; but with music, one never tires of it. It can guide and nurture one’s pneuma and vital breath, express and harmonize one’s feeling and intent. For living in adversity and solitude yet without feeling melancholy, nothing comes close to the comfort that music offers. Therefore, if playing again an instrument is not sufficient, then one may sing and chant so as to release one’s intention. If singing and chanting are not sufficient, then one may entrust to words so as to extend one’s thoughts. Men of talent throughout the ages have com- posed rhapsodies and hymns about the instruments of eight types of sounds and the various forms of song and dance.1 However, in their form and style, all imitate each another. When they extol the mate- rial of an instrument, they regard as superior a lofty and perilous source. When they describe its sounds, they emphasize sorrow and mournfulness. When they praise its power to stir and transform, they value the most the tears that it makes them shed. Those compositions may be beautiful as far as beauty goes, but they do not fully exhaust the principle of the subject. If one were to infer the reason for this, it would seem that these men have never understood music. Looking at the purport of their works, they also have not penetrated the essence of rites and music. Of all musical instruments, the virtue of the zither is the greatest. Thus, to recount my feelings on this, I have composed a rhapsody. Its lyrics read: (Owen & Swartz 2017 p359