The Chinese Classics, vol. 1: Confucian Analects

James Legge's nineteenth-century translation of the Confucian Analects is a primary-text translation made directly from the classical Chinese rather than through an intermediate language, and it remained the standard English rendering for a century after its 1861 publication, which is why later editions and citations still commonly follow his book-and-chapter division. This record states an honest technical limit: the online text used here prints the translation as running prose without marked book-and-chapter numerals, so a citation follows Legge's own standard printed division rather than a marking visible in the source file itself, a transcription detail recorded rather than left silent. Being a nineteenth-century translation is why this record holds it at the tier for a reputable period rendering rather than the top current scholarly tier. Use it for the wording of a specific passage of the Analects; a claim resting on a contested modern reading needs a more current translation alongside it.