Chuang Ts'Un-Yü and Han Learning

Lü Ching-nan's collection of essays on Ch'ang-chou classical masters, which we cited earlier, emphasized the local development of Han Learning. He conferred special honors on Tsang Lin and Yang Ch'un (whose Han Learning positions we detailed above) in addition to Chuang Ts'un-yü and his nephew Chuang Shu-tsu. Chang Hui-yen and Liu Feng-lu were also singled out. The role of Han Learning in the evolution of New Text studies becomes still clearer in light of the 1754 palace examination. Chuang Ts'un-yü's younger brother P'ei-yin

[40] Chang Hui-yen, Chou-i Y ü -shih hsiao-hsi , 3.9b, in Chang Kao-wen ch'ien-i ch'üan-chi and Liu Feng-lu's "Chi" (Inscription) for Chang Hui-Yen, Yü-shih i-yen , in Chang Kao-wen ch'ien-i ch'üan-chi . See also Ch'en Shan, "Hou-hsu" (Afterword).

[41] P'i-ling Chuang-shih tseng-hsiu tsu-p'u (1935), 3.20b-21b, includes Chang Hui-yen's epitaph for Chuang Hsiang-heng (d. 1792), in the second branch of the Chuangs. See also P'i-ling , 13.23a-23b, for Yun Ching's epitaph for Chuang Chün-chia (d. 1783), which describes Chang Hui-yen's close relations with the deceased, and Chang Hui-yen's Ming-k'o wen ssu-pien, erh-pien , B.37, for Chang's correspondence with Chuang Shu-tsu, Chuang Ts'un-yü's nephew. The letter notes the close relationship between Chuang's son and his own.

achieved optimus that year, and among his co-examinees were three of the future leading Han Learning scholars of the Ch'ien-lung era: Ch'ien Ta-hsin, Wang Ming-sheng, and Wang Ch'ang.

As New Text scholars from Ch'ang-chou slowly but surely legitimated their positions in the Han Learning movement, Old Text scholars in Su-chou and Yang-chou were forced to come to grips with the complexity of Han Confucianism. Although loyal to the Yang-chou Han Learning tradition, Juan Yuan saw to it while governor-general in Kuang-chou that the most important writings of the Ch'ang-chou New Text scholars were included alongside those of established Old Text scholars in the Ch'ing Exegesis of the Classics (Huang-Ch'ing ching-chieh ), for example. A large compendium of the best Ch'ing dynasty classical studies, issued in 1829 after four years of compiling and edit-lng at the Hsueh-hai-t'ang Academy, this Confucian collectanea was designed as a comprehensive sourcebook of contemporary k'ao-cheng scholarship. We can therefore conclude that Juan and his Han Learning associates regarded the Ch'ang-chou New Text scholars as part of the Han Learning movement. Differences between New Text Confucianism of the Former Han and Old Text learning of the Later Han dynasties, however, could no longer be glossed over by an appeal to the unanimity of Hah Learning.^[42]

Chuang's own writings on the Change, Rituals of Chou, and Spring and Autumn Annals reveal, however, that despite the inroads Han Learning had made in Ch'ang-chou in the eighteenth century, the Chuang lineage was preserving its own traditions. Although Chuang Ts'un-yü could remain aloof from the more radical implications of k'ao-cheng scholarship, his own position on the Kung-yang Commentary revealed that even he was pursuing Han Learning.

In chapter 3 we describe how Chuang resisted efforts to dislodge the Old Text portion of the Documents from the examination system. To circumvent this perceived threat to classical orthodoxy, Chuang refused to fuel the controversy. We therefore find the patriarch of the Ch'ang-chou New Text school defending an Old Text-based examination curricula. In his own studies, entitled Shang-shu chi-chien (Appearance [of the Sages] in the Documents ) and Shang-shu shuo (Talks on the Documents ), Ts'un-yü stressed the "meanings and principles" in both portions of the Documents. In other words, he tried to redirect the Han

[42] Hsueh-hai-t'ang chih, p. 28b. Cf. my "Hsueh-hai T'ang," pp. 62-63.

Learning threat by seeking out areas of agreement between Han and Sung Learning.^[43]

In his scholarly pursuits, Chuang Ts'un-yü was concerned with "meanings and principles" (i-li ) in classical texts. The Sung Learning flavor of Chuang's scholarship seemed for most of the late eighteenth century to be out of touch with the empirical mood of k'ao-cheng studies that were pervading academic circles in the Lower Yangtze. Accordingly, outside of Ch'ang-chou, Chuang was virtually unknown as a classicist. Only when Chuang's grandson Liu Feng-lu published his own classical studies, which Liu said were inspired by his grandfather, did the Lower Yangtze academic world take note of Ts'un-yü's scholarship.^[44]

Belated Scholarly Recognition

Forty years after Chuang's death another grandson, Chuang Shou-chia, was able to publish Chuang Ts'un-yü's studies on the Change Classic. They appeared in the 1828 publication of Chuang's collected writings in Kuang-chou under the title Wei-ching-chai i-shu (Bequeathed writings from the Studio of Appealing Classics), sponsored by then Governor-General Juan Yuan.

Liu Feng-lu and Chuang Shou-chia had hoped that their grandfather's writings would be included in the Ch'ing Exegesis of the Classics, which was then being compiled by Juan Yuan's staff at the Hsueh-hai-t'ang Academy in Kuang-chou. Though impressed enough with Chuang Ts'un-yü's general scholarship to publish his writings separately, Juan Yuan found those essays on the Change Classic in particular inappropriate for inclusion in a collectanea dedicated to the greatest Han Learning scholars of the Ch'ing period. Interestingly, Juan did include a work of Chuang's entitled the Ch'un-ch'iu cheng-tz'u (Correcting terms in the Spring and Autumn Annals ).^[45]

In his preface for Chuang Ts'un-yü's collected writings, Juan Yuan noted that he himself had studied under a disciple of Chuang's, who had passed his chin-shih examination in Peking in 1771 when Chuang

[43] See Chuang Shou-chia, "Shang-shu chi-chien pa," pp. 34a-35b.

[44] Elman, Philosophy to Philology , pp. 99-100.

[45] Sato^[*] , "Shincho^[*]   Kuyogakuha^[*] ko^[*]   (jo^[*] )," pp. 20-25. See also Juan Yuan's "Hsu" (Preface) to Chuang Ts'un-yü, Wei-ching-chai i-shu , and my "Hsueh-hai T'ang," pp. 62-64. Juan Yuan learned of Ts'un-yü through Chuang Shu-tsu, Liu Feng-lu, and Sung Hsiang-feng.

Ts'un-yü was one of the examiners. Despite Juan's exclusion of Ts'unyü's studies on the I-ching in the Ch'ing Exegesis, he nonetheless expressed appreciation for Chuang's efforts to avoid the partisan controversy over Han Learning vs. Sung Learning and to select the "esoteric words and great principles" of the Classics. In conversations with Juan Yuan, the examiner Li Ch'ing-ch'uan presented Chuang's scholarship as a major step forward, beyond the limitations of partisan scholarship: "[Chuang Ts'un-yü] did not specifically focus on studies of Han or Sung scholia. Instead, he alone got at the esoteric words and great principles of the sages, which were outside of the [scope of] words and graphs. This endeavor made him a great Confucian of our enlightened age."^[46]

Chuang Ts'un-yü's efforts to cut through the knot of debate that separated Hah from Sung Learning scholarship in the late eighteenth century was also noted by Li Chao-lo. In a biography for Chuang Shou-chia, Li described how the Chuang school of learning (chia-hsueh ) in Ch'ang-chou had prided itself on its classical agenda: "[The Chuangs] did not distinguish Han from Sung [Learning]. They sought to encompass the sage's profundity and return to the most appropriate [teachings]."^[47]

The Gulf Between Officials and Scholars

In his 1828 preface to Chuang Ts'un-yü's I-hsueh, Tung Shih-hsi, a

follower of I-ching studies championed in Ch'ang-chou by the Hah Learning scholar Chang Hui-yen, perceptively observed:

The present dynasty surpasses the Sung, Yuan, and Ming in classical studies not in quantity but in quality. During the Ch'ien-lung Emperor's reign, Hui Tung and Chang Hui-yen [surpassed their predecessors] through their writings on the Change . Sun Hsing-yen did so on the Documents. On the Poetry [Classic] , it was Tai Chen. On the Record of Rites , Chiang Yung and Chin Pang excelled. On the Spring and Autumn Annals , we have K'ung Kuang-sen. In philology [hsiao-hsueh ], Tai Chen, Tuan Yü-ts'ai, and Wang Nien-sun all brilliantly wrote books [on the subject] in this single period.

Their contemporary, Mr. Chuang [Ts'un-yü], because he served as under secretary in the imperial court, had not been able to make his views on classical studies known in a hook. Moreover, he did not publish anything in his lifetime. His contemporaries thus had never heard of him.^[48]

[46] Juan Yuan, "Hsu" to Chuang, p. 1a.

[47] Li Chao-lo, Yang-i-chai wen-chi, 12.31b-33b.

[48] Tung Shih-hsi, "I-shuo hsu," vol. 1, pp. 3a-3b. For Tung's link to Chang Hui yen see Tung's Ch'i-wu-lun-chai wen-lu , 1.5b-7a, and the "Chia-p'u" (Genealogy) of the Tung family, pp. 22a-22b, in Tung Shih-hsi, Ch'i-wu-lun-chai chi .

Tung Shih-hsi's preface explained the gulf between Chuang Ts'un-yü and the k'ao-cheng mainstream. His account also suggests the chasm that separated officials and Han Learning scholars in late imperial China.

Han Learning was a scholarly movement that was largely outside examination studies until the nineteenth century. Frequently insulated from directly holding office, Han Learning scholars attained and maintained their positions within the Lower Yangtze academic community by virtue of the protection and patronage of broader elite segments of Confucian officialdom persuaded of the special value of their philological studies. The Chuang lineage in general, and Chuang Ts'un-yü in particular, were part of the traditional Confucian pattern. During Chuang's lifetime, his reputation rested on his proximity to imperial power in Peking. His own students were better known in the Lower Yangtze academic world.^[49]

For example, K'ung Kuang-sen, a descendant of Confucius, had studied under Chuang Ts'un-yü before studying with Tai Chen. As Tung Shih-hsi explained above, K'ung was recognized during the eighteenth century for his important contributions to the study of the Spring and Autumn Annals, not Chuang Ts'un-yü. K'ung Kuang-sen's Kung-yang Ch'un-ch'iu ching-chuan t'ung-i (Penetrating the meanings in the Kung-yang commentary on the Spring and Autumn Annals Classic) was considered the premier work in its field. It was not until much later that anyone recognized that Chuang had cut through the philological minutiae to elaborate on broader theoretical issues in Classics such as the Change, Rituals of Chou, and the Spring and Autumn Annals. K'ung's renown demonstrates how marginal Chuang Ts'un-yü's classical writings were in the late eighteenth century.^[50]