Zhì yí 識遺
Recording What Has Been Lost
by 羅璧 (Luó Bì, zì Zǐcāng 子蒼, hào Mògēng 嘿耕 “Silent Tiller,” 1244–1309; of Xīn’ān 新安)
About the work
A late Sòng / early Yuán evidential bǐjì in 10 juan, the work of a Cheng-Zhu adherent who nonetheless preferred citation-based historical-philological argument to xìngmìng (nature-and-destiny) metaphysical speculation. The Sìkù editors place it in the Zákǎo zhī shǔ of the Zájiā division and rate it well above the casual xiǎoshuō genre: “in Sòng-era miscellaneous writings, it can still be called speaking from a foundation.” The book is dated to the post-conquest period from an internal anchor: the chapter on qián dìng 前定 (preordained matters) cites the Chén Tuán 陳摶 prophecy that “fifteen years after the fifth gēngshēn, the dynastic fate is transferred” — a reference to the actual Sòng fall in Bǐngzǐ 1276 (15 years after the gēngshēn of 1260, Lǐzōng’s Jǐngdìng 1).
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Zhì yí in ten juan was compiled by Luó Bì of the Sòng. Bì’s zì was Zǐcāng, his hào Mògēng. He was a Xīn’ān man. The Sòng shǐ has no biography of him, and his era cannot be known. According to the Qiándìng (preordained matters) chapter of the book, citing Chén Tuán’s prophecy that “five-watch cold lies at the head of the fifth gēngshēn, and the fate transfers fifteen years later,” he must have compiled the book after the fall of Sòng. He appears to have venerated the learning of ChéngZhū: he says that “Sòng-era wénzhāng is pure and emerges from the YīLuò schools, illuminating KǒngMèng — so that Ōuyáng [Xiū] and Sū [Shì] feel breathless beside them”; and again, “the dào of the master [Kǒngzǐ] reaches its summa in Huìwēng [Zhū Xī]; the canonical commentaries of all the schools come, only through Huìwēng’s adjudication, to a single right reading.” His basic position is clear. Yet what he expounds is for the most part citation of the classics, narration of history, and collation of variants — he refuses the empty speculations of xìngmìng — and his arguments are accordingly often deep and substantial.
Among them, his discussion of the yǎng lǎo 養老 (care of the aged) ritual — flatly dismissing the Lǐjì passages “tǎn ér gē shēng, zhí jiàng ér kuì, zhí jué ér yìn” (baring the arms to slice the sacrificial victim, holding the sauce-vessel to offer, holding the libation-cup to feed back) as “alleyway-tales of no foundation” — is unsupported by evidence. His claim that Bān Gù’s history derives from Liú Xīn, citing the colophon of Gě Hóng’s 葛洪 Xījīng zájì 西京雜記 as proof — fails to recognize that Gě’s colophon merely asserts Liú Zǐjùn had “Hànshū in one hundred juan,” with no corroborating evidence in the Liú Xīn běnzhuàn 劉歆本傳. Bì credulously trusted a spurious source — a failure of editorial judgment. But his other patient cross-collations are abundant in evidence and consistently exercise sound judgment. Beyond the entry on the dates of Kǒngzǐ’s birth and death which Qián Zēng’s 錢曾 Dúshū mǐnqiú jì 讀書敏求記 had already picked out, he holds up in Sòng-era miscellaneous works as one of those few who can be called speaking from a foundation.
Respectfully revised and submitted, eighth month of the forty-second year of Qiánlóng [1777].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Luó Bì 羅璧 (1244–1309; CBDB id 112837), zì Zǐcāng 子蒼, hào Mògēng 嘿耕 (“Silent Tiller”), of Xīn’ān 新安 (modern Huīzhōu, Anhui), was a Sòng yímín — a loyalist who survived into the Yuán without serving — and a private Lǐxué scholar broadly in the Zhū Xī tradition. The Sòng shǐ carries no biography; he is reconstructed entirely from internal evidence in the Zhì yí itself and from later genealogical and gazetteer records (CBDB gives flourished-dates 1270–1299 in addition to the lifedates 1244–1309). The hào Mògēng captures the yímín posture: the silent farmer who declines public office under the new dynasty.
The Zhì yí (literally “Recording the Lost”) is a ten-juan evidential miscellany. Its method is broad-tradition kǎozhèng — citation of the classics, the histories, and earlier bǐjì, with attention to chronological detail and institutional precedent. The Sìkù editors’ overall verdict is approving, with two flagged errors: a hasty dismissal of Lǐjì ritual passages and an uncritical use of Gě Hóng’s Xījīng zájì colophon to argue for the priority of Liú Xīn over Bān Gù. The work is also notable for its self-conscious refusal of metaphysical speculation despite the author’s Cheng-Zhu adherence — Luó Bì cites Zhū Xī as the jí dàchéng 集大成 of the dào, but the body of his work is overwhelmingly empirical-philological rather than expositions of Lǐxué doctrine.
Dating. The work cannot have been completed before 1276 (the qiándìng chapter’s reference to the Chén Tuán prophecy fulfilled by the Sòng fall) and was certainly complete by Luó Bì’s death in 1309. The notBefore/notAfter bracket here brackets these anchors.
Catalogued in Sòng shǐ Yìwén zhì and subsequent compilations; the Sìkù received text is the standard reference. Qián Zēng’s Dúshū mǐnqiú jì 讀書敏求記 of the early Qīng is the first widely-known notice of the work outside of the Sìkù tradition.
Translations and research
No substantial Western-language secondary literature located. The work is intermittently cited in Chinese-language scholarship on Sòng-Yuán transitional intellectual history and on the yí-mín phenomenon. The standard punctuated edition is in Zhū Yìxuán 朱易安 et al. (eds.), Quán Sòng bǐjì 全宋筆記, ser. 7 (Dàxiàng chūbǎnshè, 2017).
Other points of interest
Luó Bì is one of relatively few private yímín scholars whose bǐjì survives substantially intact and made it into the SKQS. The work’s chronological-prophetic dating-by-Chén-Tuán is unusual and was treated approvingly by the early Qīng evidential scholar Qián Zēng (also a Sòng-style yímín sympathizer) as an instance of evidential-numerological writing.
Links
- Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào 四庫全書總目提要, Zǐbù · Zájiā lèi 2 · Zákǎo zhī shǔ, Zhì yí entry.
- CBDB id 112837 (Luó Bì, 1244–1309).