Shuǐxīn jí 水心集
The Shuǐ-xīn Collection by 葉適 (撰), 黎諒 (編)
About the work
Shuǐxīn jí 水心集 in 29 juǎn (the WYG; the SBCK Shuǐxīn xiānshēng wénjí is more capacious) is the biéjí of Yè Shì 葉適 (1150–1223, zì Zhèngzé 正則, hào Shuǐxīn 水心), of Yǒngjiā 永嘉 in Wēnzhōu (modern Zhèjiāng) — the principal mature exponent of the Yǒngjiā school of shìgōng (statecraft-utility) learning founded by Xuē Jìxuān 薛季宣 and Chén Fùliáng 陳傅良. Jìnshì 2nd-place of Chúnxī 5 (1178); held office to Bǎomógé dàizhì. The collection is principal source for late-Southern-Sòng anti-Hán Tuōzhòu and pro-recovery thought; edited by the Míng Jiājìng-era literatus Lí Liàng 黎諒 (the Wēnzhōu prefect who first cut the WYG-recension after the original Sòng cuts had become rare).
Tiyao
[The KR4d0273 source file is the SBCK recension which contains a series of late-Yuán prefaces (the Zhào Rǔdàng yuánxù and others) but not the standard Sìkù tíyào. The Sìkù tíyào (Zǒngmù j. 159) characterizes Yè Shì as the heir to Xuē Jìxuān and Chén Fùliáng in the Yǒngjiā shìgōng school, and notes that Yè’s mature thought in this collection — particularly his critique of xìngmìng zhī xué and his political memorials advocating military reform — are the canonical late-Southern-Sòng shìgōng position.]
Abstract
Shuǐxīn jí is the principal textual record of mature Yǒngjiā thought. Yè Shì developed the shìgōng learning into a comprehensive program of state-building philosophy, integrating institutional history, military reform, fiscal policy, and a critique of xīngmìng (nature-and-mandate) speculation that he saw as an unproductive distraction. The collection’s structure (per the SBCK zǒngmù): zòuzhā 1 juǎn, zhuàngbiǎo 1 juǎn, zòuyì 3 juǎn, shī 3 juǎn, jì 3 juǎn, xù 1 juǎn, mùmíng 13 juǎn, xíngzhuàng / shìyì / qīngcí / shūwén 1 juǎn, jìwén 1 juǎn, shūqǐ 1 juǎn, zázhù 1 juǎn. The dominance of mùmíng (13 juǎn) reflects Yè’s role as the principal eulogist of late-Southern-Sòng administrative officials.
The political-substance of the collection: Yè’s memorial Lùn Héwén (against the renewed Héyì with the Jīn) and his frontier-defense memorials (advocating fùbīng — return-to-soldiers — institutional reform, the establishment of permanent military commands at Jīnghú and Sìchuān, and the revival of túntián military farms) make Yè the central late-Southern-Sòng anti-appeasement strategic voice — distinct from Xīn Qìjí’s poetic anti-appeasement and Lù Yóu’s Jiànnán-poetry anti-appeasement, Yè’s was institutional and policy-oriented. Yè was demoted alongside Hán Tuōzhòu after the failed 1206 Kāixǐ běifá (Northern Expedition) — though he had advised against the timing — and spent his final years at Wēnzhōu writing the Xíxué jìyán 習學記言 (separately cataloged).
The dating bracket: 1182 (around the start of Yè’s substantive composition, his early Tàixué lectures) through 1223 (his death year per CBDB id 10749).
Translations and research
- Lo, Winston W. 1974. The Life and Thought of Yeh Shih. Hong Kong / Florida State. The standard English-language monograph.
- Niu Pu. 1998. “Confucian Statecraft in Song China: Ye Shi and the Yongjia School.” Ph.D., Princeton.
- Tillman, Hoyt Cleveland. 1992. Confucian Discourse and Chu Hsi’s Ascendancy. Hawai’i. Treats Yè Shì as principal alternative to Zhū Xī.
- 周夢江. 1992. 《葉適與永嘉學派》. Zhejiang Guji.
- 鄧廣銘. 1948. 《陳龍川傳》. Treats Yè in relation to Chén Liàng’s Yǒng-kāng school.
- *葉適集》. Beijing: Zhōnghuá shū-jú, 1961 (ed. 劉公純 et al.). Standard 3-vol. critical edition.
Other points of interest
The Yǒngjiā school (Xuē Jìxuān → Chén Fùliáng → Yè Shì) constitutes one of the three principal Southern-Sòng intellectual traditions alongside lǐxué (Zhū Xī) and xīnxué (Lù Jiǔyuān). Yè Shì’s mature work in this collection is the canonical shìgōng textual statement, and the collection is required reading for any account of Sòng intellectual diversity.