Yìzhāi jí 易齋集
Collection of [the Studio of] Yì by 劉璟 (撰)
About the work
Yìzhāi jí 易齋集 in 2 juǎn (with 1-juǎn běnzhuàn) is the surviving fragment of the writings of Liú Jǐng 劉璟 (d. 1402), zì Zhòngjǐng 仲璟** (also recorded as Mèngguāng 孟光), second son of Liú Jī 劉基 (Chéngyìbó 誠意伯), native of Qīngtián 青田 (Wēnzhōu, Zhèjiāng). On Liú Jī’s death (Hóngwǔ yǐmǎo, 1375) the elder son Liú Liǎn 劉璉 was to inherit, but soon also died; in Hóngwǔ 23 (1390) Tàizǔ ordered Jǐng to inherit the patent of Chéngyìbó, but Jǐng yielded to his elder brother’s son Liú Zhì 廌, so the court created a new post of gémén shǐ 閤門使 for him. Soon promoted Gǔfǔ zuǒ zhǎngshǐ 谷王府左長史. When the Yān prince raised troops, Jǐng followed the Gǔ prince back to Nánjīng, was attached to Lǐ Jǐnglóng’s 李景隆 army staff, and after the defeat submitted memorials to the Jiànwén court that went unnoticed; he then returned to his native place. After Yǒnglè’s accession, Jǐng was summoned and pleaded illness; arrested and brought to Nánjīng, he hanged himself in prison. Posthumously canonized Zhōngjié 忠節 in Qiánlóng 41 (1776). The collection had long been lost; in late Míng Yáng Wéncōng 楊文驄, then Qīngtián zhīxiàn, recovered a manuscript copy from the brothers of zhūshēng Jiǎng Fānghuá 蔣芳華 and put it to the printing-blocks. Huáng Yújì 黃虞稷 (Qiānqǐngtáng shūmù 千頃堂書目) records Jǐng’s collection at 10 juǎn — so the present 2 juǎn are evidently incomplete; he also lists a Wúyǐn gǎo 無隱稿 in 1 juǎn, now lost.
Tiyao
Yìzhāi jí in 2 juǎn — by Liú Jǐng of the Míng. Jǐng, zì Zhòngjǐng, native of Qīngtián, second son of Chéngyìbó [Liú] Jī (劉基). In Hóngwǔ 23 (1390), Tàizǔ commanded him to inherit his father’s patent; he yielded to his elder brother’s son Zhì 廌; so [the court] specially created the post of gémén shǐ and conferred it on him. Soon [he was made] Gǔfǔ zuǒ zhǎngshǐ. When the Yānwáng raised troops, [Jǐng] followed the Gǔwáng back to the capital, and was ordered to take part in Lǐ Jǐnglóng’s military staff. After the defeat he submitted memorials [to the throne], which were not heeded; he then returned to his native place. When Chéngzǔ acceded, [the throne] summoned him; he claimed illness and did not come. Arrested and brought to the capital, [he was] put in prison and hanged himself. Qiánlóng 41 (1776), the imperial gift of the posthumous title Zhōngjié. The events are detailed in his biography in Míng shǐ (in the Liú Jī chapter). His surviving prose has long been lost. In the late Míng, Yáng Wéncōng 楊文驄, then magistrate of Qīngtián, obtained a manuscript copy from the zhūshēng Jiǎng Fānghuá 蔣芳華 brothers and put it to the printing-blocks. Huáng Yújì’s Qiānqǐngtáng shūmù records Jǐng’s collection at 10 juǎn; we suspect the present is not the complete recension. There is also a separate Wúyǐn gǎo in 1 juǎn, now lost — its identity-or-difference with the present text is also not [now] verifiable. Jǐng in his youth penetrated the various jīng (Classics), was kāngkǎi (high-feeling) and fond of military discussion. Tàizǔ Míng [Hóngwǔ] once said of him: “Truly the son of [Liú] Bówēn 伯溫.” But his poetry and prose are cūshuài (hasty-and-rough), considerably less than his father’s. Lú Tínggāng 盧廷綱 of Tiāntāi praised his poetry, saying: “Wine-drunk-then-brush-falls, the words become finer; the meaning’s design is not as ordinary men’s. Clear like jade-cup-and-jade-bowl-holding-thick-dew, harmonious like the great-court clear-temple ringing-silk-and-paulownia, swift like the Yellow River’s angry-wind rolling waves and surges, beautiful like the Jǐnjiāng’s autumn waters bathing lotus-flowers.” Zhū Yízūn 朱彝尊 thought such praise unavoidably exceeds the reality — this is fixed judgement. Yet his force is cāngjìng (deep-and-strong), upright-and-arrogant, not following the herd; still has one strain of the Líméi gōng jí (Liú Jī’s collection — Líméi gōng = Bówēn). And meeting the géchú (dynastic-replacement) hour, he kept to the end the integrity of a subject, treading righteousness and abandoning his life — he never bowed his ambition. Truly able not to drop the family voice. All the more should one weight him on account of the man. Compiled and presented respectfully in the tenth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief Compilers: Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. General Editor: Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
Liú Jǐng is the fifth Jiàn-wén-era loyalist consecutively catalogued in this division (KR4e0075–0079). He is the second son of the great Hóngwǔ statesman-strategist Liú Jī 劉基 (Chéngyìbó), best known to literary history as the author of Yùlí zǐ 郁離子 and the de-facto chief strategist of Hóngwǔ’s reunification. The biographical běnzhuàn tradition is preserved in Míng shǐ j. 128 (the Liú Jī chapter), not in the Jiàn-wén-martyrs chapter (j. 143). Birth date not in CBDB (cbdbId 34461 gives only d. 1402); the běnzhuàn records guàn (capping at 20) study of military strategy, èrshíbā (28) discipleship to Shílóu zǐ 石樓子, and Hóngwǔ-23 (1390) inheritance refusal — birth therefore must precede c. 1362 / 1365.
The transmission story is one of the more dramatic Sìkù-era recoveries: the entire collection was lost for two and a half centuries, and the present recension descends from the late-Míng (Tiānqǐ / Chóngzhēn era) recovery by Yáng Wéncōng 楊文驄 (the famous painter and Hóng-guāng-era NánMíng official, executed 1646) of a manuscript held privately in Qīngtián. Huáng Yújì’s Qiānqǐngtáng shūmù lists 10 juǎn against the WYG’s 2 juǎn: 80% of the original is no longer extant.
The Sìkù editors’ literary judgement — poetry and prose hasty-and-rough, considerably less than his father’s, with Zhū Yízūn’s 朱彝尊 caution that Lú Tínggāng’s extravagant praise unavoidably exceeds reality — is unusually candid. The defence rests on yǔ shí géchú zhī jì (meeting the géchú moment): the integrity-of-conduct argument that we have already seen for Chéng Tōng, Wáng Yuáncǎi, Zhōu Shìxiū, and Chéng Běnlì.
Translations and research
- L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang, eds., Dictionary of Ming Biography 1368–1644. New York: Columbia UP, 1976. Notice of Liú Jǐng under the Liú Jī biography.
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §28.4 (Míng bié-jí).
- Míng shǐ j. 128 (Liè-zhuàn 16) — Liú Jī biography, Liú Jǐng appended.
Other points of interest
The recovery agent Yáng Wéncōng 楊文驄 (1597–1646) is himself a famous figure — major painter of the late-Míng Sōngjiāng school, brother-in-law of Mǎ Shìyīng 馬士英, and NánMíng martyr — so the recovery is itself a piece of late-Míng / NánMíng cultural history: a NánMíng loyalist personally rescuing the lost work of an early-Míng loyalist.