Collection of Dongli Essays

Author: (Ming) Yang Shiqi / Liu Bohan / Zhu Haidian, edited by
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2005-03-01
Features: The Twenty-Five Volumes of Dongli Collection, the Three Records of Dongli Separate Collection (Imperial Edicts, Responses, and Representations), compiled by Yang Shiqi of the Ming Dynasty. Yang Shiqi, styled Yu, styled Guxuan, and known by his courtesy name, was a native of Taihe, Jiangxi. He was born in the twenty-fifth year of the Zhiheng era of the Yuan Dynasty (1365 AD) and died in the ninth year of the Tongzhi era of the Ming Dynasty (1444 AD). Poor in family background but diligent in studies, he served as a tutor in various parts of Hubei during his youth. In the early years of the Jianwen era, he was recommended for his historical talent to join the Hanlin Academy as a compiler, where he helped revise the Annals of the Taizu Emperor. During the Yongle era, he became a scholar of the Grand Secretariat and participated in state affairs. When the Yongle Emperor went north, he was often left behind to assist the crown prince. After the enthronement of the Renzong Emperor, Yang Shiqi, as a former courtier of the crown prince, was promoted to Grand Secretary of the Grand Secretariat and Minister of War, becoming the chief minister. During the reigns of the Renzong and Xuanzong emperors and the early years of the Yingzong Emperor, he earned great trust from the court and served as the chief minister for over thirty years. As he often assisted in state affairs alongside Yang Rong and Yang Pu, the three were historically referred to as the "Three Yangs." He was known as "Western Yang" because his residence was located westward. During his tenure as chief minister, he paid great attention to stabilizing the frontier, reducing taxes and corvée, comforting displaced people, relieving disaster victims, economizing on fiscal expenditures, and rectifying local official misconduct, among other areas, and made significant contributions. He also focused on selecting talents, and figures such as Yu Qian, Zhou Chen, and Kuang Zhong were among those he recommended. At that time, due to the long-term governance of the "Three Yangs," their outstanding achievements elevated the status of Grand Secretariat officials in the Ming Dynasty. However, after the fifth year of the Tongzhi era (1440 AD), when the eunuch Wang Zhen usurped power, Yang Shiqi, being advanced in age, was no longer able to suppress corruption. Additionally, his son Yang Ji was arrested and punished for killing and seizing property in Taihe, causing suffering in the local community. In his later years, he died of illness in this difficult situation, aged eighty. In the early Ming literary scene, Yang Shiqi was a highly influential figure. He inherited the classical prose of the Tang and Song dynasties, studying the style of Ouyang Xiu, and was said to have "captured the essence of his style." Therefore, Zheng Yuan, in his "Discussions on the Miscellaneous Sayings of Zheng Yuan Well," praised his prose as "conventional and free from superficiality." His recorded narratives were "stable and effortless" (as noted in the General Catalogue of the Siku Quanshu). The style of the Grand Secretariat scholars in the Hanlin Academy followed his literary form, giving rise to the "Taihao style," and thus he was regarded as its founder. Later, the Taihao style evolved into a formalistic literary form, which cannot be entirely attributed to Yang Shiqi. The "Brief Catalogue of the Siku Quanshu" comments on this: "The prose and poetry of Yang Shiqi were the foundation of the Taihao style in the Ming Dynasty, but its later decline became increasingly decadent, leading to a bloated and monotonous literary scene, earning it a bad reputation. However, Yang Shiqi's works had their own merits and should not be unfairly criticized like Li Si and Xun Qing." Li Mengyang's poem states: "The style of the Xuan era was profound and grand, the treasures of Dongli in the imperial court." Even the "Seven Masters" did not disdain him. This evaluation of Yang Shiqi's literary achievements is relatively fair and objective. Yang Shiqi was a prolific author. The General Catalogue of the Siku Quanshu records: The Ninety-Seven Volumes of Dongli Collection, Four Volumes of Separate Collection, Four Volumes of the Wenyuan Pavilion Catalogue, and Three Hundred and Fifty Volumes of the Declarations of Famous Officials of Past Dynasties (compiled with Huang Huai and others). Before his death, Yang Shiqi personally selected his own prose and poetry, which were compiled by his son Yang Dao into the Twenty-Five Volumes of Dongli Collection, along with the Imperial Edicts Record, Responses Record, and Representations Record. The collection includes a preface written by Huang Huai for Yang Shiqi, published in the fifth year of the Tongzhi era (1440 AD). The Imperial Edicts Record has a preface written by Yang Shiqi himself, published in the seventh year of the Tongzhi era (1442 AD). The Complete Dongli Collection was later compiled by others. In the forty-sixth year of the Wanli era (1618 AD), Yang Shiqi's fifth-generation descendant Yang Shouyi, in the seventeenth year of the Kangxi era, Yang Yanguang and Yang Zhenshu, and in the third year of the Guangxu era, Yang Jiguang (the thirteenth-generation descendant), all supplemented and reprinted the collection. The current edition we have is: Three Volumes of Dongli Poetry, Twenty-Five Volumes of Dongli Collection, Sixty-Two Volumes of Supplements, Five Volumes of Separate Collection, and Four Volumes of Appendices, a printing from the twenty-eighth year of the Jiajing era of the Ming Dynasty by Huang Rugui. Three Volumes of Dongli Poetry, a reprinted edition from the Zhengtong era. Twenty-Five Volumes of Dongli Collection, a reprinted edition from the Zhengtong and Zhengde eras, supplemented and repaired by Shen Yan in the Zhengde era and printed in the Wanli era. In the Complete Dongli Collection, "the supplements were self-discarded by Yang Shiqi and not entirely his best works" (as noted in Li Dongyang's Huailu Hall Poetry Notes). Important The valuable work is the Twenty-Five Volumes of Dongli Collection, which constitutes the main part of the Complete Dongli Collection. The essays, prefaces, inscriptions, biographies, epitaphs, poems, odes, and fu in the collection provide rich historical materials for studying the politics, institutions, and figures of the early Ming Dynasty. For example, the Preface for Liu Gongshi's Inspection Tour of Shandong discusses the need for setting up inspectors in the early Ming. The Preface to the Yi Jian Fang was written for the medicinal formulas collected by Hu Ming in various places. Hu Ming was sent on a secret mission to seek the whereabouts of the Jianwen Emperor, which indirectly reflects that he traveled incognito under the guise of practicing medicine. The Record of the Rebuilding of the Yang Clan Temple describes the adjustments in land ownership relations in Taihe County after the peasant uprising at the end of the Yuan Dynasty. The Record of Rebuilding the in Chuzhou reflects the horse management policies of the Southern Grand Secretariat in the early Ming. The Epitaph for the Grand Commandant of the Left General of the Imperial Guard records the plot of Meng Xian, a guard commander of the Prince of Zhao, to usurp the throne at the end of the Yongle era, and so on. The Imperial Edicts Record in the Separate Collection follows the example of Ouyang Xiu's Declarations Record and Sima Guang's Handwritten Records, documenting Yang Shiqi's face-to-face imperial decrees and responses during the Yongle, Hongxi, and Xuanzong eras. The Responses Record consists of memorial essays by Yang Shiqi in the early Zhengtong era in the Grand Secretariat, mostly concerning major military and state affairs. The Representations Record includes the inscriptions, decrees, and edicts drafted by Yang Shiqi in the Grand Secretariat, which can be cross-referenced with the Ming Annals. For this edition of the Dongli Collection, we used the twenty-five-volume edition reprinted by Yang Jiguang in the third year of the Guangxu era (1877 AD) as the base text, with annotations and corrections using the edition printed by Yang Shouyi and Zhu Zifan in the forty-sixth year of the Wanli era (1618 AD). Differences between the two editions are noted in the annotations. Obvious errors in the Guangxu edition have been directly corrected without additional annotations. Discrepancies between the table of contents and the main text have also been unified. Errors and omissions in our editing work are inevitable, and we welcome readers' criticisms and corrections.