Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/106

Rh the undertaking, and permission to use the imperial library for further reference. In the same letter he requested seven or eight months' leave on the ground that he had not been to his home in Foochow for twenty-seven years. He added that he was experiencing the first signs of old age and hoped to visit the tomb of his parents who had died in his absence. The leave was probably granted, for Ch'ên was by this time so highly regarded that he was several times favored with the emperor's personal poems and handwriting.

Little is known about Ch'ên Mêng-lei and his encyclopedia during the years 1706 to 1722. Probably Emperor Shêng-tsu became interested in the work, for he gave it the title, 彙編古今圖書集成 Ku-chin t'u-shu chi-ch'êng, "Synthesis of Books and Illustrations of Ancient and Modern times". The work seems to have become a state enterprise, for officials were appointed to help Ch'ên in the compilation. One of these assistants was Yang Kuan 楊綰, who was in charge of the sections on music (樂律) and the "study of characters" (字學). Yang's service on the project began in 1716 and lasted eight or nine years. The enormous enterprise, including as it did many maps and illustrations, was completed before the death of Emperor Shêng-tsu (December 20, 1722). The printing was done from "engraved [movable] copper type" (刻銅字), and perhaps by 1722 had been some time under way. But all the evidence relating to this phase of the project was sedulously destroyed by when the latter succeeded his father to the throne. Having fought a long and bitter struggle against his brothers for the throne, the new emperor relentlessly took revenge on his opponents and their supporters. He had many grievances against Yin-chih and, it may be assumed, also against Ch'ên Mêng-lei for assisting Yin-chih in this literary undertaking. Perhaps Ch'ên had in some way offended him. At any rate, Ch'ên was one of the first victims of the emperor's wrath. On January 18, 1723 Yin-chên issued a decree condemning him as arrogant and accusing him of lawlessness (see translation of the edict in Introduction to Giles' Index). Though Ch'ên was to be tried the edict clearly indicates that banishment was the least that should be meted out to him and his two sons. When the officials of the Board of Punishments, one of them, sentenced him to exile but released his sons, they were severely reprimanded and degraded. In view of Yin-chên's antagonism to Ch'ên it is likely that he did not survive his second exile. It is said that his remains were interred at his native place but that his descendants lived on in Manchuria.

In the edict ordering Ch'ên's arrest the new emperor demanded that the manuscripts of the Ku-chin t'u-shu chi-ch'êng, till then deposited in Ch'ên's home, be appropriated. A commission headed by was appointed to "revise" it. In order to obliterate all signs of Ch'ên's connection with the work Yin-chên cleverly gave all the credit to Emperor Shêng-tsu, and no one dared to dissent from that verdict for fear of being accused of slandering the throne. The "revision" was completed in 1726, and the first edition of the encyclopedia comprising 10,000 chüan, plus a table-of-contents in 40 chüan, was printed in 1728. Sixty-four sets were officially printed, and perhaps several others which the printers may have sold on their own account. In its final form the encyclopedia seems to have differed but little from Ch'ên's draft. Yin-chên claimed that the "revision" involved several hundred thousand characters, which even if true would constitute less than one per cent of the total number which is estimated to be about one hundred million. A second edition of 1,500 sets was printed from movable leaden type by Major Brothers in Shanghai in the years 1884–88. This smaller and less expensive edition is, however, marred by errors. In 1890 the Tsung-li Yamen obtained permission to reproduce the original edition lithographically. One hundred sets of this third edition were prepared in 1895–98 by the T'ung-wên Shu-chü 同文書局 of Shanghai at a cost of 3,500 taels each. Before preparing this third edition, the original was collated by a group of scholars, and these collation notes (校勘記 Chiao-k'an chi), in 24 chüan, were appended to the new edition. The Library of Congress has one set of it presented by the Chinese Government in 1908 in recognition of the remission by the United States of a portion of the Boxer Indemnity. An English index to the encyclopedia, with a valuable introduction, was compiled by Lionel Giles, under the title An Alphabetical Index to the Chinese Encyclopedia, Ch'in-ting (欽定) Ku-chin t'u-shu chi-ch'êng. It was published in London in 1911.

Ch'ên Mêng-lei left a work on the Classic of Changes, entitled 周易淺述 Chou-i ch'ien-shu, 8 chüan. It was written in 1694 and is mentioned in the Ssŭ-k'u Catalogue (see under ). Several collections of Ch'ên's literary 94