Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/546

 master's corps. In 1756 Liu was pardoned and the family property that had been confiscated in the previous year was restored. Thereafter he served as president of the Board of Punishments (1756–58) and of the Board of Civil Office (1758–61), and as a Grand Councilor (1756–73). He was also an Assistant Grand Secretary (1759–61) and a Grand Secretary (1761–73), holding at times the supervisorship of several boards and bureaus, including chief tutorship of the Emperor's sons in the Imperial School.

Despite the misfortune of 1755 in military matters, Liu T'ung-hsün was entrusted with many important affairs of state. He was sent several times to try officials accused of corruption, and usually his verdict won imperial approval, even though death sentences were meted out to several Manchus in high positions. He frequently conducted provincial examinations and four times supervised the metropolitan examination (1751, 1757, 1761, 1771). Three times he supervised the repair of broken dikes along the Yellow River (1753, 1756, 1761) and once the dredging of the Grand Canal (1769). For a time, in 1756, he was acting director-general of Yellow River Conservancy. He served twice as chancellor of the Hanlin Academy (1750, 1763–73) and as director-general of the State Historiographer's Office and of the Commission to compile the Ssŭ-ku ch'üan-shu (see under ). When he died the Emperor personally visited his home to convey his condolences and was deeply impressed by the simplicity and frugality of the household. He was canonized as Wên-chêng 文正 (traditionally the highest posthumous rank), and his name was celebrated in the Temple of Eminent Statesmen. A set of the encyclopedia, Ku-chin t'u-shu chi-ch'êng (see under ), was presented to his son, Liu Yung, in token of the esteem in which his father was held. Liu Yung also became a Grand Secretary. A grandson of Liu T'unghsün and nephew of Liu Yung, Liu Huan-chih 劉鐶之, was given the degree of chü-jên in 1779 and became a chin-shih in 1789 with appointment to the Hanlin Academy. He rose later to the presidency of the Board of Revenue (1814–17) and of the Board of Civil Office (1820–22). Liu Huan-chih's son,, was a well-known student of epigraphy.

[1/308/5b; 3/21/22a; 7/16/9a; 26/1/55b; Chu-ch'êng hsien-chih (1764) 33/8a and hsü-chih (1834) 13/1a.]

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 LIU Wên-ch'i 劉文淇, 1789–1856, scholar, was a native of I-chêng, Kiangsu, but lived in Yangchow where his father, Liu Hsi-yü 劉錫瑜 , practiced medicine. After studying with his father's friend,, and with a local scholar, Ling Shu (see below), Liu Wên-ch'i became a hsiu-ts'ai in 1807. About the same time he began a life-long friendship with. He became a senior licentiate in 1819 and visited Peking in the following year. During the succeeding years he competed fourteen times in the Kiangnan provincial examination at Nanking but was unsuccessful, and therefore remained a private teacher the rest of his life.

Liu Wên-ch'i was often employed by men of wealth to assist them in their scholarly activities. During the years 1848–49 he was engaged by Tung Lien 董濂, assistant Salt Controller of the Yangchow region, in the annotation of two histories, 北史 Pei-shih and 南史 Nan-shih, of the Northern and Southern Dynasties respectively. Early in the eighteen-forties he and collated for Ts'ên Chien-kung (see under ) the Old History of the T'ang Dynasty (Chiu T'ang-shu), which was printed by Ts'ên in 1843. In addition Liu wrote a criticism of the entire text, entitled 舊唐書校勘記 Chiu Tang-shu chiao-k'an chi, 66 chüan, which was printed by Ts'ên in 1846 under Liu's name.

Liu Wên-ch'i was the first Ch'ing scholar to set his hand to a critical study of the entire text of Tso's Commentary to the Spring and Autumn Annals. His work on that commentary, entitled 左傳舊疏考證 Tso-chuan chiu-shu k'ao-chêng, is reported to have consisted of some 80 chüan. As this laborious work was not completed before his death, his son,, continued the task. A part of this work, which criticizes at many points the comments of Kung Ying-ta (see under ), was printed in 1838 under the title Tso-chuan chiu-shu k'ao-chêng (考正), 8 chüan. It was reprinted in the 湖北崇文書局叢書 Hupeh Ch'ung-wên shu-chü ts'ung-shu (1877) and in the Huang-Ch'ing ching-chieh hsü-pien (see under ). In the field of historical geography Liu Wên-ch'i not only collated and criticized the 534