Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 2.pdf/293

 Chime Together), also deal, as their titles indicate, with what Yang believed to be irreconcilable differences between the two religions. These three works were published later by a pupil of Yang, named Chang Kêng (see under ).

In 1601 Matteo Ricci had presented to the throne his World Atlas (K'un-yü wan-kuo ch'üan-t'u) and the Emperor ordered the Fathers Pantoja and de Ursis (for dates, etc. see ) to add explanations. Since these explanations had been preserved by Aleni, he and Yang expanded them to form descriptive notices of the then known countries of the world, publishing them in 5 chüan in 1623 under the title, Chih-fang wai-chi (see under ). This edition was copied into the Ssŭ-k'u Library (see under ). Some years later, in the Ch'ung-chên period (1628–44), when more information on the Southern Hemisphere came to light, an expanded edition in 6 chüan was published in Fukien.

Yang T'ing-yün was so keenly interested in the new knowledge which had come from the West that he remarked in a preface to Aleni's 西學凡 Hsi-hsüeh fan (A General Survey of Western Knowledge), a preface written by him in 1623: "Some seven thousand titles of Western books have come to this country from overseas, all of which ought to be translated...If I had ten years to collaborate with a score or more persons of like ambitions we together could complete the task". (It may be of interest to add that in the preface which Li Chih-tsao wrote for the Chih-fang wai-chi in the same year, he too states that some seven thousand Western books had by that time reached China). Yang lived only four years more, and his ambition was not fulfilled. In addition to the works named above, Yang T'ing-yün is credited, in the history of Hangchow compiled in 1922 (chüan 86–95), with sixteen other items. Two of these, 玩易微言擇抄 Wan-I wei-yen tsê-ch'ao, 6 chüan, and 靈衛廟志 Ling-wei miao-chih, 1 chüan, are given notice in the Ssŭ-k'u Catalogue, though the second item is registered under the name of his collaborator, Hsia Pin 夏賓. Still another work by Yang, entitled 易顯 I-hsien, is mentioned in the Ching-i k'ao by. Yang published, early in the 1620's, a book of family instructions by a contemporary, Su Shih-ch'ien 蘇士潛, under the title, Su-shih chia-hua (氏家話). The son of Su Shih-ch'ien, named Su Mao-hsiang 蘇茂相 (1567–1630, chin-shih of 1592), was then governor of Chekiang province. It may well be that the copy of this book in the Library of Congress, and another copy in the Cabinet Library, Tokyo, are the only ones extant.

Yang Tsing-yün, Hsü Kuang-ch'i, and Li Chih-tsao are known as the "Three Pillars of the Early Catholic Church" (開教三大柱石) in China. They were devoted Christians and rendered enormous assistance to the missionaries. During the persecutions instigated by Shên Ch'üeh (see under Li) in 1616 and 1622, Yang took serious risks in giving shelter to several of the missionaries in his home or in his country villa near Hangchow. On January 12, 1619, he was recalled to Peking, but apparently did not go at this time. However, on July 25, 1622, he accepted appointment as intendant of the circuit of Ta-liang in Honan province, with nominal rank of a Vice Judicial Commissioner. In May of the following year he was promoted to sub-director of the Banqueting Court, and in 1624 to vice-governor of the Metropolitan area of Peking. When, in March 1625, several censors at Nanking charged him with incompetency in office, he was a month later allowed, at his own request, to retire on the ground of old age. In 1627 he undertook to build a church, with residential quarters attached, inside the Wu-lin Gate, Hangchow. Shortly after the building was completed, he died at the age of seventy-one (sui), leaving two sons, and a daughter known as Madame Agnès.

[Yang Ch'i-yüan hảiem-shêng ch'ao-hsing shih-chi, edition printed in Ch'ung-chên period preserved in Bibliothèque Nationale, Courant 1097; Ming Shên-tsung shih-lu (Chronicles of Wan-li period), ch. 383–431; Pfister, Notices, passim; Ming Hsi-tsung shih-lu (Chronicles of the T'ien-ch'i period).]

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 YANG Wên-ts'ung 楊文驄, 1597–1646, painter, poet and official, who died a martyr to the Ming cause, was a native of Kweiyang, Kweichow. His father, Yang Shih-k'ung 楊師孔, was a chin-shih of 1601 who became assistant financial commissioner of Chekiang in 1628. Yang Wênts'ung became a chü-jên in 1618 and was appointed director of studies of Hua-t'ing, Kiangsu. While holding that post he made the acquaintance of with whom he studied the art of painting. By the time he was thirty-three (sui) his fame as an artist had spread widely along the Yangtze valley. In poem "The Song of the Nine Painters" (畫中九友歌), Yang Wên-ts'ung is ranked with Tung Ch'i-ch'ang, 895