Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 3.djvu/495

 of Mâo Khî-ling (1623–1713) is one called 'Questions about the Hsiâo King,' in which, with his usual ability, and, it must be added, his usual acrimony, he defends the received text. He asserts—and in this he is correct—that there is no difference of any importance between the ancient and modern texts; when he asserts further that there never was any such difference, what he affirms is incapable of proof. He pours scorn on Kû Hsî and Wû Khăng; but he is not so successful in defending the integrity of the Hsiâo as I have allowed him to be in vindicating the portions of the Shû that we owe to Khung An-kwo.

The  has always been a favourite with the emperors of China. Before Hsüan ung took it in hand, the first and eighth emperors of the eastern Kin dynasty (317–419), the first and third of the Liang (502–556), and the ninth of the northern Wei (386–534) had published their labours upon it. The Manchâu rulers of the present dynasty have signalised themselves in this department. In 1656 the first emperor produced in one chapter his 'Imperial Commentary on the ,' and in 1728 the third published a 'Collection of Comments' on it. Between them was the long reign known to us as the Khang-hsî period (1662–1722), during which there appeared under the direction of the second emperor, the most distinguished of his line, his ' of the ,' in 100 chapters. The only portion of the text which it gives in full is Kû Hsî's chapter of Confucian text; but most of the topics touched on in Kû's supplementary chapters, added, as he supposed, by some later hand, are dealt with in the course of the work, the whole of which will amply repay a careful study.

It will have been seen that the two great scholars, Kû Hsî and Wû Khăng, who have taken the greatest liberties with the text of our classic, allow that there is a Confucian element in it, and that more than a fifth part of the whole, containing, even as expurgated by Kû, about 400 characters, may be correctly ascribed to the sage. I agree with them