Is the examination a study of gluttony--from several letters of "rebellion" received by Sun Xingyan?

Sun Xingyan was an official, scribe, and important representative of Qianjia Kaozhi in the Qing Dynasty. He was known for his poetry as a teenager, and Yuan Ming praised him as a "wizard of the world". After academic interest turned to evidence, Yuan Ming wrote too many "rebellion" letters to Sun Xingyan in order to save the "wizards of the world" in his heart. The statue of Sun Xingyan is taken from the first episode of the "Portrait Biography of Scholars in the Qing Dynasty", qingye yanlan jiyi, huang Xiaoquan painting.

In his reply to Yuan Ming, Sun Xingyan made multiple defenses for the rationality of the study of evidence. One of the reasons for this is the need for dynastic competition. In his view, due to the impact of the war and other factors, many ancient books lost the opportunity for public circulation. For example, in the Northern Song Dynasty, many ancient books cited in books such as "Taiping Royal Records", "Taiping Huanyu Records", and "Events" were difficult for Southern Song Dynasty scholars to have the opportunity to read publicly; and the compilation and revision of the Four Libraries of the Qing Dynasty and the excavation of various cultural relics were equivalent to providing opportunities for discovering "new historical materials". With the help of these "new historical materials", coupled with the appropriate use of evidence-based methods, Qing Confucian's insights will inevitably surpass those of Song Ru.

For the method of examination advocated by the Qianjia scholars in the Qing Dynasty, modern people often have a certain "prejudice". In a nutshell, it is very easy to degenerate into the study of food, which lacks the exploration of righteousness and is difficult to apply through the ages. Coincidentally, as an important representative of Qianjia's examination, Sun Xingyan also encountered similar doubts from friends, so it was inevitable to defend the examination method. With the help of these polemical letters, we have the opportunity to deeply understand the thinking of historical parties on the method of examination.

"Countermeasures" and "Defenses" Around Evidence

Sun Xingyan is a native of Changzhou, Jiangsu Province. He was born in the eighteenth year of Qianlong (1753) and died in the twenty-third year of Jiaqing (1818), just in the era when Qianjia Examination was extremely popular. However, he was known for his poetry during his youth, and together with Hong Liangji, Huang Jingren, Zhao Huaiyu, Yang Lun, Lü Xingyuan and Xu Shu in changzhou, he was collectively known as the "Seven Sons of Biling". In the thirty-ninth year of Qianlong (1774), Sun Xingyan, who was studying at Zhongshan Academy in Nanjing, met Yuan Ming, who had settled in Nanjing. Yuan Ming spoke highly of Sun Xingyan's poem on many occasions: "There are many talents and wizards in the world, and the present yuan is like a genius in the world", and quoted it as forgetting the year (Qian Yong: "The Words of the Garden", vol. 6, Zhang Wei's school point, Zhonghua Bookstore, 1979 edition, page 158).

However, Sun Xingyan's academic interest gradually shifted, that is, he was no longer keen on poetry, but turned to evidence. In order to save his own "wizards in the world", around the sixty years of Qianlong (1795), Yuan Ming wrote many letters to Sun Xingyan to "plot rebellion". However, due to historical sources, only one of the letters can be seen at present:

A few days ago, those who advised the foot to abandon the examination evidence always gave the word "wizard" in the past, and refused to be rejected in the chest. Recently, I saw the text of the poem under the foot, and it was not surprising that I had to blame it on the evidence. Cover the day is long, the night is short, the sky can not be combined, and the situation is not human? Therefore, dare to chen its acupuncture tube. If you don't think so, you don't know what you say, and why bother to help Confucianism into the ink, you must want to pull eighty men, put on a greasy face, and hold the "Left Biography" to kang into the car? Now, the servant still looks at the foot with the wizards of twenty years ago, and the foot treats the servant with the confidant of twenty years ago. If there is another word to argue for evidence, please punish three liters of sake and fly it three thousand miles away (Wang Yingzhi, editor-in-chief: The Complete Works of Yuan Ming, vol. 5, Jiangsu Ancient Books Publishing House, 1993 edition, page 196).

From the content, it is speculated that Yuan Ming has previously written a "rebellion" letter. In his reply, Sun Xingyan not only rejected Yuan Ming's suggestion, but also tried to persuade Yuan Ming to turn to the examination evidence, which led to the second letter quoted above. In this letter, Yuan Mei asked both sides to abandon their intention to "plot against" each other, and in order to preserve the hard-won friendship, they would not discuss issues related to the evidence in the future. Although "three liters of sake is punished" is a conventional saying, if it is strictly enforced, it also requires about 6 pounds of good alcohol. Judging from the letters included in the Complete Works of Yuan Ming, Yuan Ming after that should have kept his promise not to mention a word.

In his reply to Yuan Ming, Sun Xingyan made multiple defenses for the rationality of the study of evidence. One of the reasons for this is the need for dynastic competition. In 1930, Chen Yinke made the following statement in the Preface to Chen Yuan's "Dunhuang Aftermath", "The scholarship of an era must have its new materials and new problems, and the use of this material to study the problem is the new trend of scholarship in this era." Those who govern the school, those who have foretold this trend, are called pre-flows. Those who have not been predetermined are said to be out of the flow. This is the general meaning of ancient and modern scholarship. Those who are not behind closed doors, those who can be compared with each other" (Chen Yinke: "Jin Mingguan Series Manuscripts II", Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1980 edition, p. 236). In contrast, Sun Xingyan also had a similar statement. In his view, due to the impact of the war and other factors, many ancient books lost the opportunity for public circulation. For example, in the Northern Song Dynasty, many ancient books cited in books such as "Taiping Royal Records", "Taiping Huanyu Records", and "Events" were difficult for Southern Song Dynasty scholars to have the opportunity to read publicly; and the compilation and revision of the Four Libraries of the Qing Dynasty and the excavation of various cultural relics were equivalent to providing opportunities for discovering "new historical materials". With the help of these "new historical materials", coupled with the proper use of the method of examination, the insights of Qing Confucianism will inevitably surpass those of Song Confucianism, "In recent times, when the Sikuguan was opened, there were many books published in the Yongle Canon; and the Second Collection of Confucian Dao contained rare books and ancient books, which were not seen in previous lives; and the Zhong Ding Stele was infinite out of the soil at the age. In this way, the present man will be victorious over the ancients; but it is thought that the representatives of the dynasty are like a forest, and there is no need to benefit from it, and it is not a general theory" (Sun Xingyan: The Complete Works of Mr. Sun Yuanru, Shanghai Commercial Press, 1935 edition, pp. 90-91).

The ability to test the ability to play in prison

In the second year of Jiaqing (1797), Zhu Jue also wrote a similar "rebellion" letter. Unfortunately, Zhu Jue did not include this letter in his personal collection. According to Sun Xingyan's reply, it is speculated that Zhu Jue's reason for questioning the evidence is that it cannot be used in the world. In order to refute this prejudice, Sun Xingyan used his own political experience as a basis, believing that the evidence could at least help officials to try difficult cases. If you try to doubt the prison, you can't break it, and it is not beneficial to know the truth of the void" (The Complete Works of Mr. Sun Yuanru, pp. 196-197).

As the lucky winner of the imperial examination, Sun Xingyan was a mid-level scholar in the fifty-second year of Qianlong (1787), the editor of the Hanlin Academy in the fifty-third year of Qianlong (1788), and the fifty-fourth year of Qianlong (1789) to sixty years in the Punishment Department. For Sun Xingyan's experience in the Punishment Department, there are very few records left at present. However, it is certain that Hu Jitang, the then Shangshu of the Punishment Department, attached great importance to Sun Xingyan's ability to examine evidence, and "every difficult prison order jun yigu yiping to discuss, and the eighteen divisions thought it was a specification." For example, in a death penalty case that the emperor transferred to the Ministry of Punishment for review, A killed C in order to protect his remarried mother B. The debate is on whether the mother should be considered a biological mother in the legal sense, as this will involve a reduction in the sentence. In this regard, most people understand that since they have remarried, the mother should not be regarded as a biological mother in the legal sense. Through complex examination (the specific process is not explained), Sun Xingyan believes that the existing understanding does not conform to the original intention of the etiquette system, and the remarried mother and the abandoned mother should be regarded as the biological mother in the legal sense, so A should be given a mitigated punishment.

After the training of the Punishment Department, Sun Xingyan began to work in the local area. In the first year of Jiaqing (1796), Sun Xingyan briefly acted as an envoy to Shandong, during which he accepted many cases, such as:

(1) A invites B to his home to drink, B is burned to death because he is drunk and falls into the fire, and A is drunk and does not rescue him. State and county officials interpreted A's seizure of the pot of wine as a fight, so they invoked the law of fighting and killing to make a crime. However, Sun Xingyan interpreted the snatching of the pot to pour wine as a kind of etiquette to persuade the wine, and the "grabbing of the pot" also contained the intention of controlling the other party's excessive drinking, so he invoked the law of manslaughter to imitate the crime.

(2) A's debts in arrears to B are not repaid, and B takes off A's clothes to pay the debts. Surprisingly, A soon died of illness, and state and county officials determined that B was directly responsible for A's death. However, Sun Xingyan believed that B died in the third month of the lunar calendar, and even if he took off his clothes, the temperature in Shandong was not enough to freeze people to death, so B should be indirectly responsible for A's death, so he changed it to the law of coercing people to cause death.

Fairly speaking, if the possibility of corruption and power interference is excluded, whether it is the judgment rejected by Sun Xingyan or the judgment revised by Sun Xingyan, at least in the view of the author of the judgment, it should be reasonable. As for whether others can accept it, the key is whether the two share common sense or "general knowledge, ideas and beliefs". In daily life, "this general knowledge, thought, and belief really plays a role in the world before people's judgment, interpretation, and processing" (Ge Zhaoguang, History of Chinese Thought, Fudan University Press, 2009, p. 13). Therefore, the role of evidence in the trial of difficult cases can be summarized as follows: through the re-sorting of the meaning of keyword words, it is possible to challenge the old "common sense" and establish a new "common sense".

Of course, from Sun Xingyan's standpoint, the judgments he rejected were all "wrong" judgments. Due to the large number of "erroneous" judgments, Sun Xingyan determined that there were problems with the legal literacy of local officials and their closest associates in Shandong. To this end, he tried to carry out institutional changes. Prior to this, in the case of shangkong cases, Shandong's envoys would generally transfer shangkong cases to officials in the capital county for trial; after that, Sun Xingyan personally tried the shangkong cases and refused to hire a criminal name (see Zhang Shaonan: "The Annals of Mr. Sun Yuanru", edited by Zhou Heping: "Beijing Library Rare Books Chronicle Series", vol. 119, Beijing Library Publishing House, 1999 edition, pp. 456-477). In the fourth year of Jiaqing (1799), Sun Xingyan, who was guarding filial piety at home, wrote a letter to He Daosheng, who was then the inspector of Shandong Province, once again criticizing the legal literacy of officials and their closest associates in Shandong and other places:

Today's atmosphere, the state and county into a curse, to the court department to change from light, to change the file, not only the aftermath also. If the scribes and guests take advantage of this to show off their misdeeds, the murderer will not die, and the door to bribery will be opened! Zhongzhou and Shanzuo are close to Jingyi, and handling cases is particularly involved. When there is a case, the fate of the road is chaotic. In the land of these provinces, unless the iron is in the middle of the iron, the only one who has to be stubborn, then the people's life cannot be asked. When my brother is able to speak, he should pay attention to the affairs of the world. (Chen Lie, ed., Xiao Mang Cang Cang Zhai Tibetan Qing Dynasty Scholars' Books, People's Literature Publishing House, 2013 edition, page 337)

In order to improve the legal literacy of local officials and their closest associates, Sun Xingyan once envisioned compiling a research book entitled "The Great Qing Law and Neglect of Righteousness". Unfortunately, his selected compiler assistant was more inclined to examine the history of the scriptures, and had little interest in examining the legal codes, so they did not implement them (Wu Yi: "Zhitang Wenqi", vol. 10, "Continuation of the Four Libraries", vol. 1466, Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 2002 edition, pp. 169-170).

Disappointed, Sun Xingyan turned to the engraving of the yuan edition of the Tang Law Shuyi, and finally published it in Nanjing in the twelfth year of Jiaqing (1807). In "Re-engraving the Preface to the Discussion of the Ancient Tang Laws", Sun Xingyan said an obscure passage: "Since the Tang Yonghui Law, the Song and Yuan dynasties have all been because of it. However, in the Ming Dynasty, there were many changes, and a chapter of "Traitorous Party" was added to trap the righteous soldiers, and to lighten their misdemeanors and felonies. Or the lesser the misdemeanor, the easier it is to commit, the more serious the felony, the more unjust, and the less good governance. (Liu Junwen Dian: "Tang Law Neglect Discussion", Zhonghua Bookstore, 1983 edition, p. 668) Although the specific examination process is omitted, Sun Xingyan obviously wants to criticize Ming Law (naturally, naturally, Qing Law) from the standpoint of Tang Law. Fortunately, the late Qing Dynasty lawyer Xue Yunsheng carefully examined the differences between Tang Ming's laws in the "Tang Ming Laws Compilation". Among them, "misdemeanor" refers to the mitigation of punishment for mortals, and "felony" refers to the aggravation of punishment against ministers. As for the specific meaning of "non-good governance", Xue Yunsheng no longer concealed it, but directly pointed out the words, "Tang Law is headed by palace guards, so the emperor is also honored... Tang Law was listed in the first eight proposals of the name, and after the proposal was reduced, it was followed by the redemption of the official as a shadow, and its favor to the ministers and workers can be said to be meticulous. The deletion of Ming Luju is not contained, it is only to know the honorable jun, but not to know the courtiers, partial" (Xue Yunsheng: "Tang Minglu Co-editor", Huai Xiaofeng, Li Mingdian School, Law Publishing House, 1999 edition, p. 821).

"Prevarication" is still out of public conscience

It should be noted that Sun Xingyan should have some reservations when discussing the use of the evidence. In other words, evidence can not only help officials try difficult cases, but also become an important driver of institutional change. His actions during his tenure in Shandong are examples, but they are not limited to this, so we need to lengthen the period of investigation.

When reading the archives held by the First Historical Archive of China, the author found that the Yongzheng Emperor and the Qianlong Emperor often accused the Ministry of Punishment of "acting arbitrarily to refute" and believed that the latter had selfish intentions. The so-called "arbitrary rebuttal" means that the emperor more recognized the original judgment of the local governor and did not approve of the decision made by the Ministry of Punishment to reject the retrial. One of the records is particularly interesting: on June 19, 1726, the Yongzheng Emperor was furious, and the incident was caused by Hu Dabao's attempted sodomy and the strangulation of Cao Zhu'er. In this case, Tian Wenjing cited the case of forced sodomy and proposed to behead Hu Dabao; the Criminal Investigation Department believed that since the sodomy attempt was unsuccessful, it should invoke the law of killing and put Hu Dabao on jail, so it rejected the judgment drawn up by Tian Wenjing. However, in the view of the Yongzheng Emperor, Tian Wenjing's judgment was very reasonable, but the rebuttal suggestion of the Punishment Department was extremely unreasonable, "If the evildoers forcibly sodomize the children of good people, they should be executed; if they do not comply with sodomy, so that they strangle people to death, they will be punished with suspicion if they rape the evildoers and commit the felony of murder, and instead reduce them from the end." As for the reason for the revision of the punishment department, the Yongzheng Emperor's explanation was that the officials of the punishment department were jealous of the grace and praise received by Tian Wenjing, so they deliberately found fault in order to create the image of Tian Wenjing's harsh punishment. Not only that, the Yongzheng Emperor also further went online, embarrassing Tian Wenjing was embarrassing the Yongzheng Emperor himself. Because if he approved the rebuttal proposal of the Punishment Department, the Yongzheng Emperor would bear the accusation of improper employment; if he approved the judgment drawn up by Tian Wenjing, the Yongzheng Emperor would bear the harsh accusation of using torture, "with devious intentions, which is very hateful." After a tantrum, the Yongzheng Emperor finally made a decision: "Thereafter, all the overseers will go to the ministry, and the ministries will refute the unreasonable ones, and the superintendents will be allowed to make secret arrangements." In this case, Jiu Qing asked the Three Laws Division what his opinion was, and so he refuted it? The members of the main draft of this case will be examined in detail and will be discussed separately. (China First Historical Archive, ed., Yongzheng Dynasty Living Registration, Zhonghua Bookstore, 1993 edition, pp. 1325-1327)

Limited by historical data, the author cannot confirm the name of the official of the Punishment Department who was subsequently punished, nor can he confirm whether he is "difficult to move by nature" and once again violates Long Yan. However, it can be confirmed that this is not an isolated individual behavior, but an organized and premeditated group behavior, which will leave the emperor's record of constantly reprimanding the Punishment Department for "acting arbitrarily and refuting". In fact, this is also easy to understand, in the process of case review, if the judgment drawn up by the local governor is always recognized, then the criminal department is likely to be reduced to a rubber stamp in name only; only by finding various reasonable and unreasonable reasons to reject the retrial can the local governor respect the authority of the criminal department. Therefore, although the "arbitrary rebuttal" has not yet been approved by the emperor, it can indeed become an important means of expanding the authority of the Ministry of Punishment.

However, the problem facing the officials of the Punishment Department was how to associate "arbitrary refutation" with "public will" (rather than "selfishness"), so that the emperor would lose the reason to continue to accuse "refutation of arbitrary behavior". It is not difficult to imagine that the officials of the Punishment Department must have crossed the river by feeling the stones and experienced many failed attempts. Looking back, Sun Xingyan's revised judgment is also similar to "refuting in vain"; but at least from a formal point of view, Sun Xingyan's revised judgment was completely out of "public will" (or out of pure academic considerations) and did not mix personal "selfishness", which is probably the real reason why Shangshu Hu Jitang of the Punishment Department appreciated Sun Xingyan.

Of course, in the process of discussing Sun Xingyan's legal practice, we cannot ignore the role played by Hu Jitang, the Shangshu of the Punishment Department, after all, Sun Xingyan's opportunity to give full play to his strengths was provided by Hu Jitang. The Full-text Image Database of Chinese Books at the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Tokyo, Japan contains eight ancient books of the Ministry of Punishment. In a preface entitled "Preface to the Catalogue of Sayings," Chen Tinggui, who was directly subordinate to The Criminal Department, the General Office of the Autumn Trial, and the Law and Regulations Museum, pointed out: In the forty-ninth year of Qianlong (1784), Hu Jitang, who was then a waiter in the Punishment Department, invented the system of saying posts in the Punishment Department. He checks the articles of reference, examines the case in detail, dissects the suspects, does [discernment] to be vague, compromises and returns to the cause, and then formulates the post, prepares the purpose of right and wrong, and is close to the ancient scriptures to break the prison. Since the past, it has been possible to pass through what the law has not prepared, and it has not suffered from its deformity, lightness, or deformity." In other words, the Criminal Investigation Department's statement is equivalent to a legal opinion issued by legal experts, which is also sun Xingyan's main work during his tenure in the Criminal Investigation Department.

If Hu Jitang invented the system of the Punishment Department's postings, which must have been an important change in the legal history of the mid-Qing Dynasty, it was not intended to be made public; over time, the commercially minded officials of the Punishment Department saw the business opportunities contained in the Criminal Department's posts and published them publicly. In order to sell goods, the professional habit of "refuting in vain" by officials of the Criminal Investigation Department was once again demonstrated. For example, after introducing the origin of the commentaries of the Ministry of Punishment, Chen Tinggui went on to point out: "In addition to the examination of the current official laws, there are various kinds of compilations, compilations, compilations, and whole compilations, most of which are about the shogunates of other provinces to consult the old cases and edit the preparation books. Its understanding may not all run through, and its quotation may not be without omission, and it can still be complementary to the law. The Punishment Department is the General Collection of Criminal Names, and the Museum is a General Collection, taking pearls from yuan and collecting jade from mountains. Seeking examples from the place where examples come from is not better than voyeurism, but especially enough to be long-lasting and harmless. Judging from the qualifier "not necessarily", Chen Tinggui did not completely deny the value of "the old case of the shogunate of other provinces and the book of preparation for the examination"; as for the reason for suggesting abandoning the "old case of the shogunate of other provinces and the book of preparing for the examination" and adopting the punishment department's commentary, it is largely threatening: Does the judgment drawn up by the "reader" want to be rejected and retried by the Ministry of Punishment?

Author: Jiang Jinshun (Lecturer, School of Humanities, China University of Political Science and Law)

Editor: Fan Jing