suffering great damage, he was moved to sorrow and said, "I am
very sad for this." He therefore formed the plan of Repositories,
in which the Books might be stored, and appointed officers to
transcribe Books on an extensive scale, embracing the works of
the various scholars, that they might all be placed in the
Repositories. The emperor Ch'ang (B.C. 32-5), finding that a
portion of the Books still continued dispersed or missing,
commissioned Ch'an Nang, the Superintendent of Guests [2], to
search for undiscovered Books throughout the empire, and by
special edict ordered the chief of the Banqueting House, Liu
Hsiang [3], to examine the Classical Works, along with the
commentaries on them, the writings of the scholars, and all
poetical productions; the Master-controller of Infantry, Zan
Hwang [4], to examine the Books on the art of war; the Grand
Historiographer, Yin Hsien [5], to examine the Books treating of
the art of numbers (i.e. divination); and the imperial Physician, Li
Chu-kwo [6], to examine the Books on medicine. Whenever any
book was done with, Hsiang forthwith arranged it, indexed it, and
made a digest of it, which was presented to the emperor. While
this work was in progress, Hsiang died, and the emperor Ai (B.C.
6-A.D. 1) appointed his son, Hsin [7], a Master of the imperial
carriages, to complete his father's work. On this, Hsin collected
all the Books, and presented a report of them, under seven
divisions.'
The first of these divisions seems to have been a general
catalogue [8] containing perhaps only the titles of the works
included in the other six. The second embraced the Classical
Works [9]. From the abstract of it, which is preserved in the
chapter referred to, we find that there were 294 collections of
the Yi-ching from thirteen different individuals or editors [10];
412 collections of the Shu-ching, from nine different individuals;
416 volumes of the Shih-ching, from six different individuals
[11]; of the Books of Rites, 555 collec-
1 孝成皇帝.
2 謁者陳農.
3 光祿大夫劉向.
4 步兵校慰任宏.
5 太史令尹咸.
6 侍醫李桂國.
7 侍中奉車都慰歆.
8 輯略.
9 六藝略.
10 凡易, 十三家, 二百九十四篇. How much of the whole work was
contained in each 篇, it is impossible to determine. P. Regis says:
'Pien, quemadmodum Gallice dicimus "des pieces d'eloquence, de
poesie."'
11 詩, 六家, 四百一十六卷. The collections of the Shih-ching are
mentioned under the name of chuan, 'sections,' 'portions.' Had p'ien
been used, it might have been understood of individual odes. This
change of terms shows that by p'ien in the other summaries, we
are not to understand single blocks or chapters.
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