On Their Own Terms On Their Own Terms Science in China, 1550–1900 Benjamin A. Elman Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England 2005 Copyright © 2005 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Elman, Benjamin A., 1946– On their own terms : science in China, 1550–1900 / Benjamin A. Elman. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-674-01685-8 (alk. paper) 1. Science—China—History—16th century. 2. Science—China— History—17th century. 3. Science—China—History—18th century. 4. Science—China—History—19th century. I. Title. Q127.C5E38 2005 509'.51—dc22 2004059654 For Susan Naquin and Nathan Sivin and in memory of my mother, Rachel Elman Contents List of Maps, Illustrations, and Tables xi Chinese Dynasties xv Abbreviations xix Preface xxi I Introduction 1 Prologue 3 Finding the Correct Conceptual Grid 4 What Should Be the Literati Theory of Knowledge? 5 Late Ming Classicism in the Context of Commercial Expansion 9 Printing Technology and Publishing 16 Naturalization of Anomalies in Ming China and Early Modern Europe 20 1. Ming Classification on the Eve of Jesuit Contact 24 Ordering Things through Names 24 Collecting the Collectors 34 Late Ming Statecraft, Mathematics, and Christianity 53 Collecting Things in Texts 57 II Natural Studies and the Jesuits 61 2. The Late Ming Calendar Crisis and Gregorian Reform 63 Development of the Ming Astro-calendric Bureau 65 Evolution of the Late Ming Calendar Crisis 73 Gregorian Reform 80 Jesuits and Late Ming Calendar Reform 84 3. Sino-Jesuit Accommodations During the Seventeenth Century 107 European Scientia and Natural Studies in Ming-Qing China 107 viii Contents Literati Attacks on Calendar Reform in the Early Qing 133 Ferdinand Verbiest and the Kangxi Emperor 144 4. The Limits of Western Learning in the Early Eighteenth Century 150 The Kangxi Emperor and Mei Wending 150 The Rites Controversy and Its Legacy 160 French Jesuits in the Kangxi Court 169 The Newtonian Century and the Limits of Scientific Transmission to China 183 5. The Jesuit Role as Experts in High Qing Cartography and Technology 190 Mensuration and Cartography in the Eighteenth Century 191 Cartography, Sino-Russian Relations, and Qing Imperial Interests 200 The Jesuit Role in Qing Arts, Instruments, and Technology 205 III Evidential Research and Natural Studies 223 6. Evidential Research and the Restoration of Ancient Learning 225 Early Qing Critiques of Zhu Xi and Wang Yangming 226 Medical Works and the Recovery of Antiquity 227 Chen Yuanlong and the Mirror of Origins Encyclopedia 236 Revival of Ancient Chinese Mathematics 244 7. Seeking the Truth and High Qing Mathematics 255 High Qing Views of the Investigation of Things 255 Mathematics in an Age of Evidential Research 262 Nativism and Early Nineteenth-Century Mathematics 270 IV Modern Science and the Protestants 281 8. Protestants, Education, and Modern Science to 1880 283 Protestant Missionaries in China 283 Protestants and Modern Science in Shanghai 296 Introduction of Modern Mathematics and the Calculus 303 The Shanghai Polytechnic and Reading Room 308 9. The Construction of Modern Science in Late Qing China 320 Early Science Primers 321 Edkins’s Primers for Science and the Problem of Darwin in China 323 Contents ix From the Scientific Book Depot to the China Prize Essay Contest 332 Prize Essay Topics and Their Scientific Content 340 Medical Missionaries since 1872 and Medical Questions as Prize Essay Topics 342 Natural Theology, Darwin, and Evolution 345 V Qing Reformism and Modern Science 353 10. Government Arsenals, Science, and Technology in China after 1860 355 From Chinese Working for Missionaries to Missionaries Working for the Dynasty 356 Post-Taiping Reformers and Late Qing Science 357 The Jiangnan Arsenal in Shanghai 359 Technical Learning in the Jiangnan Arsenal and Fuzhou Navy Yard 368 Naval Warfare and the Refraction of Qing Reforms into Failure 376 Reconsidering the Foreign Affairs Movement 386 11. Displacement of Traditional Chinese Science and Medicine in the Twentieth Century 396 Western Learning Mediated through Japan 396 Science and the 1898 Reformers 398 From Traditional to Modern Mathematics 403 Modern Medicine in China 405 Influence of Meiji Japan on Modern Science in China 408 Appendixes 1. Tang Mathematical Classics 423 2. Some Translations of Chemistry, 1855–1873 425 3. Science Outline Series, 1882–1898 426 4. Partial Chronological List of Arsenals, etc., in China, 1861–1892 427 5. Table of Contents for the 1886 Primers for Science Studies (Gezhi qimeng) 428 6. Twenty-three Fields of the Sciences in the 1886 Primers for Science Studies 429 7. Science Compendia Published in China from 1877 to 1903 430 x Contents 8. Some Officially Selected Chinese Prize Essay Topics from the Shanghai Polytechnic 433 9. Scientific Societies Formed between 1912 and 1927 434 Notes 437 Bibliography of Chinese and Japanese Sources 527 Acknowledgments 541 Credits 543 Index 545 List of Maps, Illustrations, and Tables Maps Physiocratic Macroregions of Agrarian China in Relation to Major Rivers xvi China Administrative Map xvii 3.1. Map of China and Foreign Areas (Huayi tu) 123 3.2. Map of the Tracks of Emperor Yu (Yuji tu) 124 3.3. Complete Map of the Myriad Countries on the Earth (Kunyu wanguo quantu) 128–129 3.4. Capital Edition of a Complete Map Based on Astronomy ( Jingban tianwen quantu) 132 5.1. Map of Qing Dynasty Territories in Proximity to Russian and Zunghar Lands in Central Asia 204 10.1. The Chinese Coast from Weihaiwei to the Mouth of Yalu River during the Sino-Japanese War 381 10.2. Location of Key Arsenals, Shipyards, and Factories during the Self-Strengthening Period 389 Figures P.1. A Ming painting of “Broadly Examining Antiquities” 11 P.2. Late Ming pottery—vase in the shape of a ritual jade blue-and-white porcelain 15 xii List of Maps, Illustrations, and Tables P.3. Setting moveable type in the Qianlong Imperial Printing Office 18 2.1. Verbiest’s instruments in the Beijing Observatory 102 4.1. The Order of the sixty-four hexagrams in Bouvet’s studies of the Change Classic 175 4.2. The River Chart (Hetu) on the left side and the Luo Writing (Luoshu) on the right side 178 5.1. Layout of the Lofty Pavilion (Yuanming yuan) gardens 211 5.2. Blue-and-white porcelain bowl from the Qing dynasty 214 5.3. Jin Nong’s 1761 painting The Radiant Moon 218 5.4. Luo Ping’s handscroll Fascination of Ghosts 219 5.5. Vesalius’s first and third plates of the skeleton, 1543 220 6.1. Li Ye’s diagram of a triangle with an inscribed circle (representing a triangle around a city wall) 253 7.1. Dai Zhen’s diagram of the Zhou dynasty ceremonial bronze bells 261 7.2. Dai Zhen’s drawing of the sun’s paths along the celestial sphere 269 8.1. Hobson’s “Frontal and Rear View of the Human Skeleton,” in the Treatise on Physiology (Quanti xinlun), 1851 293 8.2. Pan Shicheng’s substitution for the “Frontal View of the Human Skeleton” 294 10.1. The Translation Office in the Jiangnan Arsenal: Xu Shou, Hua Hengfang, and Xi Jianyin 361 10.2. Nakamura Shu¯ko¯, “The Great Victory of Japanese Warships off Haiyang Island, 1894 384 List of Maps, Illustrations, and Tables xiii 10.3. Kobayashi Kiyochika, “Illustration of our Naval Forces in the Yellow Sea firing at and sinking Chinese Warships, 1894” 385 11.1. Traditional coarse needles and the filiform metal needles used in premodern and modern acupuncture 409 Tables 1.1. Table of contents for Zhang Hua’s Treatise on Broad Learning of Things 45 1.2. Other collectanea compiled by Hu Wenhuan 54 7.1. Forty-four subdivisions of the Imperial Library (Siku quanshu) 266 9.1. John Fryer’s “Table showing the results of the Chinese prize essay scheme” 338 Chinese Dynasties Shang: 16th–11th Century B.C.E. Zhou: 11th Century–221 B.C.E. Qin: 221–207 B.C.E. Han: 206 B.C.E.–220 C.E. (Former Han: 206 B.C.E.–28 C.E. Later Han: 25–220) Wei: 220–265 Western Jin: 265–316 Nan-Bei Chao: 420–581 (Southern and Northern Dynasties) (Lui-Song: 420–479 Northern Wei: 386–534 Northern Zhou: 557–581) Sui: 581–618 Tang: 618–907 Liao: 916–1125 Song: 960–1280 (Northern Song: 960–1127 Southern Song: 1127–1280) Jin: 1115–1234 Yuan: 1280–1368 Ming: 1368–1644 Qing: 1644–1911 [To view this image, refer to the print version of this title.] Physiocratic Macroregions of Agrarian China in Relation to Major Rivers Source: Reprinted from The City in Late Imperial China, edited by G. Wm. Skinner, with the permission of the publishers, Stanford University Press. Copyright 1977 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Jr. University. [To view this image, refer to the print version of this title.] China Administrative Map Abbreviations BJMS Baijia mingshu (Famous works of all the scholastic sects). Hu Wenhuan (fl. ca. 1596), comp. Late Ming Wanli edition, circa 1603. The Library of Congress edition contains 156 works. The edition in the Oriental Library of the Institute of Humanistic Studies, Kyoto University, contains ninety-two works. CRZ Chouren zhuan (Biographies of mathematical astronomers). Ruan Yuan (1764–1849), comp. Taibei: Shijie shuju, 1962. DMB Dictionary of Ming Biography. L. C. Goodrich, et al., eds. 2 vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1976. DSB Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Charles Gillispie et al. N.Y.: Scribner’s Sons, 1970–78. ECCP Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period. Arthur Hummel, ed. Reprint. Taibei: Chengwen Bookstore, 1972.