Pen name Jiyuan (蕺园) Citizenship Chinese Name Cheng Jinfang Died 1784 | Occupation Poet and scholar Genre Poetry Role Poet | |
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Cheng Jinfang (Chinese: 程晋芳; pinyin: Cheng Jinfang) (1718–1784) was a well-known poet and scholar of the Qing Dynasty who followed the Tongcheng school of literary prose. His courtesy name was Yumen (鱼门) and his pseudonym was Jiyuan (蕺园).
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Life
Cheng was born in Jiangdu, Jiangsu province. His father was a merchant in the salt business. Huishang (徽商), that is to say, businessmen from Huizhou (徽州), not only did well in business, but also played an important role in cultural field. There were many Huizhou merchants who were excellent in academic fields. Cheng was such a Huishang (徽商) who did well both in business and Confucianism. He earned much while being interested in cultural investments. He achieved the Imperial examination degree of Jinshi in 1771 and he was appointed to the Hanlin Academy (翰林院). After that, he continued to take the imperial examination several times but all failed. In 1773, Cheng was appointed to edit Siku Quanshu.
Cheng married in 1736 to his cousin Xiao who was the daughter of his mother’s brother . When he got elderly, he took two concubines.
Cheng carried on the family business in selling salt . Wu Jingzi (吴敬梓), who hated salt merchants, also became his friend. When the two became friends, Cheng was 24 and Wu was 41. But their friendship wasn’t influenced by the difference of age and their sincere friendship lasted a lifetime. He often discussed academic problems with scholars. In his early life, Cheng made friends with Shang Pan (商盘) and Yuan Mei (袁枚). In his later years, he often traveled with Zhu Yun (朱筠) and Dai Zhen (戴震). Cheng was so dedicated in social and cultural work that he had no time to manage his business and eventually went bankrupt.
In April of 1784, Cheng decided to go to Shaanxi Province to ask his friend Bi Yuan (毕沅) for help because of his financial problem. However, soon after Cheng's arrival at Bi Yuan's place, he died of illness on 21 June 1784.
Confucianism
Cheng learnt Confucianism from one of his family member named Cheng Tingzuo (程廷祚), who was a famous specialist in Confucianism at that time. In Cheng's later years, he also learnt Confucianism from master Dai zhen (戴震) and Zhu Yun (朱筠). Even though he was born rich, he immersed himself in studying Confucianism and he spent almost all his money in buying books and helping poor scholars. He bought over 50,000 books on Confucianism and the poor scholars were free to read them. He even offered them shelters and food and he enjoyed sharing ideas with those scholars.
Study on Wu Jingzi's scholars 儒林外史
Cheng is one of Wu Jingzi’s (吴敬梓) most intimate friends in his late years. Wu Jingzi’s Scholars was first published by Cheng, which is one of the greatest contributions to the world for him. Meanwhile, Cheng is also the first scholar to make an all-round comment on Wu and his Scholars. Cheng’s records of Wu’s life, his analysis of Wu the person and his thoughts, and his comments on the ideological theme of the Scholars are all of very high academic value. But his review of the author and the opus is biased, more or less, which shows the limitations of the time and the individual vision.
Thoughts on education
Cheng held the opinion that it was more important for scholars to be practical than to be academic. He was in favor of both innovation and seeking the truth from facts. Cheng pointed out that scholars should explore the true meaning of Confucius and Mencius rather than pursuing the fame of Imperial Examination. Cheng also suggested that people should be proficient in both study and archery.