Lady Xie, Please Conduct Yourself with Dignity!

Had she started suspecting my identity?

Had she come to investigate me today?!!!

Writing a historical poem for someone to sing Xie An's praises was no big deal, but impersonating a member of the gentry was a serious crime!

Where was my household registered? How was I supposed to answer that?

If I made something up, a single check would expose the lie.

This girl might even have come prepared!

Ever since the Eastern Jin, Wang and Xie had been spoken of together and had sometimes intermarried. She might know far more about the Langya Wang than I imagined!

But saying nothing would make me look guilty.

What should I do?

He needed to respond quickly!

Wang Yang looked out the window and let out a dejected sigh:

"On the shores of the Eastern Sea lie the Lands of Langya. There Goujian established his hegemony, there the First Emperor carved his stone inscriptions. A homeland of a thousand years, lost in a single day. I raise my head and see the sun, but cannot see Langya."

Langya lay within present-day Shandong, with a long history and a rich heritage, but it was now occupied by the Northern Wei. Reflecting on the present and recalling the past, Wang Yang wore an expression of grief. The sunlight stung his eyes, making him squint slightly, as though sorrow might bring him to tears.

Deeply moved by the sight before him, Liu Zhao said with great feeling:

"I never imagined your attachment to your homeland ran so deep, Zhi Yan. These days, most scions of the émigré clans live comfortably in Jiangzuo and have long since ceased looking north! Our Niyang Liu Clan also moved here from Nanyang a hundred years ago, yet everyone in our clan, myself included, now considers us one of the Jingzhou Gentry Clans. We truly have forgotten our ancestors while recounting their deeds."

Xie Xinghan, however, was not diverted in the slightest. She said coolly:

"We already know that your ancestral home is Langya, Young Master Wang. What I asked just now was where your household is registered, not where your ancestors came from. Where is your household registered? Jiankang? Most of the Langya Wang have lived in Jiankang for generations. Though I cannot claim to recognize every branch, I do know something about them. Which branch do you belong to? Where in Jiankang do you live? Black-Clothed Alley? Horse Manure Alley? Or are you perhaps from Linyi in Dantu?"

Damn!

Not even grief for my homeland and country moves you?

Your Chen Commandery Xie Clan is an émigré clan too!

Girl, have you no heart?!

As Xie Xinghan pressed him relentlessly with question after question, Wang Yang thought, If that's how it is, don't blame me for what comes next...

Wang Yang said solemnly, "Lady Xie, you possess both talent and beauty, and I do indeed admire you greatly. But marriage has always been arranged by parents and matchmakers. If you truly wish to learn about my family background, you should have someone inquire on your behalf. How could you question me so directly?"

Xie Xinghan: ???

Liu Zhao: (*+﹏+*)

Wang Yang stood and bowed to Xie Xinghan. "I am deeply grateful for your favor, Lady Xie! But I really have no wish to consider marriage just now. My apologies."

With that, he headed for the door.

A flush rose from Xie Xinghan's fair neck and swiftly spread across her luminous, jade-like cheeks.

Liu Zhao hurried to explain, "Zhi Yan, you've misunder-"

Wang Yang cut him off. "Sir, I know you mean well, but I am the person involved, after all. You ought to have asked my opinion! Besides, isn't scholarship more important than matchmaking? Please find another match for Lady Xie. I shall take my leave."

"Stop right there!" Xie Xinghan rose, her voice trembling with anger. "I... I didn't-"

"Lady Xie, please conduct yourself with dignity! We truly aren't suited to each other!"

Wang Yang deliberately raised his voice and emphatically clasped his hands in salute.

However learned and intelligent Xie Xinghan might be, she was still an aristocratic young lady, pure as ice and spotless as jade. Raised under strict discipline and cherished like the moon surrounded by stars, when had she ever faced anything like this?

The way Wang Yang put it, she seemed to have shamelessly begged him to marry her, only to be rejected in public!

Humiliated and furious, she felt she had suffered a monstrous injustice and insult. In her distress, she almost burst into tears! Too angry to explain herself coherently, she barely managed to force out a few words. "You're talking nonsense! I didn't... I never..."

Seeing this, Wang Yang softened a little. Bullying a young girl was hardly anything to be proud of. But if he did not bully her, she would investigate his household registration. I'm unregistered! I can't withstand a check!

So don't blame me for failing to cherish a fragrant blossom and precious jade.

"Lady Xie, don't cry. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with you. It's just that there are plenty of fine men in this world. Why pine for only-"

Xie Xinghan had not been crying yet, but at Wang Yang's words, tears streamed down her face. She stamped her embroidered shoe and ran out the door.

"My dear niece! My dear niece!" Liu Zhao hurried after her.

Wang Yang breathed a sigh of relief. Things would be easier as long as Xie Xinghan was gone. Liu Zhao was devoted to scholarship and a decent man. Even if he wanted to check Wang Yang's household registration, he would be easier to fob off than Xie Xinghan.

"Zhi Yan, I hate to scold you, but how could you be so rash? She is the young lady of Xie Ling's family. How could she possibly... possibly come to your door herself seeking marriage?" Liu Zhao complained.

"I really lost my head! She seemed so interested in my affairs, and you introduced her background, so I thought... Ah, please tell Lady Xie that I'm just a bookworm, and ask her not to take offense at my foolishness!"

Seeing the "remorse" on Wang Yang's face, Liu Zhao instead comforted him:

"You needn't worry too much about this. My niece Xie is not petty. She probably won't take it to heart."

Wang Yang thought, Then may your auspicious words come true.

"Actually, my niece Xie wasn't interested in your personal affairs. She wanted to ask where your household was registered and whether you had ever attended the local Commandery Academy. If not, would it be convenient for you to register here and enter the Jingzhou Commandery Academy?"

"Enter the Commandery Academy?" Wang Yang asked in puzzlement.

Liu Zhao said apologetically:

"I know that with your learning, you would be more than qualified to serve as a Doctor at the Academy of State Sons, or as a Western Residence Academician at the Prince of Jingling's Residence. Besides, with your pedigree and talent, you could advance smoothly straight into the ranks of ministers and high officials. There is no need for you to take the Classics Examination route at all. It's just that the Commandery Academy really is facing difficulties..."

Liu Zhao then explained in detail the origins of the Wang Academy and its disputes with the Commandery Academy before continuing:

"My own honor or disgrace is of little consequence. But the Commandery Academy carries on the Jingzhou School, and the Jingzhou School places the greatest importance on the New-Text Book of Documents. Yet the Wang Academy wants to abolish the New-Text Book of Documents entirely and recognize only the Old-Text Book of Documents!

"If they truly succeed, the study of the New-Text Book of Documents, passed down in Jingzhou for so long, will be severed completely in my generation!

"For learning to perish and the Way to be lost is a scholar's greatest calamity, and also a scholar's greatest sin!"

Liu Zhao rose, straightened his robes, and bowed to Wang Yang all the way to the ground:

"So, for the sake of the Jingzhou Scholarly Tradition, this old man begs you to enroll in the Commandery Academy, Zhi Yan, and compete on its behalf! If you win, Heaven has not abandoned our culture! If you lose, then such is the decree of fate. I shall still be grateful for your kindness and loyalty, without the slightest resentment!"

The Book of Documents recorded the words and deeds of ancient emperors and kings and was one of the Confucian Five Classics.

The dispute between the New-Text and Old-Text versions of the Book of Documents was a major event in the history of its study, following an exceedingly complex and tortuous course.

Put simply, beginning in the Han Dynasty, two versions of the Book of Documents emerged:

One was orally transmitted by elderly Confucian scholars who had lived through both the Qin and Han, using ancient pre-Qin texts as their basis, and then written down in the clerical script current during the Han Dynasty. This was called the New-Text Book of Documents.

The other was discovered inside the walls of Confucius's Residence and written in ancient characters predating the Qin and Han. This was called the Old-Text Book of Documents.

Scholars of the Western and Eastern Han argued fiercely over which version was authoritative, giving rise to different interpretive methods and schools. Only in the late Eastern Han did a tendency toward convergence gradually emerge.

But during the Eastern Jin, someone presented another Old-Text Book of Documents, claiming that this was the genuine ancient version! It contained no fewer than fifty-eight chapters, including twenty-five that had never been seen before! Thus, as soon as it appeared, it became the authoritative version and brought about a flourishing of Old-Text Book of Documents scholarship. This was also what gave the Wang Academy the confidence to seek the abolition of the Commandery Academy and become Jingzhou's sole official academy.

Wang Yang understood the twists and turns involved and very much wanted to help Liu Zhao, but this matter raised quite a few problems.

Note: One scholarly view holds that the New-Text Book of Documents had already been lost during the transition between the Western and Eastern Jin. This is not necessarily so. Setting aside both the mainstream view that the New-Text Book of Documents survived within the Old-Text Book of Documents and unsubstantiated speculation about privately held copies, the Treatise on Classics and Books in the Book of Sui alone lists six scrolls of the One-Character Stone Scripture Book of Documents. The so-called "One-Character Stone Scriptures" were the Xiping Stone Classics from Emperor Ling of Han's reign. At that time, the New-Text Book of Documents was taught at the Official Academy, so that was the version carved into stone. Its inclusion in the treatise compiled during the Tang shows that rubbings of the New-Text Book of Documents could still be found in the official library-the Imperial Library-in the early Tang. Thus, the claim that it had been lost is too absolute.