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Unless otherwise specified, the descriptions of sources in this section are extracted from Pierre-Etienne Will and collaborators, Handbooks and Anthologies for Officials in Imperial China: A Descriptive and Critical Bibliography, 2 vols., Leiden: Brill, 2020
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Description
documentTypeBook
TitleZuozhi yaoyan 佐治藥言 [Prescriptions on Aiding Government]
Topic4.1 Magistrates handbooks: General
Historical periodEarly Qing (1644-1796)
CountryChinese
AuthorWang Huizu 汪輝祖
CollectionGuanzhen shu jicheng 官箴書集成
Number of volume5
Publication typeWoodblock
Comment

The work, composed of 40 entries, is aimed at private secretaries, as opposed to the same author’s Xuezhi yishuo, which is for magistrates; but most of the prefaces insist that it is a must-read for beginning magistrates as well. As the author spent most of his muyou career as a legal specialist, problems of judicial administration occupy a significant part of the text and of its continuation, Xu zuozhi yaoyan (q.v.). Apart from technical points, there are numerous considerations on the ethical and behavioral aspects of a private secretary’s functions, how he must “establish his character” (立品), be upright in his conduct (自處宜潔), and even “leave in case of disagreement” with his employer (不合則去). For this reason, the work has been singled out as one rare example of “admonitions” (箴言) specifically aimed at private secretaries, as opposed to technical treatises (see e.g. the pref. to Guanmu tongzhou lu [q.v.]). Wang Chen’s pref. suggests that because the first printing was inserted in the collectanea Zhibuzu zhai congshu, Wang Huizu had no free-standing printed copies to distribute to the many people who asked for it, and therefore “gave it to the engraver” (the Shuangjie tang was Wang’s private studio). Ruan Yuan’s pref. and Zou Wenbing’s postf. to Xu zuozhi yaoyan (q.v.) suggest that in 1816 there was a new ed. of the work as well as of Xuezhi yishuo (q.v.).

SubjectLaw
LanguageChinese
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