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Tan Sitong and the ether reconsidered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

David Wright
David Wright
Affiliation:
School of Oriental and African Studies, London
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Extract

The main subject of this paper is the influence of Western science on the philosophy of the young scholar Tan Sitong (1865–98) who was active in the reform movement of the late Qing dynasty. It seeks to show that his understanding of Western science was not as confused and superficial as some commentators have claimed, and that in fact his conception of yitai drew on views of the ether and electricity which were held by some at least of the most eminent Western scientists of his time. It also demonstrates that yitai is the direct descendant of the qi of the Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhang Zai (1020–77), and shows how Tan developed the views of Kang Youwei (1858–1927) on the relationship of qi to consciousness.

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Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 57 , Issue 3 , October 1994 , pp. 551 - 575
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Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1994

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References

1 Both Western and Chinese commentators have suggested that Tan had a distorted understand ing of late nineteenth-century science, particularly in respect of his concept of the ether. See Talbott, Nathan, ‘T‘an Ssu-t‘ung and the ether’, in Sakai, Robert K. (ed.), Studies on Asia (Nebraska: University of Nebraska, 1960), 20–34Google Scholar and Yijun, XuTan Sitong sixiang yanjiu (Researches on the thought of Tan Sitong), (Changsha: Hunan Renmin Chubanshe, 1981), ch. 4Google Scholar.

2 See Tingfu, YangTan Sitong nianpu (Biography of Tan Sitong), [hereafter TSTNP], (Beijing: Renmin Chubanshe, 1957), 31Google Scholar. His father gave him the style Fusheng ‘returned to life’ because of his recovery.

3 TSTNP, 31.

4 See Tan Sitong Quanji (The collected works of Tan Sitong), (Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju, 1981) [hereafter TSTQJ], 348Google Scholar in which Tan speaks of the inhumanity of much of family life, and specifically mentions the behaviour of stepmothers towards the children of their predecessors. See Sin-wai, Chan, An exposition of benevolence [hereafter AEOB], (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1984), 174Google Scholar. English translations of Renxue are from AEOB unless otherwise indicated.

5 TSTNP, 35.

6 See Takashi, Oka ‘The philosophy of T'an Ssu-t'ung’ in Papers on China, 9 (August 1955), 3Google Scholar; TSTNP, 32; and Kwong, Luke S. ‘Reflections on an aspect of modern China in transition: T‘an Ssu-t‘ung (1865–1898) as a reformer’, in Cohen, Paul A. and Schrecker, John E. (ed.), Reform in nineteenth-century China (Cambridge, MA: East Asian Research Center, 1976), 186Google Scholar.

7 See Oka, 4.

8 In TSTQJ, 289–375.

9 See Sin-wai, Chan, Buddhism in Late Ch‘ing political thought (Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 1985)Google Scholar, especially ch. iii, for an excellent account of the Buddhist revival in the late nineteenth century and its influence on Tan.

10 Oka, 19. In his introduction, Tan says ‘Buddhism is greater than Confucianism and Christianity’ TSTQJ, 289.

11 Tan speculated on the possibility of a synthesis of all the world's religions, noting the spread of Buddhism to the West, and the interest missionaries such as Timothy Light and Alexander Williamson had shown in Buddhism. See TSTQJ, 464.

12 Tan's interest in the ether has been commented on inYu-lan, Fung (tr. Bodde, Derk), History of Chinese philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 692–4Google Scholar, in Nathan Talbott's monograph ‘T a n Ssu-t'ung and the ether’ (see n. 1), in Shek, Richard H., ‘Some Western influences on T'an Ssu-t'ung's thought’, in Cohen, Paul A. and Schrecker, John E. (ed.), Reform in nineteenth-century China (Harvard: East Asian Research Center, 1976)Google Scholar, Takashi, Oka ‘The philosophy of T'an Ssu-t'ung’ (see n. 6), and Xu Yijun, Tan Sitong sixiang yanjiu (Changsha: Hunan Renmin Chubanshe, 1981)Google Scholar.

13 The translator Xu Shou for example apparently rejected the traditional Chinese conceptions of wu xing and yin-yang out of hand as superstitions. See Peifang, Cheng, ‘Xu Xuecun xiansheng zhuan’ (A biography of Mr. Xu Xuecun [ = Xu Shou]) in Erchang, Min ed. Beizhuan jibu (Supplementary collection of stele biographies), (Beiping: Yanjing University, 1932), 43Google Scholar. 15b-16a.

14 See TSTQJ, 432–4.

15 References to the Chinese text are all to the version in Tan Sitong quanji (see n. 8).

16 See Xu Yijun, 171.

17 These are Buddhist terms: the realm of physical phenomena is the dharma-dhātu; the realm of empty space the ākāsa-dhātu; and the realm of sentient beings the sattva-dhātu. (See Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 693)Google Scholar.

18 As Derk Bodde points out, this negative definition echoes the description of the Dao given in chapter 25 of the Daodejing (The Way and its Power). See Yu-lan, Fung, 693Google Scholar.

19 The term for ‘scientist’ which Tan used was gezhijia , now replaced by kexuejia .

20 AEOB, 67. Chan Sin-wai translates aili as ‘centripetal force’ but it seems that it is chemical attraction being alluded to here. See Fryer, John and Shou, Xu, transl. Huaxue jianyuan (Shanghai: Jiangnan Arsenal, 1872)Google Scholar, 1.3b.4.

21 Xili is given by Martin, W. A. P. in Justus Doolittle, Vocabulary and handbook of the Chinese language (Fuzhou: Rozario, Marcal & Co., 1872), 309Google Scholar, as meaning ‘gravitational attraction’.

22 Translated in Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 693Google Scholar.

23 These are the people who comprise the Five Cardinal Relationships which Confucius said were the basis of society.

24 The term zhidian is used by Fryer and Xu Shou in Huaxue Jianyuan.

25 TSTQJ, 293–4. Translation based upon that in AEOB, 67.

26 Although yitai has its origins in a materialistic view of the universe, Tan's materialism is of a somewhat eccentric type. He seems at times to be using the least substantial of all materials, the ether, as a means of subverting the crudely materialistic views of Western scientists.

27 TSTQJ, 306 (AEOB, 89. Chan translates this phrase yuanzhi zhi yuan as ‘ element of elements’, but there seems n o reason to render the second yuan as ‘element’).

28 See Robinson, Richard, Early Mādhyamika in India and China (Madison, Milwaukee: University of Wisconsin Press, 1967), 55 and passimGoogle Scholar.

29 This interpenetration is emphasized by the Huayan-Sūtra, cited by Tan as one of his sources. The Sogdian monk Fa Zang (643–712) wrote the Essay on the Golden Lion expounding the ideas of the Huayan-Sūtra in which he uses the analogy of Indra's net. ‘Each loop of this net is decorated with a jewel, in such a way that each jewel not only reflects the image of every other jewel, but also the multiple images reflected in each of the other jewels’ (Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 353)Google Scholar.

30 Translation from Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 693–4Google Scholar.

31 The character wu ‘not’ should be emended to qi ‘its’.

32 Tan uses the term fenji meaning ‘chemical equivalents’, employed in Huaxue jianyuan. See n. 20.

33 TSTQJ 306 My translation, based on AEOB. This passage is partially translated in Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 695, and fully in AEOB, 88–9Google Scholar.

34 AEOB, 215–16, from TSTQJ, 367.

35 TSTQJ, 331; AEOB, 136.

36 Chan Sin-wai translates tong as ‘ interconnectedness’ but I prefer ‘mutuality’ as it seems to imply a more active relationship than mere connexion.

37 TSTQJ, 291.

38 ibid., 434. Tan explicitly says here that yitai is manifested as waves.

39 See Cook, Francis H., Hua-yen Buddhism (University Park: Pennsylvania University Press, 1977) ch. iGoogle Scholar.

46 TSTQJ, 291.

41 ibid., 293.

42 Letter to Ouyang Zhonggu, TSTQJ, 462.

43 TSTQJ, 344; AEOB, 166: ‘The invasion of China by the countries in the East and West was actually engendered by heaven, which applied its benevolence in the most subtle manner.’

44 ibid., 361; AEOB, 202.

45 ibid., 372; AEOB, 225.

46 ibid., 307; AEOB, 90. Here Tan's understanding of chemistry is faulty. Water is not decomposed into hydrogen and oxygen by heating under normal conditions, and nor do hydrogen and oxygen combine back into water spontaneously as heat is withdrawn. Tan seems to assume that all such changes are reversible, perhaps because he has no practical experience of doing science himself.

47 Letter to Ouyang Zhonggu, TSTQJ, 462 and in Renxue in TSTQJ, 307.

48 ibid., 315; AEOB, 103.

49 See Fuzhi, Wang, Zhang Zi Zhengmeng zhu (Notes on Zhang Zai's Correcting youthful ignorance), (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1975), 100Google Scholar.

50 From Yitai shuo in TSTQJ, 433.

51 The classic history of ether theories is Whitttaker, Sir Edmund, A history of the theories of aether and electricity (London: Thomas Newton and Sons, 1951)Google Scholar. Gillispie, C. C., The edge of objectivity: an essay in the history of scientific ideas (London: Oxford University Press, 1960)Google Scholar also gives an interesting account of the modern history of the ether.

52 Cantor, G. N. and Hodge, M. J. S., Conceptions of ether: studies in the history of ether theories 1740–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 3Google Scholar.

53 ibid., 3.

54 ibid., 5.

55 ibid., 7.

56 Sambursky, Shmuel, Physics of the Stoics (London: Hutchinson, 1971), 1Google Scholar.

57 ibid., 2.

58 ibid., 9.

59 ibid., 9.

60 ibid., 81.

61 Descartes, René, Principles of philosophy, 1644, translated by Miller, Valentine Rodger and Miller, Reese P. (Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1983), 181Google Scholar.

62 ibid., 138.

63 ibid., 47.

64 See Sir Whittaker, Edmund, A history of the theories of aether and electricity, I, 5Google Scholar.

65 Thackray, Arnold, Atoms and powers (London: Oxford University Press, 1970), 28CrossRefGoogle Scholar, quoting Newton's Opticks.

66 Cantor, G. N. and Hodge, M. J. S., Conceptions of ether, 1Google Scholar.

67 See Whittaker, History, 19 for a concise summary of the role of the Newtonian ether: ‘All space is permeated by an elastic medium or aether, which is capable of propagating vibrations in the same way as the air propagates the vibrations of sound, but with far greater velocity. This aether pervades the pores of all material bodies, and is the cause of their cohesion. Its density varies from one place to another, being greatest in the free interplanetary spaces.’

68 Harman, P. M., Energy, force and matter: the conceptual development of nineteenth-century physics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 21–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Fresnel proposed an elastic solid ether capable of transmitting the transverse vibrations of light waves.

69 ibid., 33. Faraday suggested that a ‘wave of electricity’ passed from the primary to the secondary circuit when the loop was closed, producing a transient electric current.

70 ibid., 84–98. Maxwell tried to develop a theory of contiguous ether particles which would transmit action in an electromagnetic field. His failed attempts to construct a mechanical model of the ether did not prevent him from deducing his famous set of equations which, amongst other things, predicted the existence of electromagnetic waves which would travel at the speed of light.

71 Cantor, and Hodge, , Conceptions of ether, 2Google Scholar.

72 See Whitttaker, , History, 128Google Scholar.

73 Thackray, , Atoms and powers, 25Google Scholar.

74 ibid., 25.

75 J. R. R. Christie, ‘Ether and the science of chemistry 1740–1790’, in Cantor and Hodge, 93.

76 This was the view of Joseph Larmor (1857–1942) who between 1893 and 1897 published a series of papers entitled collectively Dynamical theory of the electrical and luminiferous medium. See Harman, 101.

77 Carl von Nägeli proposed in 1884 a detailed particulate theory of the ether. He speculated that chemical atoms consisted of billions of tiny ether particles or amers, of which there were two types, A and B, and three forces, electrical, gravitational and ethereal, the latter being either repulsive or attractive. See Kragh, Helge, ‘The aether in late nineteenth-century chemistry’, in Ambix, 36/2 (July 1988), 52–3Google Scholar.

78 Harman, 83.

79 ibid., 89–93.

80 J. J. Thomson was unable in fact to make any substantial predictions with his theory, which was later abandoned. See Harman, 98.

81 Jeans, James H., ‘A suggested explanation of radio-activity’, Nature, 70, 1905 (2 June 1904), 101CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Jeans's comment on the destruction of matter to produce energy is a remarkably prescient one, coming some time before the full implications of the relationship between energy and mass predicted by Special Relativity were appreciated.

82 Kragh, Helge, ‘The ether in late nineteenth-century chemistry’, 55–8Google Scholar.

83 See Crookes, William, Researches in Spiritualism (London: J. Burns, 1874)Google Scholar.

84 Kragh, 57. Sir William Crookes, discoverer of thallium, was for many years the President of the Society for Psychical Research and a leading promoter of spiritualism. See Hall, Trevor H., The Spiritualists (London: Gerald Duckworth, 1962)Google Scholar for a fascinating account of the alleged liaison between Crookes and the medium Florence Cook.

85 Sir Lodge, Oliver, The ether of space (London: Harper and Barnes, 1909)Google Scholar, p. xiv.

86 Sir Lodge, Oliver, Raymond, or Life and Death (London: Methuen, 1916), 298Google Scholar.

87 See Merz, John Theodore, A history of European thought in the nineteenth century, II (Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1903), 36ffGoogle Scholar. on ‘Problems as to the nature of the ether’, and ch. xi, ‘On the psycho-physical view of Nature’.

88 Wallace, Alfred Russel, This wonderful century: its successes and failures (London: Swan Sonnenschein, 1898), 57CrossRefGoogle Scholar. His book is less triumphalist than its short title might suggest: as well as portraying the successes of materialistic science he has several chapters on the neglect of psychical research, phrenology and hypnotism. He dismissed vaccination as an illusion, and was disturbed by the rising tide of materialism and selfishness he saw around him.

89 Allotropy is the phenomenon of one element existing in several different structural forms. Carbon is well-known to exist both as graphite and diamond, and recently a new form C60 has been discovered. Phosphorus possesses yellow, red and black allotropes, whilst oxygen exists both in the normal diatomic form O2 and the triatomic allotrope ozone O3.

90 Organic compounds with the same molecular formulae can exist in several different forms depending on the way in which the carbon atoms are linked. Propanol C3H8OH, for example, exists as two different forms or isomers.

91 See Bolton, H. Carrington ‘The revival of alchemy in France’, Chemical News, 11 February 1898Google Scholar. For the alchemical background see Debus, Allen G., Chemistry, alchemy and the New Philosophy 1550–1700 (London: Variorum Reprints, 1987)Google Scholar.

92 For instance, Talbott, ‘T‘a n Ssu-t'ung and the ether’, 27.

93 TSTQJ, 289.

94 Tan studied under the Buddhist teacher Yang Wenhui } (1837–1911), who himself had lived in England from 1878–1881, where he took an interest in astronomy, geography and optics. See Welch, Holmes, The Buddhist revival in China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1968), 2–6Google Scholar.

95 Mo Zi was regarded as heretical by the Confucians. His writings include some of the most remarkable examples of the fertility and originality of ancient Chinese scientific thought. Tan was convinced that the teachings of Mo Zi were the origin of Western science. See ‘Xing suanxue yi’ , (Proposal for the revival of mathematics), TSTQJ, 171.

96 A poet of Daoist leanings. See Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 692Google Scholar.

97 A Song Neo-Confucianist who wrote on the Taijitu ‘The Diagram of the Supreme Ultimate’ relating yin and yang to qi. See Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 444Google Scholar.

98 Zhang Zai wrote extensively on qi and its meaning. See Kasoff, Ira E., The thought of Chang Tsai (1020–1077), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

99 A contemporary of Zhu Xi who wrote: ‘The Way (Dao) fills the Universe, nowhere being concealed. It is, in Heaven, called the yin and yang; in Earth it is called love (ren ) and righteousness (yi ). Thus, then, love and righteousness are man's original mind.’ (See Fung Yu-lan, vol. 2, 575)Google Scholar.

100 Wang Yangming also speaks of the nature of ren: ‘The reason that the great man is able to be one with Heaven, Earth and all things, is not that he is thus for some purpose but because the love (ren ) of his mind is naturally so and thus makes possible this union.’ (Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 599)Google Scholar.

101 Wang Fuzhi wrote: ‘Within the Universe there only Principle (li ) and Ether (qi , ). The Ether is the vehicle of Principle, through which it derives its orderliness.’ (Fung Yu-lan, vol. 2, 641.

102 Zongxiwrote, Huang: ‘In the great process of evolutionary change there is only the single Ether (qi ), which circulates everywhere without interruption’. (Fung Yu-lan, vol. 2, 640)Google Scholar.

103 Tan took a particular interest in Zhang Zai's philosophy, writing an unpublished article entitled ‘Zhang Zi Zhengmeng: Canliangpian buzhu’ (Additional notes on the ‘Two in Three Essay’ in Correcting youthful ignorance). See TSTQJ, 56. Tan also regarded Zai's, Zhang views on qi as prefiguring modern astronomical concepts. See ‘Lun jinri Xixue yu Zhongguo guxue’ (On modern Western studies and ancient Chinese thought), 1898, in TSTQJ, 399–400,Google Scholar and ‘Shijuying lu bizhi. Sipian’ (Notes from the Calcareous Slate Shadows Studio: Thoughts) in TSTQJ, 123–4. See also Graham, A. C., Two Chinese philosophers (London: Lund Humphries, 1958), 31 for an account of Neo-Confucian views of qiGoogle Scholar.

104 See Zhang Zai ji: Zheng Meng (Collected works of Zhang Zai: Correcting youthful ignorance) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1978), 9. The translation is based on that in Fung Yu-lan, vol. 2, 488Google Scholar.

105 Zhang Zai ji: Zheng Meng, 8–9. See Fuzhi, Wang, Zhang Zi Zhengmeng zhu, 16 (see n. 49)Google Scholar.

106 Youwei, Kang, DatongshuGoogle Scholar; , Zhang Xichen and zhou Zhenfu (ed.), (Beijing: Guji chubanshe, 1956).

107 The book was itself not written down in its present form until 1901–2, but it was conceived in 1884. (See Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 685Google Scholar). Kang in fact attempted to keep its ideas secret, but he allowed Liang Qichao to read it, and he discussed its ideas with other students, so it is likely that Tan too would have been familiar with its contents. (See Qichao, Liang, Intellectual trends in the Ch'ing period, Hsu, Immanuel (tr.), (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959), 97–8)Google Scholar. The exact relationship of Tan and Kang is rather uncertain, and the evidence that they met before Tan wrote Renxue is rather dubious (see Sin-wai, Chan, An exposition of benevolence, 15–16Google Scholar). This does not rule out the influence of Kang Youwei on Tan, nor that of Tan on Kang.

108 Emperor Napoleon III of France suffered a severe defeat at the hands of t he Prussian army at Sedan on 1st September 1870.

109 Kang uses the expression yingxi [shadow play], the contemporary term for magic lantern slides.

110 Datongshu, 2.

111 Datongshu, 2–3. This translation is based on Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 685Google Scholar.

112 As Needham, Joseph has pointed out, the terms for ‘magnet’ and ‘compassion’ are homophones. See Science and civilisation in China, vol. iv, part 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962), 232Google Scholar.

113 See Guilin, Jiang ed. Wanmucaotang yigao waibian (Posthumous drafts from the Hall of Myriad Trees and Grasses), vol. 1 (Taibei: Chengwen chubanshe, 1978), p. 24Google Scholar. The first two examples are conventional allegories of filial piety.

114 ibid., 24.

115 ibid., 29.

116 See TSTNP, 63 and Bennett, Adrian Arthur, John Fryer: the introduction of Western science and technology in the nineteenth century (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), 44CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

117 See Bennett, Adrian Arthur and Liu, Kwang-ching, ‘Christianity in the Chinese idiom: Young J. Allen and the early Chiao-hui hsin-pao 1868–1870’, in Fairbank, John K. (ed.), The missionary enterprise in China and America (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1974), 159–96Google Scholar, and H, Richard. Shek, ‘Some Western influences on T'an Ssu-t'ung's thought’ (cited n. 12 above)Google Scholar.

118 Sin-wai, Chan, AEOB, 10 says that the 1896Google Scholar meeting with Fryer took place in Tianjin, but this seems not to be the case. See Tan's letter to Zhonggu, Ouyang in TSTQJ, 458 and 461Google Scholar.

119 JSTQJ, 458 x-rays had only been discovered by Röntgen a year earlier. Fryer later translated a book on X-rays entitled Tongwu dianguang (Electric light which pierces things) which was published in 1899. See Bennett, John Fryer, 95.

120 This was probably the most widely availabel chemistry text in China at this time, and included an influential system of chemical nomenclature.

121 See ‘Lun quantixue’ (On anatomy), in TSTQJ, 403–5Google Scholar.

122 Tyndall, John, Six lectures on light, delivered in America 1872–1873 (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1873)Google Scholar.

123 Guangxue xuzhi (Shanghai: Jiangnan zhizaoju, 1890) was translated and condensed from Lees, William, Handbook to diagrams in light and heat (London: W. and A. K. Johnston, 1881)Google Scholar, see Bennett, A. A., John Fryer, 83)Google Scholar.

124 Kreyer, Carl T. and Yuanyi, Zhao (tr.), Guangxue (Shanghai: Jiangnan Arsenal, 1879)Google Scholar, 2.4a. See Bennett, Adrian Arthur, John Fryer, 105Google Scholar. The book on sound referred to is Tyndall, John, Sound (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1869)Google Scholar, translated by Fryer, John and Jianyin, Xu as Shengxue in 1874Google Scholar. See Bennett, A. A., John Fryer, 82Google Scholar.

125 Fryer, John, Guangxue xuzhi (Shanghai: Jiangnan zhizaoju, 1890), 9aGoogle Scholar.

126 Mentioned in Shek, Richard H., ‘Some Western influences on T'an Ssu-t'ung's thought’, 200Google Scholar.

127 Shek, 200. There seems to be some confusion (AEOB, 10, 196, 197) about the date and English title of Zhi xin mian bing fa which Tan says had a profound influence on him. The correct English title is Ideal suggestion through mental photography.

128 Shek, ‘Some Western influences on T'an Ssu-t'ung's thought’, 201.

Wood's original book mentions the ether only once: We find this great force called thought has scientific relations, correlations and transmutations, that its vibrations project themselves in waves through the ether, regardless of distance and other sensory limitation, that thus strike unisons in other minds and make them vibrant; that they relate themselves to like and are repelled by the unlike; that their silent though forceful impact make a distinct impression; in fact, that they are substantial entities, in comparison with which gold, silver and iron are as evanescent as the morning dew.

See Wood, HenryIdeal suggestion through mental photography: a restorative system for home and private use. Preceded by a study of the laws of mental healing (Boston, MA: Lee and Shephard, 1893), 52Google Scholar.

It is interesting to speculate as to why Fryer expanded on the notion of ether quite so extensively, giving it far more prominence than Wood did in his original work. (This was recognized by Shek. See Richard Shek ‘Some Western influences on T'an ssu-t'ung's thought’, 201). It is possible that, seeing the connexion between ether and qi, Fryer sought to emphasize the ether in the hope that it would appeal to Chinese intellectuals such as Tan Sitong. As Fryer and Tan met twice, in 1893 and 1896, it is also possible that Fryer actually knew of Tan's interest in Zhang Zai.

129 Wood, Henry, Ideal suggestion through mental photography, 94Google Scholar.

130 ibid., 112.

131 ibid., 114.

132 ibid., 144.

133 See TSTQJ, 461. In fact, Fryer was returning to the USA, not to his native England.

134 TSTQJ 127–8.

135 The way in which Tan's view of ether developed between Shijuying lu bishi and Renxue is discussed in Xu Yijun, chs. 3 and 4.

136 TSTQJ, 293.

137 ibid., 294.

138 ibid., 293.

139 ibid., 294.

140 ibid., 294.

141 ibid., 291.

142 ibid., 295.

143 ibid., 291.

144 ibid., 434.

145 ibid., 309.

146 ibid., 291.

147 ibid., 293.

148 ibid., 293.

149 ibid.

150 ibid.

151 ibid., 294.

152 ibid.

153 Tan does not say explicitly that yitai is qi, but it is clear from his attention to Zhang Zai that he regards yitai as a form of qi.

154 ibid., 295.

155 TSTQJ 331 The term xiangfen is a technical term used by the Mere Ideation (weishi ) School of Chinese Buddhism, meaning that part of consciousness which appears to be the object of perception. In the Mere Ideation School, there are no external ‘real’ objects outside consciousness. See Yu-lan, Fung, vol. 2, 302Google Scholar.

156 TSTQJ, 331

157 ibid., 293.

158 See Sivin, Nathan, Traditional medicine in contemporary China (Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1987), 47CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

159 TSTQJ, 295; AEOB, 72.

160 TSTQJ, 299; AEOB, 78.

161 TSTQJ, 303; AEOB, 84–5: ‘The way society proscribes lust is far too stringent, and has the opposite effect of giving rise to more lust.’

162 TSTQJ, 304; AEOB, 85: ‘There is nothing to suggest that men are superior to women. If we understand that both men and women are the basic components of heaven and earth, then they both have countless virtues, and have great things to do, that they are both equal …‘.

163 TSTQJ, 303; AEOB, 84: ‘If we Chinese do not examine the causes leading to the fall of our country, and in fear hasten to rid ourselves of the great evil of footbinding, there would be more lust and killing …’.

164 TSTQJ, 305; AEOB, 88: ‘… what can we say of ourselves when we …, having chosen rice as our main diet, still kill animals to stuff our bellies …?‘

165 TSTQJ, 367; AEOB, 215–16.

166 TSTQJ, 342; AEOB, 161: ‘That is why it was reported in a Russian newspaper that “Since no less than several million Chinese suffer the utmost bitterness, we should overthrow their dynasty and rescue their people.” European and American countries speak in the same vein, all trying to gain spoils for themselves, under the lofty pretext of “doing their duty”. If the Chinese people do not do it themselves, the disaster will be beyond words.’ That is to say, China faced a full-scale foreign invasion if reform were not instituted.

167 TSTQJ, 341; AEOB, 160–61 ‘Barren were their lands, inferior their race, bestial their minds, and savage their customs …’.

168 Engels, Friedrich, ‘Socialism: Utopian and scientific’, in Feuer, Lewis S. (ed.), Marx and Engels: basic writings on politics and philosophy (London: Fontana/Collins, 1984; originally published by Foreign Languages Press, Moscow), 146–7Google Scholar.

169 Guillermaz, Jacques, A history of the Chinese Communist Party 1921–1949 (London: Methuen, 1972; the French edition appeared in Paris: Payot, 1968), 21–2Google Scholar.

170 Darnton, Robert in Mesmerism and the end of the Enlightenment in France (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1968)Google Scholar shows that Nicolas Bergasse, the follower of Franz Anton Mesmer and founder of the Society of Universal Harmony, suggested in 1783 that the conscience is a physical organ ‘that is united to all points in the universe … It is by this organ that we put ourselves in harmony with nature.’ [… and that] the peaceful flow of the [mesmeric] fluid would produce a blissfully healthy, happy and justly organized France (p. 114). Darnton suggests that mesmerism helps to explain the ‘genesis of a revolutionary mood’ in the France of the 1780s, as literate French turned away from the cold rationalism of the Enlightenment and looked for a more emotionally rewarding creed (pp. 161f.).

171 This point was suggested in discussion with Bridie Andrews.

172 The late nineteenth century was a period in which other writers also tried to claim the prestige of science to support their religious or political ideas. Eddy's, Mary BakerScience and health with key to the Scriptures (Boston, MA, 1875)Google Scholar had earlier also tried to annex the prestige of ‘science’ to a ‘mind-only’ philosophy of disease, in which, as in Henry Wood's Ideal suggestion through mental photography, the right-thinking mind would overcome disease by the correct perception of error. See Kwok, Danny, Scientism in Chinese thought (New Haven, 1965)Google Scholar for the way the role of science later became an issue in the debates of the May 4 th Movement.

173 This may seem to contradict the earlier statement that Tan's yitai was ‘almost wholly metaphysical’. Tan's use of the ether/qi/yitai in Renxue indeed is almost entirely metaphysical, but he makes use of the fact that it has a respectably materialist pedigree, both in Zhang Zai's qi and in the Western scientists’ luminiferous and electromagnetic ethers. Tan makes play of the ambiguity of the concept itself to create his synthesis.

174 Talbott, ‘T'an Ssu-t'ung and the ether’, 22.

175 This is reminiscent of the definitions of the Mohist Canons, which Tan cites as one of his sources. See Graham, A. C., Later Mohist ethics and science (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 1978), 261ffGoogle Scholar.

176 Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity (1905) and his General Theory of Relativity (1915) did not require the existence of an ether. See Einstein, Albert, Relativity (London: Methuen, 1920; reprinted University Paperbacks, 1960), 146 et seqGoogle Scholar.

177 The ether died as an object of study by theoretical physicists but its use continued for many decades in texts on radio and even in poetry, as in T. S. Eliot's ‘The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ (1917).

178 Tan proposed to his teacher Ouyang Zhonggu the setting up of a Science and Mathematics Academy in Hunan in 1896. See ‘Liuyang xingsuan ji’, TSTQJ, 174.

179 Tan was executed in the Caishikou area of Beijing after the collapse of the Hundred Days Reform. His fellow reformers such as Kang Youwei managed to escape to Japan. See TSTNP, 118.

180 Mao Zedong was influenced by Tan, according to his biographer Rui, Li (Comrade Mao's early revolutionary activities, Beijing, 1957Google Scholar, cited in Guillermaz, Jacques, A history of the Chinese Communist Party, 20)Google Scholar.

181 See ‘Lunjinri Xixue yu Zhongguo guxue’ (On modern Western studies and ancient Chinese philosophy), TSTQJ, 398–400.

182 ibid., 399.

183 Such as Jize, Zeng(1839–90), writing after his first visit to Europe, in Yueheng, Yued. Zeng Jize yiji (Posthumous collection of the writings of Zeng Jize) (Changsha: Yuelu shushe, 1983), 363Google Scholar.

184 Although even Tan uses this expression, with some justice, when writing of ancient Chinese astronomy in ‘Shijuying lu bishi’. See TSTQJ, 123, and also in ‘Lun jinri Xixue yu Zhongguo guxue’ (On present-day Western studies and ancient Chinese thought), ibid., 398–400. The point is that Chinese scholars had often been far in advance of their Western counterparts, but Tan, unlike many of his contemporaries, did not use this as an excuse to dismiss Western science as the mere regurgitation of ancient Chinese theories.

185 TSTQJ, 338; AEOB, 152: ‘ The loss of the teaching of Confucius was caused by rulers and by the erroneous teaching which advocated monarchical rule. To this day, no one has come forward to revitalize Confucianism. I earnestly cherish the hope that there will be a Martin Luther for the teaching of Confucius.’

186 Liang Qichao, Intellectual trends in the Ch‘ing period, 110.

I should like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Christopher Cullen of SOAS, for several stimulating discussions of the issues in this paper; Bridie Andrews of the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, Cambridge for her comments, especially on the section on Tan's political ideas; and Professor Nathan Sivin for his detailed and helpful comments on an earlier draft. I am also grateful to Professor Tim Barrett for his help in editing the typescript and in pointing out several mistakes. I am of course alone responsible for any errors that remain. I am also grateful to the librarians of SOAS, the University Library, Cambridge, the University Library, London, the British Library, the British Library Oriental Collection, the University of Nebraska Library, and the Royal Chemical Society, London for their assistance.