Xu Luqing

Life

Xu passed the jinshi examination in 1223, the sixteenth year of the Jiading era, and was appointed instructor of the military school of the Nan'an Army (南安軍). He served successively as magistrate of Youxi and Nan'an counties; in 1227 he was an assistant (幹辦) to the Fujian military commissioner, in 1233 he became magistrate of Nan'an County, and in 1237 he took up a post in the audit office (諸司審計司) of the imperial court.

Summoned to the capital as an editor of the Bureau of Military Affairs (樞密院編修官), he was impeached together with the imperial diarist Fang Dacong (方大琮), the editor Liu Kezhuang and the corrector Wang Mai, and the students of the Imperial University composed a poem, 'The Four Worthies' (四賢詩), in their honour.

He was then sent out as prefect of the Jianchang Army (建昌軍), where he lightened taxes, restrained the powerful, dismissed corrupt clerks and abolished the extortionate surcharges on the autumn grain.

In 1240 he was recalled to the post of an official of the Right Office (右司郎官) and sent out as transport judge of Jiangdong; he later served as judicial intendant of Zhedong and Zhexi and as prefect of Ningguo Prefecture. Recalled again as a treasury official concurrently of the Right Office, he offended the chief minister in power and was put in charge of the Yuntai Temple (雲臺觀); he was then appointed transport judge of Jiangdong, and in 1241 he became judicial intendant of Zhedong concurrently superintendent of the Ever-normal Granaries and prefect of Quanzhou and Ganzhou.

In 1243 he was summoned as a Right Office official and promoted to vice-minister of the Court of the Imperial Treasury, concurrently of the Right Office, and offered frequent proposals; one account places his appointment as treasury vice-minister and expositor of the Chongzheng Hall (崇政殿說書) in 1245. A year later he was additionally acting vice-minister of the Ministry of Personnel.

Citing illness, he asked for a temple sinecure and was transferred to the office of senior compiler of the Youwen Hall (右文殿修撰) and prefect of Pingjiang Prefecture. He was summoned as acting vice-minister of the Ministry of War, changed to acting vice-minister of the Ministry of Rites with the additional post of lecturer (侍講), and promoted to vice-minister of the Ministry of Rites. In 1247 he was appointed libationer of the Directorate of Education and soon concurrently lecturer and acting supervising secretary. After repeated petitions to retire, he retired in 1249 with the title of attendant of the Huawen Pavilion (華文閣待制). Other posts recorded for him include prefect of the Nanping Army (南平軍), imperial diarist, attendant of the Baozhang Pavilion and grand master for court audiences (朝奉大夫). His biography is in juan 424 of the Song Shi.

Works

His works include the Quangu wenji (泉谷文集; also called Quangu ji, 泉谷集), the Yanchu yizheng gao (鹽楮議政稿), the Liguan duiyue ji (歷官對越集) and the Xu Qingzheng gong ci (徐清正公詞); he also compiled the Han–Tang wenlei (漢唐文類) and the Wenyuan jinghua (文苑菁華, also written 文苑精華), and memorials (奏議) and lectures (講義) are recorded under his name. Most of these writings were lost; in the Wanli era of the Ming, his descendant Xu Jian (徐鑒) gathered his remains from family records as the Qingzheng cungao (清正存稿) in six juan and composed the Chronological Biography of Xu Qingzheng (宋宗伯徐清正公年譜), which is appended to the collection.

Family and associates

His father was Xu Cong (徐琮) and his mother was née Gan (1143–1234). He had two sons, Xu Ziduan (徐子端) and Xu Zizhong (徐子中), and a son-in-law, Wu Shunlong (吳舜龍). He studied under Zhu Bing (朱炳) and was a friend of Ding Zhong (丁中). He exchanged letters with Fang Dacong and Chen Mi (陳宓), wrote prefaces for works by Zeng Yi (曾嶧), Zeng Anzhi (曾安止) and Zeng Anqiang (曾安強), a colophon for a work by Zhang Jiucheng (張九成), and a sacrificial address for Zhen Dexiu (真德秀). After his death, Liu Kezhuang composed his tomb epitaph and spirit-way stele.