廣弘明集 19.24

19.24

Liu Qiu's mind was already firmly decided within, no longer to be moved by external things. In the early Jianwu era, he was summoned to be Erudite of the National University. In the winter of the second year, when his illness grew severe, he moved to Jiangzhou. White clouds hovered as if entering the eaves and doors; an extraordinary fragrance and the sound of lithophones in the air arose, and thereupon he passed away at the age of sixty. His disciples mourned him as if for a father, yet wore no mourning garments. Several hundred monastics and laypeople attended the funeral. His remaining treatises formed a collection of twenty-four fascicles. In the third year of the Datong era of the Liang, his sons consulted the rules for posthumous names. The lofty man Yu Shen said: 'To have virtue and wide learning is called *Wen* (cultivated); this can be advanced as his posthumous name.' Chen Shi said: 'Culture serves as a model for the world; conduct serves as a norm for scholars.' Thereupon he was given the posthumous title Master Wenfan (Cultural Model). Ren Yansheng, governor of Nanjun, said: 'Although the Master and I were close in years and generation, separated by several thousand li between Jing and Wu, I never had the chance to walk humbly in his breeze and receive his remaining discourses. How could this merely cause indignation in that age? It is truly a deep regret for all antiquity. Yet when Shuye described Qianlou, or Han Zhuo admired Juzhong, they did not necessarily receive their radiance or behold their demeanor; they simply yearned toward distant principles and thought longingly over a thousand years. But that man was noble in himself; even if one were to carry scriptures and hold a broom day and night at his gate, one would never perceive an inch of a thousand fathoms or a trickle of ten thousand acres. In the end, though face-to-face across ten thousand ages, none could reach his threshold. Therefore I use this to dispel the regret of a thousand years.' Yu Xiaojing, the Master of Reclusive Integrity, said: 'His son Zhida served as Minister of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices in the Liang; he was on good terms with me. He sought out the lingering writings of his late father and arranged them to compile this biography.'