John Fryer and the Shanghai Polytechnic: Making space for science in nineteenth-century China

British Journal for the History of Science

Volumn 29, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 1-16

  Wright, David ^a  

^a NONE   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0345936531     PISSN: 00070874     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0007087400033835     Document Type: Article

References (122)

1. For the general issues in this paper, see Cyrus Peake, 'Some aspects of the introduction of modern science into China', Isis (1934), 22, 173-217;
2. Tsuen-hsuin Tsien, 'Western impact on China through translation', Far Eastern Quarterly (1954), 13, 305-27;
3. John K. Fairbank, The Influence of Modern Western Science and Technology on Japan and China, Rome, 1955;
4. R. G. A. Dolby, 'The transmission of science', History of Science (1977), 15, 1-43;
5. Ssu-yü Teng and John K. Fairbank, China's Response to the West: A Documentary Survey 1839-1923, Cambridge, MA, 1979;
6. Kuo Ting-yee and Liu Kwang-ching, 'Self-strengthening: the pursuit of Western technology', The Cambridge History of China (ed. J. K. Fairbank), 7 vols., Cambridge 1978-96, x (1), 491-542;
7. James Reardon-Anderson, The Study of Change: Chemistry in China 1840-1949, Cambridge, 1991.
8. On intellectual space for science in late imperial China, see Jonathan Porter, 'The scientific community in early modern China', Isis (1982), 73, 269;
9. David C. Reynolds, 'Redrawing China's intellectual map: images of science in nineteenth-century China', Late Imperial China (1991), 12, 27-61;
10. Xiong Yuezhi, Xixue Dongjian yu wan Qing shehui [The Eastward movement of Western studies and late Qing Society], Shanghai, 1994, the latter the most comprehensive treatment of the subject yet to appear in Chinese or English.
11. I have based my use of the term 'translation' on Bruno Latour, Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers Through Society, Milton Keynes, 1987, 117. I am indebted to Andrew Grout for bringing Latour's work to my attention.
12. Originally meaning 'vapour' or 'breath', it came to mean something akin to the Stoic pneuma, although in truth there is no Western equivalent.
13. See Joseph Needham et al., Science and Civilisation in China, 6 vols., Cambridge, 1954-96, ii, 216ff.;
14. Ho Peng Yoke, Li, qi and shu: An Introduction to Science and Civilisation in China, Hong Kong, 1985;
15. Nathan Sivin, Traditional Medicine in Contemporary China, Ann Arbor, 1987, ch. 2 for explanations of the basic concepts of Chinese science.
16. Arthur F. Wright, 'The Chinese language and foreign ideas', in Studies in Chinese Thought (ed. A. F. Wright), Chicago, 1953, 286-303. These techniques included: the use of already-existing terms to 'match the meaning' (a method known as geyi); transliteration, using a restricted group of transcriptor characters; and the creation of some completely novel terms where geyi might mislead the unwary.
17. Needham, Studies in Chinese Thought op. cit (4),
18. Sivin, Studies in Chinese Thought op. cit. (4).
19. Latour, Studies in Chinese Thought op. cit. (2), 108.
20. As Sivin, Studies in Chinese Thought op. cit. (4) has pointed out, in traditional China there was no field of study co-extensive with what we should call 'science', so my use of the term 'science paradigm' should be taken to include the main concepts of what we now term 'Chinese science'.
21. The only precedent for such an immense influx of foreign thought was the coming of Buddhism from the first century AD. See E. Zürcher, The Buddhist Conquest of China, Leiden, 1972.
22. John Fryer, 'Diary of a voyage to China', Fryer Papers: Carton 3, 1. The Fryer Papers (henceforth abbreviated to FP) are held in the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
23. See also Fred Dagenais, 'John Fryer's early years in China: I. Diary of his voyage to Hong Kong', in Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (1989), 29, 252-301,
24. 'John Fryer's early years in China: II. First impressions of Hong Kong and the Chinese people', in Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society ibid. (1990), 30, 146-68.
25. John Fryer to George Fryer, 15 March 1870, FP: Box 1 Folder 1.
26. The Fryers were originally Wesleyans, but Fryer's father split from the Wesleyan Church to set up his own sect, which seems to have been Arminian in character (John Fryer, 'The life of John Fryer Snr. of Hythe, Kent, England', FP: Carton 3, 9).
27. See A. W. Harrison, Arminianism, London, 1937, ch. 8,
28. David Young, F. D. Maurice and Unitarianism, Oxford, 1992, for accounts of the beliefs of the nineteenth-century Arminians. John Fryer himself worked for the Anglicans in Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai, but in a letter written in 1885 indicated that by the late 1870s he had become a follower of Unitarianism, FP: Box 1 Folder 6.
29. Fryer, 'Life of John Fryer Snr.', FP: Carton 3, 15.
30. John Fryer, 'Reminiscences of life in China', FP: Carton 3, 2.
31. Fryer, 'Reminiscences', FP: Carton 3, 3.
32. Fryer, 'Reminiscences', FP: Carton 3, 3.
33. Fryer, 'Reminiscences', FP: Carton 3, 3.
34. John Fryer, 'Recollections of life in Peking', FP: Carton 3,
35. Journal of the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (1929), 60, p. ii.
36. John Fryer, 'Sketch of the life of Mrs Anna Roleston Fryer', FP: Carton 1, 1.
37. John Fryer to Rev. H. Venn, 4 July 1865, Church Missionary Society Archives (CMS), University of Birmingham Library, C CH/038/4. Anna was supposed to have been seduced by the captain of the ship, 'under the influence of a drug of strong aphrodisiacal properties'.
38. Fryer, 'Life of Mrs Fryer', FP: Carton 3, 5.
39. John Fryer to Rev. H. Venn, 28 February 1865, CMS Archives, C CH/038/3.
40. One of his most famous students was the comprador and advocate of reform Zheng Guanying (1842-1923).
41. One touching letter to Anna survives, written in verse: 'Oh could you but know what I undergo day after day in this place far away living alone unloved and unknown spending my live [life] in an unequal strife standing my ground till things shall work round...', 8 November 1867, FP: Box 1 Folder 6.
42. Shanghai Xinbao (1854-72), the Chinese edition of the North China Herald, was edited successively by Marquis L. Wood, John Fryer and Young J. Allen.
43. See Roswell S. Britton, The Chinese Periodical Press 1800-1912, Shanghai, 1933, 49.
44. John Fryer to George Fryer, 25 March 1867, FP: Box 1 Folder 1.
45. Ssu-yü Teng and J. K. Fairbank, The Chinese Periodical Press 1800-1912 op. cit. (1), 64-5.
46. John Fryer to Broadhurst Tootal, 28 April 1868, FP: Box 1 Folder 2.
47. John Fryer to Cousin Susy (no surname identified), 11 July 1868, FP: Box 1 Folder 3.
48. FP: Box 1 Folder 3.
49. For Xu Jianyin, see David Wright, 'Careers in Western science in nineteenth-century China: Xu Shou and Xu Jianyin', Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1995), 5, 49-90.
50. John Fryer to Uncle and Aunt, 1 November 1869, FP: Box 1 Folder 4.
51. John Fryer to Cousin Susy, 11 July 1868, FP: Box 1 Folder 3, 2.
52. John Fryer to George Fryer, 7 December 1869, FP: Box 1 Folder 4.
53. John Fryer to Uncle and Aunt, 1 November 1869, FP: Box 1 Folder 4.
54. Daniel Jerome Macgowan (1814-93) arrived in China in 1843.
55. See Benjamin Elman, From Philosophy to Philology: Intellectual and Social Aspects of Change in Late Imperial China, Cambridge, MA, 1984.
56. Published in 1855 by the medical missionary Benjamin Hobson (1816-73).
57. John Fryer, 'Scientific terminology: present discrepancies and the means of securing uniformity', Records of the General Conference of the Protestant Missionaries of China Held at Shanghai, May 7-20, 1890, Shanghai, 1890, 531-49. The books translated at the Jiangnan Arsenal mainly related to military technology, but also included works on the fundamental sciences such as optics, chemistry and electricity.
58. See the appendix to A. A. Bennett, John Fryer: The Introduction of Western Science and Technology in Nineteenth-Century China, Cambridge, MA, 1967. Fryer's translations include works on chemistry, physics, navigation, etc.
59. John Fryer, 'Science in China', Nature (1881), 24, 56.
60. Knight Biggerstaff, 'The T'ung Wen Kuan', The Chinese Social and Political Science Review (1934), 18, 307-40.
61. Walter Medhurst, North China Daily News, 5 March 1874,
62. cited in John Fryer, First Report of the Shanghai Polytechnic Institution and Reading Rooms, Shanghai, 1875, 4.
63. Other accounts of the Shanghai Polytechnic may be found in Knight Biggerstaff, 'Shanghai Polytechnic Institution and Reading Room: an attempt to introduce Western science and technology to the Chinese', Pacific Historical Review (1956), 250, 127-49
64. Wang Ermin, Shanghai Gezhi Shuyuan zhilüe [An account of the Shanghai Polytechnic], Hong Kong, 1980.
65. Fryer, Shanghai Gezhi Shuyuan zhilüe [An account of the Shanghai Polytechnic], op. cit. (42), 4.
66. Fryer, Shanghai Gezhi Shuyuan zhilüe [An account of the Shanghai Polytechnic], op. cit. (42), 4.
67. See Suzanne Barnett, 'Foochow's academies: public ordering and expanding education in the late nineteenth century', Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Taibei (1987), 16, 513-87
68. Chen Yuanhui et al., Zhongguo gudai de shuyuan zhidu [The ancient Chinese academy system], Shanghai, 1981.
69. For an interesting account of the traditional shuyuan see Barry C. Keenan, Imperial China's Last Academies: Social Change in the Lower Xangzi 1864-1911, Berkeley, 1994.
70. Fryer, Imperial China's Last Academies: Social Change in the Lower Xangzi 1864-1911, op. cit. (42), 5.
71. Fryer, Imperial China's Last Academies: Social Change in the Lower Xangzi 1864-1911, op. cit. (42), 9,
72. Gezhi Huibian (1877), 2, 6b-7b.
73. Rev. C. W. Mateer ran Dengzhou College in Shandong Province, which provided the most extensive science curriculum of any missionary school in China.
74. John Fryer, Second Report of the Chinese Polytechnic and Reading Rooms, Shanghai, 1878, 7.
75. Fryer, Second Report of the Chinese Polytechnic and Reading Rooms, op. cit. (49), 7.
76. Fryer, Second Report of the Chinese Polytechnic and Reading Rooms, op. cit. (49), 8.
77. Fryer, Second Report of the Chinese Polytechnic and Reading Rooms, op. cit. (49), 7.
78. Zhili was the province surrounding the capital. Li Hongzhang (1823-1901), the leading Chinese statesman of the late nineteenth century, was involved in most of the self-strengthening projects from the early 1860s onwards.
79. North China Herald, 15 March 1877, 261.
80. Gezhi Huibian (1876), 1, 11b-12a.
81. Yet more impressive machinery would not have impressed the envoy Liu Xihong who visited the Polytechnic on his way to Britain, and wrote that, with its distasteful emphasis on the practical, it ought to be called a 'Hall of the Arts' [yi lin zhi tang] rather than an 'Academy for the Extension of Knowledge'. Liu Xihong, 'Yingyao siji' [Private notes on a journey to Britain], in Zou xiang shijie congshu [The Going Out into the World Collection] (ed. Zhong Shuhe), Changsha, 1986, 50-1.
82. John Fryer, 'Third report on the Chinese Polytechnic Institution and Reading Rooms', North China Herald, 18 April 1883, 432-4.
83. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (56), 433.
84. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (56), 433.
85. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (56), 433.
86. John Fryer, 'Fourth report of the Chinese Polytechnic Institution and Reading Rooms', North China Herald, 10 July 1885, 44-5, on 44.
87. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (60), 44.
88. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (60), 44.
89. Fryer, North China Herald, op. cit. (60), 44.
90. John Fryer to the [unnamed] Head of the Unitarians, n.d., probably 1885, FP: Box 1 Folder 6.
91. Li San-po, 'Letters to the Editor in John Fryer's Scientific Magazine', Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Taibei (1974), 4, 729-77.
92. For the contemporary state of British science journals, see W. H. Brock, 'The development of commercial science journals in Victorian Britain', in Development of Science Publishing in Europe (ed. A. J. Meadows), Amsterdam, 1980, 95-122.
93. See Fryer's report on the Depot in North China Herald, 28 December 1897, 702-3.
94. The essays are collected in Wang Tao (ed.), Gezhi keyi huibian, Shanghai, 1897,
95. and reports on the essays may be found in the North China Herald, 25 January 1888, 100-1;
96. North China Herald, 20 July 1889, 85-6;
97. North China Herald, 1 November 1889, 536-7;
98. North China Herald, 14 April 1893, 513-14.
99. The essays are a rich source of information on how contemporary Chinese observers saw the - influx of Western ideas, technology and science, and contain, amongst other things, some of the earliest references in Chinese to Charles Darwin (e.g. North China Herald, ibid. 4.1a, 4.6a, 4.9b, 4.16a and 5.42b).
100. The very earliest Darwin reference, in another Chinese journal, is as 'Dayun' in Shen Bao (21 August 1873), 2
101. and again as 'Duierping' in Dixue qianshi, Shanghai, 1873, 13.16a,
102. the latter being a Jiangnan Arsenal translation of Lyell's Elements of Geology (6th edn) by Hua Hengfang and Daniel Jerome Macgowan (1814-93).
103. There is also a brief account of the Darwinian theory in an anonymous article (possibly by Fryer himself), enigmatically entitled 'Huntun shuo' [On chaos] in Gezhi Huibian (1877), 2, 6a-7a.
104. See also James Reeves Pusey, China and Charles Darwin, Cambridge, MA, 1983.
105. Bennett, China and Charles Darwin, op. cit. (39), 58.
106. Fryer, China and Charles Darwin, op. cit. (60), 45.
107. North China Herald, 15 August 1890, 196;
108. Gezhi Huibian (1890), 5, 45a-46b
109. Gezhi Huibian ibid. (1890), 5, 43a-43b.
110. North China Herald, 16 July 1897, 128.
111. North China Herald, 21 February 1896, 287.
112. Luan Xueqian collaborated with Fryer on Huaxue weisheng lun [On chemistry and health],
113. a translation of J. W. Johnston, The Chemistry of Common Life, published between 1876 and 1881 in Gezhi Huibian. Luan Xueqian also ran the Chinese Scientific Book Depot after Fryer left China.
114. This text had been translated from David Wells, Principles and Applications of Chemistry, New York, 1862, by John Fryer and Xu Shou and published by the Jiangnan Arsenal in 1871.
115. Luan Xueqian, 'Gezhi shuyuan jiaoyan huaxue ji' [A note on the teaching of chemistry at the Shanghai Polytechnic], Kexue [Science] (1924), 8, 430-2.
116. Mathematics questions had been allowed by an imperial edict in 1887. See W. T. A. Barber, 'A Chinese examination paper', North China Herald, 7 July 1888, 15.
117. See Chan Sin-wai, An Exposition of Benevolence: The Jen-hsueh of T'an Ssu-t'ung, Hong Kong, 1984,
118. David Wright, 'Tan Sitong and the ether reconsidered', Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University (1994), 57, 551-75.
119. John Fryer, 'The commerce of China', 22 October 1898, FP: Carton 1, 29.
120. Hu Daojing, 'Shanghai tushuguanshi' [A history of Shanghai libraries] in Shanghai Shi Tongzhiguan Qikan (1935), 4, 1356-7.
121. 'Shijian shi jianyan zhenli de weiyi biaozhun' [Practice is the sole criterion of truth], Guangming Ribao, 11 May 1978, 1.
122. Fang Lizhi, Bringing Down the Great Wall: Writings on Science, Culture, and Democracy in China, New York, 1990.