Collected Illustrations of the Three Realms (Volume 27)

Collected Illustrations of the Three Realms: Humanity, Volume 10

Liu Yunzhuang, whose personal name was Ningzhi, was a native of Yingshang. He resigned from his official position to live in retirement at Mount Lu Mount Lu, located in modern Jiangxi Province, is a site historically favored by scholars and monks seeking spiritual or intellectual retreat. Lord Ouyang Ouyang Xiu, 1007 to 1072, was a preeminent historian, poet, and statesman of the Song dynasty passed the imperial examinations in the same year as Liu tongnian: Candidates who passed the civil service examinations in the same year often formed lifelong social and political networks. Ouyang Xiu held Liu's moral character and conduct in high esteem. He composed the poem The Height of Mount Lu to praise him. The poem contains the line: "Few men possess a heroic integrity like yours." Later, when Lord Zhu Zhu Xi, 1130 to 1200, was the leading philosopher of the Neo-Confucian school served as the governor of Nankang, he composed the Record of the Pavilion of Heroic Integrity in Liu's honor.