Hu Shi's Research on Chinese Medieval Intellectual History∗ ∗Lou Yulie (Department of Philosophy, Peking University) Part One The Outline of The Chinese Philosophy History (《中国哲学史大纲》) Vol. 1 written by Hu Shi and published in February 1919, is the commencement on Chinese philosophy history research in Chinese modern history, with its novel research methods and standpoints. It aroused blazing echoes in the academy at that time, and was reprinted only two months later. The contents of this book is limited to Pre-Chin Dynasty (ancient times), so Cai Yuanpei, after listing four features of the book in its preface, put forward the hope, saying,“ I only hope that Mr. Shizhi works hard further to write a complete Outline of the Chinese philosophy history, from ancient to medieval, to modern times, to clear up our 3,000 years’ philosophy academia which is half broken and half complex and give us an approach to the study of our own country's philosophy history. That will really be our bliss!“ However, hereafter, people didn't see the coming out of his second volume of The Outline of the Chinese Philosophy History. Does it mean that Hu Shi did not continue to study on Chinese philosophy history later? It doesn’t. At Peking University from 1919 to 1937, Hu Shi taught Chinese philosophy history several times, mainly about history of medieval and of modern philosophy, and he taught the former more times. Quite many of articles and monographs published by Hu Shi within this period, are related to his study on the medieval philosophy history. For example, Hu Shi, in his oral autobiography at his old age, said, “I, although not publishing a sequel to the Outline of the Chinese Philosophy History in the last over 30 years, still wrote several monographs, some of which came out in the form of separate edition, such as my study on Huainanzi (refer to Books of Huainan King《淮南王书》published in 1931) which contained more than 40,000 characters. Huainanzi is one of the greatest works of the Taoist philosophy.“1 And a number of his articles and monographs about the history of Zen Buddhism written in this period also are an important part of his studies on the history of medieval philosophy. According to statistics of extant segments of his manuscripts and diaries, Hu Shi taught the Chinese medieval philosophy history five times totally at Peking University. The first time was in 1919. That is just after he finished teaching “ancient philosophy history” and published The Outline of the Chinese Philosophy History (vol.1). According to Draft of the full-length chronicle of Mr. Hu Shizhi《胡适之先生年谱长编初稿》compiled by Hu Songping, it is noted under the item of that year “the course, 'the history of the medieval philosophy' this year at Peking University had compiled teaching materials. There are ∗ Originally released in Chinese Philosophy (volume15), published by Yue Lu Publishing House, the May 1992 edition. 1 The Autobiography of Hu Shi, compiled and translated by Tang Degang. 1seven chapters: Chapter 1, general discussion; Chapter 2, Taoism; Chapter 3, Huainanzi; Chapter 4, Dong Zhongshu; Chapter 5, Confucianism of the Taoist faction; Chapter 6, Superstition and Science; Chapter 7, Wang Chong王充 and the spirit of Criticism.” And with such words “stereotype edition printed by Beida Publishing Department.“ (vol.2, pp. 388-389) This teaching materials couldn’t be found now, only a part of chapter 7 under the title of “the theory of Wang Chong” were later published in Modern Students (vol. 4, no. 689), and later again collected into the 4th appendix of Commentary to Lun Heng (《论衡校释》) by Huang Hui. In 1962, Hu shi in the “Preface“(manuscript) to the photo-offset copy of Books of Huainan King by Taiwan Commercial Press, also referred to this affair, saying, “‘Wang Chong’ appended to Commentary to Lun Heng by Mr. Huang Hui, is a part of my teaching materials of ‘the Chinese philosophy history’ written in Year 8 of the Republic of China, not of The Full-length Compilation of Medieval Thought History (《中古思想史长编》) written in Year 19.“2The second time was in 1921. In the diary of this year, Hu Shi wrote on September 14, “Gave a lesson on the history of Chinese philosophy. I talked about the new Confucian movement in the Han Dynasty.“ Hereafter, on September 15, he wrote, “Talked about the new Confucianism and Wang Chong;” on September 21, he wrote “Talked about the Weijin period;“ on September 22, “Talked about the philosophy of Weijin period;“ on September 23, he only wrote “Gave a lesson on the history of Chinese philosophy “ without any detail of the course; on September 28, he wrote “talked about the first period of Buddhism;“ on September 29, he wrote“ talked about Buddhism from the first to the second period;” on September 30, he wrote “ talked about the second period-'Sutras’ Separation Times 分经时代';“ on October 5, he wrote: “ talked about the second period of Buddhism;“ on October 6, he wrote “talked about the third period, (the course is)over.”。