ABSTRACT
This chapter completes the discussion of the Yongzheng emperor and the He family presented in the previous chapter with a detailed study of the circumstances surrounding the solar eclipse of 1730. On the one hand, ministers and officials from all regions eulogized the emperor and denied that the Astronomical Bureau’s prediction of the 1730 eclipse was a failure. On the other, the He family, Jesuit missionaries, the Astronomical Bureau officials, and even the Yongzheng emperor knew beforehand that the prediction was likely to fail. In the end, all Bureau officials, missionaries included, were forced into silence. Only the Yongzheng emperor, who staged a political performance, benefited from this incident.
