Ma Liang (7 April 1840-4 November 1939), Jesuit priest, government official, and educator. He was a founder of the Aurora Academy, the Fu-tan Academy, and the Fu-jen School. Aurora and Fu-jen later became universities. Born at Tanyang, Kiangsu, into a family which had embraced Roman Catholicism in the early 1600's, Ma Liang was the second son of Ma Sung-yen (d. 1872), who was known for his learning in Chinese herb medicine. At the age of five, Ma began to study the Bible, other Christian writings, and the Chinese classics. - In 1851, at the age of 1 1, he entered the newly established Jesuit College of St. Ignatius at Shanghai, where he studied, ampng other things, Latin and French. Seven years later, he began to study Catholic theology. In 1862 Ma joined the Society of Jesus; in 1864 he completed his probationary term; and in 1870, at the age of 30, he was ordained a priest. In 1871 Ma Liang was sent by the Society of Jesus as a missionary to Nanking. However, he disliked his work, and in 1872 he returned to Shanghai to become principal of the College of St. Ignatius. At this time, he became interested in Western science, and in 1874 he began to translate a Western mathematics textbook, which he entitled Tu-shu ta-ch/uan. Although the translation was completed two years later, his superiors refused to give Ma permission to publish it. He was also prohibited from doing missionary relief work at his own expense. Greatly upset by these two incidents, Ma Liang abandoned the priesthood in 1876 and returned to secular life.

Through the influence of his elder brother, Ma Chien-hsün, Ma Liang soon became an adviser on ^Vestern technology to Yü Tzu-huan, the provincial treasurer of Shantung. In 1877 he w as appointed director of a machine factory at Lok'ou, Shantung. After resigning from his job a year later, he came to the attention of Li Hung-chang (ECCP, I, 464-71), who sent him to investigate mining affairs in Shantung. In 1880 Ma drafted a memorial to the ^^lanchu throne in the name of Liu Ming-ch'uan (ECCP, I, 526-28; urging the construction of a railroad between Ch'ing-chiang-p'u (Huaiyin) and Peking as a means of defense against Russia. !Ma Liang became an adviser to Li Shuch'ang (ECCP, I, 483-84), newly appointed minister to Japan, and accompanied Li to Tokyo as councillor of the mission early in 1882. While in Tokyo, Ma met Prince I to and other Japanese political leaders, and he studied Japanese. Although he was appointed consul to Kobe soon afterwards, he gave up the post to return to China, where he again served under Li Hung-chang. About this time. Ma's younger brother, Ma Chien-chung, was asked to assist the Korean government in reforming its administration and armv. Because Li Hung-chang required Ma Chien-chung's services in China, Ma Liang was sent to Korea. After the Tai Won Kun, the father of the Korean king, carried out a coup d'etat on 23 July 1882, Wu Ch'ang-ch'ing, Ma Chien-chung, and Ting Ju-ch'ang commanded a naval expedition to Korea to help the Korean king suppress this rebellion. Also serving on Wu"s staff was Yuan Shih-k'ai, then only 18 years old. Before returning to Peking in 1883, Ma Liang recommended the young Yuan for the post of shang-wu wei-yuan [commercial commissioner] in Korea.

After returning to China, Ma Liang resigned his posts and concentrated on the study of Western science. In 1884 Li Hung-chang appointed Ma Chien-chung the assistant manager of the China Merchants' Steam Navigation Company, and, at Li's suggestion, Ma Liang was sent on a tour of south China to inspect the company's operations. He also served as an auditor for the company. In October 1885 the Ch'ing government established the office of governor of Taiwan and appointed Liu Ming-ch'uan to fill this post. At Liu's invitation, Ma became his adviser and soon joined him on Taiwan. Ala advanced a plan for the development of the island through foreign loans in 1886, but it was rejected by the Ch'ing authorities. A short time later he returned to Tientsin. Again in the employ of Li Hung-chang, he then was sent to the United States to negotiate a loan for the Ch'ing government. Although Ma was greeted enthusiastically in the United States as Li Hung-chang's secretary and although his negotiations were successful, the Ch'ing government refused to support Li's loan plan. Ma Liang left the United States for Europe, where he visited London and Paris and had an audience with Pope Leo XIII in Rome. He returned to China in 1887.

Little is known about Ma's activities between the years 1887 and 1896 except that he devoted himself largely to the study of science. Sometime after 1887 he married and had two children. His wife died in 1893. A year later, his mother died. She reportedly denounced him just before her death, saying: "My son is a Catholic priest; you are not a priest, therefore, you are not my son." Ma returned to the Roman Catholic Church in 1896 as a lavman. He sent his children to Catholic schools and requested that they thereafter refer to him as "uncle." In 1896 Ma Liang became associated with Liang Ch'i-ch'ao (q.v.), then the editor of the Shih-wu-pao. At Ma's suggestion, Liang began to study Latin with Ma Chien-chung. At this time, the Ma brothers were writing a book on Chinese grammar and sentence construction, the Ala-shih wen-Cung, which was published in 1904. Ma Liang and Ma Chien-chung were partially responsible for Liang Ch'i-ch'ao's rise to prominence, and they introduced him to such foreign-affairs and reform experts as Yen Fu, Ch'en Chi-t'ung, and Sheng Hsuan-huai. During the Hundred Days Reform of 1898, Liang recommended that an i-hsueh-kuan [translation bureau] be established in Shanghai and suggested that Ma Liang be appointed its director. The plan, however, was never put into effect because the reform movement was suppressed soon afterwards.

In 1901 Ma Liang went to the astronomical observatory at Hsü-chia-wei (Zicawei), Shanghai, where he began to teach Latin to small groups of students and to translate the Bible into Chinese. He soon transformed his informal academy into a regular institution of higher learning. Largely financed by Ma's personal contributions, the Aurora Academy (later a university) opened officially in 1903, with Ma as principal. Under his regulations, the students practiced self-rule through the election of officers. Literature, both Western and Oriental, and science were emphasized in the curriculum. In 1905 Ma arranged for Jesuit priests to assume teaching duties at the school. However, Ma Liang soon resigned as principal and left the academy because he felt that European priests were interfering in its administration. He and Yen Fu then established the Fu-tan hsueh-yuan [Fu-tan academy] at Wusung, with Ma as principal.

In 1906, at the invitation of the governor general of Kiangsu and Chekiang, Ma Liang lectured to provincial officials on monarchy, democracy (which he advocated), and constitutionalism. In the autumn of that year, after the Ch'ing government announced that a constitution was in preparation, Liang Ch'ich'ao founded the Cheng-wen-she in Japan to foster the constitutional movement in China. Although Liang wanted to make K'ang Yuwei (q.v.) chairman of the new society, he made Ma Liang general manager because K'ang was out of favor with the Manchu throne. Ma soon went to Japan, where he received an enthusiastic welcome from Chinese students in Tokyo, Yokohama, Hakong, and Kyoto who shortly before had rioted against Ch'ing officials supervising Chinese student affairs. Ma's speeches reportedly helped to placate the students. In March 1908 the offices of the Cheng-wen-she were moved to Shanghai, where Ma continued to head the society. At this time, the Cheng-wen-she, whose members were working clandestinely with higher officials of the imperial court and planning the establishment of schools for training in parliamentary government, aroused the opposition of Yuan Shih-k'ai. As a result, several government officials who were sympathetic to the society were dismissed, and on 13 August 1908 the Cheng-wen-she was banned by imperial edict. Ma returned to his educational duties, but continued to serve as Liang Ch'i-ch'ao's representative in Shanghai.

In 1910, after resuming the principalship of the Fu-tan Academy, Ma Liang was elected a member of the Tzu-cheng-yuan [parliament] at Peking, and in 1911 he joined the Hsien-yuhui. When the Wuchang revolt of 1911 broke out, the Fu-tan Academy was moved to Wusih, but it soon was returned to Wusung. Upon the establishment of the Republic in 1912, Ma was appointed fu-yin [chief magistrate] of Nanking. During October-November 1912 he served as acting president of Peking University. Also in 1912 he and Ying Hua (Ying Lien-chih, q.v.) petitioned Pope Pius X, requesting the establishment of a Catholic university in Peking. In 1913 the two men founded the Fu-jen School. From 1913 to 1916 Ma Liang worked to block Yuan Shih-k'ai's monarchical aspirations. He advised Yuan against attempting to become monarch, and, as a result, his house was surrounded by Yuan's agents. However, in 1916, just before Yuan announced his accession to the throne. Ma, disguised as a vegetable seller, managed to flee Peking. After Yuan's death in June 1916, Ma returned to Peking, and in October of that year he published a pamphlet entitled "Objectives of the Constitution," in which he emphasized the importance of the rule of law for political and personal freedom and affirmed that sovereignty in the state must lie with the people. During this period, Ma also continued to pursue his educational and religious activities. In 1916 he sponsored a United Catholic Congress at Peking to oppose the adoption of Confoicianism as China's national religion and published the Hsin-shih ho-pien chih-chiang, a translation of and commentary on the Four Gospels. His Kuo-min chao-hsin ching [a mirror for the people of the republic], a treatise which was similar to his "Objectives of the Constitution," was published in 1919. This work was notable for its analysis of the warlord problem and its advocacy of local self-government under a nationally elected democratic government.

In 1922 Ma Liang went to Nanking to head a committee created to investigate the financial administration of Han Kuo-chün, the governor of Kiangsu, who had just resigned from office. Ma returned to Shanghai when Sun Ch'uanfang (q.v.) occupied Nanking. On the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Shanghai Shun-pao, Ma wrote an article for the paper entitled "Religions of the World in the Past Fifty Years," in which he observed that religion and science were not mutually exclusive. Ying Hua invited Ma in 1925 to become chancellor of the newly established Fu-jen University, formerly the Fu-jen School. Ma declined the appointment, but he offered to help organize the administration of the university. The following year, Catholics in Shanghai founded a newspaper, the T'ien-min pao, with Ma as editor in chief From 1927 until his death in 1939, Ma Liang lived in retirement and devoted himself to scholarly, religious, and patriotic writing. In 1927, together with Father Hsü Yün-hsi, he translated into Chinese the autobiography of St. Theresa under the title Ling-hsin hsiao-shih. That year, the Academia Sinica was founded, and its creation was based partly on suggestions made by Ma in 1913-14. After the Mukden Incident of September 1931, Ma became concerned about the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and its implications; in 1931-32 he wrote several articles denouncing Japanese aggression, and he spoke on the radio to rally the Chinese people to protect their homeland. His articles on this subject were collected and published in 1933 as Ma Hsiang-po hsien-sheng kuo-nan lun-wen chi [the essays of Ma Hsiang-po written concerning the national emergency]. In 1934, on the three-hundredth anniversary of the death of the Ming prime minister and Catholic layman Hsü Kuang-ch'i (ECCP, I, 316-19), Ma wrote "Hsü Wen-ting-kung yü Chung-kuo k'o-hsüeh" [Hsü Kuang-ch'i and Chinese science] for the magazine K'o-hsueh. The Hsiang-po Library, to which he gave 8,700 Chinese and Western books, was dedicated to Ma Liang by the people of Tanyang in 1936. In the winter of that year. Archbishop Paul Yü Pin invited Ma to Nanking, where in March 1937 he was made a kuo-min cheng-fu wei-yüan [member of the national government]. After the Sino-Japanese war broke out in July 1937, Ma moved to Feng-tung-shan in Kweilin. He attained the age of 100 sui in January 1939, and in March and April of that year masses and celebrations were held throughout China in honor of his birthday. At the invitation of his former student Yü Yu-jen (q.v.). Ma began a journey to Kunming, but on the way he fell ill. On 4 November 1939 he died at Liangshan in Indo-China. Ma was survived by his daughter. Ma Tsung-wen (b. 1889).

Two collections of Ma's writings, Ma Hsiangpo hsien-sheng wen-chi and Ala Hsiang-po hsiensheng wen-chi hsu-pien, were published at Peiping in 1947 and 1948 respectively.