<h1>Text/Xu Yongchao</h1>
He was friends with Wei Yuan and Lin Zexu, and when the whole world fell asleep, he was one of the few wise men who soberly saw the coming of the end of the world. Kang Youwei recommended his prose "Qing Dynasty First". Liang Qichao read his words, such as being shocked, and wrote: The liberation of late Qing thought is indeed a meritorious deed. "Nanshe" Liu Yazi called his poetry the first in three hundred years. Even Hu Shi praised him for "opening up the atmosphere and not being a teacher."
He is Gong Zizhen.
Gong Zizhen (1792-1841), courtesy name Xuanren, was a late Qing dynasty thinker and writer. He was born in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, to a family of literary and historical families. His grandfather Duan Yujie was a famous scholar who deeply influenced the young Gong Zizhen. His grandfather once taught him: "Strive to be a famous courtier, a famous Confucian, not a famous scholar." "The mother is not only proficient in poetry, but also has a set of teaching children, and is Gong Zizhen's enlightenment teacher. The Gong family is also the eunuch house of the sixth official. With the blessing of such a family background, coupled with his own intelligence and studiousness, he has accumulated profound academic education and talent. Once, after reading Wang Anshi's "Book of the Shangshen Sect", the young Gong Zizhen was excited and made a grand wish, one day, he would become a famous courtier like Wang Anshi.
However, fate played a big joke on him. Gong Zizhen, who has excellent talent, is full of hardships and bumps in the road of scientific expeditions.
In 1813, in the eighteenth year of Jiaqing, Gong Zizhen rushed from the Huizhou capital where his father served to Beijing to participate in the township examination, and unfortunately fell behind. This was the first time he had fallen behind. In the following ten years, he threw his best years on the road of scientific examination and in the examination room. "Even if the article is shocking, it is only on paper." No matter how well the article is written, can it save all the people from water and fire? What I really want is to be a famous courtier of Kuang Fu Sheji! For the sake of the dream of a famous courtier in his heart, he went on the road with expectations again and again, and left disappointed again and again, but he still gritted his teeth and took the test with perseverance, and finally, the 38-year-old Gong Zizhen entered the army and the first. He thought he could make a big show, but reality gave him a hard slap. Originally, with his talents and learning, he could completely enter the Hanlin Academy. However, the official in charge did not allow Gong Zizhen to enter the Hanlin Courtyard on the grounds that his words were too ugly, which made him not know for a moment whether to laugh or cry.
His ideal is to become Wang Anshi who changes the law, but reality allows him to nest in the ceremonial department and do a small master. Faced with the personal situation of the lowly official, he did not give up his ideals, he repeatedly denounced the shortcomings of the times, and repeatedly proposed reform proposals, but the court officials of Wen Tianwu turned a deaf ear to this. They regardEd Gong Zizhen as a good and unathy and unrealistic student, a student who would not come to things and did not understand things, and was squeezed out, Gong Zizhen's road to advancement became more and more bumpy.
Gong Zizhen, who had no power in his hands, had to write a book to dissolve the block in his heart. "Avoiding the prison of words, writing books are all rice sorghum plots" Because of the fear of word prison, many scholars are good at exhortation and evidence, but they do not pay enough attention to social reality. Therefore, the situation of academic detachment from reality is caused. Gong Zizhen is unique in that he not only advocates the application of the world, "the study of governing the world, east, west, south, and north." His research interests include arithmetic, geography, military science, classics, dialects, water conservancy, and agriculture. But his most valuable thing is political argument.
At that time, the national power of the Qing Dynasty was already in the twilight of the Western Mountains. But the ruling class is still addicted to the delusion of the heavenly kingdom and does not want to wake up. Faced with the reality that "everyone dares to cough", he opposed the monarch's arbitrary behavior and advocated a broad way of speech; he criticized the philistine ministers who adhered to the law of the ancestors and advocated reform; he also proposed to emigrate to the northwest and reclaim the countryside and set up a province in Xinjiang; "The majestic and extraordinary end of ancient and modern times is often created from the suffering of scholars. The Gong clan set up a province in the Daoguang Dynasty from the Western Regions, while the Great Facilities of the Gong Dynasty are established today. Decades after his death, this idea was finally adopted by the Qing government, which shows his foresight.
Gong Zizhen is talented, but he has never learned to sneak and shoot horses. At the age of 48, he angered his superiors with advice and was deducted from his salary for a year. Plus his uncle was his superior, and by the rules, he had to recuse himself. Gong Zizhen, who had long been disappointed in the official scene, took the opportunity to hand over a resignation and embarked on the road back to his hometown.
Gong Zizhen was originally proficient in poetry, and with a lot of thoughts on the way, he wrote 315 poems. Since this year is the year of Yihai, it is named "Yihai Miscellaneous Poems".
When passing through Zhenjiang, the locals were doing the ritual of praying for rain, and the Taoist monks asked him to write a blessing for the gods. Gong Zizhen immediately splashed ink and wrote down the 220th miscellaneous poem of his own sea:
Kyushu was angry and thunderous, and Wan Maqi was sad.
I advise Tiangong to shake things up and demote talents in an eclectic manner.
When passing through Yangzhou, he met his friend Wei Yuan, who was creating the "Chart of the Sea Country". The book is not valued in its home country, but it is highly sought after in Japan.
In 1841, Gong Zizhen gave lectures to students at the Danyang Academy in Jiangsu. He died of a violent illness in less than half a month at the age of 50. Behind him, the sinking and humiliation of China's modern century, the great changes that the Chinese nation has not seen in a thousand years.