What is water under the bridge?

"Everything I have done is thinking and destruction." Virtue is gained by independent thinking and corrupted by conformity.

These two sentences are from Shuo Wen Jie Zi-Han Yu in Tang Dynasty. This article should have been written in the eighth year of Tang Xianzong Yuanhe (AD 8 13). At that time, Han Yu was 46 years old and was a doctor and professor in Guo Zi, Chang 'an (now Xi, Shaanxi). The full text is called "Jin Xuejie", which is actually a work that laments the unexpected encounter and expresses self-resentment.

The original text of Understanding of Learning is relatively long. I extracted a paragraph containing this sentence from the original text for your reference:

Mr. Guo Zi went to imperial academy in the morning, invited all the students to build a library, and said, "Industry is diligent, but it is barren;" What I did was thought, but it was destroyed. The sages met today, and the fixture was finished. Pull out evil spirits and worship good. The ratio of small good people is recorded, and those who are famous for their technology are useless. Climb, scrape and polish. Guy was lucky to be elected, but which cloud is more than the others? Not all students are proficient, and there is no ignorance of the department; If you can't succeed in doing things, you won't suffer. "

This passage from the original text was translated into vernacular Chinese like this:

Mr. Guo Zi walked into imperial academy in the morning, told the students to stand under the dormitory and taught them: "Learning is specialized because of diligence, but abandoned because of play;" Virtue is gained by independent thinking and corrupted by conformity. Nowadays, when a saint meets a saint, all kinds of laws are implemented. Eliminate evil and promote good. Those who have a little advantage are accepted, and those who have a little talent are not appointed. Select outstanding talents and cultivate talents. Only those who are not good enough are chosen by luck, and those who are not good enough are not promoted. As long as you worry that your studies can't be improved, you don't have to worry that the officials in charge are not wise enough; As long as you are worried that virtue will not achieve any purpose, don't worry about the unfairness of being an official. "

Han Yu's Understanding of Learning was written in the eighth year of Yuanhe, Tang Xianzong (8 13). Han Yu is forty-six years old. He is a doctor of Guo Zixue in Chang 'an, and taught as a student. Going to school means encouraging students to study hard and make continuous progress. Explain, explain, analyze. The full text is called "Jin Xuejie" on the pretext that Mr. Wang advised students to study. Mr. Wang questioned them before answering them. It is actually a work of sighing and expressing anger.

Jin Xuejie shows the anguish of honest, talented and ambitious intellectuals in feudal times, criticizes unreasonable social phenomena, and has typical significance, so it is endless. In addition, the second paragraph about ancient prose writing can help us understand his ancient prose theory and literature, which is also worthy of attention. The object he cited ended in the Western Han Dynasty, because after the Eastern Han Dynasty, there were more and more parallel prose elements in the articles, which did not conform to the ancient writers' idea of advocating prose. In addition to Confucian classics, there are Zhuangzi, Historical Records, Songs of the South, Sima Xiangru and Yang Xiong's Essays. These works are often magnificent and extraordinary, which is why Han Yu is so excellent. He once called Qu Yuan, Monk, Sima Qian, Sima Xiangru and Yang Xiong "ancient heroes" (a reply to Cui Lizhi's book). This is quite different from some critics who unilaterally opposed "Tao" and the aesthetic characteristics of literature in the early days of the ancient prose movement, and even despised writers below Qu Yuan and Song Yu.

Jin Xuejie expresses the feeling of not meeting each other in the form of questions and answers, which has existed since ancient times. In the Western Han Dynasty, Dong Fangshuo wrote "Answering a Guest Difficult", and Yang Xiong wrote "Xiechao" imitating "Answering a Guest Difficult". Later, there were many authors. However, Jin Xuejie can still give people a sense of freshness. This is related to its good at change. For example, in the second paragraph, Mr. Wang's ability was written in a large section, which was vast and unrestrained; Then write down the unexpected in a few words, with a strong tone. In the meantime, a sharp turn was naturally formed, and the overall momentum of the whole section was hearty. The third paragraph is peaceful and modest, and it seems that the anger is gone; Under careful taste, I feel bitter, helpless, resentful and ironic, in contrast to the second paragraph. For another example, the whole article is sad and thought-provoking, but it is humorous in some places. If the teacher inculcates and has a solemn attitude, the students are laughing; In order to convince his disciples, Mr. Wang had to sell himself short and even claimed to steal Chen Shui-bian. These places show that Mr. Wang is really passive and funny. In short, although the structure of the full text is simple, its internal momentum and interest are varied and chewy. The reason why people feel fresh is related to the vividness and novelty of their language. For example, describing Mr. Wang's diligent study as "endless" and "easy to get", describing his mediocrity as "following the rules to get promoted, spying on Chen Bian as a thief" and describing his talent selection and training as "crawling around, picking and picking, moistening things silently" not only turns the abstract into concrete, but also makes the image conscious. As for the words "bite off more than one can chew", "don't donate too much", "full of elegance", "crooked teeth", "making different songs together", "always taking the blame" and "leaving it in an idle place", they are unique and concise, and have become common idioms today. Another example is "industry is good at diligence, and you don't think about it; What you do in your mind is destroyed in the follow-up, and so on. Refine rich life experience into short sentences, which are thought-provoking, just like proverbs. In a short article, there are so many original sentences that people can't help but marvel at the author's creativity in literary language. In addition, the system of this paper follows Yang Xiong's "abridgement", adopts rhyming fu style, and uses a large number of neatly arranged sentence patterns, which makes it sound forceful and catchy, and also increases its artistic charm.