Chapter 9 Moral Philosophy and Newspapers

Mao Zedong imitated the free style of Liang Qichao, a famous reformer, and wrote passionate articles.However, Chinese language teacher Yuan Dahuzi "looked down on Liang Qichao, who I regard as a model, and thought his writing was half-literate and half-white" [29]. Yuan also said that Mao Zedong was arrogant when he put the date at the end of each of his articles.Once, Yuan tore up the dated page of the article in front of the whole class.Mao Zedong stood up, grabbed Yuan's arm, asked him what he wanted to do, and wanted to drag him to the principal's office to "judgment." [30]

It is strange that this young man who resisted many restrictions accepted the shaping of classical writing style. "I had to change my style of writing,"31 he said somewhat bluntly.In fact, he still tends to the ancient prose psychologically, and he especially likes the prose style of the atheist scholar Han Yu (768-824). Twenty-two years later, Mao Zedong said to Edgar Snow: "So, thanks to Yuan Dabeard, today I can still write a passable ancient prose if I need it." ("If needed", this sentence contains irony Meaning, because Mao Zedong had already begun to criticize other people’s articles written in ancient Chinese.)

Therefore, while Mao Zedong was politically more radical than the reformists, his literary style was still backward.He deviated from Liang Qichao in both respect for the ancient style of writing and political revolution. He started paying attention to his health.In a letter to Xiao Yu in 1919, he wrote: "Stomach disease has tortured me for many days"; "It is very important to pay attention to health. A person only knows the happiness of health when he is suffering from serious illness" [32]. Mao Zedong's teachings in the First Normal University mainly came from moral philosophy and newspapers --- two hobbies that continued throughout his life.

Like most young people, Mao Zedong learned as much from his example and moral lessons.From 1915 onwards, his moral model was a figure who was very good at absorbing disciples. This gentleman with radical spirit shocked the whole Changsha because he advocated remarriage of widows. This is Yang Changji. Catheter for feeding fresh blood. Yang Changji's way of life is traditional --- people call him "Old Master".He lectures according to the script.But he planted the seeds that would bear radical fruit in the hearts and minds of a generation hungry for meaning. Yang Changji respected Song and Ming Neo Confucianism (beginning in the 10th century), but also spent four years studying the theories of Kant, G.H. Green and other European thinkers in England and Germany.What unites the two is his belief in heart and will.Prudence, courage, and the power of the heart can change the world.Undoubtedly, this is individualism, but it is an individualism that focuses on the progress of society as a whole.

No good teacher—except Stalin in the 1930s and 1940s—had had such a profound influence on Mao Zedong than this Chinese who obtained a doctorate in Chinese philosophy in Edinburgh.Mao Zedong was very interested in Mr. Yang's ethics courses. After reading the 100,000-word book "Principles of Ethics" written by the neo-Kantian philosopher F. Paulsen, he actually wrote a 12,000-word annotation.On Sundays, Mao Zedong and several other favored students visited Yang's house in awe and had lunch there.Mao later married Yang Changji's daughter, whom Mao first met at a prim Sunday lunch.As a teacher, friend, and father-in-law, Yang Changji's influence on Mao Zedong is unmatched by others.

Mao Zedong repaid Mr. Yang's moral education concept with articles.A passionate article "The Power of the Heart" got a strange score: 100+5 points, which made Mao Zedong very excited, and he told many people about it. "A man of high morals," the former student would say of his professor many times later. ［33］ This is a rare compliment, because it has been freed from the shackles of class analysis. In the evening, Mao Zedong would concentrate on reading newspapers from Changsha and Shanghai in the school library until late at night.The other students came to him to hear about the week's unrest in China and the latest developments in World War I.

For every tidbit from Europe—Verdun, Hindenburg's maneuvers, the use of taxis in the siege of Paris—Mao found parallels in Chinese history.He became a consultant for the comparison of "living history" (a term he used to describe newspapers). Any classmate who came to look for Mao Zedong would be told: "It may be in the newspaper reading room." [34] Mao subscribed to his own newspaper with some of the little money his family gave him (a habit, his father said, of "wasting money on waste paper"). ［35］He often cut out the margins around the newspapers and stapled them into small notebooks. If you look closely, you can find that he wrote the names of cities, rivers, and mountains on these strips.When Mao Zedong read the news, he always kept a Chinese atlas and a world atlas at hand. He found and wrote down every geographical name mentioned in the news on the map.

Yang Changji worked on his ingenious idea of ​​moral therapy for society; Mao Zedong read newspapers, a gateway to social action that would later lead him beyond Yang Changji's moral sphere to a life of violence.For the time being, for the young man still sitting in the library, German idealism and fervent civic consciousness had come together well. In order to make Mao Zedong follow his own path, Yang Changji directed Mao to approach the "Chuanshan Academy" (Wang Chuanshan's famous husband Zhi, a 17th-century patriot and a philosopher who cared about people's health) and "New Youth"—a copy with sharp A journal of modern Western thought attacking China's rigid traditions.

Like Mr. Yang, Mao Zedong was never completely divorced from China's own civilization.If he readily accepts Western ideas, it is only as a medicine to cure the terminally ill Chinese politics.Yang wrote in an article: "The country is an organism, just like the human body is an organism. It is not like a machine. It can be disassembled, but it can be installed." [36] Mao Zedong deeply agreed with this. Yang Changji is a figure in the transition period of modern China.When he went out in Changsha, he sat in a sedan chair for four people, but he also insisted on taking cold baths and skipping breakfast.Although Mao Zedong expressed opposition to his feudal behavior of sitting in a sedan chair, he still drew a belief from him: to achieve new life through extraordinary efforts.

Yang Changji is passionate about sports and believes that this is the first step in turning rebellion into social change.Practicing the slogan of "civilization is its spirit, barbarism is its physique", he insisted on taking cold water baths so that he would no longer sit in a sedan chair. Mao Zedong (with friends) went hiking near Changsha, swam in icy ponds, ate only one meal a day for a long time, sunbathed - he thought it would give his body energy - For more than half a year, I don't sleep in the dormitory but sleep in the school yard.This is all to make his body stronger. [37]

Mao Zedong called these "physical exercises", and this method is also unusual in the West, and even more so in China.For Mao, exercising wasn't just a way to get fit.Why did he read Tang poetry aloud against the strong wind?Of course, this is not just to practice the voice, but to experience the pleasure of competing with any resistance at will. Mao Zedong wrote in his diary: "Struggling with the sky will bring endless joy! Struggling with the earth will bring endless joy!" The above is the English translation of Amy Xiao’s memoirs, but there is a third sentence in the original Chinese text, which was deleted by the editor with Marxist thinking: "Struggling with others is a lot of fun!" It means Not only must you have a strong body, but you must also have a strong will for social struggle.One night, when there was thunder and lightning, Mao Zedong came to the home of his friend Cai Hesen, who was like-minded, dripping all over his body. It turned out that he had just run down from the top of Yuelu Mountain.Asked him the reason, he said that it was to experience the realm of "Na Yu Da Lu, strong wind, thunder and rain" in "Book of Books". [38] In the second summer vacation of the First Normal School, Mao Zedong and Amy Xiao's older brother Xiao Yu—a handsome and steady young man—did a study tour together, visiting five counties in Hunan.This "study tour" was inspired by an article he read in "Minli Daily", which said that two students had traveled all over China on foot, even as far as Tibet. [39] Mao Zedong and his friends did not bring a penny, they wrote clever couplets to the local gentry in exchange for board and lodging.This tour lasted six weeks and walked nearly a thousand miles, which allowed Mao Zedong to learn more about Hunan. The 22-year-old Mao Zedong has both civil and military skills.His first article "Research on Physical Education" was published on "New Youth" and signed "Twenty-eight Paintings" (the three characters "Mao Zedong" in traditional characters total twenty-eight paintings). [40] The article is bright and powerful: "Sports should be clumsy. Riding a spear and firing it, ten swings and ten shots. The dark sound of the mountain, the change of the situation. The mountain of King Xiang, and the ceremony of the foundation. Nothing to do with delicacy." The three links of the article are interlocking and well-founded.Will is the link between body and spirit, and exercise is the embodiment of will. In the final analysis, exercising is for fighting.Mao Zedong believed: "The main purpose of husband sports is martial courage." A healthy body, a brave will and an optimistic attitude are all needed to save the Chinese nation. "The national strength is weak, and the martial arts is weak." Mao Zedong's article began with the first sentence, and the entire article explained how to solve this problem. [41] There is no politics in Mao Zedong's desire for life. He just uses his own Promethean emotion to face the reality of China that needs to be renewed. "Two hundred years of self-confidence in life" [42], this is the rhetoric he later recalled expressing during this period. In the past few years of life in the First Normal University, Mao Zedong has always been a student organizer.From 1915 he was a prominent activist in the Fellowship[43]. In 1917, 34 students (the total number of students was 400) were elected into the Alumni Association, and Mao Zedong, who received the most votes, presided over the work of the Alumni Association. ［44］In order to increase the funding of the Alumni Association, he sold snacks on the street. [45] He encouraged the Alumni Association to fight against the school's strict rules and regulations and the pedantic and stubborn principal—Mao Zedong called him "retro-style"[46]—for which he was almost expelled (Yuan Dahuzi and others helped and protected him. , Mao's decisiveness won the respect of even those he had hurt).He also mobilized students to suppress school harassment by Hunan and Beiyang warlords. Led by Mao Zedong, the Alumni Association staged protests against Japan's "21" and other foreign powers' bullying of China.Now Mao Zedong saw the dark side of Japan. He read a book about the crisis between Japan and China, "Shame", on the cover of this book he wrote: "On May 7th, the Republic of China is ashamed. Why revenge, Be my student!" In a letter to a friend, he questioned: "How can a nation with 400 million people be bullied by three thousand island countries?" [47] In another letter to Xiao Yu in 1916, Mao Zedong foresaw that The close partnership between China and the United States in the war against Japan. [48] In the name of the Alumni Association, he organized an evening school for the workers in Changsha. "We are not wood and stone, we are human beings." He wrote on the admissions advertisement posted on the street, "With culture, we can stand straight and be human."A learning method has been considered based on his own experience, "every time you go to class, you can wear whatever you want, and you don't have to ask for better clothes", the advertisement added, "notebooks and all textbooks are free of money" [49]. Mao Zedong did not expect that few people could understand his profound explanation. ［50］He went to the workers' homes to recruit students. Even so, the night school lasted only a few months.Mao Zedong persisted tenaciously. When the results of the physics class were not good, he promised the students: "What I just said is just the beginning. In the future, the reason why electric lights can be used, and why ships and trains can be fast, will be explained to the students." You know it." [51] In the last year of the First Normal University, an action of Mao Zedong revealed his self-confidence, which was also the first manifestation of his political ambition.He later recalled with some exaggeration: "I felt that I was open-minded and needed to make some close friends, so one day I posted an advertisement in a newspaper in Changsha, inviting young people who were interested in patriotic work to contact me. I Indicate that we must make friends with strong and resolute young people who are ready to die for the country at any time." *The last sentence of the notice is the sentence on the quote: "It's singing, and I ask for my friend's voice." [52] Maybe Mao Zedong, who is often lonely, has been looking for Friends, he revealed in a letter to Li Jinxi in November 1915 that he had never had any friends in his life.In the letter to Xiao Yu in August of the same year, he said, "I am worried day and night". [53] * It is clearly written in other materials that Mao Zedong just pasted his advertisement on a wall on Changsha Street. A newspaper thought it was worthy of publication and adopted it. Mao Zedong added a headline to his original manuscript: " Twenty-eight paintings of students asking for friends". Mao Zedong only got "three and a half echoes." (The "half" was Li Lisan, who later became a famous Communist Party leader and had conflicts with Mao. When Mao recalled, he only mentioned Li's "unclear" answer coldly, saying: "There has never been a relationship between us." It didn’t lead to friendship.”) However, this apparently naive job post launched these patriotic youths into important activities.Mao Zedong formed a purely political organization, the "Xinmin Society" [54], which was the first red signal flare to go up over Hunan. "There are two kinds of people in the world," Mao Zedong remarked to Amy Xiao one day, "one is good at doing specific things, and the other is good at organizing. The former outnumbers the latter. But everyone has His strengths." [55] Mao Zedong felt that the genius of an organizer lies in his ability to integrate the strengths of various people. He should not expose and criticize the weaknesses of others, but should encourage the combination of all positive factors.His father didn't make it, and he will. In June 1918, Mao Zedong graduated from the First Normal School.Like many in his circle, he remained socially out of place, a dissident and full of contradictions in his thinking.In his letter to Li Jinxi on the eve of graduation, he said: "I have no idea how to deal with the universe, life, country or education. I think these are extremely chaotic, and the cause of chaos will inevitably lead to chaos." [56] The reformers of 1890 were also dissidents, but the society at that time had the soil for their ideas.Although Liang Qichao was regarded as an outsider in the intellectual circles, his eccentricity and willingness to make great comments were popular among the like-minded at the time. For Mao Zedong's generation, the old China is no longer a unified country --- it is even going to be full of wars.Tradition has lost its meaning in the age of warlords.At the same time, Mao Zedong could not identify with Westernized Chinese, such as Sun Yat-sen, who was educated in the West in Honolulu.Now, he was neither a small fish nor an eagle. Mao Zedong's life has undergone fundamental changes. He is no longer inspired by other people's fantasies and has been able to control himself. Mao Zedong was excellent in his studies in the First Normal University.Mr. Yang listed Mao as the third of the thousands of students he had taught in Changsha—Xiao Yu was first, and another friend of Mao Zedong, Cai Hesen, who later became a shooting star of the Chinese Communist Party, was second.In the last year of the First Normal School, the students regarded Mao Zedong as a model for the school in terms of character, courage, eloquence and writing (of course the principal would not do this).One schoolmate called him a "wizard", another called him a "brain". [57] Mao Zedong was forming his own thinking, he valued the dignity of China, he believed in individual freedom, and he had abandoned the reformism of his former heroes Liang Qichao and Kang Youwei.He feels that in the turbulent social changes, new things need to be produced. When the Xinmin Society was established in Cai Hesen’s home, Mao Zedong said: “Nowadays, the people’s thinking is narrow, and the Ande people have great philosophical revolutionaries and great ethical revolutionaries, such as Tolstoy in Russia, to cleanse the old thinking of the people and develop them. New ideas.”[58] But can new ideas bring about a new society? In recent years, Mao Zedong rarely used the word "revolution", and even when he talked about it, it only meant the sweeping away of all old things.After all, he was only 24 years old, and his plasticity was still quite large, so that the influence of a teacher—not to mention Yang Changji, even Yuan Dabeard—could leave an imprint on his soul. Mao Zedong's style is to constantly improve himself, which is incompatible with any indulgence and complacency.In any case, he is a sharp edge, he will challenge, explore, discern, rebel. During his five-and-a-half years in the First Normal University, Mao Zedong wrote no less than a million words of analysis and commentary in the margins of books or notebooks.He often writes comments such as "ridiculous" or "unreasonable" in the margins of the book. [59] He loves the word "study", "he once said to Amy Shaw that learning is exploration" [60].When he meets the "three and a half" respondent to his profile, it doesn't begin with small talk, but rather with a straightforward question of what they've been reading lately. One day, he went to the home of a wealthy friend of the "Xinmin Society".During the conversation, the young master suddenly stopped their political discussion and called the servant to ask him to buy pork, and explained clearly the price and what kind of meat to buy.Mao Zedong was extremely annoyed that this friend interfered with a major event such as China's future with trivial family matters. He got up and left in a fit of anger, and never had any contact with this rich man again. Mao Zedong was also strict with himself.He developed a habit of often taking books to read along the noisy street at the South Gate not far from the First Normal University, as a test to cultivate his concentration.This is a path to being a hero.If he has not yet been able to shape the world around him to suit his own ideas, he has at least been able to shape himself.Mao Zedong was aimless at the time, but he was not alone.He was different in Dongshan, but at the same time he felt isolated and desolate.By 1918 he stood out even more, and his distance from others only increased his appeal.His eccentricity became a charm, and others were willing to follow him.He grew from a student to a leader. Mao Zedong was indomitable, and he also surpassed the times.Even in the First Normal School, tradition and authority were trampled underfoot because the restless future elite no longer believed in them.Mao Zedong was only a student leader, and his radicalism was only manifested in a cold bath.But the nature of the times dictated a connection perhaps Mao himself hadn't been aware of: education, physique, and political revolution. The above three are interrelated.Because, in order to rebuild China, it is first necessary to empower the Chinese people with knowledge, followed by action, and action will mean sweating and fighting.Becoming a student rebel and a sports fanatic at the First Normal University during the First World War, the next step, by its own logic, was to embrace Marxism, although in 1918 Mao Zedong did not have a bit of Marxism in his head shadow of doctrine. To be sure, he was in conflict.The change plan on paper cannot cure chronic diseases in social life, and tradition and modernity cannot sleep together for a long time.Could a well-bred, energetic youth turn out to be just a fly against China's wall of misery? In the future, he will forge a sharp sword from these contradictions.At the same time, Mao Zedong still had his own creed, which was shown in his notes when he read Paulson's "Principles of Ethics": "Anyone who suppresses the individual and violates individuality is a heinous crime." [61] Paulson Sheng once wrote that if all pain and difficulty were overcome, then struggle and war would also be ruled out.Mao Zedong wrote in the margin: "Human beings cannot remain unchanged for a long time." [62] In April 1918, Mao Zedong's mother suffered from tuberculous lymphadenitis, and his elder brother Zemin took her from Shaoshan to Changsha for medical treatment.The younger brother Ze Tan was already living in Changsha at this time, and Mao Zedong arranged for him to study in the primary school affiliated to the First Normal School. In October of the following year, Wen Qimei died of illness at the age of 52.When Mao Zedong recalled his mother's death, he said: "Since then, I don't even want to go home." [63] In order to bury his mother, Mao Zedong briefly returned to Shaoshan, and many people attended the funeral. Many years later, Mao Zedong said to one of his nurses: "Before my mother died, I told her that I could not bear to see her painful face. I wanted to keep my good impression of her in my heart. So when she died, I I will avoid it. My mother agreed." At the last moment, Mao Zedong was not in Shaoshan.He later said he was deeply impressed by the affection he showed for his mother at her funeral and thereafter. Mao Zedong wrote a tribute to his mother in classical Chinese, in which Buddhist and Confucian elements were mixed: My mother, Gao Feng, first recommends fraternity.The far and near relatives and relatives, all of them are covered; Kai's kindness touches Shuhui.Caused by love, originally sincere; no lies, no deception. Mao Zedong fell into more specific recollections: "Holding hands when you are sick makes your colon sore; but call yourselves, do your best." [64] Later Mao Zedong mentioned his mother: "As her son, I am unqualified. I was not completely loyal to her when she was alive, and I failed to be filial when she died-I am this kind of person." [ 65] In October 1919, Wen died of illness.Mao Zedong traveled day and night from Changsha back to Shaoshan to guard the coffin, and wrote an affectionate "Mother's Essay" with tears.The picture shows a copy of "Worship for the Mother". Mao Zedong commemorated his mother in "Mother's Essay": "My mother is high-spirited, and the first is fraternity. She is far and near, close and distant, and everything is covered. Kai is compassionate and kind, and moves the congregation. It is caused by love and is originally sincere. No lies, There is no deceit. The nature is neat and tidy. Everything in the hand is organized. The mind is precise, reasoning and sentimental. Nothing is left behind, and there is nothing to hide. The wind of cleanliness spreads throughout the Qi. … When you are sick, hold your hand, and your colon will be sore. But you, please do your best.”