Chapter 14 Chapter 4 St. John's University

I was very lucky to get into St. John's University, which was recognized as the best place to learn English at that time.Because of my hard work, I managed to master English in the one and a half years of preparatory school at St. Petersburg University. Therefore, in my freshman year, I was selected as the editor of ECHO and entered the editorial department of this publication.The secret of my English learning is to study a pocket Oxford English dictionary.This English dictionary does not arrange a series of definitions of an English word, but lists the various uses of a word in a sentence, so it is not the definition that expresses the meaning, but the phrase, and it is related to Compared with the synonyms of this character, it is vivid and precise; not only that, but also the unique flavor and essence of a character are fully displayed.If I don't understand the usage of an English word or an English phrase, I will never let it go.In this way, precarious will never be confused with dangerous.I have a feeling that if I don't grasp the word firmly, I may slip it, and I will never forget it.The biggest advantage of this dictionary is that it contains the essence of the English language.From this dictionary I learned the subtle phrases in English.Besides, this dictionary only takes up the space of two pairs of socks, and I carry it with me wherever I travel.

At that time, the enthusiasm for learning English was unabated. The enthusiasm for English was like geese and ducks. The study of Chinese stopped completely, and the Chinese brushes were abandoned and replaced by fountain pens.Before this time, I had already started to read Yuan Liaofan's "Gangjian Yizhilu".The abandonment of the Chinese language at this time had an unexpected impact on my further research on Chinese customs, myths, and religions. The details will be discussed in the next chapter.At St. John's University, students can fail Chinese for years without harm, and they can graduate as usual.

At that time there was a Chinese teacher who was an old school scholar who didn't know how to teach.The nearly one hundred pages of civil law, he continued to read, and then explained, so that there are about ten lines in one hour. Such a thin book can be extended for a semester, and the ten lines are finished every hour. , Just like sitting in meditation and contemplating, staring at our students, we also looked at the old gentleman.Because students cannot keep their minds still in a complete vacuum, most of us took the opportunity to take in other books to peek at to pass the time.I clearly remember secretly reading Darwin, Haeckel's works, and William Howard Chamberlain's "Foundations of the Nineteenth Century" (Foundations of Nineteenth Century).The old scholar told us once that we could go to America by car, and he became the laughing stock of the students.After the 19th year of the Republic of China, St. John's was transformed into a Chinese-style university, and the situation inside was quite different from before.

It is true that St. John's University can cite outstanding graduates such as Gu Weijun, Shi Zhaoji, Yan Huiqing, etc., and they have all served as ambassadors to the United States. But as far as English is concerned, St. John's University seems to be for the cultivation of foreign compradors in Shanghai. It wasn't until I got into Harvard that I realized what I had lost in college.The St. John's University library has five thousand books, one-third of which are theology.I am very serious and careful about the whole library. I also know the nature of the books in it, and I am quite praised in this respect.Among the foreigners who came to China as missionaries, there are some good professors, such as Professor Barton McNair, and a Remer who is very knowledgeable; there is also an American with a heavy Brooklyn accent. Professor, because he is very enthusiastic about St. John's University, he volunteers to teach.

The principal, Dr. F. L. Hawks Pott, married a Chinese lady.He is very organized in his affairs, and it is said that he regularly reads a chapter of a novel every week and finishes reading it in a year.In his library, I saw a volume of Bradley's writings.He has three sons.The youngest son later became the head of Elmira College.I will never forget his week of walks around campus every morning after the convention.After the assembly and the prayers of the whole body, with his black bag and accompanied by the warden of the dormitory, he went about looking around to see what was to be done before returning to the office.I believe that the ideal of Dr. Arnold, the principal of London Yitong School, is that the school is a place to train character, just like the ideal of Zhang Boling, the principal of Nankai University in Tianjin. Dr. Arnold himself always works with the students Do a morning fast.Many prominent leaders in China are graduates of Nankai University in Tianjin.

When I was in my sophomore year at St. John’s University, the school added another piece of private property, which was adjacent to the original school property, with trees and lawns, and it was extremely beautiful.I just had a great time in this beautiful environment.If there's one thing St. John's has done me, it's given me healthy lungs that I wouldn't have gotten if I went to a public college.I played tennis, played on the varsity football team, and was the captain of the school rowing team.I learned to play baseball from a boy in Hawaii named Kenneth, who taught me how to throw the curveball and the dropball.Best of all, I set the school mile record and competed in the Far East Games, but never came close to winning.The school authorities considered this experience to be of great benefit to me.I remember that my father was in Shanghai at the time, and he went to see me at the sports field. He disapproved of my participation in the competition, thinking that it had nothing to do with intellectual competition.

I never crammed for an exam.In both middle school and college, I graduated second in the exam because there was a fool in my class who took all the subjects taught by the professor very seriously.While everyone was scrambling to get a good grade on the exam, I went fishing for fun.Because St. John's University is near the Suzhou Creek, you can catch dead eels, minnows, and other small fish for fun.In the second grade, at the graduation ceremony, I went to the podium four times in a row to receive three kinds of medals, and I also received the silver cup for leading the speech team to participate in the competition, which caused a sensation in the whole school.The girls at St. Mary's University, a nearby women's college, must have been quite shaken.This has something to do with my marriage.

I once said that because I went to a church school, I ignored Chinese.The result is that Chinese is only half proficient.Most of the graduates of St. John's University are like this.As soon as I graduated, I went to Tsinghua University in Beijing.Imagine my embarrassment when I just threw myself into Beijing, the cultural center of China.Not only my poor knowledge, but also the influence of the nature of my Christian education.In the past, I was restricted from watching Chinese dramas. In fact, most Chinese people learned about famous people in Chinese history from Chinese dramas.I know the horn of General Joshua, who caused the fall of Jericho, the ancient capital of Palestine, but I don't know that Meng Jiangnu's tears washed down a section of the Great Wall.As a university graduate, I am still considered a Chinese intellectual, and I am really ashamed.

In order to clear the shame, I began to work hard on Chinese.First of all, in my opinion, learn Beijing dialect through this, because the Beijing dialect on the Internet is still an incomparable masterpiece.The beauty of the language spoken by Xiren and Qingwen makes many Chinese who want to write vernacular feel ashamed. What should I do?I can't ask others about the commentary on Du's poems, because many professors with Ph.D.s, or professors in the Department of Electrical Engineering, their knowledge of Chinese literature is as poor as I am.I found Liulichang, which is famous for selling second-hand books. On that street, there are rows of second-hand bookstores.As a result of chatting with booksellers, I discovered loopholes in my knowledge of Chinese studies, which Chinese scholars are familiar with, but I do not know.Casual chats with booksellers I find very interesting, even surprising.Our conversations were like: "Here is another book by Wang Guowei." In fact, it was the first time in my life that I discovered this book by him.Another example: "Here is another set of "Siku Jilu". Later, I also learned to talk about books, even ancient books.

From the sixth year of the Republic of China to the seventh year of the Republic of China, it was the period of China's New Culture Movement. The storm of the literary revolution hit the whole of China. I graduated from Shengda University in the fifth year of the Republic of China.At that time, China was in a storm of thought.Dr. Hu Shizhi had already started advocating a "literary revolution" in New York, while Chen Duxiu led an uncompromising and fierce attack on "Confucius's shop", attacking Confucianism such as "widows keep their chastity and never marry", "chastity", gender standards, foot binding, Fusha and so on.Hu Shi introduced free verse to China, advocated writing new poems in the vernacular, Ibsen's play "The Puppet Family", Wilde's aestheticism, and Bernard Shaw's plays.He further pointed out China's backwardness, not only in science and technology, but also in modern political organization, and even literature, drama, and philosophy.All young students are encouraged.It was like a breeze blowing.In fact, Wu Zhihui had already issued a warning. He said, "Throw the thread-bound books into the toilet."Zhou Shuren later said that "all Chinese ancient books are poisonous".

When Hu Shi returned to Beijing in the seventh year of the Republic of China, I was there to welcome him as a teacher of Tsinghua University.When he returned from Italy, he quoted the Dutch theologian Eras Bmus as saying: "Now we have come back. Everything will be very different." I wrote an article in a newspaper in Beijing, supporting the use of vernacular writing on the grounds that the literature of European countries in ten years When they emerged in the 5th and 16th centuries, they all used the vernacular of the time, such as Dante and Baucacio in Italy.My article caught Hu Shizhi's attention, and we have been friends ever since.