Chapter 1024: Customs and National Character

The princess of Shu heard it and walked out. She saw a strange hissing outside the courtyard wall, and a strange gray meat pillar that could move suddenly appeared next to the flat pot on the wall.

"Ouch!" The Princess of Shu was so frightened by this scene that she exclaimed, but Wang Yanbi shouted excitedly and ran over: "Elephant! Brother Bian Gu, I want to ride too!"

The princess of Shu screamed miserably: "Yanbi! Bian Gu! Come back——"

But the figure of the flat jar on the wall suddenly disappeared.

The princess of Shu was so shocked that her face turned pale. Wang Yanbi was her only flesh and blood. If she stayed with a creature like an elephant and just hung around and rubbed it, how could she still be a little human?

He hurriedly went to Sujiazhuangzi to find Shi Wei for help. Shi Wei didn't know what happened. She only heard that the Princess of Shu said she was afraid of elephants hurting people, so she turned around and went in to get the magic gun, and went forward with the Princess of Shu.

Go to the elephant farm.

The elephant farm was beside a hot spring. When Shi Wei and the princess of Shu came to the woods beside the spring, they heard people laughing and joking.

The moment the water mist dissipated, the princess of Shu turned her head away with a blushing face when she saw the situation.

Sand, Flat Pot, and Wang Yanbi were standing in the hot spring with their buttocks bare. Su You was also wearing shorts, and several people were brushing Duli's body with brushes.

Duli was so served that he almost squinted his eyes. Every now and then, he would take a sip of hot spring water, which would make several people scream, and then burst into laughter.

The mist rising from the hot spring echoed in the forest. The scene of a huge animal, three children and an adult getting along with each other in the forest. Although it was blurry and unclear, the harmony and joy of the atmosphere was real and vivid.

Shi Wei breathed a sigh of relief, put the magical gun back on her back, and started to step forward.

But the princess of Shu held her hand.

Shi Wei turned her head, and the princess of Shu's eyes were filled with tears, but her face was filled with a happy smile.

Seeing that Shi Wei was a little confused, the princess of Shu's low words sounded like she was begging for mercy: "I haven't heard Yanbi laugh so happily for a long time. Sister, please don't interrupt them..."

Shi Wei was speechless: "You just care too much about your child. Now in Zhuangzi, with Zhang Er and the others watching, who dares to do anything to Yan Bi?"

After saying that, he hugged Princess Shu's shoulders and said, "You think too much about others and live too much for others, and you want Yanbi to be like you. It's too hard..."

"Brother Xiaoyou said that children are the smartest. The most important thing for parents is to inspire them. For many things, it is not to let them do or not do it, but to let them know why they should do it and why not do it. The rest is

Accompany them to grow.”

"Brother Xiaoyou said that we adults have some irrationality and a lot of unhappiness. So don't think that children are wrong and don't bring unhappiness to them."

"Their happiness is very precious and beautiful. Brother Xiaoyou said that he himself is often willing to participate in it involuntarily."

The Princess of Shu pulled Shi Wei, and the two secretly walked back until they came out of the forest, then they breathed a sigh of relief: "Young Master...it's really admirable that you can still maintain your innocent heart after so many years."

Shi Wei smiled and said: "Let's go, don't bother to care about them. He said it's called doing many arts without being overwhelmed. I think he is more playful than Bian Gu and the others."

…

Su You, Su Shi, and Su Che no longer left the Wei family after Shi Wei came back.

During this period, Su You and the two of them worked on the top ten suggestions every day, and Su Shi and Su Che also had a clear understanding of Su You's political ideas.

It should be said that the success of any one of the ten things would have a huge impact on the Song Dynasty.

Moreover, many things are inseparable from Su You's personal efforts. It would be impossible for Wang Gui and Cai Que to take care of everything properly.

He was beneficial to the country and irreplaceable. Su Shi finally understood why Su You had not been relieved of his position, but he didn't seem to be worried at all.

At Su You's level, it was just like when Wang Anshi came to Beijing and served only as a Hanlin bachelor and minister.

For them, their job is basically just a situation and is not important at all.

With Su Shi and Su Che around, Su You was too lazy to write anymore. He just discussed what he wanted to express with Su Shi and Su Che every day, and then asked them to write for him.

These are the gunmen, and the level of these two gunmen is so high that there are only eight of them in total throughout the ages.

Among them, the two items of national customs and national character were drafted independently by Su Shi after understanding Su You's meaning.

This in itself is also Su Shi's strength.

According to Su You, the national ethos of the Chinese nation has actually been condensed and formed after the completion of the development pattern of agricultural civilization.

Benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and trust.

Filial piety, brotherhood, honesty, shame and diligence.

Loyalty, courage, respect, forgiveness, sincerity.

Frugality, tolerance, kindness, generosity, and harmony.

These are indeed virtues, but benevolence is close to cowardice, goodness is close to hypocrisy, wisdom is close to treachery, and faith is close to perverseness.

From the point of view of the theory of contradiction, that is, almost every virtue is accompanied by a paradoxical vice, and there is a question of degree here.

Su Shi's article is eloquent, starting with the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors, analyzing the major changes that have occurred in the Chinese nation in its thousands of years of history, as well as the key roles these changes have played in shaping the national ethos and national character.

And in today's Song Dynasty, what major changes occurred before Xining and after Xining, and what effect these changes had on shaping the atmosphere.

The biggest impact was the defeat of several major foreign wars.

In Su Shi's article, he also focused on analyzing the impact of national ethos on foreign wars, as well as the reaction of foreign wars on national ethos.

Needless to say, neither promoted anything good.

Two extremes coexisted in the national ethos of the Song Dynasty - arrogance and inferiority, conservatism and pragmatism, cowardice and blind action.

The two extremes are reflected in diplomatic strategies: neither fighting nor peace will work; and reflected in national policies, even being aggressive can't help, and being conservative can't help.

To correct this situation, we must first achieve a change in national thinking - self-esteem, but not arrogance; self-confidence, but not vain; self-reliance, from pragmatism; self-reliance, from self-improvement.

A nation is made up of its people, and its national temperament is made up of its people’s temperament.

To give a simple example, our ancestors' national policy of "controlling military force with civility" has been completely misunderstood in the repeated defeats in foreign wars.

Correctly understood, this sentence of the ancestors should mean that national armaments, sergeant training, general training, transfer and promotion should all have a mature and effective mechanism to manage and restrict them.

The management mechanism is "Civil", and the military strength is "Wu".

Instead of simply defining "Wen" as civil officials and "Martial" as military generals, we artificially create opposition within the country.

The reason why the late Tang Dynasty perished was because Li Linfu, Tang Guozhong and others, cut off the way for military generals to advance and made this mechanism useless. This led to the domineering feudal towns and the rise of wars.

Cause and effect, effect and cause, cannot put the cart before the horse.

In the Song Dynasty, the reform of the military system only completed the first step, which was to try to integrate the country's military power into a normal management system, instead of adopting the simple general responsibility system of the warlord period.

This was a bold attempt, but it did not have the desired effect. It did not play a good role in the country's military strength. On the contrary, it caused many problems.

This problem is actually related to the customs, so much so that people like Han Zhongxiangong once said, "A good man can only be called a good man by his disciples in Donghua."

This is obviously a misunderstanding of the ancestors' will and is also caused by the custom.

But now that a large number of talented people who are knowledgeable, proficient in writing, and good at military strategy have joined the army, looking back on this sentence, it is obviously biased and overcorrected.

The most important thing in a country's dynasty is the clan. However, starting from Taizu, the clan was first awarded generals, and later transferred to observers and governors, all of which were military positions. It was not until the Xining period that the law of transferring the clan to literary talents was established.
Chapter completed!