He advocated that learning Chinese characters, thinking and learning should not be neglected, and he himself did the same. In his early years in imperial academy, he put a lot of effort into calligraphy. Even when he came to the military camp later, although he was busy with his official duties, he still insisted on learning a calligraphy every day and never stopped.
It is this persistent study and thinking day after day that makes Zeng Guofan's achievements in calligraphy so high.
In fact, it's not just practicing calligraphy. When we learn anything, we should learn to think and learn at the same time.
Although Zeng Guofan has a soft spot for calligraphy, he has no collection. What is even more rare is that he has repeatedly rejected valuable calligraphy works presented by others.
One of the things was that Zeng Guofan's old friend Li's son gave Zeng Guofan a Preface to Lanting by Liu Yong and Weng Fanggang, which was a rare treasure at that time. The purpose is to ask Zeng Guofan to make a manuscript for his father.
Even if such a gift was accepted, there would be no problem, but Zeng Guofan refused it on the grounds that it was too expensive.
Another thing is that Qu Futian, the magistrate of Xiuning County, sent Zeng Guofan a copy of Wang Xizhi carved in the Tang Dynasty. Zeng Guofan was very happy to see this copy. This gift was sent to Zeng Guofan's heart.
But Zeng Guofan only tried to play for a while and then returned it. He gave it back because "the beauty in the world dare not take it for nothing."
From these two things, we can see that Zeng Guofan is a very self-sustaining person, and he doesn't take things that don't belong to him. Even if the temptation is great, he likes it again, which is very rare.