Zeng Guofan, originally named Zicheng, with the courtesy name Bohan and the nickname Disheng, was the 70th grandson of the sage Zengzi. Chinese statesman, strategist, Neo-Confucianist, litterateur, calligrapher, founder and commander of the Hunan Army in the late Qing Dynasty.
Zeng Guofan was born in an ordinary farming and studying family. He was diligent and studious since he was a child, and entered a private school at the age of 6. At the age of 8, he can read the Four Books and recite the Five Classics. At the age of 14, he can read "Zhou Rites", "Historical Records" and "Selected Works".
In the 18th year of Daoguang's reign (1838), he became a Jinshi and entered the Hanlin Academy, where he was the student of the Minister of Military and Aircraft Mu Zhang Amen. Lei Qian was a bachelor of the cabinet, minister of the Ministry of Rites, and minister of the Ministry of Military Affairs, Industry, Punishment, and Officials. He became close friends with the great scholar Wo Ren and Huining Dao He Guizhen, etc., and they strengthened each other with "practical learning".
During the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement, Zeng Guofan formed the Hunan Army to turn the tide, and after many years of fierce fighting, he attacked and destroyed the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Throughout his life, he devoted his life to politics and regarded patience as the first priority. He advocated being diligent, thrifty and honest in everything he did and not being arrogant as an official. He cultivated his moral character and disciplined himself, sought office with virtue, put etiquette first, and pursued politics with loyalty, and achieved great success in the officialdom.
The rise of Zeng Guofan had a profound impact on the politics, military, culture, economy and other aspects of the Qing Dynasty. Under Zeng Guofan's initiative, China's first ship was built, the first military engineering school was established, the first batch of Western books were printed and translated, and the first batch of students studying in the United States were arranged.
It can be said that Zeng Guofan was the pioneer of China's modernization construction. Zeng Guofan and Hu Linyi are collectively known as "Zeng Hu", and together with Li Hongzhang, Zuo Zongtang and Zhang Zhidong, they are known as "the four famous ministers of the late Qing Dynasty and Zhongxing". He served as governor of Liangjiang, governor of Zhili, and bachelor of Wuyingdian. He was granted the title of first-class Yiyong Marquis, with the posthumous title "Wenzheng" and later generations called him "Zeng Wenzheng".
Zeng Guofan followed Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism throughout his life, but he did not blindly worship Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism. In fact, he also absorbed many ideas from other branches of Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties. Neo-Confucianism in the Song and Ming dynasties was actually divided into three academic schools: Qi, Neo-Confucianism and Xinxue.
Zeng Guofan also gradually saw the limitations of Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism in political practice and military struggle. In this situation, Zeng Guofan showed a tolerant academic attitude towards the study of mind. Regarding the academic debate between Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism and Lu-Wang Neo-Confucianism, he believed that in the dispute between the two schools, we should adopt their similarities, avoid their differences, promote their strengths, be inclusive, promote their strengths and avoid their weaknesses, and promote the development of Confucianism.
Zeng Guofan also used the resources of Qi Studies in the theory of generation to make up for the limitations of Neo-Confucianism, saying that "Zhang Zizhi's "Zheng Meng" is mellow and upright, but has few friends." According to the ideas of Qi science, Zeng Guofan believed that all things in the world are born from the endowment of Qi, and Qi is the ultimate basic element that constitutes all things in the world. In the sense that they are born from innate energy, all things in the world are of the same body.
However, Zeng Guofan also believed that although the Qi of Taihe and Miao has been popular for a long time, and the Qi originally received by all things in the world is "even", the actual Qi endowed by people and things, saints and ordinary people are not the same. same. In terms of the relative relationship between people and things, people have the complete Qi, but things only have partial Qi; therefore, people have intelligence, while things only have physical nature. As far as human beings are concerned, the Qi endowed by saints is clear and thick, while the Qi endowed by ordinary people is turbid and thin.
Zeng Guofan inherited the Tongcheng School's Fang Bao and Yao Nai's independent style, and founded the "Xiangxiang School" of late Qing classical literature, which is an important representative of Hunan culture. In terms of poetry, he learned from the strengths of many schools of thought, but he respected the poet Huang Tingjian of the Northern Song Dynasty even more. According to Shi Shan's "Wangyun Poetry Talk": "Nowadays, Zeng Guofan is addicted to yellow poems, and his poems are also similar to yellow, and the fashion has changed. In the north and south of the Yangtze River, yellow poems are highly valued, and some of them are worth thousands of gold."
His comments Ancient prose emphasizes the sonorous tone and is able to encompass the inexhaustible; the ancient prose is profound and majestic, and can convey the style of the Han Dynasty. Therefore, it has a majestic and magnificent artistic conception, which can overcome the shortcomings of the Tongcheng School's dullness. praised by future generations. Zeng's patriarchal clan was in Tongcheng, but it had some changes and development. He also selected and compiled a book "Miscellaneous Notes on Classics and History" as a model of writing. It was not limited to Tongcheng and was known as the Xiangxiang school in the world.
In the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, Yan Fu and Lin Shu, as well as Tan Sitong and Liang Qichao, were all influenced by his writing style. His works include "Collected Works of Qiuquezhai", "Collected Poems", "Records of Readings", "Diary", "Memorials", "Family Letters", "Family Instructions", "Miscellaneous Notes of One Hundred Schools of Classics and History", "Notes of Poems of Eighteen Schools", etc. There are no less than a hundred or dozens of volumes, and the name is "The Complete Works of Zeng Wenzhenggong", which has been handed down to the world. He also wrote works such as "The Way of Learning" and "Five Proverbs".