Kneel for the country and beg the teacher
When Cecilia Cheung was a teenager, he personally heard and witnessed various crimes committed by imperialist powers in seizing land, plundering resources and enslaving our people in China. The Qing government was corrupt and incompetent, only extorting money from the people, but letting foreign enemies run rampant, and the people's lives were in dire straits. He has long established the lofty ideal of serving the country by studying. At the age of 30, he was admitted to imperial academy, Jishi Shu. Since then, his career has been smooth sailing. Although he was dismissed for recommending Kang Youwei on 1898, he was dismissed soon.
1900, Zhang Baixi was sent to Britain as a first-class minister. After arriving in England, he was eager to know how this small country could build a powerful ship and become a world economic power. He carefully inspected Britain's industry, agriculture, science and technology, education and other aspects, and deeply felt that the gap between China and the advanced countries in the world was too great. If you want to catch up with these countries, you must start from the source. He believes that this origin is to attach importance to science and technology and to the cultivation of talents. A blueprint to fundamentally change China's ignorance and backwardness is brewing, drawing and gradually becoming clear in his mind.
190 1 year, Zhang Baixi returned to China and served as the minister of the Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of Punishment and the Ministry of Official Affairs. At that time, Emperor Guangxu had an imperial edict of "cultivating talents and improving knowledge". At the end of the same year, Zhang Baixi, who was young and well informed, was appointed as the Minister of Management. Soon, he submitted to the court a long-planned plan to revitalize education-folding the school charter. This paper includes the constitution of Shi Jing People's School, the constitution of entrance examination, the constitution of colleges and universities, the constitution of middle schools, the constitution of primary schools and the constitution of Mongolian schools, which is the beginning of the new education system in China.
Shi Jing University Hall, founded in 1898, was almost paralyzed after the coup in 1898 and Eight-Nation Alliance's occupation of Beijing. In order to rebuild Shi Jing University, Zhang Baixi learned from foreign experience, improved the school rules and regulations, and spared no effort to recruit outstanding talents as teachers for the school. He put forward that "we should break old habits and employ people in an unconventional way", and we should choose people who are "gifted and knowledgeable" and "quiet in practice and solid in learning" as university teachers. He believes that the general teacher of a university hall "must have a person with good moral character and excellent academic performance to be eligible to participate in this election." He inspected all kinds of talents in China at that time and recommended Wu Rulun, a famous essayist and leader of Tongcheng School. He believes that Wu is "knowledgeable, familiar with current affairs and famous at home and abroad". However, Wu Rulun insists on being young and old. Seeing that it was difficult to convince with words, Zhang Baixi used his quick wits, ignoring that he was an important official of the court and could not afford to wear a big dress and kneel down. He pleaded, "I hired a teacher for the whole country, and when I became a national student, I couldn't get a teacher, like China!" His sincere behavior touched the old gentleman in Wu Rulun, and the refusal he had prepared for many days turned into a generous promise. He also "played the title of Wu Rulun, the magistrate of Jizhou, and served as a university student." Cecilia Cheung's determination to advocate learning and selecting talents has greatly admired the whole country. At that time, Yang Renshan, Tu Jingshan, Wang Yaozhou, Yan Fu, Sun Yirang, Cai Yuanpei and other famous scholars were employed as pioneers of university education in China. Cecilia Cheung is known as the "father of universities" in China.
Dare to say "no" to the western empress dowager?
1894 is the 60th birthday of Empress Dowager Cixi. In order to prepare for the birthday celebration, Empress Dowager Cixi, the most insidious, cunning, shameless and vain, ignored the empty treasury, the hungry people everywhere and the foreign enemies eyeing up, and continued to make great efforts to prepare for her birthday. 1888, she ordered the misappropriation of naval military funds to rebuild Qingyi Garden in northwest Beijing and renamed it the Summer Palace. Empress Dowager Cixi's extravagant behavior caused strong dissatisfaction all over the country. However, as we all know, the Western Empress Dowager has always been headstrong and ruthless, or she will be killed. Therefore, no one in the civil and military affairs of the Qing Dynasty dared to disobey orders, and no one dared to say a word to the Western Empress Dowager, who had brought disaster to the country and people.
1894 10 is the birthday celebration ceremony of Empress Dowager Cixi. She originally planned to build a colorful shed, set up a colorful pavilion, plant flowers, play music and act on the road stretching about 20 kilometers from the Forbidden City to the Summer Palace in the northwest suburb, and create a peaceful scene of singing and dancing and celebrating the birthday of the whole people. She seems to have spent money on warships and cannons.
Zhang Baixi felt that the country was poor and the people were hungry and cold, so he dared to beat Emperor Guangxu: "I read the imperial edict in August and respected it. This year's 10 birthday celebration ceremony is still held in the palace. " The celebration of the Summer Palace will be suspended immediately ... not to decorate the scenery for entertainment. "This play is exactly what Emperor Guangxu wanted. Guangxu had this heart for a long time, but he didn't have the courage and agreed with a pen. This annoyed Empress Dowager Cixi. She gnashed her teeth and said, "I want people who make me unhappy today to be unhappy for life." "
Cecilia Cheung was angry with the Western Empress Dowager, leaving a future trouble for her future work. After the Western Pacific, many confidants were sent to be Cecilia Cheung's deputies, called assistants, which was actually a kind of restraint and monitoring, making it difficult to implement his reform and enterprising plan.
Protector of the student movement
Although Cecilia Cheung was a court official, his thoughts were not conservative and his understanding of affairs was clear. He pinned his country's prosperity on the promising students of Shi Jing University and the coming modern education.
1903, the Japanese and Russian imperialist powers planned wars for Northeast China and North Korea on our territory, but the Qing government not only did not interfere, but even decided to declare neutrality, and even prepared to conclude a secret treaty with China and Russia and accept Russia's unreasonable conditions. When the news reached Shi Jing University Hall, teachers and students were furious and immediately rang the bell, calling on the government to "reject the Soviet-Russian agreement, preserve the overall situation, spread the New Deal, and strive for self-improvement".
In February of the following year, a war broke out between Japan and Russia in Lushun, Liaodong Peninsula, China. The corrupt Qing government really declared neutrality and let two imperialist countries fight on the territory of China. Ding, a student of normal college, was outraged by the Japanese and Russian bandits. Under the pseudonym of Ding Kaishan, he founded the "Anti-Russian Blood Society", distributed "a campaign" and gathered "patriotic heroes and enthusiastic heroes, besides students at home and abroad, there are also green forest leaders in four provinces of Zhi, Feng, Ji and Hei" to jointly fight against Russia. The anti-Russian movement was the beginning of China students' patriotic movement.
The Qing government was shocked by the anti-Russian movement of university students, which was regarded as a rival to the imperial court and a gross violation of the law. Empress Dowager Cixi flew into a rage and sent a letter to Zhang Baixi, the minister of management, asking him to strictly control the students. The Interior Department also believes that students' writing about state affairs is "rampant" and "in order to avoid the drawbacks of civil rights in various countries, it should be banned". The imperial edict of the university hall is more specific, stipulating that all students who participate in the anti-Russian movement, as well as the lent leader and monitor, will lose 20 points in the monthly exam results of the month; And strictly check the students' correspondence, all letters with the words of country and newspaper will be checked, and irrelevant letters will be allowed to be sent to students. The anti-Russian movement of students made the Qing government see the threat of young intellectuals to the government.
Cecilia Cheung's attitude towards the students' anti-Russian movement is quite different from that of the Qing government. In his letter to the minister of management, he instructed: "This student is eager for loyalty and anger. He is different from arrogant and delusional interveners. As for Chen's interests, look at the fire in the cave, which has the knowledge of gathering the country and is not sick. The minister treats the students as children; " Fang loves it. How can he hold back his anger and blame it for sin? "I affirmed that students are patriotic in writing letters and praised students for their thorough analysis of the current situation; Correct. He also instructed: "In the future, students will be really knowledgeable when they study national news. They can write it down at any time and submit it to the minister for approval, so that they can test their knowledge and use it as a measure. There is no need to discuss or teach others! " Cecilia Cheung didn't adopt the will of "strict control" after the Western Pacific. After he arrived at the university auditorium, he didn't call all the students to give a speech on the anti-Russian movement. He has just talked with the monitor of the normal school and the official school and reiterated the meaning of his written instructions. He advised students to continue to care about state affairs, but also to pay attention to ways and means, not to give orders to others, to be serious, to love students and to make them deeply moved.
Because of Zhang Baixi's protection for progressive students, they all graduated from Shi Jing University, some went abroad for further study, some became politicians and some became scholars. Cecilia Cheung was the first protector of the patriotic movement of China students.