Gu's achievement is not only a talent, but also inseparable from his hard work. When he was a child, when he was reviewing scriptures, the average family would invite a master to teach, and Gu invited four.
He was holding a book when he was reading. Four teachers sat around him and began to read to him one by one. If you don't understand or forget something, interrupt them to argue with them or write it down secretly. Such high-efficiency and high-input study can't last for several days, but Gu has always been like this. He can review 200 pages of famous books a day, not skimming, but intensive reading.
Gu's good study habits are inseparable from his mother Wang's education. Wang is a widow. She is tired of worrying about a large family during the day, but she still can't let go of the habit of reading. In the evening, Wang will light an oil lamp, calm down and study until the second watch.
Wang is a good mother and sets a good example. What she taught Gu was the loyalty festival of Yue Fei and Wen Tianxiang. Gu is an upright man. He looked down on the snobbery of some villains in officialdom and couldn't control his words, so he failed to take the imperial examination.
Gu is a proud man. I abandoned you because you despised me, the grinding demon of the imperial examination. So after the age of 27, Gu stopped taking the imperial examinations. After giving up the imperial examination, his study was not limited to the four books and five classics, and he began to dabble extensively in historical books of past dynasties and encyclopedias of various places, as well as selected books and chapters.
These experiences are of great help to him in writing the annals of diseases of all nations.
Although Gu can't make a difference in officialdom, he still hopes that he can make some contribution to the court. But before his wish came true, the Qing soldiers entered the customs.
Seeing that your country is about to die, there is nothing you can do, and misfortune follows. Gu's mother, Wang, intends to die as a martyr. In fact, from the characters mentioned in Wang's Gu Education, we can see what kind of woman she is and how a woman with national justice can survive after the national subjugation.
So before she died, she told Gu, "You are from the Ming Dynasty, and you can't be a servant of other countries. Don't forget your family's kindness to the emperor for generations, and don't forget the teachings of your ancestors. In this way, even if I die, I can sleep underground. "
Therefore, when Kangxi wanted Gu to be an official, Gu resolutely rejected Kangxi's proposal and was willing to be a small civilian. His desire to serve the country disappeared when the Ming Dynasty perished, and he just wanted to send his feelings to the mountains and rivers in his lifetime.
Gu is also a warrior who resists the Qing Dynasty and regains sight. Finding some like-minded people, he always wants to do something big. However, since ancient times, no dynasty has been successfully restored by future generations. The demise of a dynasty is bound to be the decline of national strength to the extreme, and the people are miserable. When the new dynasty can give people a stable life, there are not many people who follow the previous dynasty.
Therefore, they are always unsuccessful. After the failure, Gu even went to jail. But he still misses the Ming Dynasty and can't forget his mother's last words. Every Dragon Boat Festival, he always hangs a carrot in front of the door, stuffed a little garlic green, and then hangs a white cloth behind his back. The word "avoid green" is written on the white cloth, which means "avoid evil if you don't go straight to the countryside."
He walked from home to the Ming Tombs in Nanjing six times and wept in memory of Zhu Yuanzhang, the Ming Emperor. Wan Li is the distance between the two places, and Gu doesn't feel hard. When he got there, he lamented that the Ming dynasty was prosperous at that time, and now even the Ming dynasty does not exist, and things are impermanent.
Gu finally fell off his horse because he accidentally slipped when he got on the horse. After all, he is old and vomits when he falls. He was hopeless and died at the age of 70.