On October 11, 16006, Zeng Guofan was born in a family of ordinary cultivators in Baiyangping, Heyetang, Xiangxiang Township, Changsha Province, Hunan Province. There are nine brothers and sisters, Zeng Guofan is the eldest son, and his ancestors are mainly farmers, and their lives are relatively comfortable. Although his grandfather Zeng Yuping had little culture, he had a wealth of experience; his father, Zeng Linshu, was a master xiucai, and Zeng Guofan, as the eldest son and eldest grandson, naturally received ethical education from the two ancestors.
Throughout his life, Zeng Guofan pursued the first principle of "being patient with the government" and advocated that everything should be diligent and thrifty, and should not be proud of the officials. He cultivated himself and disciplined himself, sought officials with virtue, put etiquette first, and sought government with loyalty, and achieved great success in the official arena. His rise had a profound impact on the politics, military, culture, and economy of the Qing Dynasty.
Zeng Guofan was one of the most famous courtiers at the end of the Qing Dynasty, and to say that his status was that he had served as a feudal governor of one side, the governor of Liangjiang, the viceroy of Zhili, or a university scholar of Wuyingdian, and was even given the title of Marquis of Yiyong of the First Rank. Even his nickname is a very positive "Wenzheng".
To say that his contribution to the Qing Dynasty, the most important thing is that he proposed that the Qing Dynasty build ships, build military academies, learn advanced Western culture and technology, and also send overseas students to study abroad.
Next, let's take a look at what Zeng Guofan did.
According to historical records, we can know that Zeng Guofan first appeared in everyone's eyes when Daoguang was thirty years old. He made four consecutive moves to the emperor, but this was not a reckless performance of his youth and vigor, not knowing the height of the sky, on the contrary, it was his accumulation of ten years. Thirty years after Daoguang, it was the transitional period when the former emperor died and the new emperor ascended to the throne.
As soon as the Xianfeng Emperor succeeded to the throne, he ordered hundreds of officials to make suggestions to express the new era, new atmosphere, and new development. When he first ascended the throne, emperor Xianfeng naturally wanted to be a good emperor, and his courtiers were very pleased to see the emperor so diligent. A doer like Zeng Guofan was more willing, and he valued this opportunity to make suggestions to the emperor.
Zeng Guofan, who was twice the age of the new emperor, first went to the top and mentioned the cultivation of talents. He believes that after all, Bole Soma is a minority, and the cultivation of talents is the internal driving force for the country to develop in the long run. Such ideas are undoubtedly bold and innovative, after all, the ancient sages were all assisted by talents with outstanding abilities.
Among them, such as: King Wen of Zhou wanted to rejuvenate Zhou, so he took jiang Shang, who was not confused; Liu Bang appointed a new man Han Xin in order to fight against the brutal Qin state; Liu Bei, in order to revive the Han chamber, even more so, took Zhuge Liang in three places...
Moreover, the talents of the past and the present rely on the foresight and foresight, directly speaking, talents need to be cultivated, need to be excavated, and rely on their own advantages, the efforts of the day after tomorrow, so as to make due contributions to the country. Therefore, zeng Guofan was the first person in the Qing Dynasty to really put the cultivation of talents in front of the major affairs of the country, and he was also the one who raised questions and solved problems.
After all, like the previous sages, they recovered talents for the purpose of their own use, while Zeng Guofan put the talent problem at the level of national problems and rigorously analyzed it, and proposed feasible measures to cultivate talents. To this end, Zeng Guofan proposed a three-step strategy, namely: training, transfer and inspection.
Here, training is to cultivate talents, it is easy to understand, to evaluate the behavior of students' subordinates, and to wake up praise and punishment, to distinguish their essence is to be good with people, the interests of the country are supreme, or selfish villains who harbor evil intentions. Then, the selection of talents who are good enough, or even the recruitment of talents out of the box, is a bit like the inspection system in the nine-pin system.
The transfer still relies on the quality of the upper-level officials themselves to make the officials below get a good influence. After all, from the perspective of our current people, environmental factors occupy a very heavy proportion of talent training.
Then there is the investigation, which is the problem of knowing people. Like Zeng Guofan, he attaches great importance to a person's speech and thought, he believes that it is possible to see the essence from a person's language, through phenomena, and to see this person's knowledge, understanding, and views and thoughts on things.
If you encounter some people with poor eloquence, you need written expression ability, that is, through the emperor's superiors, folds, you can identify talents. As for Zeng Guofan himself, he has the reputation of the world's first recital. Such a letter, expounded and analyzed from all aspects, moved to understand the reason, the Xianfeng Emperor looked very useful, and Zeng Guofan also entered the emperor's eyes.
For Zeng Guofan, this is also a kind of experience. Subsequently, he put forward his correct views and opinions on events such as the Hong Xiuquan Uprising, as well as solution measures, and soon Zeng Guofan had a high reputation. However, this is not the reason for his real name, and on his official road, there is another most sinister performance, this time he accuses the emperor from many angles.
He first wrote that the emperor did not have a big picture view, paid too much attention to some details, and did not have the arrogance of the emperor;
Moreover, he accused the emperor of liking some vague and exaggerated things, obviously the king of a country, thinking about the subjects of the world, rather than thinking about writing poetry all day. At the same time, he also lost Hong Xiuquan's problem to the young Xianfeng Emperor.
Finally, and most ironically, he points out that the emperor likes to listen to rumors and to stay away from loyal martyrs.
It can be said that this is a very dangerous challenge, but it also shows that Zeng Guofan is sincerely good for the Xianfeng Emperor and is a loyal subject. It's just that the emperor is young and vigorous in the end, and in the face of such bold accusations, he immediately wants to punish Zeng Guofan. Fortunately, most of the ministers interceded for it, and in the end, the emperor was relieved. However, it is regrettable that Zeng Guofan's efforts were ultimately in vain, and the so-called Xianfeng Emperor's humble heart and advice were, in fact, just a son of a showman.
Resources:
["Bitter Destiny of Heavenly Son: Xianfeng Emperor Yixuan", "Zeng Guofan Family Book", "Qing History Manuscript : Liechuan 192"]