Note: The following excerpt is from "Young Changemaker: Liang Qichao 1973-1898", by Xu Zhiyuan, published by Shanghai People's Publishing House in 2019. Liang Qichao's study showed a kind of educational style of that era, so he deliberately used it as a theme to extract the relevant content into a chapter.
On March 23, 1873, Liang Qichao was born in The Village of Chakeng, Xinhui, Guangdong.
At the age of six, Liang Qichao officially went to school. My grandfather opened the "Yitang Library" in a nearby cottage, liang Qichao and the same age school children in the family were the first students, and his cousin Zhang Yixing served as the first teacher. In the academy, Liang Qichao's intelligence was immediately highlighted, his memory was amazing, he was extremely sensitive to language, and he was especially good at pairing. After Zhang Yixing, Liang Qichao's father, Liang Baoying, became Mr. Xuetang. At the age of eight, Liang Qichao officially began to learn "art making", which is an important moment for schoolchildren and means the opening of the road of imperial examination.
When he was ten years old, his grandfather and father decided that he deserved a more appropriate teacher, so he went to Xinhui County to study with Zhou Yuwu in a special scripture hall. Shucai Zhou Yuwu is a famous private school teacher in the city. Huicheng is a richer world, with bustling markets, city god temples, county palaces, school palaces, and a memorial hall built for Chen Baisha. Chen Baisha was the most famous literati in The history of Xinhui and was known for his innovative insight into Confucianism.
At the age of thirteen, Liang Qichao came to Guangzhou. There are many academies and a variety of books, and the famous teachers who give him guidance will help him to go further on the road of the imperial examination. This was the first time he had left home to live, accompanied by his father and accompanied by his cousin Tan Bi. Compared with the isolated chakeng village and the small Xinhui City, Guangzhou is a large-scale, strange new world, and they enter a completely unfamiliar environment.
Like most of the students who came to the provincial capital, Liang Qichao first had to look for a "big museum" to study. The "Tai Kwun" is designed for students who have at least received meritorious names, and they often rent unused houses in ancestral halls or temples to recruit students. Each museum enrolls hundreds of students, all because of the reputation, curriculum and personal charm of mr. lecturer. In the museum, Mr. Li lectures for one or two hours a day, the content is mainly based on the eight strands of writing, with both scripture history, poetry, and policy, all related to the township test and the meeting test. There are examinations every week, in addition to the eight strands of text, there are also trial poems, legal endowments, historical theories, etc. Students' examination papers will be corrected by Mr. Wang, and the superiors will be posted for observation. Liang Qichao first studied at the Academy of Lü Bahu. Liang Qichao then went to Foshan Academy and was taught by Chen Meiping. Liang Qichao then enrolled in the Large Pavilion of Shi Xingchao next to Han Mochi.
In 1888, at the age of sixteen, Liang Qichao became a full-time student of XuehaiTang. At this moment, Ruan Yuan's golden age has passed, the silver age represented by Chen Li has also become a thing of the past, and XuehaiTang is inevitably sliding into decline. Powerful scholars disappeared, seniors no longer had a wide influence, and the Four Collections of Xuehaitang, published in 1886, was the last collection of poems, and since then there has been neither funds nor talents to publish new anthologies.
Entering XuehaiTang also means that Liang Qichao has become a member of the academic community and must develop the habit of governing his studies. "Most of the studious people of that time must have a "notebook" for each person, and every time they have a book, they will remember it," he later wrote. Gu Yanwu may be the founder of this tradition, and he wrote down his daily reading and thinking in the "Rizhilu". This is a rigorous training of thinking, divided into four steps: first, you should pay attention to observation and find things special; second, you should pay attention to the things related to words and list them and compare them; then, synthesize these observations to come up with your own opinions; and finally, collect information from multiple parties to prove or disprove your own views. In Xuehaitang, this set of logic developed into four trainings: "sentence reading, evaluation, transcription, and writing".
Xuehaitang not only means a set of academic training, but also a way of life. Enjoy the flowers with the alumni in Yuexiu Mountain, drink on the flower boat in Lychee Bay, and write poems in the elegant gardens of the rich, feeling the history, landscape, friendship, changes in the festival, and the joys and sorrows of life. The upper flower dynasty, the mid-autumn moon, the september chrysanthemum, and the winter solstice plum are their common memories. In early summer, the red kapok surrounds the mountain hall, inspiring Lingnan poets to chant to their hometown, and there are also many teachers and students in Xuehai Hall who are famous for their poetry, Liang Qichao does not belong to this group, and poetry is not his way of expressing himself.
Xuehaitang is a loosely disciplined academic institution with two classes per month and only four quarterly examinations per year. Students can take courses in other colleges, Liang Qichao is an out-of-college student of Jupo Jingshe, Yuexiu and Yuehua Colleges, which are the most well-known colleges in Guangzhou, and Jupo Jingshe pays special attention to lexicography training. Students outside the academy only need to take the exam in the college, and those with excellent grades can also receive anointing silver.
In 1888, Liang Qichao had a new choice. Zhang Zhidong opened the Guangya College, a grand scale, ready to enroll 200 students in the Liangguang area every year, the college is not only well-funded, but also pioneered the establishment of a zhai society for teachers and students to make their students' lives more stable. The mountain chief Liang Dingfen's beard is as famous as his poetic talent, and he is a popular genre literati who is famous for impeaching Li Hongzhang. Zhang Zhidong hopes that Guangya Academy can become the Xuehai Hall of this era and help him build a Ruan Yuan-style reputation. Liang Qichao's inner pride was revealed at this moment, and he found that the school was full of officialdom, and once the chief officer came, all the students had to stand at the door to greet him, so he withdrew from the academy.
At the beginning of 1891, Kang Youwei rented one of Qiu's bookstores and opened his own bookstore, Changxing Xueshe. Beneath this small courtyard and simple name, there is a vast (perhaps excessively broad) ambition to "think of the decline of the Sacred Path, the lack of the royal system, and the excitement of the world."
Inside the school, Kang Youwei asked them to teach speech classes on the first day of each month, and handed in a daily diary, involving six items: heart nourishment, self-cultivation, reception, deacon, reading, and current affairs; outside the school, gymnastics were required every other day, and students were encouraged to travel. This teaching program continues the style of Lishan Caotang, pursuing the shaping of personality and emphasizing the compatibility of intellectual traditions. Kang Youwei has also added new content, requiring students to study foreign politics, customs, and science in order to understand the changing world. He attaches particular importance to moral education, because this is the continuation of the ideal of a gentleman, and practicing the spirit of benevolence and forgiveness, finding joy in art, sharpening integrity, will give life a strong sense of mission. These programs, curricula, and academies and academies are not the same, and they do not focus on the eight-strand exam, nor do they focus on kung fu. However, Kang Youwei was not yet so proud as to ignore the eight-strand training, and in the xueji, he specially set aside a small section on the "study of the imperial examination", and made a discussion on the four items of scripture, questioning, poetry, and calligraphy.
For a teenager like Liang Qichao, the syllabus and curriculum of Changxing Xueshe are full of novelty, but Kang Youwei's personal charm is the key - in addition to the unique knowledge structure, he has a kind of speech genius. At that time, the mountain chief and the owner of the museum may not lack the arrogance of the celebrities, but they were rarely good at speaking, and they were only accustomed to expressing their views on paper. Kang Youwei is just the opposite, and when facing the crowd, he is especially passionate. Once, when he was teaching on behalf of the Hanmo Library, he "hung the inexhaustible mouth of the river, quoted from the side, and came up with a new solution." At the end of the table, the students were shocked at each other, thinking that they had never heard of it."
The school house is a close community, and the disciples wander together every three or five minutes, and their footprints are all over the Yuexiu Mountain, such as Xuehai Hall, Jupo Jingshe, Red Cotton Grass Hall, and Zhenhai Tower. They admired the moon, chatted, discussed what they had learned during the day, and argued with each other passionately. In the summer, they rented a boat to travel the Pearl River, swimming into the river to drink, eat supper, and talk freely.
Over the past year, the Changxing Academy has been expanding continuously, first from Changxingli to the Kwong Ancestral Hall on Weibian Street, and then to the Guangfu Xuegong, which was renamed Wanmu Caotang. Mr. Kang is impressed not only by his knowledge and imagination, but also by his extraordinary energy. After sitting on the hard bench for several hours, the disciples immediately lay down on the bed after leaving the hall, but Kang Youwei continued to review the lessons. Each disciple has a homework book, writes down his questions or experiences when reading, and turns them in every half a month. Even if it is a short question, Kang Youwei often makes a long reply. When he approved the homework, he would also summon his disciples for interviews. It was a disturbing moment, when they had just laid down on their beds and rested with their hands and feet spread out, but they were about to be called up for questioning.
With the increase in students and The increasing frequency of Kang Youwei's lectures, the senior system has become increasingly important. The Grass Hall became an autonomous organization that allowed a group of maverick youths to compete freely.
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