In the fifth year of Daoguang (1856), the street talk of xuzhou officials added a topic: Why was the new prefect Zhang Zuonan so uninhibited? After work, he did not attend the gentry's banquet, nor did he go to the Qinglou to listen to small songs, which was very different from the previous prefect. Some curious people went to the mansion to peep and came back: Lord Zhang ran a "scattered house" (a private school run by the people) and was competing with Mr. Private School for a job. Moreover, Mr. Zhang taught nearby children to read at night, not only did not charge tuition, but also let them eat free supper.
Zhang Zuonan began in the first year of Daoguang's tenure as the governor of Taicang Zhizhou, and has been privately running education, but he has never worried about costs. Where did his money come from? Do you use public funds? No way, he's an incorruptible Confucian official; does he pay for it out of his own pocket? It is also impossible, Zhang Zuonan's salary body also has to support a family of old and young, he is not so rich. It turned out that these education funds were earned by him to let his wife and daughter work overtime to do textiles.
Zhang Zuonan's strangeness is more than that. For example, the readers at that time, who were not officials, did not hesitate to spend a lot of money to donate to an official; those who became officials sharpened their heads and climbed up. Zhang Zuonan, however, felt that it was not interesting to be an official. At the beginning of the seventh year of Daoguang, the imperial court promoted him to Huaixu Haitong Military Preparation Road, Zheng Sipin. After staying up for another two or three years, Bao Buqi will be the envoy or envoy of a certain province, and the future cannot be said to be bright. Surprisingly, he asked for early retirement.
In addition to health reasons, there are only two major factors for the current officials to propose retirement: one is poor treatment, low income, and feeling that being an official is boring; the other is mood problems, such as poor political ecology, personal value expectations can not be realized, and so on. Zhang Zuonan belongs to the latter. According to the "Notes on Living", one day, the emperor wanted to drink vermicelli soup and let the imperial dining room do it. The Ministry of internal affairs said: "If you want to make noodle soup, you must build another kitchen and make it by a special person, which needs to be funded by 60,000 taels; the annual cost is 15,000 taels." "A bowl of ordinary noodle soup, but the following execution is such a cost, let alone anything else?" Zhang Zuonan entered the army from Jiaqing thirteen years (1808), along the way, the official ecology of the Qing Dynasty, he knew everything, this early retirement, more like "escape", not a source of pressure, low income, less opportunities, his salary is enough to spend a few children's milk powder money and diaper money, his promotion is still quite smooth, what really makes him sad, it is the unbearable ecology of the officialdom, so that his value realization has no hope.
The strangest thing happened after he retired. In his hometown of Jinhua, Zhejiang, many officials discovered that Zhang Zuonan's three sons did not study, but engaged in farm work, and even learned crafts from craftsmen. Someone couldn't figure it out and asked Zhang Zuonan: "Your family is a scholarly door and an official eunuch's house, so what's the matter with letting your son work as a farmer?" Zhang Zuonan smiled and said, "For thousands of years, boys have been studying, but it is only for the sake of meritorious service, but now it is not possible, once they become officials, people's hearts will become bad, I do not let my son take the road of keju, I really do not want them to degenerate." ”
Zhang Zuonan, who historians praised as "actuarial science, through The East and the West", was an outstanding astronomer, and there was the "Cuiwei Mountain House Series" that was said to have been regarded as a guideline by scholars at that time. This academic achievement is undoubtedly the reason why he "escaped" from the official field and concentrated on research. If he survives until he retires normally, wastes time in deception and ushers in the delivery, where will he realize the value of his life?
Zhang Zuonan's "Qi" cannot be simply understood by "the state has a way, and the state has no way to hide", he has also fought in the official field for more than ten years, and has also done a lot of things for this "state". His "oddness", qi in the cognition and accurate judgment of the political environment, qi in changing the traditional family style and self-worth of the realization, enough for today's national examination students to learn. Being an official is nothing more than a career or job choice, and engaging in a certain occupation or work is nothing more than a means of making a living and realizing personal value, neither of which is delayed, it is for wisdom, and if one of them is delayed, it should be weighed.