One
Northeast is still Northeast, now in the late summer, the watermelons in Jiangnan have been harvested, while here they seem to have just started, along the highway, a wall made of watermelons stretches high and low, farmers are still carrying them out from the green vineyard one by one and piling them up. Bought several and moved them to the car, cut open one on the side of the road and took a bite. The sweetness and refreshment that I rarely experienced in my life!
Can this land actually contain so much sweetness?
I raised this question with a shudder in my heart, because I was standing halfway from Mudanjiang to Jingpo Lake, under my feet was Ning'an City, Heilongjiang Province, where "Ningguta" was located in the Qing Dynasty. Any reader who has a slight understanding of Qing history can understand my emotions. In the long hundreds of years, how many "criminals"' judgments were written: "Exile to Ningguta."
So many great cases of the imperial court ended with it, so the three words "Ningguta" became the most unlucky curse in the hearts of officials all over the country. Anyone could possibly be linked to this place for life overnight, like falling into a dark abyss, and it was unlikely to get out again. The Jinluan Hall was far away yet close, so these three words often quietly crept into the nightmares between the high pillows and brocade quilts, scaring many people out of their wits with cold sweat.
The Qing rulers particularly liked to exile people from Jiangnan, so this land also has a deep connection with my birthplace and the place where I made a living. The Jiangzhe dialect hundreds of years ago must be quite different from now, but the clouds are still like that, the sky is still like that.
The land is not like that. In a book called "Yan Tang Jian Wen Za Lu", it was written that at that time, Ningguta was almost not a human world. Those who were exiled went there and were often eaten by tigers and wolves halfway, or even eaten by the local people who had fainted from hunger. Few could survive. At that time, there was another famous place of exile called Shangyangbao, which was also a place that made people's hair stand on end. But compared to Ningguta, Shangyangbao still had houses to live in and it was possible to survive, which was simply great. Maybe someone would think, where there is a tower, there should be some civilized legacy? This is wrong. Ningguta has no tower, these three words are completely Manchu transliterations, meaning "six" ("Ninggu" means "six", "Ta" means "individual").
It is said that a long time ago there were six brothers living here, and these six people may still be distant relatives of the later Qing dynasty.
Ningguta also brings to mind several other famous places of exile in Northeast China, such as today's Shenyang (then called Mukden)
Liaoning Kaiyuan City (Shangyangbao at that time)
Qiqihar (then known as Bukui)
I want to come and touch some of the uncomfortable parts of Chinese history again.
Two
In ancient China, the punishment for offenders was complex and varied, but roughly speaking, it can be divided into three categories: beating, killing, and exile. Beating is a light punishment, killing is an extreme punishment, and exile is "not light or heavy", falling in between.
There are many ways to beat, and there are many tools for beating (such as whips, sticks, etc.)
The methods and numbers are different. Let alone the folk criminals, even in the imperial court, there is always a possibility of being beaten at any time. No matter how dignified the official or how elegant the scholar, from childhood they have received education on "not viewing what is not proper", with every move and gesture full of elegance and refinement. Just now standing in the central hall to give a speech, they were still slowly and quietly adjusting a series of profound allusions to replace all worldly words. Suddenly, it was unclear which sentence was spoken incorrectly, and immediately they were pressed to the ground by a group of palace guards, beaten one after another in full view of everyone. Pale muscles, crimson blood, mournful cries that dare not be uttered loudly, disheveled white hair, strongly reminding the other civil and military officials standing on the side: you are ultimately just a physiological existence; using thought to refute thought, reason to face reason, has never been the case.
The ways of killing are even more numerous. In my early years, I read in an old book about the specific account of how the Jiaqing court killed a would-be assassin, and for several days I couldn't eat. Later, I finally came to understand other ways of killing as well, and I truly hope that our next generation will not have to know about these things again. Their methods are to turn death into a long process that can be savored slowly, and in this process, all the organs and skin of the human body become the source of pain, so that the person being punished can only blame themselves for being human. I believe that the ways of killing implemented by China's imperial court are the most cruel self-destructive game since humans became humans over a hundred million years ago, even wolves and tigers would be shocked if they saw it.
Cruel, for the rulers, is first a means of intimidation and secondly a pleasure. The later it gets, the less intimidating it becomes, and the more pleasurable it gets. This turns into a kind of psychological toxin that sweeps away human dignity. Rulers think this makes governance easier, but fundamentally destroys the humanity and compassion foundation of Chinese civilization. The consequences are very severe, even to this day when torture has been abolished, there is still no recovery.
It can be said now that I have been exiled.
Compared to killing, exile is a prolonged torture. Dying would be fine, but what's terrifying is that one is still alive, and all sorts of cruelty must be endured bit by bit with the heart, which is even more difficult than death.
For the Jiangnan people and Central Plains people who were exiled to Northeast China at that time, what was most unbearable was the scale of exile by association. Sometimes not only the whole family was exiled, but also nine clans were implicated, all distant and close relatives, even including neighbors, all became exiles, often in groups of dozens or hundreds of people, surging forward.
Don't think that traveling together in a lively and bustling manner is not bad, but you should know that these families, who were still enjoying luxurious food and clothing just a few days ago, have already been searched and their property confiscated. Their fate has already been decided after they arrive at the place of exile, such as "being given to soldiers as slaves" or "being given to armored men as slaves". Even the children by their side are already slaves. Along the way, they were afraid that these people would escape, so they were locked up with shackles for thousands of miles. I saw a record in historical materials: In the eighth year of the Xuande era of the Ming dynasty, 170 prisoners were exiled to the northeast, and two-thirds of them died on the road, leaving only 50 people when they arrived in the northeast.
Finally arrived at the place of exile, these slaves were assigned to their masters. The masters would ravish the beautiful women at will and kill their husbands first for fear that they would get in the way. With so many exiles who could not be used, some of the women were selected and sold to brothels, while some of the men were chosen to exchange for horses.
The best treatment was to be a laborer in the so-called "official estate", of course, there was also no freedom at all. According to the Qing dynasty scholar Wu Zhaoxun's account, "the people on the official estate were all thin as firewood", "all year round, they were either farming, or hunting, burning lime, and burning charcoal, without a single idle day".
In a book called "Jue Yu Ji Lue", it is described that the scene of Jiangnan women fetching water in the flow: "After the frost and snow, the well was frozen like a mountain, and those who carried the shoulder pole with bare feet and single clothes were wailing, all of whom were descendants of wealthy and noble families in China."
Among these poor water-fetching girls, there must be many Cui Yingying and Lin Daiyu. The pampered and proud demeanor of yesterday dare not be thought of again, even that little bit of sorrowful and melancholic love tragedy has all become a luxury.
During the Kangxi period, poet Ding Jie wrote these two lines of poetry:
The south has many beautiful women, but few in the north.
Half of the famous scholars in China come from Luoyang.
What a great tragedy that is really unthinkable! The poem may be somewhat exaggerated, but at that time, the provinces in Central Plains were reduced to "no province and no people" in Northeast China. According to Mr. Li Xing Sheng's statistics, only during the Qing Dynasty, the number of people who flowed into Northeast China (the concept is slightly larger than that of exiled prisoners)
The total number is over 1.5 million. Ordinary civilians are rarely exiled, so the proportion of "famous scholars" and "beautiful women" among them is indeed not low.
As mentioned earlier, among so many people, a large part of them are implicated relatives, and this injustice is really too great. Those distant relatives may not have seen the person involved at all, and their kinship needs to be explained by the elderly through twists and turns in order to barely clarify it. Now they are all rushed here together. In the eyes of the ruler, Chinese people are not individuals, but leaves on a big family tree. If one leaf does not look good, it proves that the root is not good, so a big tree is pulled out from the root. I think the original meaning of the two words "implicated relatives" comes from this.
There are so many leaves on the tree, and it's hard to know which one will cause trouble for itself, let alone when its own actions will harm the entire tree. So, it can only be trembling with fear, as if standing at the edge of a precipice, as if walking on thin ice. How then can China still have an independent individual consciousness?
We have also seen many people who are clear-minded but hesitant in their actions: if they had persisted a little longer according to their original intentions, they would have established their character; but as soon as they furrowed their brows and thought of their wives, children, relatives, and friends, they immediately changed their minds. If not a single leaf on the big tree dares to face the blowing wind, the soaking dew, and the swirling frost, then the entire forest will become a dead forest without any sound of wind or birds.
Three
I often imagine what those people who were exiled to the Northeast would say when they met distant relatives they had never heard of before, but this time suffered because of themselves. What kind of expression would they have? And how would those distant relatives react?
The parties are extremely guilty, which is beyond doubt. But is guilt enough? And what is guilt anyway? He may explain the case, but can he really clarify his own case?
It is the real anti-Qing activists among the exiles who can clearly explain their cases. There are also those who failed in the internal struggles of the imperial court, and they can generally explain the reasons for their exile. The ones who cannot explain themselves clearly are the scholars, who inadvertently got involved in literary inquisitions or examination cases, became criminals overnight, and were sent to the Northeast with a large group of people implicated by association, most of whom do not understand their own cases.
The case of literary inquisition is too complicated to be explained clearly, and many people have written about it before. The imperial examination scandal refers to the suspicion of cheating in the imperial examinations, which involves a wider range of issues.
Since the Ming dynasty, especially during the Qing dynasty, there were numerous so-called "exam cases" that kept emerging one after another. It seemed that even Lu Xun's grandfather was later implicated in such a case - fortunately, his whole family wasn't exiled, or else we wouldn't have had the chance to read "The True Story of Ah Q".
In my opinion, there are indeed cases of cheating in the imperial examination, but a large part of them have been exaggerated or even fabricated out of thin air. For example, in 1657, two famous cases of cheating occurred, resulting in many people being executed or exiled. Let's take a closer look at one of the more serious ones, known as the "Nanjin Imperial Examination Case".
After the exam, the list was announced, and those who did not pass were full of complaints and discussions. The most talked about was Fang Zhangyue, a young man from Anhui who passed the imperial examination, who might be a distant relative of the chief examiner, so-called "connected by clan", should have recused himself, if not recused, it is possible to cheat.
The rumors of the failed candidate were heard by an official, who then reported to Emperor Shunzhi. Upon hearing this, Emperor Shunzhi immediately issued a decree, dismissing both the chief and deputy examiners from their posts and ordering that the candidate Fang Zhangyao be arrested and interrogated.
The father of this Anhui candidate, Fang Gongqian, also an official in the imperial court, petitioned that our family had never been related to the chief examiner and that the rumor was false, so there was no need for avoidance. In previous years, he had also taken the exam, and the imperial court could investigate.
Originally, this was a very easy thing to investigate clearly, but the trouble is that the emperor has already taken a stand and has dismissed two chief examiners. If they really didn't collude with each other, where would the emperor put his face?
So the imperial court, from top to bottom, is unanimous in saying that your two families must have been related by marriage, it's impossible not to be related by marriage, there's no reason not to be related by marriage, why aren't you related by marriage? It would be strange if you weren't! Since they are certain that you were related by marriage, then you should have avoided each other during the imperial examination for sons and younger brothers, not avoiding each other is a crime.
The Ministry of Punishment spent a lot of time pondering the case and the emperor's thoughts, and finally came up with a plan to report. The general idea was that since the chief and deputy examiners had already provoked the emperor's anger and been dismissed by him, they might as well be put to death to make an example of them so that others would not dare to speak out; as for Fang Zhongyan, the imperial court did not recognize him as a successful candidate and his title was revoked.
The plan was sent to the Shunzhi Emperor. Everyone originally thought that the emperor might be more lenient than the Ministry of Punishment, making some gestures, but unexpectedly the emperor's edict was extremely terrifying: The chief and deputy examiners were beheaded without any courtesy; what about the other 18 examiners under their leadership? All were hanged, their property confiscated, and their wives and children were all punished to become slaves. It is said that a examiner named Lu had already died? Consider him lucky, but his property would also be confiscated, and his wife and children would also go to become slaves. Also, let the Anhui examinee not be a Jinshi? No way, take care of the eight examinees who passed the exam, their property should also be confiscated, and each person should be severely beaten with 40 big boards. More importantly, the parents, brothers, wives of these examinees must be exiled to Ningguta together! (See "The Real Record of Shengzu" Volume 121)
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This is a typical ancient Chinese verdict, the punishment was so severe that it was completely out of proportion. Wasn't it just a suspicion of nepotism between one candidate and the chief examiner? His father had already cleared up the suspicion, but the result was still so tragic, and the scope involved was so large. These twenty examiners should have been China's top scholars at the time, yet they were all killed without knowing what was happening, and their families suffered as a result. This atrocity is still shocking to think about today.
In the meantime, the only ones who could explain the ins and outs of the suspects were the Anhui examinees - the Fang family. The others who were killed, beaten or exiled may not even know the basic reasons. However, on the execution ground, heads had already rolled and bloodstains were everywhere, and on the way to Northeast China, a long queue had already formed.
The family members of these candidates thought about the twenty or so university professors who were beheaded a few days ago, and their hearts calmed down - it's not as good as before, but better than nothing. Besides, those famous people didn't even make a sound when they died, why should I come out and shout injustice?
This is the usual psychological logic of Chinese people when they are facing the greatest injustice and disaster. There's no need to ask for any reason, even if it's a natural disaster.
Look at the homeless victims of the disaster, how many have asked about the reasons for the formation of typhoons and the outbreak of mountain floods? Forget it, just bow your head and work hard, it's already good enough to be able to do so.
Four
Disaster, for ordinary people, is just a disaster. But for intellectuals, it's different. When disaster strikes, they will be more tense and painful than ordinary people, but after passing this threshold, some of them may awaken their cultural consciousness, start facing the disaster to find the depth of life. Their previous value system may also be deconstructed, even thoroughly deconstructed.
Some scholars, when they were first exiled, still maintained a dignified and loyal appearance, waiting for the day when the wise ruler would clear their names. Others hoped that after their death, a historian would speak out in justice on their behalf. However, the vast and desolate wilderness beyond the Great Wall negated them, and the strong cold winds of the northern regions mocked them.
Exiles all remember the story of Hong Hao and Zhang Shao, envoys of Southern Song Dynasty, being exiled to Heilongjiang during the Jin-Song War. Hong Hao and Zhang Shao can be said to have fought for the dignity of the great Song Dynasty, remaining unyielding even in the face of picking wild vegetables to fill their hunger and collecting horse dung to keep warm.
Unexpectedly, these two men suffered hardships for over a decade in the Northeast for the Song court, and as soon as they returned, they were immediately demoted. On the other hand, the Jin people showed great respect to these two envoys who opposed them, and every time someone from the Song court came, they would ask about their well-being, and even showed extra kindness to their children.
This example made later exiles fall into deep thought: if the imperial court treats its own envoys like this, is it really worth everyone's loyalty? Are all the things we considered supreme in our minds in the past truly valuable?
Along this ideological vein, a miracle appeared in the northeastern exile land: many Qing officials who were exiled and anti-Qing righteous men became good friends, even to the point of being inseparable in life and death. Their original political stances all dissolved, dissolving in the reconfirmation of human values.
When official titles, status and property are stripped away one by one, what remains is the direct call of life to life. The famous anti-Qing martyr Fan Kuo, during his exile in Northeast China, befriended those who were demoted Qing officials, such as Li Yu, Wei Kun, Ji Kaisheng, Li Chengxiang, Hao Yu and Chen Yechen, among others. However, he took these people as the backbone to establish an "Ice Sky Poetry Society".
Hanke's friends are all worthy of respect in terms of their personal character. For example, Li Yu was punished for memorializing the imperial court, pointing out that the "fugitive law" at the time was too harsh and implicated too many people; Wei Juan was exiled for advocating that the wife of a criminal should be exempt from exile, but he himself was exiled; Ji Kaisheng advised against the emperor going to the countryside to select beautiful women; Hao Yu impeached Wu Sangui for being arrogant and lawless... In short, they were all kind-hearted and upright people. Now their right to speak has been taken away, but kindness and uprightness cannot be taken away.
Huang Zongxi was befriending them in the seventh year of Shunzhi, at that time many scholars in Jiangnan still regarded serving the Qing as a shame, so they looked down on Han officials who served the Qing and were harmed by the Qing. But Huang Zongxi completely disregarded this set, with an unobstructed mindset he discovered their kindness and integrity, respecting them as individuals with independent personalities.
Political enemies have disappeared, opposition has relaxed, and only a group of sincere friends are left.
With friends, even the greatest disaster will dissipate by half; with friends, even the worst environment will become beautiful.
I dare to assert that in the long ancient Chinese society, the most precious and touching friendship must have been born in the exile of Beibei and Nanhuang, among those scholars with disheveled hair and dirty faces. Those other famous stories of friendship are too externally decorated.
Apart from the friendships among exiles themselves, there is also a special weight to the friendships between outsiders and exiles.
In an era when the wind of guilt by association was extremely strong, maintaining friendship with exiles was a very dangerous thing. Moreover, being in a remote location, it was extremely difficult to maintain friendships under the transportation and communication conditions at that time. Therefore, exiles could completely rely on the degree of maintenance of past friendships to re-evaluate the world they were originally in.
In the Yuan Dynasty, a Zhejiang official named Luo was exiled to Northeast China, and his friend Sun Zigeng accompanied him all the way from Hangzhou. During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, the Minister of War Cai Yueming was convicted and exiled to Heilongjiang, and his friend He Shicheng from Shanghai not only escorted him but also stayed with Cai for more than two years before returning to Jiangnan.
What touches me most is that during the Kangxi period, Gu Zhen Guan rescued his old friend Wu Zhao Jiu from exile in Northeast China with great difficulty.
Gu Zhen Guan knew that his old friend had been in exile for a long time, suffering all sorts of hardships, and he wanted to redeem him back in his later years so that he could live a few peaceful days. For this, he was willing to knock on every door of the nobles to collect funds. However, this matter couldn't be resolved with just money; it also required the approval of the most authoritative person in the imperial court. After much difficulty, he got acquainted with Nalan Rongruo, the son of the current Taifu Mingzhu. Nalan Rongruo was a man of good character and literary talent, who was also willing to help his friends, but when Gu Zhen Guan proposed this request, he felt that it was a matter of great importance and found it difficult to agree.
Gu Zhen Guan had no choice but to take out the two Ci poems he wrote thinking of Wu Zhaoxun, "Jin Lv Qu", and show them to Nalan Rongruo. The full text of the two poems is as follows:
Are the seasons peaceful? Come back, all my life's affairs, can't bear to look back! Who comforts me on the long journey? Mother is old and poor, child is young. I don't remember, from before, wine cups. Ghosts and monsters attack people, should be used to seeing them, but always lose to those with the power to cover the rain and turn over the clouds. Ice and snow, revolving for a long time. Don't let tears soak through my leather cloak, count the edges of the sky, still flesh and blood, how many families can do this? Compared to beautiful faces with thin lives, it's even worse now. Only in the desolate borderlands, suffering from cold is hard to bear, twenty years of loyalty, waiting for a promise to be fulfilled, hoping to meet again at the end of the sky. Leave this letter, you hold it in your sleeve.
I too have been drifting for a long time. For ten years, I have been deeply in debt to my friends and teachers who have helped me through life and death. In the past, we were equally famous, but now I am ashamed of my decline. Look at how thin and weak I have become! My health has not improved, and I am still suffering from illness. I am about to bid farewell to my dear friend, and I ask: is this the end of life? I have a thousand regrets, all for your sake. My brother was born in the year of Xinwei, and I was born in the year of Dingchou; we spent some time together, but were soon separated by the harsh weather of life, and our youth withered away like the willow trees. From now on, I must reduce my writing of poetry and prose, and keep my heart and soul intact. I only wish that the Yellow River would clear up and people's lives would be long and peaceful. On the day of my return, I hastily revised my manuscript, and entrusted my empty name to be passed down after my death. My words are not yet exhausted, but I must stop here for now.
I don't know what thoughts the readers have after reading these two lyrics, but Nalan Yongru burst into tears as soon as he finished reading them and said to Gu Zhenyu: "Give me ten years, I will take it as my own business, from now on you don't need to remind me again."
"Ten years? How many good years does he have left? Five years, how about that?"
Nalan Rongruo wiped away her tears and nodded.
After much effort by many people, Wu Zhaogui was finally redeemed and brought back.
I often think that the Northeasterners' generosity, hospitality, emphasis on friendship and loyalty must have some connection with the spiritual legacy of the exiles. Exile created a rich spiritual world, which has benefited us to this day.
Five
Apart from enjoying friendship, exiles also wanted to do something they thought of doing. Due to climatic and managerial reasons, exiles also had a lot of spare time. In some places, they were even in a state of abandonment. This gave cultural people a small opportunity for self-choice.
I should do something that others can't replace, right? I should have some behavior that is higher than picking wild vegetables, collecting horse dung, burning limestone and burning charcoal. After thinking about it, these things and behaviors are all related to culture. Therefore, this is also a kind of return, not in the geographical sense but in the cultural sense.
More common is teaching, for example, Hong Hao once silently wrote "Four Books" on the dried birch leaves to teach village children; Zhang Shao even lectured on "Zhou Yi" in exile, "listeners gathered"; and Huan Ke as a Buddhist scholar took every opportunity to spread Buddhist teachings.
Secondly, they taught farming and commerce. For example, Yang Yue once spent a lot of effort in spreading the agricultural technology of the south to the place of exile, teaching the local people to use "breaking wood for houses" instead of the original "digging earth for houses", and also letting the exiles exchange goods with the local indigenous people using the items they brought with them, cultivating initial market awareness. At the same time, they carried out cultural education, almost comprehensively promoting the progress of civilization on this land.
Culturally more refined exiles took the Northeast as an object of cultural investigation and left their findings in writing, which are still cherished by regional culture researchers today. For example, Fang Gongjian's "Ningguta Chronicle", Wu Jingchen's "Ningguta Brief Chronicle", Zhang Jiayan's "Ningguta Mountains and Rivers Record", Yang Bin's "Liu Bian Brief Chronicle", Yinghe's "Longsha Product Ode", etc., these works have high academic value in multiple aspects such as history, geography, customs, products, etc.
We know that in ancient China, academic research, except for a few exceptions like Li Shizhen and Xu Xiake, mostly went from books to books, lacking the spirit of field investigation, which has resulted in our academic tradition often lacking empirical consciousness. These exiles overcame this shortcoming in hardship and wrote a surprising page in the history of Chinese academia.
The land under their feet gave them so many unknown strangers, so much desperate bitterness, but they did not intend to resent it, and instead used warm palms to caress it, making it feel the warmth of civilization, and entering the annals of culture.
In this regard, several southern families who were exiled for generations played a significant role. For example, the Lv Liuliang family of Zhejiang Province during the Qing Dynasty, the Fang Congqian and Fang Xiaobiao families of Anhui Province, and the Yang Yue and Yang Bin father-son duo of Zhejiang Province. In the early years of the Republic of China, the great master of national studies, Zhang Taiyan, mentioned that Lv Liuliang (Lv Yonghui) was exiled to Northeast China for generations due to his involvement in literary inquisitions.
The family's contribution: "Later generations mostly worked as teachers, doctors, and merchants. The locals called it the Old Lü Family, although they were Taiwanese, those who sought knowledge had to go to the Lü Family, and officials who were exiled had to visit their home, so the locals did not dare to be disrespectful, and their descendants never humbled themselves either." "The people of Qiqihar knew how to read because of the descendants of Lü Yonghui who were exiled there."
Speaking of the Fang family, Zhang Taiyan said: "At first, outside Kaiyuan and Tieling were all barbarian lands, with no one who could read or write. The people of Ningguta knew books because they were opened up by the descendants of Xiaobiao who were exiled there." (Taiyan Wenlu Continuation)
Modern historians believe that Mr. Taiyan's statement may have some factual errors and the evaluation may be slightly high, but it is certain that the two families made contributions to the enlightenment of culture and education in Northeast China.
A family was exiled from generation to generation, which is a great sorrow for this family, but they continued to develop the Northeast with continuous efforts. They were exiles, but in fact, they became old-timers "natives". So where is their hometown? Facing this question, I have sympathy and melancholy, as well as respect for the victors, because in cultural terms, they are brave conquerors.
Six
I hope that the above statements will not lead to a misunderstanding, namely that exile is a painful experience from a micro perspective but not so bad from a macro perspective.
No. From a macro perspective, exile is always a kind of destruction to civilization. Some exiles who struggled out of the painful wounds created those civilizations in a hurry, which cannot add luster to exile itself. Not to mention that most exiles no longer have any cultural creation, even if we evaluate the few people mentioned above as the best, they cannot become the first-rate talents in our country's cultural history.
Top talent can withstand hardships, but cannot let the hardships exceed the basic physiological limits and material limits. Although Qu Yuan, Sima Qian, and Cao Xueqin also suffered a lot, Ninguta's exile method would never produce "Li Sao", "Historical Records" and "Dream of Red Mansions".
Civilization may arise from barbarism, but it absolutely dislikes barbarism. We can endure hardships, but we absolutely do not praise hardships. We are not afraid of persecution, but we absolutely do not affirm persecution.
It is the nobility of their inner hearts that enables some intellectuals to reveal humanity and create civilization in the midst of hardships during their exile. Their external identities may change time and again, or they may be imprisoned for life, but the nobility in their hearts has never been completely erased. This is just like how some people, no matter how hard they try to follow the trend or hold high positions, can never cover up the baseness in their hearts.
Undoubtedly, the most touching is the nobility in adversity, and it is also this kind of nobility that makes people see why nobility is noble. With this nobility, people can recite poems and compose essays on the edge of life and death, use their own warmth to melt the ice and snow on others' hearts, and then use their humiliated bodies to ignite the flames of civilization. For culture and civilization, they can disregard material interests and gains, disregard benefits and losses, and sacrifice themselves without hesitation, generation after generation.
I stand on this land once known as Ninguta in ancient times, and after a long time of looking around with my head held high, I finally lower it to pay tribute to some souls from afar - for their origins mostly from Zhejiang, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Anhui, those places so familiar to me, and even more for their nobility in the midst of hardships.
