中国人的精神 The Spirit of the Chinese People（民商：马星宇 等）
民商：马星宇，张夏冰
The book "Chinese Spirit" was written by the famous master Gu Hongming. Everyone must know something about him. He was born in Nanyang, studied in the West, married in the East, and worked in the Beiyang. In the awakening era of the explosion some time ago, he entered the public's eyes. Westerners once said: You can't look at the three main halls in China, but you must not look at Gu Hongming. It was also his wonderful speech in the play that made me want to know more about the Chinese spirit in his eyes.
First, we wanted to know why he wrote this book. During the reading and thinking, we got a deeper insight into his mind. In our opinion, this book tries to defend Chinese traditional culture, which has aroused great repercussions in western society after its publication. It has been translated into German, French, Chinese and other languages and reprinted many times. Ku Hongming's craze has been aroused for decades because of this German book. At the beginning of the article, he questioned Arthur Smith, the author of Chinese Characteristics, and Dr. Giles, a famous British sinologist. He thought that being a foreigner did not really understand Chinese language and Chinese people.
Gu Hongming believes that to evaluate a civilization, we must look at what kind of people, men and women it can produce. He uniquely pointed out: "To understand the real Chinese and Chinese civilization, that person must be deep, broad and simple", because "the three characteristics of Chinese character and Chinese civilization are deep, broad and simple", in addition to "delicacy". From this unique perspective, Gu Hongming compared Chinese with Americans, British, Germans and French, highlighting the characteristics of Chinese people: Americans are broad and simple, but not deep; English people are deep and simple, but not broad. Germans are broad and deep, but not simple; The French are not as deep as the Germans, not as broad-minded as the Americans and simple as the British people, but they have the sensitivity that these three nations lack. Only the Chinese have all these four outstanding spiritual qualities.
Second, after reading the book for the first time, we had a general understanding of the main idea. So, we began to think about what the Chinese spirit means. The longer a foreigner lives in this country, the more he likes Chinese people. There is something indescribable in Chinese people, despite their lack of clean and elegant habits, and despite their many flaws in thought and character. This indescribable thing, Gu Hongming, defines him as tenderness, or the power of sympathy. Chinese people's life is a life of feeling, a life of emotion and soul. Chinese people live a life with heart and full of feelings. "Chinese people's spirit is gentle first. Gentleness is not weak by nature, nor is it fragile to yield, but there is no toughness, harshness, rudeness and violence. There is a quiet, sober, pure and mature temperament in the true Chinese type of humanity. According to his metaphor, it is like a piece of well-tempered metal. My personal understanding is that it is more like being smooth after being honed, without any edges and corners, and gives people a comfortable feeling as a whole, that is, Chinese people.
He also admitted that Chinese people are a stagnant civilization to a certain extent in terms of pure knowledge life and have made little or no progress in some purely abstract scientific fields. Chinese people live a spiritual life. Therefore, "Chinese people are a nation that never ages" rather than being hindered in their development, and a nation that "has the secret of eternal youth". This nation, "living a spiritual life like a child", is of course not interested in abstract and rigid science and technology. In Europe, art and poetry enable artists and poets to see the beauty and order in the universe. Confucianism and Confucius taught Chinese society and civilization on the right track.
This book is quite long, and it may not be well understood at some point. My biggest feeling is that Gu Hongming is proud that he is a Chinese. He wants to change the outside world's view of China in his own way. He does not feel inferior because of foreigners' prejudice. On the contrary, he is extremely confident in his country and its people. At that time, this idea was very valuable. He acknowledged the merits of foreign cultures and did not deny the fine traditions of Chinese culture. He foresightedly put forward theoretical support for today's cultural self-confidence with this all-encompassing mind. This kind of Chinese spirit has also been passed down, and today it urges us to be a real Chinese. In his works, I have seen the elegant demeanor of a hundred years ago and the unremitting efforts of countless Chinese people in exploring the way of saving the world. This self-confidence and arrogance not only encouraged Chinese people to raise their heads a hundred years ago, but also had the courage to say, "I am Chinese", which transcended time and space and gave us a spiritual strength today.
In this book, Ku Hweng-Ming described his views about the differences between Chinese and foreigners and explored the origin of the differences. Someone remarks about this book is just on average, but, if you could read this book from different angles, you will agree with me.
If you read this book from the perspective of modern Chinese people, it gives you a chance to get exposed to the old society and to know what they are thinking about, it is also a process of learning. I think what we can learn from the old society is what the Confucius said. As we all know, Confucius created extraordinary traditional culture. He tells us that kids should respect their parents because they give us a birth and bring up us; he tells us that students should respect their teachers because they deliver the knowledge; he also tells us brothers and sisters should stand united and help each other. The wife and the husband should be loyal to each other, the members should follow their leader, and the strangers should be friendly to each other. In additional, he thinks everyone is born with a kind heart. The belief that everyone should be kind and responsible was passed one by one, from generation to generation. And now, it develops to be a universally accepted idea. I think it is one of the reasons that why we can keep the society in order without police and wars.
If you read this book from the perspective of Chinese who is living in the old society, you will develop self-confidence in your own culture, and be proud of your own country. That is the basic step to build a strong country, and that is what we need eagerly at that time.
If you read this book from the perspective of a foreigner who think China is nothing, you will find yourself a fool, because the potential power and the life intelligence that Chinese people have are far more important than the modern tools of war. You would say should learn from Chinese, learn them to live wholly a life of heart, a life of emotion and a life of child. And you would tell your country that Chinese people are gentle, they have sympathy and intelligence, they are kind and careful, but it doesn’t mean they will give in to the power. As for the reason, it is because Chinese people live wholly a life of the heart, a life of emotion or human affection, a life of a child. In short, the real Chinese people is a person with the head of a grown-up man and the heart of a child. They depend on this, and this keep the society moving forward.
We are proud of being Chinese.
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