"With ambition, I am worthy of being a young man who can write the lyrics like "Linjiangxian"!"

Lin Zhen praised Chen Yichen for his decisive "response to the challenge", saying, "I don't talk about my knowledge, but at least I am extraordinary."

"Weichu just asked me to help you point out this sutra. Does that mean that Yichen, you are already familiar with the four books?"

"I dare not speak wisely, but I have gained something after studying for several years."

Chen Yichen dared not speak too much, but he could not act too timid, so he had to look as confident as possible.

"Okay, I'll set the questions to test you."

After saying that, Lin Zhen pondered for a while, and then said, "Mencius said, what are the five kinds of people who teach gentlemen? "

Lin Zhen took a paragraph from "Mencius: The Complete Heart" as the test question. The translation of this sentence means that Mencius said that there are five ways for gentlemen to educate people, which five ways Chen Yichen answered.

Chen Yichen almost didn't feel happy to speak out about this kind of problem. Isn't this delivered to my door? The best thing in the four books is "Mencius", and the first emperor just used "Mencius" to draw the title.

Of course, the joy in my heart bloomed, and the Chen Yichen could not be revealed on the surface, so he pretended to be calm and composed and said: "There are those who transformed from time to time, those who have achieved virtue, those who have gained wealth, those who have answered questions, and those who have private welfare. These five are the reasons why gentlemen teach."

"Then do you think Mencius said the fifth person of gentlemen to teach the world what reason do you want to tell the world?"

If the previous question is memorizing by rote, then what Lin Zhen asked now is to let Chen Yichen explore the philosophy expressed behind it.

"Teach according to your aptitude."

Without any hesitation, Chen Yichen gave the standard answer.

When Sun Tixue next to him heard this, he couldn't help but nod and said, "Not bad!"

Li Tingxiu also had a faint smile on his face, one was to be happy for his students, and the other was to be very clear that Chen Yichen was good at "Mencius", and this kind of question could not defeat him.

"Okay, the Doctrine of the Mean says that governing is based on people, taking people with their bodies, cultivating themselves with their Tao, and practicing Tao with their benevolence. How can this be explained?"

If this question was placed a month ago, even if Chen Yichen's familiarity with "The Doctrine of the Mean", even if he could answer it, he could only say that he could barely be able to answer it.

But over the past period of time, reading these four words at night by Bingzhu is no longer the joke I used to say, but Chen Yichen's daily life experience.

He has basically kept the original text and annotations of the Four Books in mind!

"Reply to the throne of the throne, this is Confucius's words to answer Duke Ai of Lu's question. Confucius believed that to do good governance, one must obtain virtuous ministers. To obtain virtuous ministers, one must first improve morality, and morality is the first priority."

"The answer is very good, but there is also a sentence in "The Doctrine of the Mean". If the person survives, his politics will be carried out. If the person dies, his politics will be settled. How can we ensure that good policies can be implemented for a long time?"

When Lin Zhen raised this question, the expressions on Li Tingxiu and Sun Tixue showed obvious changes.

Because this kind of test questions completely exceeded the requirements for Tong Sheng’s Four Books, and even exceeded the stage of taking the exam for scholars and juren. It was more like the emperor personally asked the tribute scholars who were admitted to the imperial examination in the palace examination.

I used this kind of question to test Chen Yichen. Those who know that Lin Zhen is willing to try his limit on his knowledge, but those who don’t know think it’s intentional to make things difficult for him.

To be honest, Chen Yichen was in a dilemma when facing Lin Zhen’s question.

From a literal sense alone, the sentence "Doctor of the Mean" is not difficult, and it is much better than many rare and difficult ancient Chinese essays. Even if you call a high school student in later generations, you can roughly understand this sentence: "The meaning of "the rule of law is preserved and the rule of law is lost."

Lin Zhen is now asking how to change this situation and allow good policies to be implemented for a long time.

To answer from a modern perspective, it is actually very simple, that is, to change "rule of man" to "rule of law". Use the law to fix policies, so that it is easy to avoid the situation where people maintain political activities and people die and political retention.

The problem is that this way of thinking is correct in modern times, but in ancient times when Confucianism was the only one, it is emphasized that "law" is higher than "people" is higher than "benevolence".

That is equivalent to being a Confucian scholar, you have penetrated the bottom line of your political philosophy and spread it with popular words to describe it as "society death". There is no hope of learning in the future.

Unless it can change the entire social ideology against the will of heaven and change it.

So this question is even more difficult for Chen Yichen. Not only does he have to come up with a reasonable answer, but he also has to go against his original intention!

Looking at Chen Yichen's thoughtfulness, Lin Zhen had a slight smile on his face and was not in a hurry to urge him.

From the previous questions, he could already know that Chen Yichen's four books has a solid basic skills, and his answers were quick and accurate. It even made Lin Zhen a little confused at one point. How could this level of knowledge be impossible to pass the exam for several years at the Duke of Chengguo Mansion?

So Lin Zhen broke free from the restrictions of the Four Books, Five Classics and Eight Essays, and asked for more practical strategies, wanting to see if Chen Yichen is a nerd who only knows how to study hard or is truly talented.

"Good laws and good governance."

After thinking about it over and over again, Chen Yichen finally gave his own answer.

Chen Yichen began to struggle with answering "rule of man" or "rule of law", but soon realized that "rule of law" was not a new concept in later generations, and had been discussed in various schools of thought.

With Lin Zhen’s top talent, how could the test questions he gave were just superficial and choose one of two?

If you follow your own heart and simply choose "rule of law", then this answer must have some flaws, and where is this flaw?

It was precisely because of realizing the problem that Chen Yichen thought for a long time, and fortunately he finally figured it out.

That is, the Code itself will not spontaneously uphold justice for the weak, it only provides everyone with a basis for protecting themselves. How to use the Code still depends on the laws that no one abides by, and it is not as good as a piece of waste paper!

Xunzi once concluded that "there is a rule of law to govern people, but no rule of law". Therefore, the simple "rule of law" and "rule of man" are not right. We must nourish the rule of law with morality, benevolence and righteousness, and use the rule of law to strengthen morality, benevolence and righteousness. Only when the two complement each other is good law and good governance!

"Good answer!"

Almost the moment Chen Yichen gave the answer, Lin Zhen slapped the table excitedly and shouted loudly!

He never imagined that this issue that had been debated by countless sages and powerful people would be summarized in just four words by a student who had not entered the school.

If you add the previous "teaching according to your aptitude", it can be said that Chen Yichen hits the point and solves the problem with the agility, among the students and disciples taught by Lin Zhen, there is no better choice!

"It's really a genius!"

Sun Tixue stood up tremblingly, his tone was extremely excited, and Chen Yichen was afraid that he would make any mistakes. What if he was angry?

Compared to Lin Zhen who only started teaching after resigning from office in recent years, Sun Tixue can be said to be a supervisor for half his life and has met countless scholars.

Some are proficient in poetry, songs, and romance, and some are writing beautiful writings of eight-legged articles. However, at the age of sixteen, there are really no one who has reached Chen Yichen's opinion pattern!

He is worthy of being a student who can write "Linjiangxian". This young and mature aura is amazing.

Even Li Tingxiu, who was a Mengshi, was shocked. He originally wanted to ask Lin Zhen to help Chen Yichen make up for the shortcomings in the classics and prepare for next year's college and provincial examinations.

As a result, the scope of the school exam was completely out of date. What's even more outrageous is that Chen Yichen can actually answer, and it's so outstanding...
Chapter completed!