Since ancient Greece, universities all over the world have been established for the same purpose. This is the truth. Mr. Jiang Ping, the former president of my alma mater, once said: I only bow to the truth all my life. I really want someone to write this sentence down and hang it on our purlin. If possible, I want to hang it in front of every university in China.
Over the past 60 years, China's universities have gained and lost. There are many offices, some are plaques, some are titles, some are people who look like student cadres, but there are too many things. I once commented that there are fewer and fewer academics and more and more political skills in universities. Less and less personality, more and more obsequiousness; There are fewer and fewer masters and more and more big officials; There are fewer and fewer people pursuing truth, and more and more people pursuing level; There are fewer and fewer reasonable people, and more and more people talk about treatment. As you know, there is an Asian university ranking every year. The University of Hong Kong, The Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology are always among the best, while the most famous universities in China, such as Tsinghua and Peking University, never seem to make the top ten. Hong Kong is a tiny place with so many excellent universities. We have 9.6 million square kilometers and trillions of foreign exchange reserves. Why can't we even build a decent university?
A few days ago, a university professor announced that if his students didn't earn 40 million yuan after graduation, they wouldn't come back to see him. This is the reason for the decline of China University.
A few days ago, a university teacher said a few inappropriate words in class and was reported by students. This is another reason for the decline of China University.
There are many books in this world. Some books teach people wisdom, while others only make people more stupid. If you claim that you are the only truth in some way, you should doubt it, read as many books as possible, learn more about other opinions, and then go back and verify whether it is accurate.
Numerous high-rise buildings have been built in China for more than 30 years, but the foundations of the high-rise buildings in the spiritual world have not been laid. We have often heard several words recently: revival, rise and strength. In fact, the strength of a nation is not only the strength of GDP, but also depends on how many inventions it has in the spiritual field. The philosopher Schelling said of Goethe: As long as he lives, Germany will not be lonely or poor. Without Goethe and his masterpieces in thought and art, the so-called revival and rise is just empty talk. No matter how many tall buildings and airports are built, they are just deserts of tall buildings and airports. There is an old saying: If Zhong Ni was not born in heaven, the ages would be like a long night. In fact, from the death of Confucius, or more recently, from the death of sages in the last century, China has ushered in an academic winter, which lasted for more than half a century. But we saw the dawn, because someone was working hard, and because of everyone present.
A friend of mine used to work in a company and wanted to be a department manager, but the leader refused to promote him. The friend worried about it day and night. Finally, one day, the leader had a conscience and sent the promotion document to this friend. After watching it for a long time, he suddenly felt a sense of awakening. He asked himself: Is it such a piece of paper that I dream of day and night? What's the point? After thinking about it all night, he decided to resign, then rented a small courtyard in Lijiang and lived there for a whole year. There is a pear tree in the yard. When the pear tree blooms, he will move a recliner, make a pot of tea, take a book he didn't have time to read before, drink two cups of tea, read a few pages, and sometimes sleep for a while. When he wakes up, he will see snow-white pears falling into his book one by one.
Many years later, all of you here will have all kinds of luck, some will become high officials, some will become extremely rich, and some will become great scholars. No matter what kind of life you live, you will experience such a moment: you feel that you are not happy enough, but you don't know how to change. I think the reason is that there is no such "pear blossom moment". You need a leisurely time to drink tea, read books or do nothing. You only need one night to see how pear blossoms fall from your side. This is the sentence: to be happy, money is not enough, you need to live in a certain civilization.