Yuan Dexiu, character Zizhi, a native of Henan, was good at literature and music. He was a pure and simple man with no pretensions, and took the simplicity of the ancients as his way of life, and his filial piety spread far and wide. He was awarded a scholarship in the 21st year of Kaiyuan (733 A.D.) in the Tang Dynasty of Emperor Xuanzong. His life’s ancient way of life was praised by future generations, and he was really a man like his name.
His noble deeds and filial piety
Although Deok-su’s father was the governor of Yanzhou – the governor of Yanzhou, he lost his father at a young age and lived in poverty. However, his filial piety in serving his mother in the midst of poverty was known far and wide. He always carried his mother on his back whenever he went out, and he could not bear to leave her alone when he went to the capital to take the entrance examination.
After he passed the exam, his mother died, and he mourned by her tomb in a hut, eating food without adding salt, and not eating milk and milk food; no straw mat in the car, sitting place, or sleeping place, and his material needs to sustain his life were reduced to the lowest point, without a trace of material attachment.
After he finished his mourning period, he was transferred to the position of a county lieutenant in Nanhe, Xing Prefecture (now a county in Hebei), where he lived in great poverty. He assisted the governor in catching thieves and maintaining local law and order. He was promoted to the position of a counselor of the Longwu army after the emperor knew of his virtues and achievements.
Serving as a nurse for his nephew and nursing him
After his father died when he was a child, and his mother died when he became a scholar, he lived in poverty and mourning for many years, and when his parents died, he did not want to marry. He was told that an heir was unfilial. He said that his brother had an heir in the family, so he could just pass on his parents’ bloodline.
His brother’s family was also poor. In the early years, his sister-in-law died after giving birth to a son, and his brother also died, so there was no money to hire a nurse, and his nephew had no milk to drink, so Yuan Desu nursed his nephew himself. Heaven was moved! After several days of breastfeeding, the big man De Xiu’s breasts actually flowed milk, and he continued to be his nephew’s nurse until his nephew could eat. Later, his nephew grew up and wanted to get married but there was no money for marriage. In order to give his nephew a wife, Yuan Desu asked to be the order of Rushan.
The letter made the bandit turn back and helped the orphan with his salary
At that time, there was a fierce tiger in the area that ate people and made them panic. When a robber in prison found out about it, he asked to be allowed to catch the tiger to redeem himself, and Yuan De-xiu agreed.
When the subordinate jailer found out about it, he was very anxious and said, “This is his trick to escape, if he doesn’t come back, won’t we be implicated and suffer?”
Deok-su replied, “I have promised him, so I cannot repent. If he escapes and does not come back, I will bear the guilt alone and not involve others.”
The next day, the bandit really came back with the tiger’s corpse. This incident spread throughout the county and was admired!
All of Yuan Desu’s salary supported the orphans, buying them clothes and food. After his term was up, he found that he had a silk cage left, so he went on a tour of the mountains in a woodcart. When he arrived in the area of Luhun (Songshan County, Luoyang), he fell in love with the landscape there and settled down in the mountains alone.
When he settled in the mountains, Yuan Dexiu was almost at ease with nature, and his home was not walled up or locked up, and he did not use servants or concubines. In the wild years, he sometimes did not eat for a whole day. He did not mind if he was invited to drink, no matter who the other party was, and he was at ease with his drunkenness and fullness of food. De Xiu’s “sickness of wine” may be said to be a minor drawback in his life.
Tang Emperor Xuanzong marveled at Yuan Derxiu’s song “Words of a Wise Man!”
One year, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty held a banquet for officials at the Five Phoenix Tower in Luoyang, the eastern capital, and ordered the magistrates and assassins within 300 miles to share the event with music. Hearing that Emperor Xuanzong wanted to determine the reward for the winners and losers, everyone was eager to show their skills. At that time, the governor of Hanoi brought hundreds of haiku and musicians, each wearing embroidered clothes and playing instruments decorated with rhinoceros horn, ivory and other precious jade. At that time, De Xiu only brought dozens of musicians with him and sang a song he composed, “Yu Yi Yu”, which made Emperor Xuanzong marvel, “The words of a wise man!” Instead, the governor of Hanoi was removed from his official position by Emperor Xuanzong of Tang. Emperor Xuanzong of Tang said to the Chancellor, “I’m afraid the people of Hanoi are living in misery, aren’t they?”
Zi Zhi’s eyebrows and aura make people forget their fame and fortune
Although he was hidden in the mountains, the fragrant virtue of Yuan Desu still attracted many people to be his disciples, and many famous scholars claimed to be his disciples. Whenever he saw De Xiu, Fang Kuan (697-763, word Jiru, Chancellor during the reign of King Su Zong) said, “The moment I saw the aura of Zizhi’s eyebrows, I forgot all about my fame and fortune!” Su Yuanming, a scholar in Tianbao (? -He often said, “I was unfortunate to be born in a world of moral decay, but the most fortunate thing in my life was to have known Yuan Zizhi!”
Yuan Desu died in the thirteenth year of Tianbao at the age of sixty. At that time, Qiao Tan was a lieutenant of Lu Hun, and held a funeral service for him. Looking around Yuan Dexiu’s house only pillows, shoes and tan, good clothes are not a piece, really four walls, a lifetime of two sleeves of clean wind.
De Xiu clan brothers grief more than constant, someone said: “excessive mourning, in line with the etiquette?” The clansmen remembered Yuan Xiu, saying that he had followed the ancient way all his life, and was happy to be poor, he did not have any human delays, love or evil, he did not speak perfunctorily and frivolously, he did not behave idly, he did not know women for sixty years of his life, he did not look at the beautiful things, and he did not seek abundant food and clothing. How can it be said that it is not polite to mourn for the loss of a model of simplicity on earth? Because of his generosity and virtue, people all over the world respectfully called him Yuan Lushan.
Li Hua (a literary scholar of the Tang dynasty, who was admitted to the scholarship in the 23rd year of Emperor Xuanzong’s reign) praised Yuan Dexiu in his book “Three Sages” for his “discipline of the world with the Way”, for treating the wise and the foolish alike without distinction, and for his “benevolence” in ruling the source of chaos. Li Hua also said that although De Xiu was sick and drunk, his temperament could be a model for the world.
Fang Kuan praised “Zi Zhi Mei Yu” for his bright aura and noble virtue. In later times, the allusion of “Zi Zhi Mei Yu” to the virtue and purity of a person was derived from the virtue of Yuan Dexiu.
Source: Xin Tang Shu‧Leizhuan 119 – Zhuo Xing
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