Reborn and become a Great Scientist

Chapter 442 181 Gift from the Crown Prince of Sweden

From the first chapter in "Xunzi" "Encouragement to Study", to Yan Zhenqing's "black hair does not know how to study diligently and early", to Zhenzong of Song Dynasty's "there are beautiful faces in books", China has used literary and artistic works to urge people to study since ancient times. Tradition.

"Evening Song" by Master Hongyi is also such a literary and artistic work.

Although this song only has a few simple lyrics, its meaning is anything but simple.

In Chen Muwu's eyes, "Sunset Song" is not only suitable to be placed in Kaimeng schools, but also a song for primary school students who are exposed to Taoist culture for the first time to sing as they skip home as the sun sets.

No matter what age you are, as long as you are still learning, you can gain new insights from songs.

In particular, the lyrics in "Evening Song", "The future governance of the country and the peace of the world will all depend on us", which speaks to Chen Muwu's heart.

His original intention in founding Prince College was not only to govern the country and bring peace to the world, but also to cultivate talents and contribute to the future of China.

The key is that Master Hongyi, who was still called Li Shutong at the time, composed "Xi Ge" in the late Qing Dynasty, just in time for the establishment of new-style schools across the country, so it was quickly promoted.

These students here were basically born in the 1900s, and entered the school to study in the 10s.

So when Chen Muwu mentioned and started singing this song, everyone sang along with him.

Of course Xu Zhimo was a little disappointed not to hear the new song written and composed by Chen Muwu himself.

However, the song he quoted this time to call on everyone to work hard is quite suitable for use in the opening speech.

Xu Zhimo's idea was similar to Chen Muwu's idea when he first selected the song, so in the second half of the song, he also joined the chorus.

After leading all the students to sing the song "Evening Song", Chen Muwu made a few concluding remarks and ended his speech at the opening ceremony.

He called on the students sitting in the audience to study hard as he just sang in the song and not let down the hardships everyone went through to get to Stockholm.

But this was difficult for Shi Ruwei and the native translators who were waiting for Shi Ruwei to translate the Chinese into English and then into Swedish.

In the end, they could only explain to the people at the scene who could not understand Chinese and were waiting for a translator that this song was a traditional Chinese song to encourage students to study. The specific content would be published in "Prince" after the opening ceremony. Journal of the Academy.

Chen Muwu did exactly what he said and gave a very brief opening speech.

His original intention was to finish the lecture quickly, and then let these students who had just arrived in Sweden leave the auditorium to have a good rest and prepare for the first semester that was about to start.

But Chen Muwu forgot one thing, that is, although he had finished his speech, his speech was not the last part of the entire opening ceremony.

After Chen Muwu walked back to his seat on the podium, his eldest brother Chen Muqiao, who is also the acting superintendent of Prince's College, began to walk on the stage to explain to the students various rules, regulations and precautions in their study and life in the next few years.

Although Chen Muwu did not serve as the acting superintendent of Prince's College, it did not mean that he would give up this right.

He had been busy for so many years, just to establish such a school, but he couldn't finally make it happen because he didn't have the right to use his hard work for so many years to become a wedding dress for others.

In addition to Chen Muqiao, the acting superintendent of Prince's College, the second brother Chen Muping and Chen Muwu themselves are also members of the board of directors of Prince's College.

As early as a few years ago, when Chen Muwu invited his family members to leave Sihai and come to Europe, he had already thought about letting his eldest brother Chen Muqiao, who had served as the Ministry of Transport and Communications Nanyang University for nearly ten years, to serve as the acting superintendent of Prince's College. He asked his second brother Chen Muping, who ran a bank in Jihai, to help him take care of his businesses after arriving in Europe.

After the family came to Europe, Chen Muping had already started to engage in the career assigned to him by his younger brother. Basically, he traveled all over Europe with London as the center every day.

And now, Chen Muqiao has finally rejuvenated his career in education.

Although he said he still had to take care of his family and was unwilling to go out to work, he still honestly agreed to Chen Muwu's invitation.

Nanyang University of the Ministry of Transport is considered a very good university in Wuhan and even in China. The Prince's College in Stockholm is basically made up of Chinese students and teachers. It is suitable for Chen Muqiao to manage this school.

So at the end of 1928, after Chen Muwu got married, the old Chen family, with their children in tow, had moved from London, the capital of England, to Stockholm, the capital of Sweden.

Chen Muwu did not choose to be like Bohr, who dedicated a floor of the Institute of Theoretical Physics, which he built with money from the Carlsberg Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, as his own residence.

It was different when he was in Sweden and in the UK. The Chen family's house in London was rented from Montagu, a member of the Apostolic Society of Cambridge University and chairman of the ITTF.

After arriving in Stockholm, Chen Muwu paid for himself and bought a large house in a place with good urban environment and public security.

The reason why Chen Muwu did this was not because London, as the center of the world, has a lot of money and housing prices are second to none - of course he could afford a house in London.

But I didn't plan to stay in London permanently from the beginning, but it was more convenient to stay in London and get married than in Stockholm.

Now, Chen Muwu has shifted the focus of his work to Stockholm, and the businesses managed by his second brother Chen Muqiao are also here.

The more critical point is that Sweden was a neutral country in the Second World War more than ten years later. Stockholm was not a war zone, and it was impossible to be bombed by German planes every day, so Chen Muwu finally chose to make his home here. .

After Chen Muqiao finished explaining all the rules, regulations and precautions to the students present, the opening ceremony of Prince College finally came to an end.

After sitting on the podium and listening to the speech for a long time, Chen Muwu, who was also very tired, just wanted to get up and leave when he saw the Swedish Crown Prince next to him staring at him with a smile.

Chen Muwu then remembered that before the opening ceremony, the Crown Prince of Sweden had said that he would give himself a gift and that he would be able to see it after the ceremony.

It was estimated that the other party came to him because he was talking about this gift, so he took the initiative and walked next to the Crown Prince of Sweden.

"Chen, let's go see the gift I prepared for you."

"Okay, His Highness School Superintendent Gustav."

Chen Muwu used a very novel title, which was very useful to the Crown Prince of Sweden who had an additional identity from today on.

As a school superintendent, he is not just playing for fun, but wants to do something real.

The Crown Prince of Sweden even asked the Prince's College to prepare a superintendent's office for him in the school. He did not intend to dictate the teaching work of the school, but to make it more convenient for him to come to the school to study Chinese studies in the future.

Don’t forget that the Crown Prince of Sweden is also a Sinology enthusiast, and the initial construction of the Prince’s College was only possible with the strong support of the Crown Prince of Sweden himself. Now that the Prince's College has finally been built, he, as the founder of the college, will definitely not miss the opportunity to learn Chinese knowledge up close.

Chen Muwu followed the Swedish King off the podium one after another, walked out of the auditorium door, and followed him to the square inside the main entrance of the school.

In the center of the square, there stood something several stories high, with a red cloth covering it.

Although he didn't know what was carved inside, Chen Muwu could tell at a glance that what was covered under the horror was definitely a statue of a character.

Although he has been following the campus construction of Prince College, Chen Muwu's focus is on the school's various teaching facilities, sports facilities, living facilities and student dormitories, and he does not pay much attention to the construction of the specific environment of the school.

He left the greening part of the campus, as well as architectural design and other elements to more professional hands.

When it came time for school acceptance, Chen Muwu was very satisfied with everything on campus.

He didn't feel at all that something was missing somewhere.

For example, today, it was not until he saw this statue covered with red cloth in the square entering the school that Chen Muwu realized that it seemed appropriate to place such a thing here.

"Your Highness the Crown Prince, are you bothering to ask? Whose statue is this?"

According to Chen Muwu's speculation, Europeans seem to like to give statues to their ancestors, or to the kings who have informed this country.

For Prince Gustav, his ancestors and the former king of Sweden overlapped, so he thought it might be a certain previous king of Sweden.

But there is one thing that Chen Muwu is not sure about, that is, basically these European statues will have a war horse underneath them.

These war horses are not only to set off the heroism of the owner of the statue, but to appear as part of the statue has profound meaning.

If the horse's two front legs are in the air, it means that the owner of the statue died on the battlefield;

And if the horse only lifts one front leg, it means that the owner was seriously injured in the war and died after returning home;
Of course, if the horse's two front legs are not raised and all four legs are firmly on the ground, it means that the owner has passed away.

Counting back to Sweden, basically all the kings have participated in wars, either following Napoleon in the north or south, or opening up territories for their country.

The most famous among them is King Gustavus II of Sweden. During his struggle with the Holy Roman Empire, he single-handedly transformed Sweden from a snow country located in remote Northern Europe into one of the European powers.

Gustavus II, known as the Lion of Northern Europe in Europe and the father of modern European wars, unfortunately died on the battlefield at the age of thirty-eight, in his prime.

But now looking at the outline of the statue covered under the red cloth, there is no shadow of the horse at all, which makes Chen Muwu feel very strange.

Could it be that I thought wrong?

Hearing Chen Muwu's question, the Swedish Crown Prince with a smile on his face did not answer directly.

"Chen, you will know if you go and see for yourself."

Judging from what he said, the Swedish Crown Prince planned to let Chen Muwu unveil the statue himself.

Faced with His Royal Highness the Crown Prince's kindness, Chen Muwu did not refuse this time.

Accompanied by the other party, he strolled up to the statue, casually picked up a corner of the hanging red cloth, and tried his best to lift it up.

However, Chen Muwu made a mistake, that is, the red cloth covering this statue, which is several people tall, should not be lifted up by hand, and it cannot be lifted up by hand. The red cloth must be pulled off from a certain corner. Let the truth about the statue come out.

Chen Muwu looked awkwardly at the Crown Prince of Sweden next to him. The smile on his face was indeed unbroken, and he even made a "goodwill" downward gesture to Chen Muwu.

However, Chen Muwu's cowardly move just now was not all without gain.

At least he saw a few Latin letters, "...cius" on the base of the statue.

What the hell?
But by accident, this should be a personal name, and it is very likely that it is a personal name from the ancient Greek period.

The most famous Odysseus is undoubtedly the heroic protagonist Odysseus recorded in one of the famous Homer epic poems "The Odyssey". He used a wooden horse to defeat the city of Troy, which the Greek coalition forces had been fighting for ten years but failed to capture.

In addition to Odysseus, in ancient Greek mythology, there is a son of Zeus, Perseus.

However, the ending suffix of these two ancient Greek names is "-seus", not the "-cius" that Chen Muwu saw.

He really couldn't remember which great thinker or educator in ancient Greece had the name "-cius".

Now is not the time to think so much. Anyway, the red cloth covering the statue is already in his hands. As long as he takes it off, the truth will be revealed.

Chen Muwu used his right hand to pull off the red cloth covering the statue.

The Crown Prince of Sweden next to him clapped his hands, while Chen Muwu, who was standing there, stared at the marble statue on the pedestal.

Chen Muwu asked why he always felt that the name "-cius" sounded so familiar, but he couldn't remember which ancient Greek sage it belonged to.

The people on the statue of Qingqing are not ancient Greeks at all, not even Europeans.

"He" looks exactly like an East Asian, and he is also wearing ancient Chinese costumes.

Where is this "Xius"?
This damn thing is Confucius, Confucius!

But then again, Chen Muwu's initial thoughts were not wrong.

After all, even Mencius' English name "Mencius" can be translated as "Mencius" by an anthropology professor at Beijing University.

So what's the problem with "Confucius" being mistaken for "Kong Fuxius" by Chen Muwu?
(End of this chapter)