The capital is still the same capital, the only difference is that it is warmer than the previous days, the spring flowers are blooming, and the wind is intoxicating.
A banquet was held at Gao Gong's house as a welcome to Gao Guoyan and others, and to cleanse them from the dust. In the inner hall, in addition to Gao Gong, Mrs. Gao Zhang also attended as an elder. However, she only came forward to say a few polite words and left early. After all, among the few people who came this time, only Gao Guoyan She is a junior member of the Gao family. The rest of the family, regardless of their seniority, are just servants of the family. Gao Gong staying to eat with them is equivalent to a gift from the master to the servants. It is not appropriate for her to stay at the table as the hostess.
After Mrs. Gao left, everyone began to eat. Because of Gao Gong's presence, everyone didn't dare to be disrespectful of etiquette. Talking while eating was not allowed, so they had to eat in silence. However, Gao Gong himself, as an elder, said a few words of encouragement to Gao Guoyan.
After finishing the meal, it was time to chat. After the servants had cleared the table, Gao Gong asked Gao Guoyan about his father's situation. After hearing that Gao Guoyan said that his father had expressed that he was about to request an official career, Gao Gong seemed to be slightly lost in thought.
The two brothers Gao Guoyan and Gao Pragmatic looked at each other without saying anything to disturb his thoughts.
After a while, I heard Gao Gong sigh slightly: "People will always grow old. I just hope that when I am old, I can look back on my life in my free time and not feel that I have missed too many opportunities or have too many regrets. , this life is enough.”
Gao Guoyan was not familiar with his third uncle and did not dare to speak up when he heard the words. Gao Guoyan was different. He immediately persuaded with a smile: "Third uncle, you have grasped the opportunity now. If you want to leave no regrets, Now is the time.”
Gao Gong was stunned for a moment, and then he smiled: "Yes, you are right, but Third Uncle, I am old, and it is easy for me to feel emotional..." He paused for a moment, then suddenly stood up: "I am also young. It’s nearly a year, and I don’t know how much time I have left to serve the Ming Dynasty and your Majesty loyally. Pragmatically, you and Guoyan are brothers, so you can talk slowly.”
Gao Guoyan stopped talking. Even Gao Jingshi didn't expect that Gao Gong would suddenly feel so emotional about the fact that his second brother was about to retire. He seemed to be even more focused on official duties than before. He couldn't help being a little surprised, but he couldn't persuade him anything, so he could only say: "Uncle San, although you have to do things, you must also take care of your body. After all, the body is the revolution... No, I mean, the body is the capital of revolution. You If you are too busy and something happens to your body, then you have really missed something big!"
Gao Gong laughed, waved his hand and said: "I know that my body will probably not die in the next few years. You should not worry about these things at a young age... By the way, I see that you have been doing a lot recently, eh ...Don’t you want me to emphasize what I said to you that time? No matter how many things you have to do, you have to prioritize them.”
Gao Pragmatic was afraid of hearing this, so he hurriedly said: "Yes, yes, third uncle, my nephew understands, understands."
Gao Gong glared at him, but considering that he had indeed not fallen behind in his recent studies, and with her status, she couldn't say anything unreasonable, so she had to let Gao Pragmatic master this degree by herself. She shook her head and left on her own. .
Several people at the table naturally stood up to see each other off, and Gao Gong waved his hand casually: "No need to see her off, you can chat." After saying that, he walked away, which was quite cool.
After sitting down, Gao Pingshi saw that Gao Guoyan seemed a little curious about his third uncle's performance. He couldn't help but touch his nose and explained in an awkward manner: "Well, third uncle's behavior... has always been, uh, always chic."
Gao Guoyan was a little cautious when facing Gao Gong, but of course not when facing his younger brother Gao Jingshi. He smiled and said: "I heard that Jingshi wrote a book called "Longwen Whip Shadow", which was highly praised. Now it is even more so. It is really gratifying and congratulatory for me to be the crown prince's accompaniment and to be admitted to the Hanlin Academy."
Gao pragmatism naturally responded with a few words of humility, and Gao Guoyan added: "It's a good thing that you are good at reading. Unlike me, my brother, I have never been interested in those classics and poems. I just prefer mathematics. There is nothing in this life." Counting on it.”
Gao Pangshi hesitated for a moment and asked, "Brother Sanhuai, will you not participate in the tribute examination in the future?"
"I won't participate." Gao Guoyan said, hesitating for a moment, and then added: "The most I can do is pass the examination to be a scholar, so as not to be unable to speak anywhere."
Gao pragmatically said: "In fact, numerology is an extremely important knowledge in the world. From the revenue and expenditure of the imperial court to the expenses of the people, which one is not related to numerology?"
Gao Guoyan was a little surprised when he heard these words, and asked: "Why, pragmatism also knows something about mathematics?"
In his opinion, since Gao Pragmatic can be valued by his third uncle in terms of knowledge, he must be an excellent reader of scriptures. In his eyes, such people are devoted to the way of sages, and they are not interested in mathematics. "Tricks and tricks" and even "fantastic tricks and cunning" are just something to be dismissed with disdain. Why is this little brother of mine so unreasonable?
Gao pragmatically said: "There are many different skills in the world, but calculation is the foundation of human beings. Knowing the book but not knowing the calculation is like being in a dark room and feeling faint."
Gao Guoyan was shocked: "Do you know my teacher?"
Gao Pingshi pretended not to know, and said with a surprised look on his face: "Your teacher? Who is that and how do I know him?"
"Oh, yes, but what you said... is also a coincidence. My teacher also said the exact same thing."
Gao Pragmatic smiled: "Then I can only boast that 'heroes think alike'."
In fact, Gao Jingshi was surprised when he heard that Gao Guoyan had a teacher with a business background. Later, he was even more surprised when he heard that his teacher was named Cheng Dawei. Later, he recalled it carefully, and then he remembered who Mr. Cheng was.
This person is really a rare talent in the Ming Dynasty - and it is the kind of rare talent that Gao Pragmatic considers "rare".
Because he is a mathematician.
Cheng Dawei, whose courtesy name was Rusi and nickname was Binqu, was from Xiuning County, Anhui Province (now Huangshan City). He was born in a small businessman. He was smart and eager to learn since he was a child. He especially loved mathematics and often spent a lot of money to buy arithmetic books.
When he was about 20 years old, he took advantage of the opportunity of going out to do business and invited him to visit Wu Chu and visit famous teachers. He met "a wise scholar who was very knowledgeable in mathematics and worked tirelessly to solve problems." He lived in a small county town and attached great importance to land surveying. He once created a "measuring cart" and made drawings passed down to the world.
Historically, after Cheng Dawei was forty years old, he was tired of traveling, so he "returned and thought about the water for the remaining twenty years." He carefully studied ancient books, interpreted their meanings, reviewed their methods, learned from the strengths of various schools, and added his own experiences. Finally, in the 20th year of Wanli, he wrote "The Algorithm Tongzong" (formerly known as "Zhizhi Algorithm Tongzong"). ) seventeen volumes. In the next six years, he deleted the complicated details of the book, revealed its essentials, and wrote it into four volumes of "Algorithm Compilation Essentials", which were successively published in Xiuning.
In "Algorithm Tongzong", the first and second volumes are the basic knowledge used in the whole book; the third to twelfth volumes are a compilation of solutions to various application problems, and each volume is basically titled with the chapter name of "Nine Chapters of Arithmetic"; Volumes 13 to 16 are "hard problems". In fact, the algorithms are very simple, but the conditions are expressed in poetry; they are relatively obscure; volume 17 is "miscellaneous methods". Abacus is used in various problems in the book. The set of concise and smooth abacus addition, subtraction, multiplication and division formulas and square root methods used by Cheng Dawei have always been used in the most pragmatic time travel.
This book systematically summarizes various abacus calculation methods in China's past dynasties and becomes a relatively complete abacus calculation book. Its writing and widespread circulation marked the completion of the transformation from calculation to abacus in the history of Chinese mathematics. Cheng Dawei himself was therefore known as the "Abacus Master". Familiar sayings such as "Two and one add to make five" and "Three under five divide two" all came from him.
When Gao pragmatic thought about this at that time, he felt that he could almost pick up treasures on the roadside. Since his second brother was his disciple, first of all, his level would definitely be the same, and more importantly, his own level would be the same in the future. "Great cause" requires a master of mathematics like Cheng Dawei!
