The Gay Genius Chapter7

I.  The central question

Q: Why did Su Tungpo and his father against Wang Anshih's innovation?

Su Shun wrote Essay on the Hypocrite to criticized Wang Anshih's character and knowledge, for the reason that he thought this personality will incur great trouble to the whole country and the people. It didn't take a long time for Su Tungpo and his brother relized their father's prediction was true. Just like Su Tungpo said in the former chapter, "one who can take his own life in his hands can also kill others". In Wang Anshih's case, that is — one who neglect his own living can also neglect others' living. Wang Anshih was a determined reformer, but he was too eager to carry out his innovation. He was busy in tackling the adverse opinion, even have no time to know how the new policy was took place in counties and villiages. Su Tungpo thought Wang Anshih's innovation didn't accord to fact, on the contrary, it made the people's life more harder. What's more, Su also object to Wang use his own interpretation of classics to control scholars' thoughts and ideas.

II.  The sentence

1. Unfortunately, he combined a Messianic sense of mission with a deplorable lack of tact and inability to get along with anyone but himself.

Messianic    someone who has messianic beliefs wants to make very big social or political changes.

deplorable    very bad, unpleasant, and shocking

2. The heart of the matter was that the subscription of the loans inevitably became compulsory. Intolerant of opposition, Wang Anshih had to succeed.

两个简单而又实用的短句“the heart of the matter”和“intolerant of opposition”

3. Western scholars can understand how easy it is to compose twenty-five volumes on etymology once the scholar lets his imagination go without checking it by scientific methods.

这一句将学者不采用科学的思维方式做研究而让想象信马由缰的坏处。其实，不仅仅适用于王安石在字源学方面的著作，这句话的精妙之处在于它所指出的问题现在依旧存在。一些所谓的“明星学者”学识不足，更不去认真考证，仅凭一己之见便大书特书，且固执己见，与王安石何异？这句话真是能够戳中许多人。