Letter To Chang Wen-tien

[Excerpt]

August 2, 1959

[SOURCE: Red Guard Publication.]

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. . . Confusion. It’s like drawing water from a well by means of 15 buckets, seven of them coming up and the other eight going down. [You] are being tied up by others and can’t get free. You are getting the consequences of your own doings. Whom can you blame? In my opinion, you have relapsed into your old illness. You haven’t got rid of the original germs of your old and old disease of malaria. Now you are having spells of cold and fever again. A scholar of former days composed a poem on malaria as follows: “When the spell of cold comes, one feels as if sleeping on the ice. When the spell of fever comes, one feels as if sitting in a cooking steamer. When pain comes, one feels that one’s scalp is cracking. When one trembles, one has to grind one’s teeth. It hurts so much, it hurts so much. Really one passes the difficult time of winter and summer back and forth.” Comrade, is not like this? If so, then that is fine. One like you needs to go through a serious illness. In the Literary Selections of Chao Ming, Vol. 34, Mei Sheng’s “Chi Fa” [1] says in its last part; “This is also an important saying and wonderful truth in the world. My prince, wouldn’t you want to hear it? Then, the Prince arose from the bed and said: ‘After I have heard what the sage scholar said, I have perspired, and my illness is entirely gone.’ ” Your illness is similar to that of this prince of the Chu Kingdom. If you are interested in, you may read Mei Sheng’s “Chi Fa”. Indeed, it’s a wonderful literary piece. You have entirely forgotten the important saying and wonderful truth of Marxism. Therefore, you joined the Military Club, truly a combination of men of civil and military services. What is to be done now? Comrade, I would like to give you a piece of advice: “Thoroughly rectify yourself.” Thanks to your courtesy in calling! me over the telephone several times and saying that you wished to come to my place to talk to me. I am willing to talk with you but I am busy these days. You’ll have to wait for some other day. I have written this letter first to give you a piece of my sincere thought.

Mao Tse-tung

August 2, 1959

Notes

[1.] “Chi Fa” is the title of Mei Sheng’s article, meaning literally “seven shots” or “seven utterances”. See Mao’s exposition of this article in “Concerning Mei Sheng’s Chi Fa”, pp 232-234 of this volume.

Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung