The Eastern Han Dynasty was particularly tolerant of intellectuals. It was this tolerant policy that made those scholars think that their status was also very noble, and they would always be particularly arrogant. The representative figure is Yang Zheng during the Eastern Han Dynasty. He not only had the arrogance of an intellectual, but also the domineering spirit of a scholar.

Yang Zheng’s teacher Fan Sheng was once framed and imprisoned. Yang Zheng nakedly hugged Fan Sheng’s son and lurked aside waiting for the emperor’s motorcade. At this time, the emperor's motorcade had just arrived, and Yang Zheng took the memorial and shouted that he was wronged. The emperor's guards thought he was an assassin and shot him with arrows, but he did not move away. He even slashed him with a knife and injured his chest, but he still wouldn't give in. In the end, the emperor was moved and Fan Sheng was saved.

Not to mention what crime his teacher Fan Sheng committed, just because Fan Sheng married three wives during the Eastern Han Dynasty, he was probably not a good person, but Yang Zheng insisted on holding a child. With tears and runny noses, what he said made sense, and in the end even the emperor was forced to order his release. It was this incident that made Yang Zheng famous for his madness.

Yang Zheng also likes to drink, is bohemian, and doesn't pay attention to details, but he attaches great importance to friendship. At that time, the emperor's son-in-law and the queen's brother all envied his reputation and integrity, and were willing to be friends with him.

Yang Zheng went too far when he was a guest at a friend's house. At that time, Yang Zheng wanted to visit Ma Wu's house, but Ma Wu didn't want to see him and claimed he was sick. Yang Zheng went directly into the bedroom, pulled Ma Wu up from the bed, grabbed his arm and asked him. The guard next to him thought he had encountered someone who was robbing him. That Ma Wu was a general, and now he was at the level of a military commander. A scholar could be so presumptuous, but Ma Wu could do nothing about him. This also shows how tolerant the entire Eastern Han Dynasty was towards intellectuals.