Since he is a hermit, he must live in the mountains. Nature is the first object of his singing, hoping that "building a house is human, but there are no horses and chariots." This image is expressed in "Miscellaneous Fu in the Mountain": "The figure is scattered in the street gate and turned into a green hill. Stone is cool, and there is no clear variety in the distance. " Mountain flowers are indescribable, and chemicals can be colored. In front of the Jade Girl Mountain, the new leader will eventually become a fragrant country. ""Idle thinking lightly brushes the dust, and the heart is clean and dew. Thin shows the real material, I am bearish. Osmanthus fragrans in autumn is fragrant in Qiu Lai. "If you are a hermit, you must love nature. People who love nature must be good people. Changhai is such a good person. Listen to his "Jujube Flowers": "Temple incense is exhausted in spring, and twenty-four fragrant flowers send a message. When the seeds of the new capital come, big trees and small trees will blossom. "However, the poem of Changhai has been sublimated here. He wrote not only jujube flowers, but also fruits. From this fruit, he thought of the benefits this jujube tree brought to the poor, because it "can easily reach a barrel of ten liters of rice." Six quatrains of Fangshan is a poem with a certain meaning: "I am Dafang Mountain, overlooking the forest for a while. Yukime counts the breeze and the wind blows cold. " "Portable green cloth bag, when storing white clouds. Drunk pillow and white clouds sleep, the mountain wind can't wake up. " "The setting sun is far away, and the haze shadows faint stone que. Collecting herbs alone, Qingyun spits in the first month. " Quiet as a wild crane among clouds, revealing natural and elegant Taoist thoughts.
But Ma Changhai is not a complete hermit. He joined the WTO. When he heard that Yue Zhongqi, the general of Ningyuan, came back from the western expedition to Junggar, he wrote a poem "I heard that Julian Waghann Town was still on the road, and Hu Xiao was rewarded by the emperor" ... predicting that the general would make meritorious deeds and an army would return to the snow-capped mountains ". Of course, it is full of praise for the emperor, but it is also full of his reverence for the soldiers who defend the national territory. It can be seen that Changhai's "concealment" is not indifferent to state affairs. "China dynasty poetry anthology" said that he "abandoned Fu Ying (official position), proud, and met Chen Ge. During the banquet, the pavilion was protected from autumn, and Huichuan took off his fish intestine sword and gave it to him, lamenting generously. He admired the national hero Zheng Chenggong: "The son of heaven conquered Liaodong, such as Yong 'an Palace. Ambition can't rest. I wrote a monument for Gong Zheng. "Although this kind of poetry does not account for a large proportion in all Changhai's poems, it is enough to prove that he is a poet who cares about the country and the people.
Ma Changhai is also a poetry theorist. Poetics prevailed in the Qing Dynasty, and theorists mushroomed, but many of them imitated Yuan Haowen's On Poetry, with little new ideas. Changhai's poetics is refreshing. For example, on Tao Qian: "The wind in the millet makes Mu Chun pale, and every word is always naive. Yi Xi is still willing but unable, so he is above the emperor. " For example, on Du Fu: "Old Du Zhang went abroad, and his poems were similar to those of Yu. The Northern Expedition has its own hammers, and it is nothing to pick Nanshan. " For example, on Li Shangyin: "The literary mind is a cuckoo, and Yuxi cherishes 50 years of Chinese New Year. However, I pity Jinse, and no one knows it, so I call Tsing Yi the sword of A Zheng. " For example, on Lu You: "Needle and thread are superior in nature and rust in spring. It never takes much effort to make birds fly. How to explain the poet's secret is not only poor but also thin. " These poetics show Changhai's erudition and talent.
Ma Changhai hasn't made many friends in his life. He believes that "it is enough to have a bosom friend in life, and you should treat it with a bosom friend." This "tonghuai" is Kay Lee. Kai Li, also a scholar in Northeast China, refused to be an official and hid in Panshan Mountain, one of the fifteen famous mountains in China. The famous mountain is indeed a famous mountain. If you go sightseeing, it will be pleasant. If you hide in this mountain all your life, your life will be miserable. Such people are naturally respected by Changhai, and it is no wonder that Kai Li made a biography for them. The poem given by this intimate friend is really pleasing to the eye when Changhai was alive: "There are deer skin and fur in February, but there are few horses in the world." There are no fireworks at the bottom of the stove at night, and the poems are definitely from Yongmei. "The world is crazy, but so is Ma Changhai. Changhai behind him, together with Kai Li and Dai Heng, is called "Three Old Men in Kanto". Because of Schiller's long-term seclusion, most of Changhai's poems came from outside Shanhaiguan, and few described life in Northeast China. However, from these poems, we can still see the wanderer's nostalgia for his hometown: "Water and mail sail, people fireworks." My old friend is full of Luo Jing, but I haven't read any books. " "The moon is as white as water, and the west wind is frost. Whether the book can be sealed or not, I will give it to Gu Xiaoxiang. "However, he died in Chang 'an Committee Lane until he died of old age, and never returned to his hometown Changbai, which he missed day and night.
After nine years of Qianlong (1744), he was buried in the sea. "There is nothing behind him, only a few volumes of manuscripts. I am afraid that all of them will be lost. His Highness Wang Ning accepted it and paid for it." We really should thank this "His Royal Highness Wang Ning", because of him, more than 200 years later, we can still see this Schiller's Cottage Collection, which contains more than 200 poems.