From Zhu De's "Give Friends", the original text:

People with lofty ideals hate it endlessly and go west and east alone.

Throw a pen into the army and refresh the old national style.

Translation:

People with lofty ideals can't serve their country, but travel all over the east and west alone.

Throw away the pen and join the army to change the old customs.

Joining the Army: Ye Fan's "Biography of Ban Chao in the Southern Song Dynasty": "(Ban Chao) was born in a poor family and often worked as an official servant to support him. After a long period of hard work, I dropped out of school, sighed and said, "Although a gentleman has no ambition, he should still serve Fu Jiezi and Zhang Qian in a foreign country to get a title and make them stay for a long time. "After meritorious service in the western regions, he was appointed as a distant Hou. Because there is an allusion to "joining the army with a pen".

Because of his poor family, Ban Chaochang copied books for the government to earn money to support his family. He copied for a long time and worked hard. On one occasion, he stopped his work, threw a pen and sighed: "If a gentleman has no better ambition, he should make great achievements in a foreign land like Fu Jiezi in Zhao Di's time and Zhang Qian in Liang Wudi's time, so as to get a seal. How can he be busy between pens and inkstones for a long time? "

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This five-line work was written at the beginning of 1909. Zhu Deshi was 23 years old. 1907 In the spring, Zhu De was admitted to the sports school affiliated to Sichuan University, where he secretly circulated People's Daily, the organ newspaper of China League, and continued to be influenced by the democratic revolutionary thought. At this time, he not only felt that the Qing government was autocratic and corrupt, but also clearly realized that he wanted to overthrow the Qing dynasty and establish a good country. He repeatedly secretly requested to join the league, but failed.

The first sentence is "people with lofty ideals hate it endlessly". Hate is hatred and exclamation, and there is regret here. A young man with lofty aspirations is bound to be extremely dissatisfied with the dark social reality; There must be a deep hatred for cruel feudal autocracy. In order to change this unreasonable social system, we must find another way. Therefore, "go west alone, go east alone."

"West East" is an inverted sentence of "East West" for the sake of rhyme. East, west, north and south, the motherland and the rest of the world. The last two sentences, "Join the army, refresh the old national customs", borrow the allusions of Ban Chao in the Eastern Han Dynasty, which shows his ambition and pursuit of making contributions to the country, and also shows that the purpose of his pursuit is to create a new generation of fresh air, change the filthy social reality, and thus save the people in from the mire.