Chapter 9 Pythagoras strings

During the reign, Liao sent envoys to the Central Plains. Su Dongpo, an academician, was ordered to entertain him. The Liao envoy sent a couplet: "Three Lights, the Sun, the Moon and the Stars" and invited Su Dongpo to come to the Liao envoy. This is a sub-absoluteness, because the quantifiers in couplets must be correct. The word "three" is used in the first part, and the second part cannot be repeated. There are only three words under "Three Lights". Su Dongpo thought about it and made a couplet: "Four Poems of Elegance". The beauty of the four poems is that there are only three names: "Style, Elegance and Ode". Originally, the "elegance" in The Book of Songs can be divided into "elegance" and "Xiaoya".

Liao said: "I thought it was absolute. I don't want you to get it easily. " Su Dongpo said: "What is absolute? I can triple it. First a gust of wind, a thunderstorm; Second, the two dynasties were brotherly countries, and third, the four virtues were Yuan Henry. " Liao asked: "The four virtues in the divination of' Gan' in Zhouyi should be Yuan, Heng, Li and Zhen. How did you miss a word? " Su Dongpo replied: "The last word was taboo by the late emperor, so you can't read it casually." It turns out that the first emperor's name is Zhen and Zhen are homonyms, which belong to "taboo", so deleting a virtue is also wonderful.