Protect the nature and culture
In the river bank of Jialingjiang River, an ancient temple at more than one hundred years old was hidden into the cliff. Entering the temple, we saw a pavilion on the left, which was built by the Cangxi people to commemorate the poem saga Du Fu. In 763, the first year of Guang De Emperor in Tang Dynasty, Du Fu saw off his guests here and composed the Boating Poem. On the east of the pavilion there also engraved three words "Fang Chuan Tai" in the meaning of boating terrace. The terrace was actually not so near the pavilion. However, rocks lay on in disorder by the river. The famous poet Lu You in the Southern Song Dynasty paid a visit to this pavilion when he was on his way northward to South Zheng and engraved the famous poem "I miss Cangxi County most, where I saw my friend off in a pavilion.
Looking at the distance between such worldly landscapes and the temple, we realized that it did conform to our Chinese's persistent respect for the Buddhas. The distance between the reality and spirit realm should be similar with what between the three words of "Fang Chuan Tai" and the temple.
Visiting the ancient temple, seeing some architecture destroyed with time, but our mood would not be affected. The more we learned about the temple, the more admiration we paid for the creators of it. The temple must have been expanded construction several times by generations, hence we surely would keep it well protected. |