Adhering to this principle, Joseph took the approach of not only not objecting to, but even praising, all those crank quirks of Mara.
But everything is easier to know than to do. Deciding to adopt the policy of "agreeing with him, encouraging him, and cultivating him into a big shit" was not difficult, but agreeing with a very shit viewpoint against one's will was really hard to bear. Joseph even recalled a passage he had read in his past life about the great poet of the Republic of China, Zhang Zongchang.
It is said that Commander Zhang compiled the poems he wrote (i.e., such as "Daming Lake, Daming Lake is big, there are lotus flowers on Daming Lake, there are toads on top of the lotus flowers, poking and jumping" and other great works like that) compiled a collection of poems and then got an old gentleman to taste them. This old gentleman didn't know at first that Zhang Zongchang wrote it, and after reading it, he said the truth: "Bullshit!"
Commander Zhang was furious: "How dare you say that the poem written by me is 'dog shit'? I think you old boy doesn't want to live! Someone come, drag this old thing out and shoot him!"
When the old gentleman heard, he knew it was bad and hurriedly kneeled down and begged, "Commander, commander, I am old and blurry-eyed. I didn't see it clearly just now ... You let me see it again ..."
Zhang Zongchang then told the guards to let go of that old gentleman for the time being, tapped the box gun at his waist and said to him, "Old thing, watch carefully this time!"
That old gentleman read Commander Zhang's book of poems two more times critically, then sighed, put down the book of poems, stood up and said to Zhang Zongchang, "Commander, you'd better ask someone to drag me out and shoot me."
Now Joseph then kind of wants to say to Mara, who is sputtering, 'You might as well drag me to the top of the guillotine.'
Well, Danton also seemed very unimpressed with Mara and stepped up to argue with Mara. Mara also then let Joseph go and argued with Danton with one eye on him.
Armand then took Joseph to get acquainted with a few other people, and he told them that Joseph was a rising star in science and had an eye for art and that a good deal of his unfinished Spartacus, for example, had originated in Joseph's suggestions.
So everyone chatted. Whenever young men in France talk together, if the topic isn't women, it's definitely politics. Then Joseph was surprised to find that these future Jacobin big shots around him (the most famous one, Robespierre, was not there, of course) did not seem to be radical in their political attitudes at this time.
Mara favored a constitutional monarchy-which may have had something to do with the fact that he had studied in England. Danton, on the other hand, is a bit more conservative, believing that an enlightened monarchy is the best system - and on this point, he is in general agreement with Voltaire. As for Louis, his political views lean more toward Mara and even a little more toward Honoré, but it's clear that he seems to hate Mara a little more than Danton. The owner of the place, Abel, who is less concerned with the specific system of government, is more concerned with the defense of the rights of the underclassmen, the holsterless men.
In all seriousness, Honoré is pretty much the only one who supports a republic, and even Honoré is actually not particularly adamant about it because it seems to him that if a republic is not possible, then a constitutional monarchy doesn't seem unacceptable. All in all, if they were to be suddenly thrown back a few years by some force, they would certainly be guillotined by their future selves as "counter-revolutionaries" or simply hanged on a streetlight pole.
'It's only natural, and it's precisely because they're fairly moderate nowadays - in fact, at the present time, even the most radical of youths are only radicalized to this extent - that the Duke of Orleans and the others feel that they can use them, use these little sparks in the dry woodpile, to catapult themselves to the throne. Little did they know that once the fire had started, the situation might not be under their control. It's really a case of 'he who plays with fire will burn himself'.' Joseph couldn't help but think about this.
Coping with such an assembly was not difficult for Joseph. He had traveled over in the latter part of his life, and he didn't know how many of the various political theories, political systems, and various political experiments he had seen. It's not a problem to deal with these politically very immature future bigots. And some of the ideas he casually threw out could make these young people feel deeply inspired, so much so that even Louis, who had always been as calm as a marble statue, also let out an exclamation of "there is actually a man in the world who is as versatile as Bonaparte".
In fact, at first, Joseph was a bit hesitant to accept Armand's invitation to attend the gathering of these "radicals" since most of them had either cut off a lot of heads or had their heads chopped off, and some of them had both chopped off and had their heads chopped off, in the frenzy of the upcoming Revolution. It's also dangerous, he's afraid, to socialize too much with these dangerous people. But considering that the Revolution is, after all, an inescapable torrent, by inescapable, it means, in fact, that it is equally dangerous not to recognize these dangerous elements and to have no dealings with them at all. So, in the end, Joseph decided that he had to deal with these people but must keep his distance. It was important to make them feel a certain amount of good about themselves to save someone from targeting them in the future, but not to get too close to them to avoid getting unnecessarily involved in political struggles.
All in all, Joseph felt that he should have done quite well, and even Mara, after he had given him the honor of continuing his research on colorblindness and even discovering it, had actually treated him quite a bit better. Though he still talks with a very idiomatic pinch of salt. Still, Joseph could sense that Mara didn't have much ill will toward him.
In this era, the status of outstanding scientists is similar to that of the great scholars in ancient China. These types of people may not be powerful, but it's an honor for everyone else to be associated with these types of people. So, in the end, everyone was quite sincere in inviting Joseph to more of their gatherings. However, this was not what Joseph had envisioned, so Joseph simply apologized. He said that he personally would like to attend such gatherings more often, only that he recently had an important mathematical problem which he was working on, and he was afraid that he would be very busy during this period of time, and he might not be able to come to join the gathering.
"What kind of problems is Mr. Bonaparte having?" Mara was very interested in that.
Joseph spread his hands and said, "To say this, it sounds simple enough, but when you look into it seriously, you feel that there is no way to start. Perhaps, I still need a spark of inspiration to twinkle a bit. Well, one student said to me that he found all the maps that seemed to only need four colors to distinguish the different areas. He just didn't know how he could prove it mathematically. I thought it was an interesting question at the time, and it didn't seem too difficult, so I tried to prove it, and well, as it turns out, to this day, I still haven't made any progress at all."
This problem is one of the so-called "Four Great Conjectures of World Mathematics", the "Four Color Conjecture". The question does sound simple enough that even an elementary school student could understand the question. But it is exceedingly difficult to argue for it. Even in later times, it took the help of electronic computers and the completion of as many as ten billion judgments to prove the problem. And in this era, the problem is virtually insoluble.
By bringing this issue up as an excuse, Joseph actually meant to take the opportunity to trap the Crank Mara. Generally speaking, these kinds of problems that are easy to understand on first hearing and seem to require only a spark of inspiration to solve are always the most likely to be favorably received by the Crank.
Sure enough, Mara was immediately interested in the question, "Is that a hard question?"
"Yes, it is difficult. Personally, I feel that in terms of difficulty, this problem is no less than cubic multiplication, turning circles into squares, and trisecting angles." Joseph replied, "I have already raised the question in a letter to the Academy of Sciences, and suggested that if people did not have a way to prove it in a short time, they should publicize the question and offer a reward."
This statement naturally made Mara even more excited, and he even fished out a small notebook and a pen, "Mr. Bonaparte, please repeat the subject."
...
By relying on this excuse, Joseph could properly distance himself from these people. Now that both brothers were with him, except for Napoleon, he was going to have to focus more on his brother's upbringing.
Louis was still young at this time, not yet ten years old, and it was too early for his specialized training. Lucien, however, has begun to show some talent in speech and art. In his previous life, Joseph was not well-versed in history. He did not know that Lucien was once the President of the Council of Five Hundred and played a key role in Napoleon's rise to power, but since Lucien had already demonstrated his talent in this area, it seemed good to let him develop in this direction.
"By then, Napoleon was committed to the military. As for me, I ensure the good name of the family and the general direction of the development of France, and well, isn't the greatest advantage of a traverser, in fact, to know the general direction of history? As for Lucien, since he has some talent in speech and art, he could be put in charge of public opinion campaigns in the future. In a sense, roses are just as much a weapon in battle."
Joseph himself had little connection to the art world, so quite a bit of this had to be entrusted to Armand's help. But Joseph was quite uneasy about Armand's attitude toward life. Lucien is in the critical period of the formation of the fundamental views, so he and Armand are allowed to learn that can be ... really good. Well, recently, after Armand and the gang of radicals mixed together, this aspect of the virtues is quite a lot better.