Chen Zilong's ancestors worked as farmers for generations. His father Chen Sowen was famous for his literature. He passed the Jinshi in the 47th year of Wanli and became a Jinshi, and was promoted to the position of the two ministers of the Ministry of Workers.

Chen Zilong entered school at the age of six, diligently studied classics and history, and vigorously attacked chapters. In the third year of Tianqi (1623), he was selected as a boy test at the age of sixteen, and ranked second in name. At that time, a large number of court officials were demoted to the people or arrested for being arrested. Chen Su heard that he was sick at home, and he sighed when he read the news from the residence, and taught Chen Zilong to analyze the evil and righteousness and distinguish right from wrong. In the fifth year of Tianqi (1625), he became friends with Xia Yunyi, Xu Fuyuan, Zhou Lixun, Song Zhengbi, and some literati scholars from Suzhou and Jiaxing, and discussed current affairs. Later, most of them became the backbone of the Jiangnan Party Movement in the Ming Dynasty. In the sixth year of Tianqi (1626), he was a student of Songjiang Prefecture. His father died of illness, stayed at home and stayed at home and read a lot of books, especially devoted to ancient Chinese lyrics.

In the spring of the seventh year of Chongzhen, the imperial examination was again taken, so the supervisor admitted Wen Tiren. Wen Tiren was extremely rejected by members of the resummons. This year, the number of members of the resummons decreased sharply, and Chen Zilong naturally failed the exam. Due to this major blow, Chen Zilong was almost discouraged and went home to express his gratitude to the guests. He "focused on learning" and wrote more than a hundred chapters of ancient poems. Then, he studied and wrote in the Songjiang South Garden, and wrote "Zhu Yutang Collection" and "Pinglutang Collection".

In the tenth year of Chongzhen, he went north for the third time and passed the Jinshi with Xia Yunyi. Both of them were in the Bing C (Three A) and were appointed as foreign officials. Chen Zilong was appointed as the manager of Huizhou Prefecture, Guangdong. Before he arrived, he heard that his stepmother died and went home to attend the funeral.

In the 1638th year of Chongzhen (1638), Chen Zilong, with the sense of urgency of "a gentleman's learning is important to know the times; the urgent matters of the times, the matter is urgent, and the matter is afraid of the future". Together with Xu Fuyuan, he took the articles of famous ministers of the Ming Dynasty "involved in the world and national affairs", "selected their elites", "and also collected them to help the advanced", and "move in the pursuit of reality", and compiled them into the "Emperor Ming Jing Shiwen Collection", which consists of 504 volumes, and adds four volumes. This book selects the articles based on the principles of Ming dynasty, reserving differences and similarities, detailing military affairs, and focusing on economy. The content is very rich, including politics, military, taxes and service, finance, farmland, water conservancy, school culture, rules and regulations, etc., and based on many practical problems encountered at that time, some of them were written on.

The chapter adds a side note to express the editor's political proposition. The motivation and purpose of Chen Zilong and others to edit this book was to "prepare the principles of the generation, and learn from the methods of future generations." They tried to reverse the bad atmosphere of "the common scholars are the past rather than the present, and to pick up the beauty and abandon the reality" through their own efforts. It is a book that "started from the actual history, summarized the 200-decade ruling experience of the Ming Dynasty, and attempted to learn from it to change the current reality and be practical. The editing and publication of this book was a serious challenge to the literary style and academic style at that time, and also played a leading role in advocating the practical learning of Huang Zongxi, Gu Yanwu and others later."

Later, Chen Zilong compiled Xu Guangqi's great agronomy work "Complete Book of Agricultural Affairs". Xu Guangqi fulfilled his ambitions and said, "What he learned in his life was proficient in heaven and man, and he was all practical. As for farming, he was particularly dedicated to it. He thought it was the source of cultivation and the foundation of prosperity and strength of the country." Chen Zilong had always admired Xu Guangqi's personality and knowledge. In his early years, he visited him in Beijing to "ask for the affairs of the world." After Xu Guangqi passed away, Chen Zilong obtained dozens of volumes of draft "The Book of Agricultural" from his second son Xu Erjue, and copied it day and night. In the 12th year of Chongzhen (1639), he said that he was the basis of enriching the country and rebuilding the people.

Therefore, he deleted the complexity and made up for the shortcomings and made up for the shortcomings. "About 300 of those who deleted it, two of those who increased it", and Canran formed the sixty volumes of the "Complete Book of Agricultural Affairs". He also wrote "Fairy Regulations" to summarize the basic purpose of the "Complete Book of Agricultural Affairs", the main contents of each article, the ideological origins and Xu Guangqi's unique insights. At the same time, he expressed his own social and economic propositions. Editing the "Emperor of the Huangming Jingshiwen" and compiling the "Complete Book of Agricultural Affairs" were Chen Zilong's two most important contributions in his life to practical practice. From this, it can also be seen how much he attached to "Complete Book of Agricultural Affairs", that is, real social and economic issues, especially agricultural production.

After that, Chen Zilong once "wanted to be an official" and "opened his house to show that he had no ambitions" at home. However, facing the prairie fire of the peasant uprising in the late Ming Dynasty and the step-by-step advance of the Qing army, in order to save the national destiny of the Ming Dynasty, he eventually became aware of the country's destiny in the Ming Dynasty.

"Ming Jing Shiwen Edition" compiled by Chen Zilong still gave up his personal plans, and in the 13th year of Chongzhen

(1640) In June, he became the manager of Shaoxing Prefecture, Zhejiang Province, and soon began to act as the governor of Zhuji. On the day of his official position, due to the floods in his jurisdiction over the years, hungry people were rising. In order to maintain the stability of the local society, he used both hard and softness and used both suppression and repression. While "working hard to implement the baojia, establish a law of mutual heads, and the order of serving the seated people" to quell the riots of hungry people; while personally taking care of relief, relief of hungry people, setting up a porridge factory, setting up a pharmacy, nursing the elderly and children, treating diseases, collecting dead bones, and saving more than 100,000 people. In May of the fifteenth year (1642), under the control of Zhejiang Governor Dong Xiangheng, more than a thousand governors of Chen Zilong went to Suichang County, Zhejiang Province, actively participated in the capital suppression of Zhejiang, Jiangxi and Fujian Province, and pacified Qiu Lingxiao, a native of Tingzhou, Fujian who had been active at the junction of the three provinces for many years, had been active at the junction of the three provinces.

The mountain people led by father and son riots. In the spring of the 16th year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng's rebel army defeated Chengde and Nanjing was in great shock. He was appointed by Dong Xiangheng to plan the military preparations, build gates and platforms in Yuhang and other places, renovate cities, cast artillery and store salt, and supervise the transportation of military rations to Nanjing. At the beginning of the 17th year of Chongzhen, Chen Zilong was awarded the military department for his contribution to recruiting Xu Du, a student from Dongyang County, Zhejiang Province. However, after Xu Du surrendered, the Zhejiang Inspector Zuo Guang, ignored Chen Zilong's repeated requests and violated the promise that Xu Du would be bound to surrender and "should not die." After Xu Du led his people out of the mountain to surrender, he killed more than 60 people of Xu Du and his subordinates. Chen Zilong was very dissatisfied with this. He also heard that his grandmother was very ill, so he did not go to the post and begged to return home in March.
Chapter completed!