Fan Zhongyan, courtesy name Xiwen, was born in Wu County, Suzhou (modern-day Suzhou, Jiangsu) during the Northern Song Dynasty. His family was very poor when he was young; his father died when he was just two years old. His mother then remarried into the Zhu family in Changshan County, and he followed her to live with the Zhus.
Fan Zhongyan showed great ambition as a child. After learning of his family background, he left his mother to study elsewhere, reading day and night with tireless dedication. When exhaustion struck in winter, he splashed cold water on his face; when food ran short, he survived on thin gruel. Through such relentless effort, he passed the imperial examinations during the Dazhong Xiangfu era (Emperor Zhenzong's reign) and held posts including Right Remonstrance Advisor, Vice Director of the Ministry of Personnel, Prefect, and Vice Commissioner of the Privy Council.
In 1043 AD, Fan Zhongyan was appointed Vice Chancellor by Emperor Renzong of Song. Together with Han Qi and Fu Bi, he led a reform focused on improving official governance, known historically as the Qingli Reforms.
He took out the official roster and examined each person's performance one by one. Whenever he found an incompetent official, he would strike their name from the list with a single stroke, removing them from their post. The vacant positions were then filled by appointing capable officials from the ranks below.
Fu Bi deeply respected Fan Zhongyan and treated him like an elder. Seeing Fan show no mercy to these incompetent officials, he said, "With a single stroke of your brush, you dismiss them from office. Their entire families will weep in grief!"
Fan Zhongyan replied, "It is far better for one family to weep than for them to bring disaster upon thousands of families, causing all those households to mourn."
He then dismissed all the incompetent officials from their posts.
However, because the new policies infringed on the interests of the aristocratic officials of the time, they faced fierce opposition and were abandoned within less than a year. Fan Zhongyan was demoted to serve as the Pacification Commissioner of the Four Circuits in Shaanxi. That same year, he wrote the timeless line, "Be the first to worry about the world's troubles, and the last to enjoy its pleasures."
The idiom "wipe the slate clean" later came to mean completely canceling everything.
Source: *Records of the Words and Deeds of Famous Ministers of the Five Dynasties*
Meaning of the Idiom: Later, the Chinese idiom "一笔勾销" came to describe completely canceling everything.