On the evening of 18th April, 2024, Professor Chen Congfu of the College of Law of National Taiwan University gave a lecture on the topic of ‘Constituent Elements of Meanings and Mistakes of Meanings’ in the Lecture Hall of the College of Humanities for the students and teachers of the University. The lecture was sponsored by the Law School of Southeast University and the Civil Prosecution Research Base of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (Civil Prosecution Research Centre of Southeast University). Professor Shan Pingji, Vice Dean of the Law School of Southeast University and Director of the Civil Prosecution Research Base of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, presided over the lecture.

The venue of the lecture hall was full. Before the start of the lecture, Professor Ouyang Benqi, Dean of the Faculty of Law of Southeast University, on behalf of Professor Chen Congfu, presented Nanjing special cloud brocade as a token of respect, and Professor Chen Congfu gave a souvenir to the Faculty of Law of National Taiwan University as a token of appreciation.

Professor Chen firstly introduced the theme of this lecture, which mainly focuses on the contractual meaning of the parties and the unilateral and bilateral errors of the meaning, and then took the contractual meaning of the parties as the starting point, focusing on the elements of the meaning, the constitutive elements of the meaning of the different doctrines in China and Taiwan, as well as the meaning of the meaning of the expression of the necessary elements of the meaning of the expression, and so on. Through the cases of social activities, acts of kindness, raising hands in auctions, and mistakes in signatures on documents, Professor Chen Congfu vividly explained the meaning and role of effectual and expressive meanings. Based on the questioning of German scholar Flumet's viewpoint, Professor Chen Congfu explained the viewpoint that the meaning of expression should be an element of expression through cases such as Provision of Investment Information, Mother and Child Land Auction, and Assignment of Artistic Works, etc. He also introduced the unilateral and bilateral errors of expression through cases such as Purchaser's Purchase of a House by Opening a Dance Hall, Sale and Purchase of Diamond Rings, and Mistaken Purchase of a House on Sea Sand. As a conclusion, Prof Chen Congfu believed that law is the result of rational thinking and encouraged students to think as a rational and diligent thinker.

In the question and answer session, Prof. Chen Congfu answered the questions of the students, ‘Whether natural person can express his meaning through machine-assisted way’, ‘Whether the act of delivery includes the expression of the meaning of the change of property right’, ‘Whether the claim of returning the original object or unjustified profit is based on the right of property right after the contract is cancelled’. The contract is cancelled on the basis of the right to return the original request or the right to return the request for unjustified enrichment’ “contract terms written in error can the right to refuse to perform” and other theoretical and practical issues.

At the end of the lecture, Professor Shan Pingji summed up the lecture and talked about several learning experiences. First, the legal concept is the foundation of civil law, learning civil law do not have to worry about mastering too many concepts; second, the legal people need to do in the judicial cases and the theory of the eyes of the back and forth interpolation; third, students need to be based on China's judicial cases and new amendments to the law, combined with the method of comparative law research, to seek solutions to China's legal problems and the improvement of the legislation; fourth, the law is the result of rational deliberation, the cultivation of rational thinking is the necessary cultivation of the law people. Fourthly, law is the result of rational thinking, and cultivating rational thinking is a necessary cultivation for law scholars. Finally, on behalf of the Law School of Southeast University, Prof Shan Pingji expressed his gratitude to Prof Chen Congfu for his wonderful lecture!