Zhang Jiuling
September 14, 736, was Emperor Xuanzong's birthday, and the princes and the dukes all offered jeweled mirrors as gifts. Zhang Jiuling, believing that the best way to reflect on oneself was to look at others, wrote a five-volume work, calling it the "Golden Mirror Records for a Thousand Years" (千秋金鑑錄 -- "a thousand years" being an oblique reference to wishing the Emperor a long life, on his birthday), discussing historical examples of rulership, and offered it to Emperor Xuanzong as his gift. Emperor Xuanzong issued an edict thanking and praising him.