Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1168 An De Yitian Draws a Sword

Gao Pragmatism's sentence "the one who should be impeached should be impeached" can be regarded as the final statement of today's Chongyang Conference.What it represents is not just him personally, but the battle declaration of the entire Gao Party and the entire Practical School group.

The first Wanli party struggle launched with a high pragmatic will broke out.

In his view, the core driving force of this party struggle is to ensure that the cabinet's power advantage will not be lost without the chief assistant of the real school.And its more direct driving force is to ensure that Shen Shihang will not be able to stuff a second Heart School official in the cabinet this time.

Even if Uncle Ding You resigns, I will leave you, Shen Rumo, alone!
And Pan Sheng.

Regardless of whether you are ungrateful for profit or forced to do so, all in all, you have changed your previous neutral position and obviously sided with the School of Mind.

This is because you betrayed the past friendship first, so don't blame me, Gao, for not talking about the past friendship.

If such a thing as betrayal can be easily forgiven, then with so many people in my real school, if one day a betrayer comes, how can I "lead the team"?
Killing chickens to warn monkeys may not be easy to use sometimes, but the effect of killing monkeys to warn chickens is not too bad.

A court elder is qualified to be this monkey.

Party fights and fights with each other, and if there is a party, there must be a fight!What's more, this is a party dispute in the Ming Dynasty, not the Song Dynasty, where it is not so gentle and refined, abolishing laws but not abolishing people.

The party struggles in the Ming Dynasty have always been life and death.

Gao Yushi is very clear that there have been different degrees of party struggles in all dynasties, but their impacts are also different.Although Confucius once said: "Gentlemen are a group of people but not a party, and villains are a party and not a group."But history told him that factionalism has never been the "patent" of villains, and gentlemen are also capable of party warfare, and even fight much more fiercely than villains.

Why does Gao Yushi think that party struggles in the Ming Dynasty were different from those in the Song Dynasty?The characteristics that can best explain the party struggles in the Song Dynasty are the "Qingli New Deal" and "Wang Anshi Reform".

In the third year of Qingli in the Northern Song Dynasty (1043), nearly 90 years have passed since the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty. At this time, the Northern Song Dynasty had already experienced several wars against Liao and Xixia, and the national power was seriously consumed.At the same time, rebellions of hungry people also appeared in the country, which can be described as "internal and external troubles".

At this time, Fan Zhongyan, a famous official, wrote to the emperor Song Renzong in the "Response to Shou Zhao Tiao Chen Shi Shi", and proposed reform measures in response to various shortcomings in the system at that time.Afterwards, Renzong promulgated a number of edicts based on this, known as the "Qingli New Deal" in history.

Since the New Deal directly hit the vital points of many vested interests, the seeds of "partisan struggle" were planted at the very beginning, which eventually made the Qingli New Deal "end without a problem".

In order to implement the New Deal, Song Renzong intends to promote Xia Song as Privy Envoy (the highest military officer in the country).Originally, Xia Song didn't have much opinion on the New Deal, but Wang Gongchen, Ouyang Xiu, Yu Jing and others who were also "reformists" firmly opposed it, and Xia Song failed in the end.In this regard, Xia Song completely stood on the opposite side of the "reformists".

With the advancement of the New Deal, the contradiction between the reformists and the opposition gradually became public, and the struggle became increasingly fierce: first, Ouyang Xiu wrote a letter accusing the censor of Taiwan officials of being "not talented"; The two ministers who were closely related to the leader Fan Zhongyan finally made Fan Zhongyan and Wang Gongchen, the chief of Yushitai, resign from their official posts to show their support for their colleagues.

After that, the party struggle further "escalated": Xia Song mentioned above had someone tamper with the letter, falsely claiming that the reformist officials' behavior was "a matter of Iraq and Huo".This "killing and killing" act deeply frightened Fan Zhongyan and Fu Bi, the backbone of the reformists, and they immediately resigned from their positions in the court and went to the court to patrol the border.

The continuous party struggle made the reform come to an end: only one year after the implementation of the New Deal (the fourth year of Qingli), Fan Zhongyan was dismissed from the post of Shenzhizhengshi (approximately equivalent to the deputy prime minister), and Fu Bi also resigned from office on the same day. He was re-appointed as a frontier envoy and stayed away from the court.Shortly thereafter, all reform measures were abolished, and the "Qingli New Deal" came to an end.

Compared with the "Qingli New Deal", the "Wang Anshi Reform" is more representative.

The reform during Song Shenzong's Xining period can be said to fully reflect the characteristics of "partisan struggle": almost all officials in the court chose to "stand in line", and because Shenzong supported the new law, the "reform faction" took the top spot from the beginning.

With the advancement of the new law, the voices of the opposition "wave after wave": Censor Zhong Cheng Lu Huo Shangshu impeached Wang Anshi, Shenzong refused to answer, the former asked himself to leave the court; Zhijian Yuan Fan Chunren Shangshu attacked Wang Anshi's chaos Shenzong did not comment, and Fan Chunren also resigned resolutely; Fu Bi, a veteran and important minister, said he was sick; Su Zhe was demoted to Henan, and Su Shi asked himself to leave Beijing to serve as a judge in Hangzhou...

It can be said that, without exception, officials of the opposition have left the central government.However, in the 30 years of Hedong and 30 years of Hexi, the final result is still that the reform failed, and the conservatives took power again (omitting a bit, I don’t want to write too much Song history).

But the most critical situation is that these seemingly fierce battles basically did not result in death, or in other words, there was no personal attack or even physical destruction outside of politics itself.

Compared with the Ming Dynasty, the party struggles in the Song Dynasty were really restrained.

So what is the style of Ming Dynasty's party struggle?
Some people talk about the late Wanli period when they explain the party struggle in the court. In fact, that is a misunderstanding. In fact, as early as the period of Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang, the signs of "party struggle" had already appeared.

At that time, most of the people who followed Zhu Yuanzhang to fight the world were from Huaixi, and Zhu Yuanzhang himself was also from Huai. Therefore, after the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, most of these people were granted public titles and held high positions.

At that time, the core figure was Li Shanchang, the Duke of South Korea, who led the formation of the Huai bureaucratic group in the middle of the court.

Due to his dual identities as a hero and fellow emperor, after the founding of the country, Li Shanchang served as Prime Minister Zuo, ranking first in the court.After him, Hu Weiyong, his fellow countryman, succeeded him as prime minister.

During the more than ten years when they were in power successively, due to the exclusion of the Huai people group, it was difficult for non-Huai people officials to gain a foothold in the court.For example, Liu Bowen, Zhu Yuanzhang's trusted counselor, was suppressed since he entered the court because he was from eastern Zhejiang.

Liu Bowen's talent and contributions are obviously not bad among a group of heroes, but due to the obstruction of Huai officials, he was only named Boss Chengyi when he was named a hero, while Li Shanchang, who was born in Huai, was named Duke of Korea.

Due to Li Shanchang's instigation, in only four years in Hongwu, the clever Liu Bowen retired and returned to his hometown, and has since stayed away from officialdom.But this is not the end: when Zhu Yuanzhang asked Liu Bowen for the prime minister, the latter did not speak well for Li Shanchang, so Li Shanchang held a grudge, and later removed Liu's salary with an excuse.

After a series of blows, Liu Bowen soon became ill with anxiety and anger. At this time, Hu Weiyong of the Huairen Group took the opportunity to send a doctor to treat him, but a strange thing happened: Liu Bowen died of illness a month later.

It can be seen that even if they stay away from politics, the Huai bureaucrats still refuse to let go of their enemies.Liu Bowen is just one of their opponents, far from all of them.In fact, the Huai people group at that time almost suppressed the whole country with one faction - or else you think Zhu Yuanzhang really had a brain twitch, and he killed the hero like that?

It was because he found that the Huai people group was already too powerful, and he himself could hold it back when he was alive, but the crown prince died young, so it was completely uncertain whether the grandson had such prestige and ability.So there was Zhu Yuanzhang's hero who killed him.

In the Jia, Long, and Wan eras in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, "party struggles" with more distinct factions officially appeared.

First, during the Jiajing period, the struggle between the "Strict Party" headed by the chief minister of the cabinet Yan Song and the "Qingliu" represented by cabinet members Xu Jie and Gao Gong-note that the word "Qingliu" at this time does not have a derogatory meaning .

At that time, Yan Song formed a party for selfish purposes and wanted to embezzle. Officials of "Qingliu" used this to attack the "strict party".And Yan Song was not idle either. He used his power to kill Xia Yan, the leader of "Qingliu", and others on successive charges.But during the more than [-] years of Yan Song's power, "Qingliu" never stopped attacking him: Shen Lian, Yang Jisheng and others successively filed charges of impeachment against Yan Song, but they all failed, and Yan Song framed him to death.

A lot of things after Yan Song's defeat have been said in this book, so I won't repeat them here. I will talk about the party struggles in the late Ming Dynasty in the original history.

At the end of Ming Dynasty, the trend of "Party Struggle" reached its peak.First, on the issue of Wanli establishing the crown prince, Zhejiang party officials who were born in Zhejiang basically chose to obey Wanli's idea (mainly because they were legitimate), while the well-known Donglin party officials strongly opposed it.In this regard, other parties attacked the Donglin Party again.

As a result, officials from various factions have been fighting for more than [-] years on the issue of the candidate for the prince.

At the time of the apocalypse, "party struggle" evolved into a dispute between "inner court" and "outer court".Because the eunuch Wei Zhongxian was the eunuch who held the pen and was able to participate in confidential matters, he was also the admiral of Dongchang, and he was able to weave charges at will and control the life and death of officials, so a group quickly formed around him. "Eunuch Party".

Because Wei Zhongxian was trusted by the apocalypse, he was so powerful inside and outside the court and did whatever he wanted, and there was an endless stream of followers of him, who even called him "nine thousand years old".

Seeing that the "eunuch party" monopolized power and corrupted the court (Donglin Party believed), Donglin Party members began to attack Wei's party fiercely: Yang Lian, deputy censor of Zuodu, wrote a letter to impeach Wei Zhongxian for 24 crimes, and was falsely imprisoned. He was tortured and died in prison; other Donglin party members such as Zuo Guangdou and Wei Dazhong were also tortured to death in prison for opposing Wei's dictatorship.

So far, the power of the "Donglin Party" has been greatly frustrated, and the "Eunuch Party" has spread all over the court. It was not until Chongzhen that it was wiped out by the "beheading tactics" of the "Sage King"—by the way, the Holy King also wiped out himself.

Looking at the party struggles in the Song and Ming dynasties, most of the former were purely political disputes, such as reformers and conservatives, and the result of the struggle was only the dismissal of prime ministers and officials (away from the central government).

The latter, on the other hand, mostly divides factions based on the native place of officials, and fellow villagers hold each other together, and those who do not belong to the faction must be suppressed and excluded. Later, it develops into "fighting for the sake of fighting", criticizing everything, and fighting each other. The result can be described as tragic: many of the losers were sentenced to capital punishment and died unexpectedly.

Gao Yushi once thought about what is the reason for these two different situations?
He felt that perhaps the basis of the founding of the two dynasties was not the same.

The Song Dynasty can be called the happiest dynasty for intellectuals in Chinese history. Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin once made an oath of "not killing scholar-bureaucrats and those who wrote letters" and engraved it on the stele.Therefore, the Song Dynasty was extremely tolerant of intellectuals (scholar-bureaucrats). As long as the crimes were not heinous and aroused public indignation throughout the country, they would not be punished.

Even if they are fighting with the monarch, there is often no danger of their lives. At most, they are sent to other places, away from the government.This is most typical from the situation of Fan Zhongyan and Wang Anshi.

Daming is different.Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang was born in poverty, so he had a personal experience of the corruption of officials.After the founding of the country, the administration of officials was rectified with severe punishments and harsh laws. The requirements for officials were extremely strict, and the slightest corruption would be punished with death.

But when it came to dealing with ministers, he and his son Zhu Di set a very bad example for future generations: Zhu Yuanzhang dealt with the case of Hu Weiyong and Lan Yu, the officials who were implicated and killed were all the same. Reached more than [-] people;

Zhu Di didn't give up too much, and in Fang Xiaoru's case, he even made a feat of "punishing ten clans", even Fang Xiaoru's disciples and friends were not spared.Because of Fang Xiaoru alone, more than 800 people were killed before and after.

Therefore, almost all party struggles in the Ming Dynasty ended in personal annihilation, and the losers often lost their lives.

If this is just the inertia of the "ancestral system" formed by the actions of the founding emperor, then there are actual social roots.

The key point of this social root lies in the development of the Yangtze River Basin.

In the Northern Song Dynasty, the development of the south of the Yangtze River was already on a large scale, and the economic and cultural levels were relatively high, but the Yellow River Basin did not decline, and since the capital of the country was in Kaifeng, the development of the entire north and south was relatively balanced.

This can be seen from the birthplaces of famous officials in the Northern Song Dynasty: Fan Zhongyan was from Suzhou, Wang Anshi was from Linchuan, Jiangxi, Kou Zhun was from Weinan, Shaanxi, and Han Qi was from Anyang, Henan.

But by the Ming Dynasty, the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River had been well developed, and its economic and cultural level surpassed that of the north; in addition, Nanjing was the capital of the founding of the People's Republic of China, so its status as a political and cultural center has never fallen.

Since then, it has led to a result. Most of the "golden list titles" came from this area, so that the emperor had to change the national first list of the imperial examination and divide it into the northern and southern lists, etc., in order to maintain a balance as much as possible.

But even so, the effect is not particularly good, at least it should not have achieved the desired result of the emperors.Therefore, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, the most influential "Donglin Party", "Zhejiang Party", and "Kunming Party" were concentrated in the Suxichang area without exception.

This makes it easier for them to recognize each other in terms of cultural concepts, and then embrace the unity of the party and advance and retreat together.

If Gao Yushi hadn't appeared, Gao Gong's "Gao Party" would have been short-lived, relying entirely on Gao Gong alone. Once Gao Gong himself fell, the Gao Party would disappear in smoke.

Similarly, Zhang Siwei's Jin Party would not have been controlled by himself if Gao Gong hadn't been helped by Gao Yushi to help Gao Gong integrate a Gao Party. Dude, it turns out that they are not inferior to the Zhang family.

It was only because Gao Pragmatism "stringed" Zhang Siwei and Gao Gong together, so that Zhang Siwei could in turn use the power of Gao Dang to establish his absolute advantage in the Jin Party, thus forming a dominant authority. Some scattered Jin parties have also been integrated.

The combination of the two parties has basically formed the basic board of the Practical School, and standing opposite it is the current Heart School. (In fact, due to the highly pragmatic management, it is almost impossible for the Zhejiang Party to appear, at least it is difficult to appear like the Zhejiang Party in history.)
But right now, with the death of Gao Gong, Guo Pu Zhishi, Zhang Siwei and Dingyou, the School of Heart finally found an opportunity from more than ten years of forbearance, and with the support of some sea merchants, they began to "recover lost ground" first trial.

It stretched out its first paw.

Xu Guo didn't see this, or even if he saw it, he seemed hesitant because he was a party leader who didn't deserve his name.

In this way, Gao Yushi, the person behind the scenes who actually established the political resources of three generations of chief ministers, and the former Xiaoge elder finally stood up.

After the Double Ninth Festival was over, Gao Wushi stood on the Baiyu Building and suddenly read a phrase that he had read by heart.

"Ande Yitian draws a sword and cuts you into three pieces."
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Thanks to book friends "Too Fat to Fly", "Mo Wen Seven Swords", "Cao Mianzi", "HAMW05" for their monthly support, thank you!
PS: I have thought about the title of the next chapter, and it will be called "Cut You into Three Sections"!
(End of this chapter)