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Chapter 206 The Importance of Shang Yang to Qin State

Shang Yang's reform made the Qin State unprecedentedly powerful, and made great achievements. He was named king by Qin Xiaogong and owned fifteen cities in the land of Shang Yu, so he was called Shang Jun.

This feudal monarch is different from the previous enfeoffment. Shang Yang only has the right to tax the land of business and land, and the administrative power and land rights still belong to the state. Moreover, the feudal monarch is only handed down to two generations, and must be returned to the state by the third generation.

During the Warring States Period, many countries had feudal monarchs, such as Wei Wuji, Lord Xinling of Wei State, Zhao Sheng, Lord Pingyuan of Zhao State, Huang Xie, Lord Chunshen of Chu State, and Tian Wen, Lord Mengchang of Qi State, commonly known as the Four Princes of the Warring States Period. Jun, it is a reward activity organized by various countries to attract and retain talents.

The result of the system of prefectures and counties is the weakening of the power of the nobility and the strengthening of the power of the monarch. In fact, it is the transformation from feudalism to centralized power.

The result of the enfeoffment system is the separation of powers. The country is actually ruled by the nobles, and the monarch alone does not count; the result of the county system is the centralization of power. The power of the whole country is concentrated in the monarch, and all other officials become wage earners for the monarch. , the monarch can arbitrarily withdraw the killing penalty.

As a result, the nobles of Qin State began to die out, and the strength of the country was greatly enhanced.It can be said that the Qin State is fighting with the strength of the whole country, while the other six countries are only fighting with nobles.The result can be imagined.

The original nobles suffered the most from Shang Yang's reform.

Like Chu State, as soon as Qin Xiaogong, who supported the reform, died, the nobles of Qin State rose up to punish Shang Yang; like Wu Qi, Shang Yang was eventually torn apart.

But what is different from Chu State is that Qin State did not abolish Shang Yang's system because of his death, but continued to implement it.

After Qin Shihuang unified the world, he pushed the system to the whole country.

Complementing the system of prefectures and counties is the policy of ignoring and weakening the people.

Shang Yang believes that in order for the people to be easy to manage, obedient, and follow the country's policies, the people had better be a little stupid, like the Six Kingdoms where a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend. In terms of benevolence and righteousness, if you let him play tricks, he will scold you for being immoral.

There is another one, it is better for ordinary people not to have money.

"When the people are rich, the country is weak, and when the people are weak, the country is rich."

Because once the common people have money, no one will go to the battlefield with their lives.

The stimulating effect of interests will be greatly reduced, and those who are always struggling on the line of food and clothing will risk their lives and fight wars in order to change their destiny, and have no time to ponder whether the country's policies are reasonable.

Therefore, Qin Shihuang's "burning books and burying scholars" was not an accidental move. This behavior is in the same line as Shang Yang's policy, which is to control speech and implement a policy of ignoring the people.

In view of the fact that the dynasty died too quickly, the emperors of later generations did not sacrifice the banner of Legalism nakedly like the first emperor, but adopted the policy of "confucianism outside and law inside", and outwardly used Confucianism to appease the emperor. People's hearts, in their bones, are still the legalist way.

Shang Yang's practice did not disappear with the demise of the Zuo Dynasty, but intensified and reached its peak in the Qing Dynasty.

The struggle between the enfeoffment system and the prefecture and county system continued until the Han Dynasty. Xiang Yu wanted to restore the enfeoffment system, and Liu Bang wanted to establish the prefecture and county system, but he was afraid of going the old way of playing the first emperor.

Finally, when the country was established in the early Han Dynasty, a compromise was made to form a half-enfeoffed and half-county country.

This kind of struggle ended with Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty's Tweeting Order, and the enfeoffment system completely died out, and China became a centralized country with thousands of years of reincarnation.

Is the enfeoffment system or the county system better?
The benevolent see benevolence, the wise see wisdom.

Later generations can see that since the fall of the Roman Empire, there has been no unified centralized government, and a modern democratic country has developed on the basis of the feudal system, and the feudal system of Japanese pirates has continued into modern times. Sprout.

On the contrary, under the centralization of China's power, it will only bring about the change of regime, constantly overthrow and start again, and fall into an endless loop.

Some people also say that capitalism had sprouted in China during the Ming Dynasty. If the Manchu Qing Dynasty hadn't entered the customs, perhaps China would have been able to develop capitalism.

This is pure wishful thinking.

Those in the late Ming Dynasty were not called capitalism, but small workshops at best.

The soil of centralized power cannot produce democratic ideas.

Even if the Qing Dynasty did not enter the customs, Li Zicheng's becoming emperor would only be another cycle, or everything would be overthrown and restarted, and it would not be more advanced than the Ming Dynasty.

The eldest son inheritance system under the feudal system will naturally produce capitalism, and democracy is also the result of compromise after various forces wrestle.

Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty's Tweeting Order abolished the eldest son inheritance system and changed it to be divided equally among all sons. In this way, capital was dispersed and became smaller and smaller. Capitalism could not be produced, only small workshops could be produced.

During the Zhou Dynasty, the monarch would often compromise with the ministers, but under centralized power, all power was concentrated in the emperor, and the emperor would never compromise with the ministers.

Qin Shihuang also brought a bad idea, that is, whoever has the strength can be the emperor, unlike the Wanshi line of Japanese pirates, and it is not like King Wu's crusade against Zhou, which requires a large set of theories to only stick to his own actions.

For example, follow the destiny, have the right way and cut down the wrong way, etc.

Chen Sheng and Wu Guang were even more straightforward: Princes, generals and ministers, they would rather have kindness!

Naked is that I am going to replace you, without any disguise.

When the State of Qin invaded Yingdu of the State of Chu, it set fire to the most beautiful Chu Palace in the world at that time.

It's just that when Qin Shihuang came to burn books and bury Confucianism, she burned all the books of the six countries. Later generations could not see the beauty of Chu Palace and the tragedy of burning Chu Palace, but Xiang Yu's behavior was recorded and passed down.

Moreover, once the emperors of the past dynasties seized the world, they burned down the palaces of the previous dynasty, which seemed to have become a common practice; only the Manchus were the exception. The Manchus entered the pass under the banner of revenge for Emperor Chongzhen. The main enemy was Li Zicheng. .

Under the legal system of the Qin State, with the demise of the nobility, the former poetry and books, etiquette and righteousness disappeared, and those who promise a thousand gold and scholars who are confidantes will die. People often do whatever they can to achieve various goals in the name of national interests.

For example, Shang Yang himself.

You know, the state of Wei once occupied the land of Hexi, and it has been overwhelming the state of Qin. When did Qin take back the land of Hexi?
It is in the hands of Shang Yang.

At this time, the State of Wei had just suffered heavy losses from the State of Qi in the Battle of Maling, and the State of Qin attacked Wei on a large scale while the strength of the State of Wei had not yet recovered.

In September of the same year, Qin Xiaogong sent Shang Yang to attack the land of Hexi, and Wei Guo sent his son Ang to fight.

When the two armies confronted each other, Shang Yang sent an envoy to send a letter to the young master, saying: When I was in Wei, I got along very happily with the young master. Now you and I have become generals of two hostile countries. I can’t bear to attack each other. The two met, made a covenant, drank a few cups happily, and then withdrew their troops, so that Qin and Wei could live in peace.

For the sake of old love, the young master went away, but was captured by Shang Yang's ambush soldiers.

The Wei army had no leader, Shang Yang took the opportunity to attack the Wei army, and the Wei army was defeated.King Wei Hui was forced to cut off the land west of Hexi for peace.

It was also because of this credit that Shang Yang was conferred the land of Shang Yu and had the title of Shang Jun.

Later, when King Qin Huiwen succeeded to the throne, Shang Yang was falsely accused of treason and forced to flee.

On the way to escape, he wanted to stay in a hotel, but the owner said that according to the Shangjun's order, guests without certificates cannot stay in the hotel, otherwise they will be seated together, which is called "self-destruction".

The state of Qin could not stay any longer, so it could only flee to the neighboring state of Wei.

Fortunately, the State of Wei did not trick him into killing him. King Wei Hui just resented Shang Yang for his treachery and expelled him back to Qin State.

Shang Yang was desperate, so he could only return to the land of Shang Yu. He really rebelled, but he was defeated and killed, his body was ripped apart, and his family was wiped out.

It's really self-inflicted.

Shang Yang's deception of his friends was only on the battlefield. In front of the battle, the two armies never tire of deceit, which is justified.

Compared with Zhang Yi, Shang Yang is just cheating, but Zhang Yi is completely shameless.

At that time, Wei State began to decline after being defeated by Qi State. Qin State took the opportunity to rise and began to expand eastward.

The six countries joined forces to deal with Qin, and Chu was the leader.

Qi and Chu are the strongest among the six countries. As long as these two countries are united, Qin's east-east expansion plan will be difficult to carry out.

So Zhang Yi went to the state of Chu as an envoy, saying that as long as the state of Chu broke off diplomatic relations with the state of Qi, the state of Qin would cede the six hundred miles of Shangyu to the state of Chu.

King Huai of Chu agreed and broke off diplomatic relations with Qi.

When King Huai of Chu sent people to Qin to deliver the land, Zhang Yi played tricks and said it was six miles, not six hundred miles.

King Huai of Chu was furious, so the two countries fought.

Isn't it stupid that King Huai of Chu was so easily fooled by Zhang Yi?

Actually not.

In the Warring States Period when rites collapsed and music was destroyed, King Huai of Chu was the last generation of monarchs cultivated by the ritual and music civilization.

He believed that Zhang Yi came from a poor background and had never received aristocratic education since he was a child, so he didn't know how to be honest.

The tragedy of King Huai of Chu is very similar to that of Song Xianggong back then. Song Xianggong paid attention to etiquette and lost to the barbarian state of Chu.

But in the era of King Huai of Chu, after hundreds of years of development, Chu State not only absorbed Chinese civilization, but also became more Chinese than China.

Chu's clothes, Chu's dance, Chu's music, and the Chu king's thin waist are all fashionable things that are sought after by the Central Plains countries.

Why is there an idiom called "Chu Chu moving"?
Because everything in Chu is beautiful, Chu has become synonymous with beauty.

What surprised King Huai of Chu even more was King Qin Zhao.

King Qin Zhao went too far, directly tricking King Chu Huai to Wuguan, and then asked King Chu Huai to cede the land to save his life.

King Huai of Chu would rather die than follow, so Qin State has been detaining him. Three years later, King Huai of Chu died in Xianyang.

This practice of Qin State planted the seeds of hatred in the hearts of the people of Chu State.

Later, when Xiang Yu rebelled, he supported the grandson of King Huai of Chu as Emperor Yi, and under the banner of King Huai of Chu, he started an uprising in Chu. The sympathy of King Huai of Chu.

Confucius said that the Spring and Autumn Period was a time when rites collapsed and music was destroyed. That was what happened during the Warring States Period.

Although the royal family was in decline during the Spring and Autumn Period, the order was still there. From the time when Duke Huan of Qi dominated the Central Plains in the name of respecting the king and fighting against the barbarians, the princes of all walks of life had to give face to the king of Zhou and the overlord.

To seek hegemony is to maintain order, not to annex land.

In the Warring States period, these are all gone, and everything is based on interests.

Mencius saw Liang Huiwang (Wei Huiwang, after the Wei State ceded the land of Hexi to Qin State, in order to avoid Qin State's edge, moved the capital from Anyi to Daliang, people used to call him Liang Huiwang.

The king of Liang asked him directly, what benefits can you bring me, and Mencius was disappointed. There is no market for benevolence, righteousness and morality.

All the six countries are like this, and Qin is the best among them.

Qin Guo has always learned from Rongdi, not from the Central Plains, so he abandoned the set of Chinese etiquette faster than anyone else.

Having said that, Qin State's spirit of caring only for profit and not being shameless suits Liu Bang's taste very well, so he fully accepts Qin State's legal system and the legalist core.

On the contrary, Xiang Yu can't do this kind of thing. He wants to enfeoff, and wants to return to the civilized society of ritual and music in the past.

Xiang Yu's final defeat and suicide, and his refusal to return to Jiangdong, is exactly the embodiment of the spirit of success or benevolence of scholars.

If it is Liu Bang, it must be better to live than to die.

Both Liu Bang and Xiang Yu are from the state of Chu, which is exactly what the saying goes: Although there are three households in Chu, Chu must die.

In the end, the Han Dynasty was actually a hybrid of Qin system and Chu culture.Soft things such as music, dance, clothing, and lacquerware of the Han Dynasty belonged to Chu State, but hard things such as laws and regulations still belonged to Qin State.

The prefecture and county system of the Qin State can concentrate its power on major tasks, making Qin State leap from a small border country to a superpower that frightens the princes of the Central Plains.

Shang Yang's reform had a great impact on the historical development of China.

It can be said that Shang Yang's shadow can still be seen until later generations.

It can be said that Shang Yang is undoubtedly a staunch supporter of the one-man dictatorship.

His three rounds of reforms were farming, military warfare, and centralization. The final result was to turn Qin into an extremely powerful and terrifying war machine.

His art of strengthening the country is a radical experiment in nationalism, which is reflected in the "command-style planned economy" in terms of economic model.

Under his rule, Qin State became the well-known "Country of Tigers and Wolves", and an aggressive atmosphere of extreme utilitarianism spread throughout the country. In fact, every person in Qin State became a tool of the state, just like the terracotta warriors and horses unearthed in later generations. The expression is extremely powerful.

It may be that God felt that Qin State was too difficult, so he sent the angel Shang Yang for them.

Shang Yang is really the angel of Qin State, because Qin State before Shang Yang's arrival was almost the target of being bullied by other countries.

They had to cede their territory to other vassal states and return their sphere of influence to Hangu Pass.And Qin State had to face other opponents in Hangu Pass, such as the powerful Yiqu State and the Huns.

Shang Yang played a key role in the reform, because he was able to govern the state of Qin completely according to the law, so the people of the state of Qin were more convinced.

After Shang Yang's death and King Qin Huiwen came to power, Qin State finally had the ability to compete with Wei State.

Since then, the state of Qin can be said to be thriving and stronger.

From being bullied by the princes in the past to being jointly defended by the princes of the six countries, this kind of change actually began after Shang Yang's reform.

After Shang Yang's reform, Qin's good days have come. The soldiers all have fighting spirit, and the common people have the enthusiasm for production and life.

By the time of King Qin Zhaoxiang, Qin already had the power to dominate the world, and Qin Shihuang inherited all the resources of Qin and completed this feat.

It can be seen from this that Shang Yang's contribution to Qin is indeed indispensable. Without Shang Yang, later generations would never see the situation where Qin Shihuang unified the six countries.

(End of this chapter)