New Shun 1730

Liu Yu was not very familiar with Louis XV, and at most he had heard some jokes.

But since it was a joke, it was hard to tell whether it was true or not.

Just like the famous French joke, Queen Marie asked "Why don't you eat cream cake if you don't have rice to eat", which originated from the spread of Eastern learning to the West, and the Enlightenment scholars made up the sentence "Why not eat meat porridge"; for example, the later rumors of the great uprising at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, eating moon cakes and killing Tartars on August 15, originated from the Indian native soldiers' uprising using Indian tossing cakes to communicate and transmit information, and was borrowed and spread by the well-informed Nanyang secret society as an allusion, with excellent effect.

This kind of fabricated jokes is very familiar to both the East and the West, and it is definitely not possible to understand a person by relying on jokes.

However, Liu Yu can still find some clues about a monarch like Louis XV by taking the history of China as a mirror.

He ascended the throne at a young age, and the right of succession was not originally his, but those who were ahead of him in the order of succession died.

After ascending the throne, someone was regent. Someone who later became the prime minister did his lectures when he was young and was very strict with him.

This lecturer became the prime minister, and he held power for a long time, and formulated a series of policies and reforms.

As soon as this man who was both the prime minister and the tutor died, he overturned many of the established policies before the prime minister's death.

As soon as the prime minister died, he wanted to abolish the prime minister and monopolize power, thinking that if the prime minister was in charge, how could I rule the world.

He fought three victorious campaigns during his tenure, the War of the Quadruple Alliance, the War of the Polish Succession, and the War of the Austrian Succession.

But before his death, he fought a failed Seven Years' War that caused France's financial collapse and completely lost its hegemony, and could no longer suppress the rise of the Anglo-Saxon barbarians.

France did not have a tradition of eunuchs, so this Louis XV believed in his lover, let his lover make suggestions for him, and also let his lover supervise the actions of the ministers.

The difference may be that the one in the Chinese region has a living mother; while the one in the French region, his mother died early, so he is particularly concerned about women, especially mature women, and craves maternal love.

Or, it is not an exaggeration to say that the demise of the Bourbon began with Louis XV.

To deal with such a person, you have to understand his mentality.

He ascended the throne at a young age but did not rule the country himself. His ancestors had a Sun King who was a great warrior and held all the power. Whatever he wanted to do before was opposed by the prime minister. Now the prime minister is not dead yet and he wants to abolish the prime minister's monopoly of power. What this person lacks most at this time is "recognition, approval, praise" and flattery.

With such a rough judgment in mind, Liu Yu decided that this trip to Versailles would use the most respectful attitude since he came to Europe, flattering and trying to establish a good personal relationship with Louis XV as much as possible, so as to reach a very favorable sharing of spoils conditions for Dashun in dealing with the issue of the Netherlands.

In the Netherlands, personal relationships are of little use, interest groups are intertwined, and a centralized meeting has been held for a year and nothing has been resolved.

In Russia, personal relationships are useful, and the power of the Tsar is much greater than that of the Dutch consul and the great speaker. But the woman in Russia was too shrewd and clear-headed, and personal relationships could not bring anything beneficial.

Except France.

Centralized, very centralized, the king has great power.

Level, very average, the king is not a powerful ruler.

In such a situation, personal relationships are very useful and can also bring very valuable exchange of interests.

However, the envoys had just arrived in Paris, and Louis XV had not yet met him. The cardinal and prime minister Fleury, who were already ill and knew that they were dying, sent the French financial director, Philibert Ollie, who he promoted, to meet Liu Yu first.

One of the important reasons why Fleury sent someone to meet Liu Yu before Louis XV met Liu Yu was that Liu Yu's identity in France this time was different from that in other countries.

Going to the Netherlands and Russia was in the name of the Dashun court, and it was an official act authorized by the Tianyou Palace and the Sixth Government.

Coming to France, he came as the "personal envoy of the emperor" to achieve direct communication between the emperor and the king of France.

To put it more bluntly, when Liu Yu went to the Netherlands and Russia, he was an official appointed by the court; when he came to France, he was more like a eunuch close to the emperor.

The diplomatic exchanges between France and Dashun had always been high-level, not at the court but at the royal level. Since the time of Louis XIV, Bai Jin came to China as the "king's chief mathematician", and Bai Jin came first, and the French "tribute ship" went later.

In addition, the things discussed this time were too confidential, so of course the fewer people who knew about it, the better.

Fleury knew the level of Louis XV, and knew that Louis XV would most likely have secret negotiations with Liu Yu.

Even though he was seriously ill, Fleury still sent Philibert, the financial director he promoted.

In his words, it was because "His Majesty the King likes war, but he doesn't even know that war requires logistics; His Majesty the King likes prestige, but he doesn't know that treasury income is the basis of war; His Majesty the King likes merit, but he doesn't know how much money is behind merit."

Old Fleury knew that once he died, the peace and recuperation he had been seeking for France for thirty years would be impossible.

And what did the king know about governing a country?

He had no idea how serious France's financial problems were, and he didn't understand that war would cost a lot of money.

Since it was an inevitable trend, the negotiations between the king and Liu Yu might not even involve money.

Most likely he would just seek "glory beyond his great-grandfather the Sun King" like a child who looks at a map and fantasizes about war, and he might not even look at the national map, but a globe...

Fleury hoped that Philibert could talk about economic, technical and financial issues before Liu Yu met the King of France.

When he came to power, France had a huge crater caused by the Mississippi Bubble. After the currency reform in 1726, Fleury maintained a deflationary policy, hoping to fill the big hole of the Mississippi Bubble.

Two consecutive financial directors were promoted by Fleury, and they both implemented his will. And implemented the economic policy formulated by Colbert sixty years ago - state investment, economic development, technology learning, recruitment of technicians, state control, government orders.

Fleury hoped that Philibert could reach a series of technology transfer cooperation before Liu Yu met the king.

For example, silk textile industry, cotton textile industry, papermaking industry, etc.

Although he also hoped to obtain the skills of Dashun's porcelain manufacturing industry, he knew it was impossible, so his greatest hope was to obtain the technology of the textile and papermaking industries.

The king would definitely not have thought of such a thing.

The king just thought he was a genius strategist and didn't care about these small economic and trade matters at all.

Because he knew it too well, he knew it was impossible, so he could only settle these "small matters" before Liu Yu met the King of France.

Colbert's policy has continued to this day. When it comes to the papermaking industry, the route is also very clear: recruit skilled workers from Dashun, invest in the establishment of papermaking factories by the French treasury, raise tariffs to protect the local papermaking industry after ensuring that production can be carried out, ensure the booming development of the papermaking industry through orders from the nobility, the royal family and the government, and start exporting to foreign countries in exchange for gold and silver currency after meeting domestic demand.

The papermaking and textile industries were the development plans set by Fleury before his death.

Strive to make France the best cotton and silk center in Europe within five to ten years by relying on the cotton and silk weaving technology of Dashun; rely on the papermaking technology of Dashun so that France no longer needs to import British paper, and even sell it abroad after meeting domestic needs.

In addition to these technical issues, Fleury wanted to learn about the "Chinese development model" before his death, especially the control, promotion and taxation of handicrafts in ancient China. See if "other people can polish jade".

France, Britain and the Netherlands are not on the same economic path.

Colbert's series of policies have continued to this day. If people on the Dashun side see it, they will feel quite familiar, at least more familiar than the British and Dutch ones.

For example, the financial director Philibert at this time tried his best to promote the construction of the "French Straight Road" - with Paris as the center, a road that extends in all directions was built. Every non-privileged French class had to serve for two weeks every year for road construction and conscript labor.

For example, the "Canal Plan" he tried his best to promote at this time. The conscription of civilians, the construction of canals, the continuous digging of the Saint-Quentin Canal, connecting several large rivers, and improving the level of infrastructure and transportation.

These canals and road networks, as well as the surveying and mapping preparations for the construction of these road networks and canals, are the basis of the accurate Cassini map of the French Revolution. Without the road infrastructure laid in this era, there would be no accurate Cassini map.

In "The Two Heroes", Dumas wrote that "there is a Cassini map on the table, on which even the smallest rugged path can be found."

So the French public "saw" their country, and from the earliest map manifestation of national consciousness, they identified their country, found their homes, villages and towns where they lived, and understood that the place where they lived was called France.

Every inch of land on the map is defined as France, binding the people and the land together, not to be loyal to a monarch, but to be loyal to an impersonal, imaginary national community, which is called France. This is the origin of the maps that were mostly hung on the walls of compulsory education classrooms later.

Another example is the "state-run handicraft industry" that has always been quite important in France. Of course, in France, it is called the "Royal Handicraft Factory", which is exclusively operated by the royal family. Although the craftsmen are not registered as craftsmen, the proportion of state-run handicraft industry in France has always been very high, which is completely different from the British and Dutch.

From the perspective of pure Eurocentrism or Western-centrism, the modern and contemporary history of the world seems to be a continuation of the struggle between Britain, the Netherlands and France: the Anglo-Dutch model, free trade, VS, Colbert's state-owned industrialism, the French Revolution, Rousseau's popular sovereignty, the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, the planned economy... It's just that the orthodoxy of the opponents continues to move eastward.

From the perspective of historical theology, the modern and contemporary history of the world seems to be a normal and universal development model, VS, the unexpected, abnormal, and sudden change route of the Anglo-Saxons. The normal and universal development model should eventually lead to the peak of the feudal monarchy such as the Ming and Qing Dynasties, but the Anglo-Saxons mutated.

These are all wrong ideas. However, the correct historical view has not yet been born.

So Fleury seemed to see a different path that was suitable for France from the illusory picture of China portrayed by those Enlightenment scholars and missionaries, and a path that was so similar to Colbert's system.

Especially, the Dashun regime did not completely deny Wang Anshi's reform. The Dashun Wude Palace and the Sanshe Law inside it, among other names, forced the French missionaries sent to China to learn about Wang Anshi's life, and then used their way of thinking to draw conclusions that Wang Anshi and Colbert were somewhat similar.

But as the criticism and satire in the "Manifesto" in later generations said, "When this kind of work was moved from France to Germany, the material basis of France was not moved at the same time. Under the conditions of Germany, the French literature completely lost the meaning of direct practice and only had the form of pure literature."

To be honest, even the Dashun and the Ming Dynasty could not replicate the system of the Song Dynasty, because the material basis was different, and the continuous decline of the official economy, the official monopoly of the Song Dynasty, and the all-round commercial tax and trade monopoly system could not be learned at all.

There was nothing to learn from Dashun and the Ming Dynasty, let alone France.

The most basic labor system, craftsman registration, buying and selling, the proportion of official handicrafts, trade control, and the proportion of bureaucrats were all completely different, and could only be "completely lost the meaning of direct practice and only had the form of pure literature." Even Dashun himself was in the same situation when looking at ancient books. He couldn't learn anything at all.