New Shun 1730

People who are obsessed with religion don't like the word "coincidence".

They are more eager for someone to explain the coincidence in a way related to gods. Reason is sometimes not pleasing.

The suffering in religion is both a manifestation of real suffering and a protest against this real suffering.

Religion is the sigh of oppressed creatures and the emotion of a ruthless world, just as it is the spirit of a system without spirit.

The manifestation of real suffering and the protest against real suffering make this coincidence have an inspiring effect.

If there really are Buddhas and gods, it may not be a bad thing for poor people.

Why do we have to use reason to break these coincidences into coincidences? Even if many people are skeptical in their hearts, what more people expect at this time is that someone tells them that this is not a coincidence.

People need such a shot of something that can excite the spirit.

As a person who easily converted for power, Rajsinghe naturally gave the people such a shot.

Under the pavilion outside the palace, Rajsinghe appeared in front of the people and told them about a dream he had a few days ago; he told them about a mysterious spiritual state after he converted from Hinduism to Buddhism, and it seemed that he could communicate with the Buddha to a certain extent on the spiritual level.

Dashun was actually also a colonizer, but because of the mutual needs between them, Dashun became a liberator.

The leader of the Anti-Christ, the heavenly soldiers sent by Buddha, and the guardian of Eastern faith.

This is basically the general image of Dashun after the king's speech.

The monks sent by Dashun with shaved heads and wearing cassocks also confirmed this.

They are also Buddhists.

So, in mid-March, when Du Feng and others came to Kandy City, the people of the entire Kandy City crowded on the streets to see these liberators sent by the Buddha.

The road covered with flowers and the Bodhi leaves thrown by the people along the way made Du Feng, who was riding on an elephant, feel a lot of emotion.

He couldn't help but think of a very dark word Liu Yu once said.

If the Batavia massacre had been allowed to happen, when the Dashun warships appeared in Batavia after the massacre, the local Chinese would have been prepared with food and drink.

Now, when Dashun went to Batavia, there was no food and drink. The sugar factory owners, tax farmers, and big businessmen had to be extremely wary of Dashun, and they might even miss the rule of the Dutch.

Judging from this level of welcome, it is obvious that the Ceylonese people have really felt the hatred of the Dutch and the Portuguese.

After experiencing the "from driving the tiger to swallow the wolf to letting the wolf into the house" one bird, the Ceylonese people still did not give up their fantasy, hoping that the next one would not be a bird.

From the appearance, it is indeed a bird.

Europeans and Dashun people look different, and the Dutch and Portuguese look the same to Ceylonese people.

Protestants and Catholics can beat each other's brains out in Europe. But in Ceylonese, how many people can understand the difference between Protestants and Catholics?

Perhaps the only similarity, for the time being, is that they both have weapons that can shake down Mount Sumeru.

Of course, in fact, the origin of the weapon that can collapse Mount Xumi comes from the Taoist alchemy. If the Five Pecks of Rice Yellow Turban Dao becomes a political and religious unity, it may be possible to bury gunpowder under Mount Xumi and blow up Mount Xumi in one wave. In religious wars, it is normal to destroy each other's holy places.

Du Feng on the elephant looked at the cheering Ceylon people on the roadside and was sure that he should be able to gain a foothold in Ceylon.

Thanks to the dark rule of the Portuguese and the Dutch, Dashun has an excellent foundation in Ceylon. As long as this foundation is well grasped, Du Feng believes that Liu Yu's plan of "two years of preparation, three years of interference in internal affairs, eight years of oppression of the French to withdraw, and twenty years of seizing South India" can have a fairly stable rear base.

As long as the relationship with the Sinhalese is improved, at least 1,000 garrisons guarding against the Sinhalese can be saved.

And 1,000 soldiers trained in the system after the Dashun Army Reform are enough to change the outcome of the war of infighting among the Indian Jiedushi. Those Indians have guns and cannons, but lack a new training system, and having more people is useless.

In view of his recognition and practice of Liu Yu's strategic concept, and in order to seek a title of nobility, Du Feng rarely pretended to be very kind and pious.

After the elephant parade, he and the monks from Dashun went to visit the temple where the tooth of Sakyamuni Buddha was enshrined.

When he met the King of Kandy, he also knelt on both knees and greeted the king according to the etiquette of meeting a prince.

This is all in accordance with the rules of etiquette. Except for Korea, which follows the etiquette of a prince, the other tributary countries must follow the etiquette of a prince. Even if Kandy really pays tribute in the future, even if Du Feng is a marquis, he must kneel when he sees the king: Liu Yu did not need to kneel when he went to Ryukyu. First, his identity at that time was an angel, and he accepted the kneeling of the Ryukyu prince on behalf of the emperor; second, before the imperial edict of the Celestial Empire arrived, even if he had ascended the throne, he was only a prince, not a king. The prince of a county must pay tribute to the five nobles.

This kneeling made Rajsinghe feel very good, and he personally felt the sincerity of Dashun. The Dutch also knelt on both knees at the beginning, but after driving away the Portuguese and gaining a firm foothold, they not only stopped kneeling, but also asked the King of Kandy to pay tribute.

Dashun did not have the possibility of not being able to gain a firm foothold. The Dutch, who had gained a firm foothold, collapsed within a few days. How could they have the possibility of not being able to gain a firm foothold?

So they also knelt, but this was very different from the Dutch kneeling at the beginning.

The Celestial Empire itself is a country of etiquette and law, and the form of kneeling is absolutely the pinnacle. Compared with the etiquette of a small country like Ceylon, it looks much more formal and "grand".

Rajsinghe was greatly satisfied with his face.

In the subsequent negotiations, officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also clarified Dashun's attitude in response to Rajsinghe's needs.

There are many capable people in the court, and some are political masters. They just lack an accurate understanding of the outside world, so they can't make the right decisions.

After the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Liu Yu's Privy Council clearly wrote about the situation in the outside world, those political masters in the court certainly knew what the other party wanted.

Rajsinghe was a "vassal king" from South India; after this "vassal king" came to power, it was necessary to reuse his confidants, which would inevitably lead to dissatisfaction among the old people.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Dashun had a whole set of rhetoric that would please him, tempting him to become a tributary state and come to the capital of Dashun.

In the first negotiation, Dashun did not raise any specific demands, but took out a newly drawn world map, introduced some of Dashun's situation, land area, etc., so that Rajsinghe could have an intuitive understanding.

Ceylon is not big, and the whole is not much bigger than Hainan Island. The map of Dashun was drawn after the border survey with Russia, and the west has been drawn to Central Asia. Just from this map, it can be said to be extremely vast.

Then, members of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs focused on the issue of Dashun's tributary state. Although it is impossible to make Ceylon a new type of tributary relationship like Ryukyu in Korea, it is better to conform to the form of tribute.

First, it can satisfy the emperor's vanity of "all nations come to pay tribute" and make the dragon heart happy.

Second, it can also be regarded as a greater voice for Dashun in the future formulation of international law: that is, what is a tributary state?

This negotiation itself is targeted.

The Kingdom of Kandy's understanding of Dashun is limited to legends. In which corner of the world does it know that there is a country called China?

As for Dashun’s understanding of the Kandy Dynasty, it had already begun to collect intelligence since Liu Yu made the plan to seize India.

With deliberate actions, the King of Kandy was firmly under his control.

After learning about the situation in Ceylon, the political masters in the court determined that the king was most worried about two things.

First, would Dashun interfere in Kandy’s internal affairs?

Second, what form did Dashun’s tributary system take?

It’s not that they think the King of Kandy doesn’t like others interfering in his internal affairs, but that they want interference that is beneficial to him.

For example, if Korea revolted and the King of Korea was unable to suppress it, he asked Dashun to send troops. If Dashun said that it would not interfere in the internal affairs of the tributary country, the King of Korea would be unhappy.

Or, if there was a coup in the Ryukyu Kingdom and a certain noble rebelled, the King of Ryukyu sent an envoy to “cry to the Qin Court” and asked the suzerain country to make decisions for the King of Ryukyu. Of course, this was also what he liked.

The tributary country hoped that the suzerain country would interfere in its internal affairs, provided that the interference was beneficial to the ruler.

Therefore, the people from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs introduced in detail the tribute situation of Korea, Ryukyu, Annan, Siam and other countries:

Theoretically, Dashun does not support any form of rebels.

The foundation of Dashun is etiquette and law, and acts that violate feudal etiquette and law are not allowed by Dashun.

Dashun recognizes the succession of the king and will never interfere in the succession issue under the conditions of the inheritance law.

So:

Dashun unconditionally supports the legitimate heirs to exercise their power.

Dashun will not interfere with the reasonable inheritance of the tributary states, nor will it interfere in the internal affairs of the tributary states, and of course it will not interfere in the religious beliefs of the tributary states.

The last point is that it is really powerless.

In the Nanyang region, it should be a tug-of-war between Confucianism and Indian religions, but it was defeated and pushed all the way to the border of Guangxi. Even the country had to engage in Neo-Confucianism to fight against the Buddhist worldview, not to mention Christianity, which would have fallen to the entire coastal area if the court had not directly banned religion.

Considering that although Dashun also has temples and Buddhism, the difference between Buddhism and Ceylon is even greater than the difference between Confucianism in the Spring and Autumn Period and Confucianism in Neo-Confucianism, Dashun did not think of sending monks to Ceylon to revive Buddhism.

In short, Dashun's attitude this time is unprecedentedly pragmatic and quite tolerant. If you want to join the Kandy Dynasty to pay tribute, you don't need to fulfill too many obligations on the surface. It's mainly a formality.

As long as the conditions of economic trade are met, you can do whatever you want internally.

Because the control of Ceylon must be achieved step by step.

The definition of this policy in the court is "manage without management, and rule without governance".

First stabilize Ceylon, take over South India, digest Southeast Asia, and then slowly infiltrate and influence. Try not to move the interests of the Kingdom of Kandy in the early stage, and take advantage of the unstable position of Rajsinghe to win over Rajsinghe who needs to stabilize power.

Stabilizing power has never been an easy task, and it is necessary to touch the old interests.

If there really was an "ambitious ruler" who even attempted to gather the power of the nobles and to "I am the state", there would inevitably be a rebellion.

And in the current situation in Ceylon, it would take at least seven or eight years to stabilize the position; when the position was stabilized, power began to be concentrated, and it was time to reduce the power of the nobles, more than ten years would have passed.

The Dashun "did not care and did not govern".

If you are allowed to develop on your own, without a powerful leader, a bunch of small nobles will share power in a mess, and nothing will be accomplished; if there is a powerful leader, how can the nobles just sit there and surrender, and they will definitely rebel.

If Dashun does not care and govern, there is a possibility of rebellion. If it manages and governs, how can there be rebellion and internal strife? Dashun will really become a worker for the King of Kandy.

Only if there is a rebellion, internal strife, and noble rebellion in the future, can we achieve the effect of management and governance at the lowest cost and support a puppet.

If it is just a waste and cannot solve the problem of national centralization, it will not be easy to find a noble to act as an agent in the future.