Chapter 34: The secret of dynasty change
Xi Xingchen said: "Students who get into fights are actually just like ordinary people in the city. They also like to get relatives and friends to hug together and form an 'alliance' to work together."
"There is a saying that goes like this: 'The hooligans are not to be feared, but the hooligans are educated.' Scholars formed a group to fight against the emperor, and thus a clique was formed that even the emperor was afraid of."
"But scholars are different from ordinary people. The 'alliance' they formed not only resisted the imperial power, but also attacked those who disagreed with them."
"What's different about this!" Wen Gaoming waved his hand and said, "Isn't it just that everyone gathered some people to form the Black Tiger Gang, the Little Knife Club, the Ax Gang, etc. In order to collect more protection fees, they would ask the superiors to do it from time to time. In a fight, the winner will take the big share, and the loser will take the small share.”
"Right!"
Xi Xingchen thought about it carefully, and found that the partisanship in the court was really just like that. It was just that the ruffians were more simple and direct, and they didn't have as much fuss as the scholars to think of reasons and excuses that were bigger than the sky.
"The internal fighting among the bureaucrats gave the emperor an opportunity. At this time, the smart emperor would see the opportunity and support the weak from time to time to prevent any one of them from becoming powerful. When the bureaucrats couldn't kill each other, they would ask the emperor to come out and preside over Due to the situation, the emperor took the opportunity to firmly hold the power of the country in his hands, thus making the imperial power greater than the power of the gentry."
"When the imperial power is greater than the power of the gentry, the bureaucrats will do their best to serve the emperor in order to please the emperor. As a result, the country's decrees will be smooth, tax revenue will be sufficient, and the country will prosper."
"But when it comes to a stupid emperor, he will support one faction and defeat the other."
"It's just that when things have developed to this point, haha, the problem is a bit big."
"Isn't it great if we all work together to make money?" Wen Gaoming said.
Xi Xingchen smiled and said: "For businessmen, of course, it is best to be friendly and make money. But in the temple, that is not the case at all. Whether it is the east wind overpowering the west wind, or the west wind overpowering the east wind, there are no 'cliques' of competitors. The blow to imperial power is fatal.”
"When the power of the gentry is greater than that of the emperor, officials will use the 'alliance' to form parties for private gain, establish connections between the court and local governments, become officials when they join, and become gentry when they leave, interfere in central and local policies, and do everything possible to protect them Benefits already received.”
"So it will happen that bureaucrats have a lot of privileges and accumulate a lot of wealth, but the national taxes they pay are almost nothing. The result is naturally a decrease in the country's revenue and an empty treasury."
"Doesn't that mean the emperor has become the 'taken advantage of'?" Wen Gaoming said.
"Absolutely correct!" Xi Xingchen praised Wen Gaoming: "You know, this guy who suffered a loss from the officials is not a vegetarian. He is the king of a country and holds the power of life and death for all living beings. In order to regain his position, , the emperor will transfer the tax source to the common people who are responsible for paying taxes and food. The common people cannot afford it, so they flee their residences and become refugees."
"Once there are too many refugees in the country, war will break out, and national taxes will not be collected. The emperor will still suffer."
After hearing what Xi Xingchen said, Zhou Zhenbang nodded thoughtfully.
Xi Xingchen continued: "It is a terrible thing for an emperor to have no money, such as no money to control rivers, no money to provide disaster relief, no money to fight wars, etc."
"Take the last years of the previous dynasty as an example. There were droughts in the north of the country, floods in the south, and then locust plagues. Each disaster lasted for several years. Over the past few years, the emperor was reduced to poverty, and his power was emptied by the gentry. He could only watch the country being filled with smoke. , there were rebels everywhere. Finally, the rebels entered the capital, and the emperor had no choice but to find a tree with a crooked neck and hang himself. At a young age, he went to complain to his ancestors. "
"When the emperor dies, it means the decline of a dynasty; at the same time, it also means the rise of a new dynasty."
"The cyclical replacement of dynasties, as long as we continue to implement the Confucian strategy of governing the country and put aside the dazzling blindness of the rulers, is essentially a process of competing for the interests of imperial power and gentry power."
"If the imperial power is strong, the country will prosper; if the gentry is strong, the country will be destroyed. This is the case in all dynasties, successes and failures."
When Xi Xingchen said these words, he seemed to have returned to the time of his college graduation defense. His tone was ups and downs, impassioned, and he spoke in one breath. Everyone present listened with gusto and couldn't stop.
"Exquisite!" When Xi Xingchen was talking about imperial power and gentry power, Zhou Zhenhai sometimes frowned in thought, sometimes scratched his ears and cheeks, and said nothing until Xi Xingchen finished speaking for a long time, then patted his thigh and praised.
Xi Xingchen used the ebb and flow of imperial power and gentry power to explain the rise and fall of a country. For Zhou Zhenhai, this was a brand new perspective that completely subverted his previous world view.
The establishment of a person's worldview is a long-term and arduous process. Therefore, once a person has established his own worldview, it is extremely difficult for others to put a grain of sand into it.
For someone like Zhou Zhenhai who spends his whole life building a worldview, subversion is tantamount to killing him. But at this moment, he didn't know why, but his eyes were shining, as if he had been walking in the clouds and mist all his life, and suddenly the clouds cleared and the sun appeared.
When Xi Xingchen said that "if the imperial power is strong, the country will prosper, and if the gentry is strong, the country will be destroyed", Zhou Zhenhai couldn't help but applaud.
Zhou Zhenhai suddenly stood up, walked to Xi Xingchen, clasped his hands in fists, and bowed deeply to Xi Xingchen.
Zhou Zhenhai's move shocked everyone present, because what he did to Xi Xingchen was actually a disciple's gift.
What's even more surprising is that Xi Xingchen actually smiled and accepted Zhou Zhenhai's gift, and then returned the gift to Zhou Zhenhai with the courtesy of a junior.
This is not because Xi Xingchen is arrogant, because what he just said was not written by himself, but was written by a great writer in his previous life.
There is no age of learning, only those who have mastered it come first.
Zhou Zhenhai paid homage to Xi Xingchen as a disciple regardless of his identity, and that was it.
This was also the case when Xi Xingchen received a courtesy from Zhou Zhenhai on behalf of the great writer in his previous life.
After the ceremony, Zhou Zhenhai and Xi Xingchen looked at each other and smiled.
"Xiao Xi is not a girl, why is Zhou Zhenhai looking at Xiao Xi like this?" Looking at the ambiguity between the two, Wen Gaoming nudged Elder Ximo next to him and said softly.
This elder from Ximo is called Chang Tiancai, and he is a zoologist and botanist. The characteristic of this person is that he always talks about his profession, so when he saw that Wen Gaoming asked such an amateurish question, he answered in a very professional tone: "From a breeding perspective, this situation generally does not occur between two people." It's between men, but it can't be said that it doesn't exist. There is a very famous person in history who is just like this."
"Who?" Wen Gaoming originally just wanted to find someone to ridicule Zhou Zhenhai, but he didn't expect Chang Tiancai to give such a genius answer, and he suddenly became excited.
"Long Yangjun!" Chang Tiancai said.
