Luo Sheng embarked on the road to the Western Regions. From Chang'an to the Western Regions, he had to pass through the four counties of Hexi and the counties of Guanzhong west of Chang'an. Luo had been in Guandong for a long time and gradually lost sight of the situation in Guanzhong. He just took this opportunity to observe the situation in Guanzhong. Check it out.
As a result, Luo Sheng's sight was beyond his expectation, because he actually found a lot of refugees in Guanzhong.
And it seems that the time is not short. These refugees range from old to young.
His housekeeper was also shocked when he saw this. If there were refugees in Guandong, it would be normal. After all, there were so many powerful people in Guandong that even with the mausoleum system, land annexation could not be controlled.
But in Guanzhong, this is the land directly controlled by the royal family. It is the basic territory of the royal family. Even the princely states do not entrust it here, but there are also refugees?
The steward quickly found out the origins of these people and said in a deep voice: "Sir, these people are from the Guanzhong flood in the twelfth year of Yuancheng. In order to release the flood, the court could only open the north side of the dam, so they were drowned. They have good farmland and houses, and because the materials issued by the court are insufficient, new land has not been allocated, so they can only become refugees."
Yuancheng is the reign name of Emperor Ding of the Han Dynasty.
Luo Sheng frowned slightly and said: "In the twelfth year of Yuancheng, the Han court, which has not experienced the defeat in the southwest, will not be able to provide disaster relief?
Although Emperor Xiaoding made mistakes in his later years, he was not a cruel monarch. How could he not provide disaster relief? "
Starting from Emperor Xiaowu, disasters gradually began to occur in the world. By the time of Emperor Xiaoding, there were some floods. There were several floods in Guanzhong, which almost broke out this time. Fortunately, the court was still able to provide disaster relief, and nothing happened. Big mess.
Unexpectedly, after a little investigation, I discovered that there are still big problems in the follow-up of disaster relief.
As he spoke, Luo Sheng looked at the surrounding terrain and said strangely: "Besides, the tributaries of the Wei River are flooding, but the water flows to lower areas. It is obviously easier to discharge floods on the south side, so how can the dam on the north side be opened?"
If something goes wrong, there must be a monster. Luo Sheng's face darkened and he said, "Ask the people who owns the land on the south side?"
The steward was startled, and of course he understood what Luo Sheng meant. He quickly turned around and said with a serious face: "Master, as you expected, half of the land belongs to the eldest princess's family, and the other half belongs to other royal nobles and officials. They did not dare to open the dike and destroy the fertile farmland of these powerful people, so they opened the dike on the north side and destroyed the land of the common people.
Luo Sheng closed his eyes slightly when he heard this, with endless anger lingering in his heart, and even blue veins popped out. Seeing this, the housekeeper asked: "Master, do you want to inform the emperor about these things?
These people are really pitiful. They only have such a small amount of wealth, but they lost everything in a flood.
Do you want to secretly punish these powerful people? "
Luo Sheng slowly opened his eyes, looked at the housekeeper, shook his head, and said through gritted teeth: "This is a royal matter, just tell the emperor, but there is no need to take action.
Send people to check whether there are any resisters among the people, whether there are people who are praying for the people, whether there are heroes who are not afraid of power and dare to take action against the powerful and officials, and take these people away and resettle them.
Those who work for everyone should not be allowed to freeze to death in the ice and snow!
Those who accept the situation and accept it will stay here.
Those who can endure injustice will still have to experience countless injustices in this life. "
The butler couldn't bear to hear this and asked, "Sir, is this too cruel?"
Luo Sheng said seriously: "So what if I take him away?
Can you give them a house to live in?
Can you provide them with food and clothing?
Can they live and work in peace and contentment?
Besides, even King Su’s heaven will not accept weak souls.
If there is no King Su in this world, then there will never be a savior. If you want to be happy, you have to rely on yourself.
This is the truth that life determines destiny.
Now King Su gives blessings to brave people and gives their souls the opportunity to ascend to heaven.
There is also the Luo family who has been fighting bravely for the first place from generation to generation. This is already the luck of the people of Zhuxia.
The weak spirit will be eliminated, and the strong spirit will be passed on. As generations are eliminated, the spirit of the people of Zhuxia will become more and more full and correct.
Moreover, the Luo family has no ability to save them. The family has tried its best to maintain its current scale. If the Western Region had not been opened up, Zhaocheng would have exploded.
Family creed, don't do good beyond your means, don't you understand? "
The housekeeper said with cold sweat: "Sir, I was wrong."
Luo Sheng said with emotion: "Don't underestimate the people of the world. The Qin Dynasty was so powerful, but it still failed at the hands of farmers. The world thought that Emperor Gao, King Xiang, and King Zhaosheng were the great contributors to the destruction of the Qin Dynasty, but the family praised King Chen Rise up, how great is that? Is there more than one King Chen in this world?
Don't look down too high on the people of the world. There are still many people who are resigned and submissive, and there are also many people who will become more aggressive once their fortunes turn around.
The family promoted the ideological fire, and now retains the spark of the brave. One day, maybe this will start a prairie fire? "
The housekeeper nodded with deep understanding, then suddenly thought of something, and said in shock: "Master, if Guanzhong is unstable, then the defeat in the southwest, coupled with the emperor's tax increase this time, Guanzhong..."
Luo Sheng's expression changed.
The things the housekeeper said were nothing individually, but taken together they were no small matter.
As mentioned before, the rule of the Han Dynasty was based on small landowners who could perform military service and pay taxes. In fact, merchants were also one of the foundations of rule, because most businessmen were small businessmen, which in the words of later generations were called self-employed.
Sang Hongyang personally watched and collected taxes. It was true that he could collect taxes from big businessmen, but he could not do everything. Once he did not pay attention and relied on local officials, how could he collect taxes from big businessmen?
Behind the big businessmen are big powerful people.
In the end, ordinary merchants had to suffer. In real history, lawsuits caused large-scale merchant bankruptcies. In fact, it was the bankruptcy of small and medium-sized merchants. The real powerful people took advantage of the bankruptcy of small and medium-sized merchants to make massive acquisitions. This This is a major reason why local powerful people have become powerful.
The scariest thing about this matter is that even if you know the cause and effect, you can't solve it.
For example, in the case of the eldest princess, the officials took it upon themselves to destroy the people's farmland, because even if this matter was brought to the emperor, except for a few emperors who truly loved the people like their own children, most of them would only receive a symbolic punishment.
This is the famous strength order in history, and the princess was not punished in the end.
After all, one party is one's own relatives and the other party is an abstract common people. What they will choose has actually been determined from the beginning.
Luo Shi has always been strict with himself and lenient with others.
If one person does something, it may be one person's fault, but if everyone does it after becoming rich, that's how human nature is.
Luo Shi only set an example, but did not strictly require others to do the same. Just like Bangzhou's nobles eventually fell, Luo Shi did not care.
Because the fallen nobles will eventually be swept into the garbage dump of history, Luo Shi will not persuade them, but will only be the person who sweeps away the garbage.
In Luo Sheng's eyes, although the Han Dynasty had been established for a hundred years, it was still in its prime and rising period.
This was even stronger than Bang Zhou. Seventy years after Bang Zhou was established, it began to decline. However, it was still relying on the ancestor Luo Wen Gong who greatly extended the country.
But now he suddenly discovered that Dahan's situation was not as good as he had imagined, and signs of various problems gradually appeared.
And I don’t even know when these problems appeared. It was obviously so good during the period of Emperor Xiaowu. Could it be just some natural disasters?
You must know that the current natural disaster in Guanzhong is nothing at all. When Bang Zhou occupied Guanzhong a thousand years ago, three rivers were cut off. The entire ecological environment of Guanzhong was greatly changed, and it could not accommodate the capital of a dynasty.
Coupled with political reasons, the Zhou royal family had to withdraw from that land and moved to Luoyang between Heluo and Luoyang to re-establish its capital.
There were no continuous severe droughts, no overwhelming locust plagues, no continuous earthquakes, and most importantly, no rivers bursting and changing their course. For a dynasty, floods that affected tens of thousands of hectares of farmland were nothing at all.
"Liu Dan."
Luo Sheng muttered the name, "Isn't it a good thing that an emperor who is good at martial arts appears in this period?"
Luo Sheng didn't know the answer to this question. He was not one of those wise ancestors, and none of the aspects of governing the country reached 90. The reason why he could become the heir to Duke Zhao was just because he was the eldest son, and the other direct lineages were equally mediocre.
There has never been a shortage of people in this world who have enlightened themselves, and there has never been a shortage of people who have corrected their evil ways. Similarly, it is not uncommon for people who were once outstanding to become comatose due to certain blows.
Emperor Liu Dan now likes martial arts. Who can guarantee that he will always be like this?
————
Serious land annexation was one of the main reasons for the decline and demise of ancient dynasties. Land annexation resulted in fewer free farmers paying taxes and serving the country, or the royal family, resulting in financial difficulties and ultimately the inability to invest in the maintenance of large-scale public projects. Military expenditures could not be raised during the war, and the country's military administration gradually declined, but this was not the reason for the decline of the Han Dynasty.
The Han Dynasty had a good foundation for the founding of the country. In the first hundred years since the founding of the country, the problem of land annexation was not serious. Moreover, due to the existence of the feudal system, the kingdom could be replaced at any time by the emperor and the princes, and the country would be eliminated in no more than three generations. , although the princely states have been around for a long time, they will also change their titles on a large scale according to the needs of military deployment. The princes have little demand for land annexation.
Moreover, the Han Dynasty had strict regulations on the size of princely feudal states, and the collection of taxes and corvees would be adjusted according to the size of the feudal kingdom. Therefore, the annexation of land within the princely states did not affect the country's mobilization ability and dynasty tax revenue.
But in this good situation, the royal family was actually attacking its own fundamentals. This incredible man-made disaster, coupled with the frequent occurrence of natural disasters, ultimately caused irreversible results. ——"The Rise and Fall of the Han Dynasty"
(End of chapter)
