Chapter 44 Second entry

Still at the climax of the New Culture Movement, Qian Xuantong once said that Hu Shi "has dealt too much with him in the old society that has accumulated for thousands of years."Hu Shi himself no longer defended himself, but went his own way.After publishing the "Efforts" weekly newspaper, he went to the palace twice to visit the "abdicated" Emperor Xuantong Puyi, the so-called "second entry to the palace", which was most opposed by public opinion. The incident was caused by installing a telephone in the Forbidden City. It turned out that during the Revolution of 1911, the Southern Revolutionary Party reached an agreement with Yuan Shikai, the representative of the Qing court. After the Qing emperor abdicated, Yuan would be the president of the Republic of China. :

After the resignation of the first emperor of the Qing Dynasty, the honorary title still exists.The Republic of China treats each other with the courtesy it treats foreign monarchs. In the second paragraph, after the emperor of the Qing Dynasty resigned, he spent four million taels per year.After the new currency is changed, it will be changed to four million yuan, which will be allocated by the Republic of China. After the third paragraph, the emperor of the Qing Dynasty resigned, he was temporarily confined in the palace.Later moved to the Summer Palace.Guards, etc., remain as usual. After the fourth paragraph of the Qing emperor's resignation, his ancestral temple mausoleum will be enshrined forever.The Republic of China will set up guards at its discretion to protect them carefully.

The fifth item is the unfinished project of Chongling Mausoleum of Dezong, if it is properly repaired.The ceremony of enshrining the Annunciation is still the same as the old system.All utility expenses shall be paid by the Republic of China. The deacons used in the palace before the sixth paragraph can be retained as usual, but no eunuchs can be recruited in the future. Article 7 After the resignation of the Qing emperor, his original private property shall be specially protected by the Republic of China. Article 8. The original imperial guards shall be established by the Ministry of Army of the Republic of China, and the amount of payment and salary shall remain the same as before. ①

According to this absurd "preferential treatment conditions for the Qing Dynasty", ②after Emperor Xuantong Puyi abdicated, he was still called "emperor", still used the title of Xuantong, and was still "temporary residence in the palace". Live the life of an emperor in the same place. Puyi was still young at the time, and the emperor's life in the small court was very dull and boring.Children are curious by nature, and their knowledge is growing. They dream of "restoring their ancestors", so they are very interested in new things in the outside world.Introduced by the foreign master Johnston, he met the British naval commander and the British governor of Hong Kong in the Forbidden City; he also knew about the vernacular movement and read Hu Shi's "Trying Collection".But the princes and ministers in the Forbidden City are very conservative, and they always use the "ancestral old system" to limit the little emperor's deviant behavior in an attempt to maintain the peace of the little court.The palace used to have no telephones.

Once, Puyi heard Johnston talk about the function of the phone, and he became curious and wanted to pretend.The ministers all came to dissuade them, saying that "these Western strange skills and ingenuity are not used by our ancestors."But Pu Yi refused to listen.Finally, a telephone was installed in the Hall of Mental Cultivation.Puyi was very happy, flipping through the phone book, dialing the phone randomly to have fun. On May 17, 1922, Pu Yi hung up the phone to Hu Shi and asked him to enter the palace to talk.In order to enter the palace, Hu Shi first visited Johnston.In his diary on May 24, he recorded:

Because Xuantong wanted to see me, I went to see his husband Johnston today and asked him about the situation in the palace. He said that Xuantong has been quite independent recently, doing what he wants, and not being restrained by a group of old women (according to, referring to the empress dowager).The last time he cut off his braid was an example.Last week his husband Chen Baochen was seriously ill, he wanted to visit him, but the palace people tried to dissuade him, but he refused to listen, and even hired a car to visit him once, this is also an example.The last time Johnston mentioned that Xuantong had read my "Experimental Collection", so when I gave Johnston a copy of "Wen Cun", I also gave Xuantong one.This time he wanted to see me, and he didn't discuss it with anyone at all, and Johnston didn't know about it, so it can be seen that he had his own way. ③

On May 30, Pu Yi sent an eunuch to pick up Hu Shi.At that time, the palace ban was still quite strict.They got off the car in front of the Shenwu Gate, sat in the guest room of the Guard Inspector's office for a while, and waited for a phone call with the palace before entering the palace.The meeting with Xuantong that day is also recorded in Hu Shi's diary, which is quite detailed: We enter the palace gate, pass through the Chunhua Gate, and enter the Hall of Mental Cultivation.The emperor of the Qing Dynasty was in the east chamber of the hall, with large glass on the outside and thick curtains on the door; the eunuchs raised the curtains and I went in.The Qing emperor had stood up, and I bowed to him. He first put a large stool with a blue satin cushion in front of him, and asked me to sit down, and I sat down.I called him "Emperor" and he called me "Sir".He looks very handsome, but very thin; although he is 17 years old, his eyes are more short-sighted than me; he wears a blue robe and a black vest.There are some antiques in the room, and there are many books by the window. There are more than ten kinds of newspapers on the kang table, most of which are bad newspapers, including "Morning News" and "English Express".On the table is "Cao'er" by Bai Qing, Yadong's.He asked about Baiqing and Pingbo; he also asked about "Poetry" magazine, and he also tried to write new poems recently.He said he was also in favor of the vernacular.When he talked about his study abroad, he said, "We have done a lot of wrong things. I am very disturbed to waste a lot of money from the Republic of China in this position. I wanted to live independently, so I had to liquidate the royal family's property. But many older people are against me, because once I become independent, they have nothing to rely on."

He said that there are many new books that cannot be found.I asked him to let me know if there are any books that he can't find in the future.I (we) talked for 20 minutes and came out. ④ This incident later caused a bit of disturbance both inside and outside the palace.According to Pu Yi's recollection, when the princes and ministers in the palace heard that the emperor had met Hu Shi, a "new figure" privately, they "began to make a noise behind their backs like frying oil." , and also published rumors such as "Hu Shi begged not to kneel down" and "Hu Shi was the emperor's teacher", which caused a lot of trouble in the city.

Hu Shi had to write an article "Xuantong and Hu Shi" to defend.After explaining the same meeting situation as that recorded in the diary, the article accused others, saying: This 17-year-old boy in the Qing palace was in a very lonely and pitiful situation; in this loneliness, he wanted to find someone who could be regarded as a boy to talk to; this is also very human. usual thing. Unexpectedly, the imperial thoughts in the minds of the Chinese people have not been scrubbed clean.So this incident, which was originally very human, became a strange piece of news when it was written by a journalist. ⑥

Hu Shi started from humanitarianism, sympathized with Puyi, and felt that this was "very human", which generally seemed reasonable.He also wrote a little poem about it, titled "Feeling": A kernel that cannot be bitten open, cannot be broken by a mallet, cannot shut down a little business in the kernel; A hundred-foot palace wall and thousands of years of etiquette can't lock a young man's heart! But Puyi is no ordinary poor lonely boy, he is an emperor who dreams of "restoring his ancestors".In the Forbidden City of the Republic of China, there were indeed emperors, and under the support of Zhang Xun, it was restored for 12 days. This is an iron fact.So, how can the imperial thoughts in the minds of Chinese people be washed away? And a new person who advocates "Mr. Is the imperial thought scrubbed clean?

After that, Hu Shi remained stubborn and refused to listen to people's advice and criticism. In October 1924, Feng Yuxiang led the national army to launch a coup d'état in Beijing, disbanded the "Piggy Congress", put under house arrest the bribed president Cao Kun, and Huang Yu acted as the prime minister to form the regency cabinet. On November 5, the government of the Republic of China sent Lu Zhonglin and others to the Qing Palace to revise the preferential treatment conditions for the Qing Dynasty, confiscate the Qing Palace, permanently abolish the emperor's title, and drive Puyi's small court out of the Forbidden City, and all moved out on the same day. Taking such decisive measures to end the imperial system that should have been completely ended by the Revolution of 1911 is undoubtedly a revolutionary cause that conforms to the trend of the times and the people's sentiments.Hu Shiben also opposed the imperial system, but he sympathized with the deposed little emperor.In the afternoon of that day, he wrote to the government of the Republic of China to lodge a protest, saying in the letter: Gentlemen know that I am a man of justice, and today I would like to offer a few words of protest to the government which gentlemen have organized.This afternoon, there are many rumors that Feng Jun surrounded the Qing palace and expelled the Qing emperor. I didn't believe it at first, but after inquiring, I found out that it was true.I am not in favor of keeping the emperor's title in the Qing Dynasty, but the preferential treatment of the Qing Dynasty is a kind of international faith and treaty relationship. ⑦ Treaties can be amended or abolished, but the dignified Republic of China bullied people's weakness, took advantage of people's mourning, and committed violence with violence. This is really the most disgraceful thing in the history of the Republic of China. ⑧ Hu Shi's letter of protest was published in various newspapers in Beijing at that time.Pu Yi and the princes and ministers were naturally happy to see it.Then, Hu Shi personally went to Beifu, where Puyi lived temporarily, to condolences, and in front of Puyi and his group, he blamed the National Army; he also cared about Puyi's future and encouraged Puyi to study abroad. ⑨It can be regarded as the knowledge and defense of the last emperor.People with a little conscience and democratic spirit were dissatisfied with Hu Shi's words and deeds, and sent letters and telegrams to criticize and refute Hu Shi; even Zhou Zuoren disagreed with Hu Shi's views.Li Shuhua and Li Zongtong even "felt very shocked" after reading Hu Shi's remarks in the newspaper.They believe that it is not surprising if this kind of discussion comes from ordinary people who "servants of the Qing Dynasty became officials of the Republic of China" or other ordinary people "related to the Qing Dynasty"; It was beyond their expectation that a new figure in thought would make such an argument.Therefore, they also wrote to criticize Hu Shi, and refuted his accusations against the Republic of China government very frankly, pointing out: The usual so-called "deceive the weak, ... with violence" means, of course, refers to the rights that the strong should have over the weak, and the meaning of forcibly seized, ... is of course unacceptable to Mr. Puyi's emperor title. his due rights.Therefore, the act of modifying the conditions of preferential treatment is of course completely different from the strong taking the weak.As for the reason of "taking advantage of people's mourning", it is especially untenable.The issue of the abolition of the emperor's title in the Qing Dynasty is an issue of the national system of the Republic of China. How can it be combined with the funeral of a concubine? In short, if we agree with the brand of the Republic of China, we must admit that "the abolition of the title of the emperor of the Qing Dynasty" is a legitimate and necessary thing, and there is no such thing as "mourning" or "weakness". ⑩ The two Mr. Li argued with reason, but Hu Shi couldn't listen.They don't understand Hu Shi's character. He clings to his "humanitarian" corner view, disregards public opinion and the facts, and even accuses others of insulting and slandering his criticism, "the air between the lines is full of harshness and intolerance."Hu Shi is really quite stubborn.Later, the "September 18th" incident occurred, and the Japanese imperialists occupied the Northeast and created a puppet regime called Manchukuo.Hu Shi felt that the situation was serious, so he realized his mistake of opposing Puyi's expulsion from the palace, and expressed his regret deeply. ① Quoted from Aixinjueluo Puyi, Beijing Mass Publishing House, March 1, 1964, pp. 45-46. ② "Conditions for Preferential Treatment of the Qing House", in addition to the above-mentioned "Conditions for Preferential Treatment after the Abdication of the Qing Emperor", there are also "Conditions for the Treatment of Manchurian, Mongolian, Hui and Tibetan ethnic groups" and "Conditions for the Treatment of the Qing Royal Family". ③ "Hu Shi's Diary", Beijing Zhonghua Book Company, January 1985 edition, Volume 2, p. 359. ④ "Hu Shi's Diary", Volume 2, pp. 364-365. ⑤ Same note as ①, p. 141. ⑥ "Xuantong and Hu Shi" was published in the twelfth issue of "Efforts" weekly report, published on July 20, 1922. ⑦ Hu Shi's words are extremely absurd.The preferential treatment of the Qing Dynasty in the Republic of China refers to the relationship between the new regime and the old regime personnel, and the state's relationship with some citizens after the change of dynasty; it cannot be compared with the nature of international treaties.At that time, Mr. Zhou Yusheng, as a legal expert, wrote an article to refute such absurd remarks made by people like Hu Shi, see "Modern Review", Volume 1, Issue 1. ⑧ Hu Shi wrote a letter to Wang Zhengting on November 5, 1924, see "Selected Letters from Hu Shi", Volume 1, p. 268. ⑨ See pages 173, 179-180 of Puyi.Wu Xiangxiang, a Taiwanese scholar, wrote the article "Hu Shi "But he was not a teacher" (contained in the first volume of "Biography of a Hundred People of the Republic of China" published by Taipei Biographical Literature). In Hu Shi's letter to Zhou Zuoren on November 12 of the same year ("Hu Shi's Correspondence and Correspondence", Volume 1), there is a saying "I met Mr. Puyi two years ago", which proves that there is no such thing as entering the Forbidden City.But this time Hu Shi went to Beifu to meet Puyi, which is a fact.Puyi regards Beifu as a "Little Forbidden City", so there is still a problem of "Second Entry into the Palace". ⑩ For correspondence between Zhou Zuoren, Li Shuhua, and Li Zongtong criticizing Hu Shi and defending him, see Selected Correspondence of Hu Shi, Volume 1, pp. 270-272, 275-277. For Hu Shi’s letter to Li Shuhua and Li Zongtong on November 28, 1924 (draft), see Selected Letters from Hu Shi, Volume 1, p. 278. See Luo Ergang's "Something About Hu Shi", see "Hu Shi Research Collection", Beijing Joint Publishing, February 1989 edition, pp. 12-13. (Third Edition Note)