Chapter 12 Chongzhen succeeded to the throne, and the three cases were reversed again

Zhu Youjian, who succeeded Tianqi as the emperor, was the last emperor of the Ming Dynasty. He was the fifth son of Ming Guangzong Zhu Changluo. Country, lived in Xinqiu.He lived there for less than a year. In August of the following year, Tianqi was critically ill, and Zhu Youjian was recalled again, and he was ordered to succeed him as king.He was eighteen years old then.In the second year of his ascension to the throne, he changed the reign name to Chongzhen. Since he was a subjugated king, his posthumous title and temple name were rarely used, so people became more accustomed to using the reign name as a synonym, calling him Chongzhen.His posthumous title is "Emperor Zhuang Liemin", which was pursued by the Qing people after entering the customs.His mausoleum is called "Siling", so later generations also called him "Emperor Zhuang Lie", or Ming Sizong.

When Chongzhen was young, he was even more lonely and helpless than Tianqi.His biological mother, surnamed Liu, was originally a court lady. Not long after giving birth to him, she was punished by confinement for offending Ming Guangzong, who was still the prince at that time, and died in depression.Chongzhen lost his biological mother, and he was much younger than Tianqi when he lost his biological mother. He was ranked fifth, and his status was much worse than that of the emperor's eldest grandson.After he lost his mother, his father Ming Guangzong told Li Xuan to take care of him.But Li Xuanshi didn't really care what he liked about this child.Chongzhen grew up silently in the deep palace. Because of his loneliness since childhood, he developed a suspicious, stubborn, and unkind personality.He is not as addicted to playing as Tianqi, but he still puts his heart into reading. Although he has not been assigned any outstanding Ci ministers to teach him, there are still ordinary masters and internal supervisors who accompany the Pope's sons.In terms of writing and knowledge of historical events in the past, Chongzhen is much better than Tianqi, and this is the reason.

Chongzhen lived in the palace until he was seventeen years old. He knew a lot about the crimes committed by Wei Zhongxian and his gang. Although Wei Zhongxian is powerful and has many people, everyone hates him, so it is not difficult to get rid of him.In the matter of getting rid of Wei Zhongxian, he was able to do it so neatly, which really showed his courage. After Tianqi's death, Wei Zhongxian also made arrangements.He first called for Cui Chengxiu, screened around, and had a long secret talk.According to legend, what they discussed this time was to estimate their own strength and see if it was possible to seize the throne.Cui Chengxiu estimated the manpower, and felt that although there were people in all departments, there were still many disputes. If he wanted to usurp the throne, he was afraid it would be too dangerous.At that time, Wei Zhongxian's influence was already very great, as in previous dynasties, he had more than usurped the throne, but the ethos of wrangling among ministries created by the Ming Dynasty for a long time made them unable to move smoothly and unable to do anything.

Chongzhen was also very aware of Wei Zhongxian's power. Although he wanted to get rid of him as soon as possible, he didn't dare to move lightly.He first watched the changes calmly, leaving Wei Dang confused, and then arranged his forces one by one, showing a little wind direction, waiting for them to mess themselves up.This practice of attracting and not releasing really caused confusion among the Wei party. In order to test Chongzhen's intentions, Wei Zhongxian's little minions, Yang Suoxiu, Yang Weiyuan and others, first went to impeach Cui Chengxiu to identify the direction of the wind.Their idea is very ingenious. The person they are discussing is Cui Chengxiu, who is the leading figure in Wei Zhongxian's party, but Wei Zhongxian is not involved in the discussion.He can detect Chongzhen's intentions, or defend Cui Chengxiu and keep him, that is of course the best thing.If or not, Cui Chengxiu can also be allowed to bear everything first, and then play it by ear.Chongzhen still waited quietly for this, but the outer court made waves for this.Although the anti-Wei Zhongxian wave was suppressed due to the repetition of the three cases, in fact it was only on the surface. Those who were not killed or exiled were still secretly gathering, waiting for an opportunity.Chongzhen's heirship has been regarded as a turning point, but it is still uncertain for a while, so no action is taken.As soon as Yang Suoxiu, Yang Weiyuan and others' essays were published, it seemed that the fuse was ignited, and the momentum of discussing Wei Zhongxian in the past broke out again.Among the many essays on essays, Qian Jia's ten crimes in the impeachment of Wei Zhongxian by Gongshi (those who have passed the general examination but failed the palace examination are called "gongshi") are the most comprehensive and violent.The ten crimes he mentioned are: 1. Merging the emperor; 2. Despising the empress; Bian Gong; Nine, Min Min; Ten, Tong joints.The so-called "joining the emperor" includes Wei Zhongxian's majestic self-indulgence, going in and out of the police station, even asking people to cover his way and worshiping him, shouting "nine thousand years old", standing side by side with the emperor, and so on. "Mianhou" lists Wei Zhongxian's repeated trapping of the queen, conspiring to depose Queen Zhang, and appointing Wei Liangqing's daughter as the queen. "Encouraging soldiers" refers to Wei Zhongxian's disobedience to the court's proposals, and he chose 3,000 people from the small inner prison to practice martial arts in the ban, saying that he was harboring evil intentions and plotting against the country. "There are no two ancestors" and "restriction of feudal feudal titles" are nothing more than numbers. The feudal imperial family pays the most attention to ancestors and clans, which is a necessary item for crusade articles; , but such things have always happened, not just when Wei Zhongxian gained power. "No Saint" said that Wei Zhongxian's party members dared to compare him with Confucius. They said, "Confucius wrote "Spring and Autumn", Zhongxian wrote "Yaodian"; Confucius punished Shao Zhengmao, and Zhongxian punished Donglin. Yijian Shrine to the country and learn from the West, and respect the ancestors."When they sang the important codes, they also said: "Decree morality to punish crimes, every detail is obvious, that is, Yao and Shun released the four evildoers, and raised Yuan Kai, why should it be added. Xunyou and Xia are incapable of praise." Compare Wei Zhongxian with Confucius.Among the following items, "indiscriminate nobles" cited the most cases. The ultimate goal is that Wei Zhongxian, as an eunuch, was granted the title of Duke Shang, his nephew Wei Liangqing was also named Duke of Ningguo, and Wei Liangdong was also granted the title of Duke of Ning. The Marquis of Dong'an was sealed.

After seeing Qian Jiazheng's essay, Chongzhen began to attack.He summoned Wei Zhongxian to the palace and ordered his servant to read the Shuwen to him slowly from beginning to end, sentence by sentence, and give him a mental blow first.Wei Zhongxian was really crushed. He was terrified and tried his best to rescue him.He took Wanli, Taichang, and Tianqi's father, son, and grandson all greedy for money and good goods as an example, and wanted to solve it by offering treasures.He had a gambler named Xu Yingyuan, an eunuch who had always been around Chongzhen, and bribed Xu Yingyuan to present treasures to Chongzhen on his behalf, hoping to be saved.Xu Yingyuan was not far from Wei Zhongxian in knowledge, and he really did that for him, but Chongzhen was furious because of this, and he also reprimanded the person who offered the treasure.

When Chongzhen punished Wei Zhongxian, he was also very cautious. In order not to cause any serious problems, he was not punished severely. He was only sent to Fengyang to guard the imperial tomb. After he made a move, he ordered him to be arrested and brought back to Beijing for treatment.Wei Zhongxian learned that he was going to be arrested and returned to Beijing when he arrived in Fucheng. He knew that the situation was over and his future was dangerous, so he hanged himself together with Li Chaoqin, who was sent away with him.Their suicide took place in November of the seventh year of Tianqi, just over three months after Tianqi's death.Chongzhen only learned about this in December, so he began to act resolutely, and immediately ordered Wei Zhongxian to kill his body, and ordered his head to be hung in Hejian Mansion for public display.At the same time, they also ordered people to arrest Ke Shi and put her in the clothing bureau, and beat her to death with flogging.Ke's son Hou Guoxing, her younger brother Ke Guangxian and Wei Zhongxian's nephew Wei Liangqing were also taken to Shicao on the same day to be executed.Cui Chengxiu was also killed by hanging himself.It was only after he learned of Wei Zhongxian's death that he knew that he would never survive, so he got very drunk and finally hanged himself to death.

Chongzhen had only been on the throne for a few months before changing the Yuan Dynasty, and he completely shattered the powerful Wei Party, giving people the impression of being wise, capable and confident.For a while, all the government and the public cheered, thinking that with such a wise master, it would not be difficult to restore the previous peace and prosperity.For this reason, Chongzhen himself mistakenly overestimated his ability, thinking that he was really an outstanding talent, and he wanted to make himself a wise king of ZTE.In fact, his success was due to the unpopularity of the Wei party, the long-established wrangling system, and the proper handling of it in the end.In fact, his unpretentiousness and calm arrangement are due to his deep knowledge of Wei Zhongxian's powerful influence, and he had to, after Wei Zhongxian's death, his shortcoming of being impetuous in handling affairs has already begun to show.

After smashing the Wei party, rehabilitating those who were wronged in the three cases and eliminating Wei Zhongxian's party members are two major issues that should be handled.These all started after Chongzhen changed Yuan Dynasty.The work of rehabilitating the three cases is a part that is easier to handle. For the ministers who died unjustly, they will be given officials and sympathies one by one.It is more difficult to find out the crimes of those who made suggestions and fueled the flames in order to reverse the case and flatter Wei Zhongxian. Only Xu Dahua, Liu Tingyuan, Jia Jichun and others were punished as they deserved at the beginning, and the rest Those who have to wait until Wei Zhongxian's gangsters are completely wiped out.

In order to completely eliminate Wei Zhongxian's party members, Chongzhen recalled the first assistant Han Yu, and asked him to handle the matter with Li Biao, Qian Longxi and others who were already in the cabinet, and to determine the crimes of rebels.These three people have all been persecuted by members of the Wei party.Han Yu was squeezed out of the cabinet by Gu Bingqian and Wei Guangwei of the Wei Party. After he came out, he was impeached again and was punished by losing his membership and name.In the end, he was given two thousand taels of stolen goods, and he was forced to sell his farm and live in his own grave.Li Biao was included in the "Donglin Comrade Records", so he was so frightened that he hurriedly resigned and went back to seclusion to avoid disaster.Qian Longxi was also punished for offending Wei Zhongxian.Although these three people have all been persecuted by the Wei party, they are all cautious and do not want to go too far. After discussing, they only briefly stated the facts and issued a list of forty or fifty people who were notoriously guilty. Used to play.After Chongzhen saw it, he thought it was too little, so he ordered them to search again.The three searched again, added dozens of people, and played again.Chongzhen still felt that there were too few this time, so he instructed them very dissatisfied to search carefully from several aspects such as "praise", "support", "song beauty", and "flattery".He also said that some of the servants who help each other with evil should also be included.All three of them said that they were very unclear about the affairs of the servants, and it was really difficult to handle them.Chongzhen said: "It's not clear, it's just that I'm afraid of complaining." A few days later, Chongzhen called the three into the toilet again, pointed to a full cloth bag on the table and said to them: " It contains all the essays written by the treacherous party, and they can be included in the case by name." The three of them came to this point, and they felt that Chongzhen really wanted to handle the case thoroughly.But they still didn't want to complain, so they used the excuse of not practicing Buddhist rituals.When Chongzhen saw it, he ordered Wang Yongguang, Minister of the Ministry of officials, to assist them.Wang Yongguang also said that he didn't practice legal affairs, so Chongzhen called Qiao Yunsheng, Shangshu of the Ministry of punishment, and Cao Yubian, the censor of Zuodu, and ordered them to help.Qiao Yunsheng and Cao Yubian worked in one of the three legal divisions, of course they couldn't shirk, and they were more daring to do things, so when they were doing it, even though Wang Yongguang had ulterior motives and obstructed him from many sources, various people involved in the case , or almost collected.

This rebellious case was completed in March of the second year of Chongzhen (1629), and it was promulgated to the world under the name of "Imperial Rebellion".A total of 262 people were involved in the case, and the charges were divided into six grades. The first two rebels: Wei Zhongxian and Hakka were sentenced to death by Ling Chi.This kind of judgment is actually just empty words, because Wei Zhongxian had hanged himself, had his body killed and his head hung, and there was no way to impose capital punishment again.Ke's family has already been beaten to death, and there is no way to deal with it.People here once again felt that Chongzhen was unavoidably impatient in handling affairs.

The second-class criminals were Cui Chengxiu, Wei Liangqing, Hou Guoxing, and internal supervisors Li Yongzhen, Li Chaoqin, and Liu Ruoyu. They were charged with "conspiracy with the first traitor" and sentenced to "never wait."Among these six people, Cui Chengxiu also committed suicide and was slaughtered. Li Chaoqin was hanged together with Wei Zhongxian. Wei Liangqing, Hou Guoxing, and Li Yongzhen were all killed before they were convicted.The only one among the six who stayed and executed at this time was Liu Ruoyu.He was forcibly sentenced because there was no one under the item of "never wait for the time". In fact, he is not a "prime accomplice". The third class committed the crime of making friends with close servants and was sentenced to execution after autumn, a total of 19 people.Among the nineteen people, Liu Zhixuan and Liang Menghuan ranked first and second, and Tian Ergeng, Xu Xianchun and others were the most notorious criminals.Liu Zhixuan was listed at the top because he attacked Sun Shenxing desperately in the Hongwan case; he also shamelessly praised the "Three Dynasties Essential Code".Liang Menghuan was the initiator of Wang Wenyan's prison. In that case, Yang Lian, Zuo Guangdou, Wei Dazhong, Zhou Chaorui and many others were murdered to death. The fourth-class crime was making friends with close servants, and he was sentenced to exile.There are eleven people in this class, and the leader is Wei Guangwei who once joined the cabinet to pay homage to the prime minister.Xu Dahua came up with the idea of ​​killing Yang Lian and others on the grounds of recovering stolen goods. He said, "If he commits the crime of moving the palace, there is no stolen goods to point to. If he takes bribes from Yang Gao and Xiong Tingbi, it will be a serious matter to seal the border, and he will be famous for killing."Zhou Yingqiu was the head of the ten dogs. After Yang Lian and others were killed, he was so happy to spread the word everywhere: "God has eyes, Yang Lian and Zuo Guangdou are dead!" The fifth class is to make friends with close servants and second class. After three years in Luntu, he loses and redeems himself for the people.This category has the largest number of people, with a total of 129 people.Among these people, there are four cabinet ministers: Gu Bingqian, Feng Quan, Zhang Ruitu, and Lai Zongdao.There are more officials who are ministers, including Wang Shaohui, Shao Fuzhong, Sun Jie, Liu Tingyuan and more than 20 people.Among this category of people, the masterminds reversed the three cases were the most, and Jia Jichun, who was the deadly enemy of Yang Lian, was also in this category. The number of the sixth class is second only to the fifth class, and there are also two cabinet ministers, namely Huang Liji and Shi Fenglai.Most of the others are relatives of internal eunuchs and Wei Zhongxian and others.The punishment for these people is: Dismissal. After deciding on this reverse case, Chongzhen showed his determination and depth of understanding.He not only personally selected some more suitable people to handle the case time and time again, but also pointed out the key points for everyone when they hesitated.For example, when the list of rebellious cases was initially determined, the cabinet ministers Shi Fenglai, Zhang Ruitu, and Lai Zongdao were not included in the list. When Chongzhen asked the reason, Han Yu and others said that they had no real evidence for the rebellion.Both Shi Fenglai and Zhang Ruitu were well-known calligraphers at that time. The inscriptions on Wei Zhongxian's ancestral hall and many inscriptions about Wei Zhongxian were written by them, and some of the inscriptions were also written by them.Chongzhen listed the inscriptions they wrote, and asked: "Are these still unfounded?" Regarding Lai Zongdao, Chongzhen also cited his sacrificial oration to Cui Chengxiu's father. A kind of "flattery".In this way, both Zhang Ruitu and Lai Zongdao were convicted of the fifth class, while Shi Fenglai was convicted of the sixth class.There is also Jia Jichun, who was originally unknown in the case, because he was very good at turning the wheel with the wind. In the case of Yigong, he attacked Yang Lian vigorously at first, and then announced to everyone that Yang Lian married Wang An in order to get involved. Court.Later, because everyone praised Yang Lian, Tian Qi also praised Yang Lian. It seemed that Yang Lian might be of great use, so he turned to seek peace, bowed to Yang Lian, and even spoke kind words to each other.He was recalled by Wei Zhongxian with a decree, and he knew that he wanted him to attack Yang Lian, so he turned his head and attacked Yang Lian with all his strength, and said that it was very important to quickly revise the "Three Dynasties Essential Code", so that future generations in the world would know about Yang Lian The charges of Lian and others.After Tianqi's death, he felt that the situation was not good, so he changed himself again. First, he talked about Cui Chengxiu, Tian Ji, Shan Mingxu and others. He also called Yang Lian and others loyal and respectable. , he also praised it with all his strength, trying his best to dress himself up as a figure in the Qing school.He is so changeable that it is difficult to judge him.When Chongzhen asked about him, Han Yu and others said that although Jia Jichun repeated many times, his arguments were not without merit.Chongzhen said: "Only if he repeats himself, he is a real villain!" With such a conclusion, Jia Jichun was listed as the fifth class and was imprisoned for three years.There is also Huo Weihua, who is more cunning and more varied than Jia Jichun.He was the second only to Cui Chengxiu, the mastermind of Wei Zhongxian, he was the one who pursued the three cases, he was the one who attacked the upright cabinet ministers, and he was the one who offered the aphrodisiac "Manna Drink" to Tianqi. Almost all bad things, there is no one without his share.But he did it very covertly, leaving few traces, so that almost all of Wei Zhongxian's henchmen were caught, but he was still able to move freely, and he was about to go out to supervise the division.However, no matter how secretive the matter was, there would always be someone who would know about it. Yan Jizu noticed him during the incident, and when talking about Huo Weihua, he not only exposed his crimes, but also drew his face.He said: "Weihua is also a cunning person. When Pang Chi is together with Pang, if Pang loses, he will attack Pang. Those who attack Yang and Zuo are also Weihua; those who catch Yang and Zuo and save Yang are also Weihua. Use one In the middle of the matter, I went to Shangshu in three years, no one is inferior, and I have to add money, even Weihua can't explain it." As soon as this book was published, Huo Weihua was included in the fourth class of criminals and was sent to Xuzhou. .For him, this kind of punishment is undoubtedly too light. Considering what he has done, even being listed as the third class can be regarded as top-notch. In the matter of smashing the Wei party and setting up the counter-case, although Chongzhen still had some impatience, it is really rare to be honest. He played a more profound and subtle role than others.For this, he received endless praises, and he himself was dazzled by the victory. Since then, he has claimed his sanity, always acted eagerly and willfully, and never did anything like this incident again. In comparison.Until he committed suicide in Meishan, before he came to his senses, he had to write the words "The king is not the king of the subjugated country, all the ministers are the ministers of the subjugated country" on his robe.However, he had put in a lot of effort to become the hero of ZTE. He was not ostentatious, and he worked hard from morning to night. It can be said that he worked hard on the road to his demise.When he came to the throne, it can be said that the fate of extinction was already doomed. Not only was the mediocre man irresistible, but even stronger people could hardly do anything under the years of accumulated evils.