Chapter 17 The Dream of Governing the Country

Full of enthusiasm, Jia Yi wrote letters to Liu Heng many times, all of which were to clarify his political views and propositions, so there was the famous "Public Security Policy", also known as "Chen Zhengshi Shu". "Policy for Public Security" reflects Jia Yi's political thoughts in a concentrated way, and the meaning of irony and remonstrance is much more straightforward than "On Guoqin". The words are very direct, and it comes up to discuss the two issues of the kingdom and internal affairs. First of all, in response to the rise of the power of the princes and kings, Jia Yi proposed the method of "building the princes with less power".It is to reduce the territory of a single vassal state by building new kingdoms on the original land of the vassals.This is very similar to the "Tweeting Order" implemented by Zhu Fuyan during Emperor Wu's period in the future, except that the "Tweeting Order" ensured the continuity of this "all built princes"-all the sons of the princes and kings could divide up the land under the father's rule.However, whether the Emperor Wen's dynasty added new kingdoms can only be determined by the emperor's preferences, and the "many establishment of princes" is irregular, so "less power" cannot last for a long time.

Secondly, Jia Yi must establish a clear hierarchy. Jia Yi is a Confucian student. Confucianism says that "the monarch, the minister, and the father, the son, and the son." The Confucian so-called "reconstruction of ritual and music" political ideal is actually to build a hierarchical system like the early Western Zhou Dynasty, so Jia Yi has always advocated clear The status of the monarch and his ministers.In addition to his suspicion that the group of heroes dominates the government in front of Liu Heng all day long, more importantly, he is eager to realize the Confucian ideal of rebuilding the hierarchical order.

Moreover, Jia Yi believes that the government established a parallel system of counties and enfeoffments that could not fully safeguard the authority and status of the emperor, which was the cause of the political chaos throughout the early Western Han Dynasty.Jia Yi said that Liu Heng should "make the difference between the monarch, the ministers and the ministers, and the father and son and the six relatives should get their own benefits", so that the distinction between high and low can be determined, "the hierarchy is clearly defined, and the son of heaven is added, so his respect cannot be reached", and build a centralized rule. The centralization system with strict hierarchy makes the status of the emperor supreme.

Jia Yi believed that the best way to solve the kingdom's problems was to establish the absolute authority of the emperor himself. To make "etiquette" concrete, it is necessary to advocate etiquette and music. The so-called "strict integrity and shame, and etiquette and friendship" cannot be abolished by laws and enlightenment.At the same time, it is necessary to instill the Confucian idea of ​​loyalty to the emperor in the common people. It is called "transfer customs and customs, and make the world return to the country (to) the way". "" made a foreshadowing.

The implementation of these suggestions of his has indeed led to the development of the material civilization of the entire country, and his idea of ​​first stabilizing the people and then stabilizing the country is also correct. Jia Yi elevated the status of Confucianism, but because Jia Yi himself was particularly unpopular in the court, this aroused people's rejection of Confucianism.Although there are many reasons why Huang Lao chose to rule by doing nothing during the Wenjing period, Jia Yi's negative reputation for Confucianism must not be ignored.This eventually led to Jia Yi's dramatic promotion of Confucianism, but potentially promoted the expansion of Huang Lao's art in people's ideology.

There is also a part of the important content in the "Public Security Policy" that recommends paying attention to Nongsang. Jia Yi's "New Book" talks about "to secure the world for prosperity", and if you want to be rich, you must first farm. Jia Yi believes that the important task of the country is to encourage the common people to engage in agricultural production.He regards the prosperity and stability of the common people as his governing ideal, encourages production, and allows the common people to farm with peace of mind. When the time comes, it is time to plant seeds, fertilize and fertilize... Then, then there is no more.Since then, ordinary people have no holidays to travel, and they don’t even have the opportunity to travel domestically. They just lie on their own three-acre land all year round.

Encouraging farming and mulberry is said to make the common people rich, but the essential purpose is to "peace the people" and tie the common people firmly to one-third of an acre of land in the field.This is conducive to social stability and autocratic rule, reducing the floating population. When we look at any political suggestion, we should see the dark side behind it.Because darkness is the essence of politics, enlightened choices do not require political manipulation. Politics is actually "potential", public opinion, and propositions, not the only strategy or absolute truth to solve problems.

Jia Yi's suggestion of encouraging agricultural production to enrich the people is combined with his previous idea of ​​"rebuilding rituals and music", which is to firmly grasp the two aspects of the material and spiritual aspects of the common people, and the fundamental purpose is to maintain autocratic rule.This is actually different from the free economy we develop through industrial and agricultural production today. Jia Yi emphasized the government's encouragement and promotion in agricultural development, which has a strong political color and serves politics. Therefore, the so-called "people-oriented" advocated by Confucianism should be understood as "people-oriented" in essence.

"New Book Dazhengshang" says: "Husbands and people are too humble to be simple, and too stupid to be deceived. Therefore, from ancient times to the present, those who are enemies of the people have time and speed, and the people will win." That is to say, in the eyes of Confucianism, the public opinion of the people is actually an obstacle to the implementation of centralization and autocracy, but because the power of the people is too strong, it is necessary to give certain benefits to appease them. After all, openly and clearly harming the interests of the people will lead to Their resistance, and the large number of people themselves have an advantage.

Jia Yi used this to advise Liu Heng that he should educate the people with rites and music, as the saying goes, "The people can be taught, let them know; if they can't be taught, they should know it" ("The Analects of Confucius Taber").If the common people are uneasy, then brainwash them and let them live in peace, so that the common people can willingly obey the arrangement of the state, and the people can unite around the central government... This is the so-called "Guotai Minan". Jia Yi's thoughts produced due to the limitations of the times are beyond his personal control. Fortunately, Liu Heng believes in Huang Lao and is at the top of the autocratic ruling class, so he knows the reason better than Jia Yi.Therefore, we see that when Liu Heng faced Jia Yi's suggestions, most of them accepted Jia Yi's questions, but did not adopt Jia Yi's solutions.

There is also a part of "Public Security Policy" that talks about the issue of establishing a reserve. When Mao Zedong commented on this section, he said that Jia Yi was very pedantic.Jia Yi said this: "The future and destiny of the country are all pinned on the prince alone. If you want the prince to become a talent, you must not let him lose at the starting line. He must be educated early, and at the same time he must be well arranged. The people around him should restrain him with rites and music before puberty. This is very effective, allowing him to cultivate his personality and develop his intelligence. Moreover, the people around him will also affect his temperament, so we must put him The right and left candidates are good. Only with proper education and people around him personally exerting influence on him, can the prince become a talent. "Shangshu·Lu Xing" said, "If a person does a good job, all people will rely on him", which is exactly what he said reason." Jia Yi's words sounded very unpleasant, after all, these words were pointing fingers at the emperor's family affairs.In short, Liu Heng didn't quite agree with his suggestion.Lu Xun had an explanation, saying: "But the reason why there was no difference afterwards was because Emperor Wen kept quiet, so Jia Sheng's suggestions were useless, and he died of depression for the king of Liang." () Jia Yi's "Policies for Public Security" clearly teaches people to govern the country.However, there have always been different opinions in the academic circles as to how much gold is contained in the content.The author agrees with Lu Xun that Liu Heng's choice of doing nothing to govern is not just a whim, while Jia Yi sees the choice of the road to governing the country as too simple.Some of the problems Jia Yi pointed out cannot be ignored. Liu Heng takes all of these into consideration, but he also needs to consider all aspects of the actual situation.So he only accepted Jia Yi's criticism, but rejected Jia Yi's suggestions, which lacked political foresight. Liu Heng and Jia Yi are in two positions. Jia Yi only needs to think about the country, the emperor, and his own enthusiasm and ideals, while Liu Heng has to consider the balance of all parties every time he chooses to implement a government order. This is true of many monarchs and ministers in history, and the relationship between Chao Cuo and Emperor Jing is also the same in the future.The ruler is different from the counselor, the birth of the ruler is the result of the comprehensive choice of various forces.Taking Liu Heng as an example, his ascension to the throne has also been announced, and he will represent the interests of various forces such as the Kwantung princes and kings group and the hero group.No matter whether he is willing or not, whether he approves it or not, and whether he wants to break this interest relationship, he is objectively in such a position.The responsibility of the counselor is single, and he only needs to continue to advise, and there is no need to consider the emperor's personal advantages and disadvantages.Therefore, in a sense, there is an inevitable conflict between the remonstrance and the interests of the emperor, and the emperor's choice to accept the remonstrance is actually an "abnormal" phenomenon.It is precisely because of this that whenever people see a king who is good at accepting advice, they will regard him as a "Ming King". Depressed, Jia Yi worked as a tutor in Changsha for three years.One day, an owl flew into Jia Yi's room and landed next to his seat.People in Chu called owls "fu". Jia Yi was demoted at this time, and his mood was depressed. In addition, Changsha was still a remote place at that time, and the climate was not suitable for Henan people in the north. Jia Yi felt that he could not survive. I grew up and became sentimental, so I wrote a poem "Fu Niao Fu": Jia Yi was confused, confused, unable to see clearly the way forward in life, and did not understand why he was down and out.People, there is sorrow because you know too much.A person with a lot of knowledge is naive, he can't figure out why those unfair phenomena in society happen; a person who understands human feelings is lost, because there is nothing that can ignite his passion again. Jia Yi used to belong to the former, but after experiencing ups and downs in life, he has slowly transformed into the latter. He had to rely on conjecture to comfort himself, "why doubt" about worldly affairs!Yes, there is something to worry about!Jia Yi really wanted to be relieved of the ups and downs of life, he wanted his life to be smooth sailing, and he wanted to be as innocent and innocent as before he was demoted, writing essays in front of his neighbors.If he is not a Confucian student who is familiar with Confucianism, he may not have so many ideological burdens, and he will no longer think about loyalty to the monarch and patriotism, building social order, and kingly ideals. He only wants to be an ordinary person, a Rural talent, wandering in the world of literature under the admiration of everyone, and watching the sunrise and sunset of Luoyang every day. The tragedy of Jia Yi's life became the epitome of the depressed and depressed life of many intellectuals in the autocratic dynasty under the indoctrination of imperial power and Confucianism. No matter what kind of governance it is, as long as it fails to get out of the autocratic routine, it will be difficult to produce truly responsible and moral intellectuals, because there will be no room for these people to develop freely in the world. I don't have the right to speak politically, so I only talk about Fengyue. Jia Yi is not a politician, but a genius.