Chapter 23 Chapter Four From Sui to Song

Yang Jian, Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty, was a very superstitious guy—in fact, there are very few emperors who are not superstitious.To prove that his throne was not snatched out of conscience, but was bestowed by God using various opportunities, it is impossible for the emperor not to believe in those nonsense such as prophecy and virtue. For example, Yang Jian's father is Yang Zhong, who was originally one of the twelve great generals of the Western Wei Dynasty. Later, he helped the Yuwen family usurp the Western Wei Dynasty, and was named Sui Guogong.After Yang Zhong passed away, Yang Jian inherited his father's title and also became Sui Guogong. After Yu Wenyun's death, he took control of the government and forced his grandson, the little emperor, to make himself Sui Wang.

You see, here comes the problem.Before Liu Bang became emperor, Xiang Yu made him the king of Han, so he established the empire, and the country name also used the word "Han"; Cao Pi was originally the king of Wei, and the word "Wei" was used when he established the empire; Sima Yan was originally the king of Jin, and the word "Wei" was used when he established the empire. The word "Jin"; Liu Yu was originally the king of Song, and he continued to use the word "Song" when he established the empire... Logically speaking, since Yang Jian climbed from the king to the throne of the emperor, the dynasty he created should be "Sui Dynasty", why? Did it become the "Sui Dynasty"?

This has something to do with superstition. Yang Jian planned to proclaim himself emperor and establish the name of the country, so he thought that the word "sui" was bad and unlucky.One way of saying, "Sui" means to follow, he is afraid that if he follows, the emperor's air will go with him; How can the glorious new dynasty follow in the footsteps of the old era?So, he looked up ancient books and found that the two characters Sui and Sui are both fake, and the word "Sui" looks so festive, let's just call it Da Sui! Therefore, since Yang Jian is so superstitious, it is impossible for him to abandon the theory of the five virtues that has lasted for so many years, and the history of the five virtues continues to turn a new page.

The Sui Dynasty was succeeded by the Northern Zhou Dynasty, and the virtues of the Northern Zhou Dynasty were messed up as mentioned above. Yang Jian simply cut the mess quickly, only looking for "wood virtue" to talk about things, and ignoring everything else.According to the theory of the mutual generation of five virtues, if wood makes fire, the Sui Dynasty should be the virtue of fire again. It is said that in the early years, someone presented a prophecy, saying: "The Chidi descended the essence, and the Sui was born by induction, so the Sui took Huode as the emperor of the Chidi." Even when Yang Jian received the letter of abdication, some people claimed to have just seen it A Suzaku landed on the roof of the palace... Anyway, it's an old auspicious bridge section, and it's clear that you get on the train first and then pay the fare.As we said, the change of "Sui" to "Sui" was thought up by Yang Jian. Before that, how could there be such a saying that "Sui was born by induction". Thinking about the name of the new country?

In short, the prophecies and auspicious signs were created, and they can "prove" that they are indeed prophecies from the heavens, and Sui Yinghuode.Then everything was logical, accepting Zen, ascending the throne, declaring the virtue of the dynasty as the virtue of fire, and the uniforms, flags, and sacrifices of the court meeting were all red and alive. Interestingly, at this time, Chen Chao, who was in the south of the Yangtze River, also claimed to be Huode.Since the demise of the Western Jin Dynasty, two sets of independent cycles of the Five Virtues have evolved in the north and the south, and they both consider themselves to be orthodox while the other is a tyrant, so the north calls the south "daoyi" and the south calls the north "suo" captive", no one looks down on anyone.However, by nature, after hundreds of years of reincarnation, the terminus of the two lines, "Chen" and "Sui", one in the south and the other in the north, happen to be fire virtues. The coincidence is astounding.And who is the real Huode emperor?Then it depends on which one burns more vigorously.

In the eighth year of Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty (AD 588), Yang Jian sent an army of 510,000 troops to the south to attack Chen, and they came to the city of Jiankang, the capital of Chen, almost without bloodshed.Chen Shubao, who only knows how to hold literary parties with his favorite concubines and ministers all day long and doesn't care about state affairs at all, panicked and dragged all the soldiers and horses outside the city to fight the enemy.But he forgot one important thing, so many soldiers, so many generals, he forgot to appoint a commander-in-chief. Ever since, Chen Jun did not belong to each other, did not cooperate with each other, and was completely collapsed by the Sui Army.The Sui army easily entered Jiankang City and entered the imperial palace, but they couldn't find Chen Shubao when they searched to the left, and Chen Shubao couldn't be found when they searched to the right—the city was surrounded like an iron barrel. A chance to escape?It was getting dark until someone was at the well in front of Jingyang Hall, and seemed to hear someone talking.He asked several times in the well, but no one answered, so Sui Bing threatened, "If you don't answer me, I will throw stones."

Sui Bing slid a rope into the well and asked the people inside to grab the rope so that they could be pulled out.This pulling was extraordinary, it turned out that Chen Shubao and his two favorite concubines - Concubine Zhang and Concubine Kong - hid in a well, and they were not afraid of trying to make a difference.Chen Shubao was captured like this, and Chen Chao was finished.Thinking about it, there is water in the well, and the Emperor Huode of the Chen Dynasty hid in the well, hasn't the fire been extinguished yet?Can you still fall? Since then, China has finally regained unity after more than three hundred years of great division, and the two branches of the cycle of five virtues have finally merged into one and reunited after undergoing various dazzling changes.

But wait a minute, although the Sui Dynasty was unified, the lifespan of this unified dynasty was too short. It was comparable to the Qin Dynasty, which was directly degraded by Zhang Cang, Liu Xin, and others as an interunification instead of a dynasty. Let’s say that Yang Jian, Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty, was a wise emperor who was praised by Westerners as the "Saint Khan". Under his rule, the government was very fat-what, you ask the common people?The common people are so poor, what's the matter with the son of Shengming?Yang Jian's attitude towards the common people is no different from that of Qin Shihuang except that the law is a little looser.When Qin Shihuang abused the power of the people, everyone said that if his eldest son, Fusu, who had a generous personality, could succeed to the throne, maybe the power of the people could be slowly recovered, so that the Qin Dynasty would not perish in the second generation.What about the Sui Dynasty?The next emperor of the Sui Dynasty was the famous Sui Yang Emperor Yang Guang.

Since the Five Husbands, I have appeared on the stage, and hundreds of emperors have been raging on the land of China. There are rare tyrants in the ages, and faint emperors that are rare in the ages. .But if you put all these guys together, I'm afraid they can't compare with Yang Guang in IQ, and they can't compare with Yang Guang in terms of violence, faintness, and strangeness. Not only did Yang Guang make the common people poorer and harder to live, but he also ruined the government fortune that his father had worked so hard to accumulate.He started a series of big projects, including the Grand Canal and the like, which was really a blessing for all ages, but so many big projects started at the same time and were hurriedly completed, and his courage would be jaw-dropping even if Qin Shihuang came back alive.As a result, the Sui Dynasty died in the hands of Yang Guang in just 30 years after the unification of the Sui Dynasty, and Yang Guang's cousin Li Yuan picked the fruits of reunification.

It is said (again, it is said) that shortly after Yang Guang ascended the throne, there was a prophecy rumor in the world, saying: "Mr. Li should be the Son of Heaven." Kill all the Chinese surnamed Li, so as to avoid future troubles.Yang Guang believed his words, but he couldn't agree - just kidding, "Zhang Wang Li Zhao is everywhere Liu", at that time Li was also a common surname, and there were half a million people in China if there were not one million, how could they be killed?Furthermore, if the countless important ministers in the court surnamed Li were all killed, how could Yang Guang, the emperor, sit firmly on the throne?

But someone saw a business opportunity from it... no, it was a good opportunity to slander, that is Yu Wenshu, the treacherous official and Baoguo Gong.Yu Wenshu passed a small story to Yang Guang, saying: "What Angata said has some truth, I heard that Li Hun, the Duke of Yi, often has small meetings with a group of people behind closed doors, and they must be discussing some conspiracy. This 'Li family should be the son of heaven' must be on his head." Yang Guang "followed the goodness" this time, anyway, it was easy to kill a person, so he immediately put Li Hun in prison and handed it over to Yu Wenshu for trial. Isn't this throwing the mouse to the cat? How can Li Hun get it?Yu Wenshu quickly obtained the confession he wanted by extorting and inducing a confession, and submitted it to Yang Guang.Yang Guang was also grateful to him, and said with tears: "My Sui Dynasty was almost finished. It all depends on my father-in-law (Yu Wenshu's second son, Yuwen Shiji, is a son-in-law, and married Yang Guang's daughter, Princess Nanyang). Ah!" ordered Li Hun and his followers to be executed. Li Hun is dead, but there are too many people surnamed Li. When the world is in chaos and wars are everywhere, people surnamed Li will use that prophecy to talk about things—if Yang Guang doesn’t kill Li Hun, haha It is nonsense to laugh at the prophecy rumors, and it is estimated that no one will want to use the prophecy rumors. Therefore, at the end of the tenth year of Daye (AD 614), a prophecy rumor suddenly spread on the streets of Luoyang, which said in more detail: "Peaches and plums win the world; the queen circles Yangzhou and turns around in the garden. Don't speak loudly, who will promise?" ?” A cultural person named Li Xuanying explained: “The homophony of 'tao' and 'fleeing' means that the fleeing Li family will take over the world; the second sentence means that both the emperor and the empress will stay in Yangzhou and it is difficult to return to the Central Plains; The third sentence says 'Don't speak language', which is to deduct the word 'secret'." This explanation couldn't be more clear, the one who wins the world will be "Li Mi".It should be said that there was a person named Li Mi at that time, and he was very famous. He used to be the Duke of Pushan County in the Sui Dynasty, and later assisted Yang Xuangan in rebelling against Yang Guang. After Yang Xuangan failed, he fled everywhere and finally entered Wagangzhai. Big boss.It is estimated that the prophecy rumor was made by Li Xuanying himself. He made up his own commentary to prove that Li Mi is the true son of heaven and will succeed the Sui Dynasty.In the beginning, Li Mi really lived up to his expectations. Among all the anti-kings, Wagangzhai was the strongest, but this Mr. Li Mi was proud of his victory, and he became more and more perverse, and finally he still failed to become the emperor. I'm afraid no one would have imagined at that time that this "son of heaven" surnamed Li should be on the head of Li Yuan. Li Yuan's mother and Yang Jian's wife are sisters, in other words, he is Yang Jian's nephew, Yang Guang's cousin, and a relative of a high family. No one would have thought that he would rebel against the Sui Dynasty.But seeing Yang Guang's misbehavior and the chaos in the world, Li Yuan thought that if I didn't do anything again, I would definitely die with Yang Guang.His surname is Yang, and my surname is Li. Why should I be buried with him?So he brazenly set up a pole in Taiyuan, then drove straight into Chang'an, and supported Yang Guang's grandson and acting king Yang You as emperor--Yang Guang was "overlord" without his knowledge. Yang You granted Li Yuan the Duke of Tang, and was later promoted to King of Tang. Then, logically, Li Yuan went one step further, accepted the abdication, and became the emperor of the Tang Dynasty.Now that the new dynasty was established, according to the custom, "virtue" had to be promoted. The five elements were born together, and fire gave birth to earth. Since the Sui Dynasty was the virtue of fire, Li Tang properly responded to the virtue of earth, and his clothes were yellow.