Chapter 11 1. Doomsday trends

The politics of the Western Han Dynasty can be divided into three periods, and their guiding theories are Huang-Laoism in the early stage, Gongyangology in the middle stage, and pure Confucianism in the late stage. Huang Lao's study emphasizes quietness and inaction, resting with the people. Gongyang School is a philosophical school based on Confucianism and using the technique of criminal names.The emergence of this theory on the political stage indicates that the Western Han regime began to replace the early inaction politics with the politics of desire.Xu Laodao said that "Gongyang Learning" is a study that disrupts the world, which means that "Gongyang Learning" broke Huang Lao's technique of quietness and inaction, and caused the world to fall into chaos.

In the later period, it was pure Confucianism, keen to imitate the so-called "sage system" recorded in Confucian classics, such as abdication, Jingtian, Zhouli... Obviously, this is a kind of political theory full of nerds, and it is "Gongyangology" extension. The decline and fall of the Western Han Dynasty began in the late period of Emperor Wu. Although the revival of Emperor Zhao and Xuan was experienced in the middle, it began to decline completely since Emperor Yuan who sent Zhaojun out of the fortress. Emperor Yuan's father, Emperor Xuan, once had a precise evaluation of this son. In "Hanshu·Yuandi Ji", Emperor Xuan sighed: "The prince is also the one who messes up my family!" Why did he say this?This involves the conflict between Emperor Xuan and Emperor Yuan's father and son ruling the country.

This is not surprising. Since Qin Shihuang wiped out the six kingdoms, how to govern such a huge unified empire has always been a topic of discussion among the wise men of ancient China: Confucianism talks about benevolence and justice, Legalism talks about system, military strategists talk about conquest, Taoism talks about inaction, peasants talk about Talking about Ligeng... There are many plans listed in terms of ideology and technology, some of which are of considerable value even today. However, the great unified empire is also most afraid that there will be no unified governance thinking, and if one sheep and nine shepherds, there will be big troubles.Qin Shihuang simply and rudely adopted the method of burning books and burying Confucianism to unify his thoughts-but history has proved that this is just ostrich logic, and it failed to really solve the problem.

Qin Shihuang only ruled the country based on experience, and did not leave a set of applicable theories to his successors. In addition, Qin II was mediocre, and the Qin Dynasty quickly collapsed. However, the early Han Dynasty was not much stronger in this regard. Han Gaozu could only be regarded as "empirical", and even went back to the old road of enfeoffment, leaving the future generations with endless disasters. chaos". The three dynasties of Hui, Wen, and Jing began to reflect on the rules of governing the country after recuperating, abolished the "law of relying on books", found out and rearranged historical documents such as "Spring and Autumn" and "Shangshu", and examined and studied from a historical perspective. They—this is the historical background for the prosperity of Confucianism.

By the time Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty "dismissed all schools of thought and respected Confucianism alone", Confucianism finally established its dominant position and became the guiding ideology for ruling the country in the next two thousand years. In the Western Han Dynasty, it first appeared as the rise of "Gongyang School" , later manifested as the heyday of "pure Confucianism". Between Emperor Xuan and Emperor Yuan, it was the era when Confucianism was rampant, and all kinds of whimsical ideas based on the basic theories of Confucianism emerged one after another. A key part of the combination of domination.

Emperor Yuan was deeply influenced by Confucianism, to the point where he had to compare his behavior with a book-this has gone to the extreme-jumped from the "Gongyang School" of dialectically accepting Confucian theory to blindly following Confucian theory. "Pure Confucianism". His father, Emperor Xuan, disagreed with this, saying: "The Han family has its own system, which is based on the overlord's way, but it is purely a moral education, and it uses Zhou politics! Moreover, the vulgar Confucianism is out of date, so that the past is not the present, which makes people dazzled by fame." In fact, if you don’t know what to keep, what’s the point of appointing?”

The old emperor's view is justified. At that time, although the immature Confucianism had the upper hand and had merits in theory, it was still in the process of running in with the secular regime. It needs to be verified by practice. Governing an unprecedentedly large empire without any existing experience to learn from, people at that time inevitably had to explore and experiment carefully; since it was exploration and experimentation, failures were inevitable; the failure of a dynasty's rule naturally required human effort This is responsible, and it is nailed to the pillar of shame in history—but we should reflect on what we have gained from these failed explorations and experiments?

The following history will tell us how difficult it is to take an unexplored road! At the beginning of the era of great unification, people believed that there should be a new order in the new era, and it was no longer a matter of course that "the father passed on the son, and the family belonged to the world", and the theory of "abdication" became popular for a while. As early as Emperor Zhaodi of the Han Dynasty, there was a Confucian Sui Hong who wrote to the emperor due to a disaster, advising him: "Look for a sage, take the throne, and retreat to be a hundred miles away." He suggested that the emperor let the sage become the county magistrate himself.

At the time of Emperor Xuan, another Mr. Gai Kuanrao also said: "The five emperors govern the world, and the three kings family the world. Families pass on their sons, and officials pass on their virtuous people. The luck of the four seasons, those who succeed will retire, and those who are not suitable will not occupy their positions." .” In the eyes of Confucian scholars of later generations, this is simply deviant and apostate, and should not be heard. However, at that time, this was a generally accepted idea of ​​Confucianism-the example of the abdication of the three generations of Yao, Shun, and Yu was not passed down as a good story in "Shangshu" So why shouldn't we follow suit?

Based on this alone, we cannot simply say that there was no "democracy" in ancient China, but only a dark dictatorship - what we lack is only a reasonable understanding of "Mr. De". But this Mr. Suihong was unlucky, and met Huo Guang as the assistant government.Mr. Huo Guang was afraid that people would misunderstand that he was creating public opinion and trying to usurp power. To avoid suspicion, he killed Sui Hong, but he did not seriously oppose Sui Hong's ideas. However, there are really people who dare to do what Huo Guang dare not do.Decades later, a son of a foreign relative named Wang Mang took over the fate of the Han Dynasty amidst calls for abdication.

He was the hapless experimenter.