Chapter 28 Chapter 28: An Alternative to the Controversy of a Hundred Schools of Thought——Farm House

Compared with the Mohist School, which had a glorious moment in the Warring States Period, another forgotten school of farming, also had a very important position in the Warring States Period. Most of the main ideas of the peasant family have been lost today, mainly because Qin Shihuang burned books to bury Confucianism, and most of the classic works of the peasant family were burned.However, judging from the surviving materials, the basic idea of ​​the peasant family is agricultural equality, which requires the ruler to work with the peasants and distribute the fruits of labor together, and opposes the excessive oppression of the peasants by the ruler.Another contribution of farmers is in agricultural science. Their research on agricultural production, especially research on increasing farmland output and improving farming techniques, has an important impact on the development of Chinese agriculture.

As for the origin of this school, there were different opinions at that time. Due to the burning of many relevant materials, there are many different opinions about the identity and origin of the Farm School.There are two popular theories, one is a member of the peasant school, who is a descendant of the Shennong clan in ancient times, and the other is a descendant of the Housu clan of the ancient Zhou clan.In fact, the prosperity of the peasant family in the Warring States Period was just a manifestation of the increase in the number of self-cultivating farmers and the collapse of the traditional well-field system during the Warring States Period.Many members of the farming family are themselves farmers engaged in agricultural production. The relationship between them and the peasant class can be described as blood.

Speaking of the representatives of the Farm School, the most famous one is Xu Xing. Like Mozi, Xu Xing is also a very mysterious person.According to relevant records, he was a native of Chu, and he should have lived during the reign of King Xuan of Chu to King Huai of Chu. He was a contemporary of the Confucianist Mencius. "Mencius Teng Wengong" by Mencius. The most important activity in Xu Xing's life was leading his disciples to open up wasteland and cultivate land on the Jianghan Plain.His proposition is that "the sages and the people farm and eat together", that is to say, even the king should work and eat together with the people.To live on rent and taxes, as the landowners do, is a disgraceful way of getting something for nothing.When Mencius went to Teng to promote Confucianism, he happened to see Xu Xing leading his disciples to pay a visit to Teng Wengong.He asked Teng Wengong to give him a piece of land as a test field, where he worked as a demonstration, and hoped that Teng Wengong could participate in their labor. Teng Wengong agreed to his request and gave him a piece of land.Afterwards, Xu Xing led his disciples to work hard in Teng country, and they soon reaped very good harvests. Their actions have attracted the attention of many scholars, including Mencius, the master of the Confucian school.

Although Mencius admired the hard work of the peasant family, he did not agree with the views of the peasant school. When Xu Xing’s disciple Chen Xiang talked with Mencius, they had a fierce quarrel about many issues of the peasant school. Wen Gong, Chen Xiang said with emotion, Teng Wengong is not a holy king after all.Mencius asked why?Chen Xiang said that Teng Wengong himself did not work, his warehouse was full of grain, and he enjoyed what was not his grain. This is a shameful reaping for nothing.Of course, Mencius disagreed with this point of view. He had a heated debate with Chen Xiang. Mencius used the hat worn by Xu Xing as an analogy and said that the hat you wear, Xu Xing, was bought with grain, that is, with your In exchange for the labor of the king, the grain eaten by the monarch is also exchanged for his mental labor.After saying a few words, Chen Xiang was no match for Mencius, and he immediately fell tongue-tied. Instead, Mencius threw out his point of view: Those who work hard will rule others, and those who work hard will rule others.

Even so, the farm school has not changed its original intention. In the concept of the farm school, labor is honorable, and getting something for nothing is shameful.They opposed the government’s establishment of warehouses to store grain, and opposed those urban people who did not participate in agricultural production but obtained grain to eat. In the eyes of the peasant school, this is also a shameful way of getting something for nothing.The emergence of this new school was not accidental at that time. This era was the period when feudalization was formed in the Warring States Period, and the status of ordinary self-cultivating farmers was improved. In terms of academics, their spokespersons also needed to appear.The transformation of land ownership has also made the importance of agriculture increasingly prominent. Under this situation, ordinary self-cultivating farmers are eager to improve their lives and reduce taxes on themselves. Proud of identity.Farmers have become their spokespersons.

The core idea of ​​the farm family, the main sentence is "encourage farmers to have enough food and clothing", that is, they hope to establish an agricultural society where everyone farms and eats together, and all people work in agriculture. It is best not to have cities.Members of the farm school regard agriculture as their own life and an inseparable part of their lives. They are proud of being a farmer and engaged in agricultural production, and they enthusiastically persuade many figures in the ideological world and The political elite, join their factions.But under the conditions at that time, the farmers' market was still too small, and not many people really understood them.Later in the Western Han Dynasty, when Liu Xiang compiled the "Book of the Later Han Dynasty", the peasant family was placed among the nine streams, and it seemed to be an important faction.

But in the society at that time, the peasant family was also of use value to the princes from all walks of life.Because treating farmers with courtesy means that they can win over the farmers behind the farmers, especially the self-cultivating farmers. If the farmers are given proper respect, it will definitely help stabilize the rule.With such a purpose in mind, many princes at that time treated the peasants very politely. Of course, this was superficial courtesy. The propositions of canceling warehouses and cities as advertised by the peasants were absolutely unacceptable to the princes of all walks of life.For the vassal states, the peasant family thought is a very good signboard, but its mainstream content must not be used.

During the Warring States period, the ideological content of the peasant family was dominated by Xu, but it also turned into different factions.During the entire Warring States period, the farming ideas began to be systematically sorted out, but it was thanks to Lu Buwei. During Lu Buwei's tenure as Prime Minister of the Qin State, he began to organize people to compile the famous "Lushi Chunqiu". The four chapters of "Shangnong", "Rendi", "Biantu" and "Shenshi" in "Lushi Chunqiu" clearly put forward the theory of emphasizing agriculture.In Shangnong, peasant thinkers put forward the theory of respecting farmers and giving priority to the development of agriculture. The article "Ren Di" describes in detail how to improve the fertility of the land, identify the degree of fertility of the land, and how to improve the quality of the soil in agricultural cultivation.The softness, hardness, and thinness of the soil are all explained in great detail. The farm theory in "Lu Shi Chunqiu" is the concentration of the main idea of ​​the farm and the concept of agriculture.In particular, in "Shen Shi", the farming time of agricultural production was divided very carefully, and the quality of seeds was also explained in great detail. In China at that time, four simple articles could become A treasure trove of Chinese agricultural production.

And another book with very detailed records of peasant thoughts is "Guanzi" compiled by Jixia Academy of Qi State. Among them, "Diyuan" is a purely peasant work, and in "Wufu", "Shepherd" and "Eight Chapters" And other chapters, also expounded in detail the various contents of the farm thought. The important significance of "Guanzi" to the peasant thought is that the main content of the peasant thought was placed in the chapter about "people-oriented", because in China at that time, peasants were the main body of the common people, and what the peasant advocated The idea of ​​emphasizing agriculture is actually in line with the idea of ​​putting people first.The ideas of emphasizing agriculture and emphasizing the people are themselves a pair of twin brothers.It is this kind of connection that makes the farmhouse thought in "Guanzi" have many progressive meanings beyond agriculture itself.

An important feature of the peasant thought in "Guan Zi" is that it reflects the simple materialism of ancient China. , against the will of the people.” This idea clearly puts the hearts of the people at the height of “politics”. In the eyes of peasant thinkers, the people have become the key to the survival and abolition of the regime. This is bolder than the "people are the most precious" in Confucianism. In addition to putting forward the idea of ​​people-oriented, farmers also show a strong sense of urgency, which should be inseparable from the long-standing situation that Chinese agriculture depends on the sky for food.Farm scholars who have tasted the bitterness of relying on the sky in their own farming have a strong sense of crisis.In "Guanzi", agricultural scholars clearly put forward the idea of ​​"cultivating hunger and relieving disasters". They believe that if a country's agriculture is to develop, it must do a good job in early warning of natural disasters and improve its ability to resist risks.

The core idea of ​​the peasant family in the Warring States period is also vividly reflected in "Guanzi" - emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business.The Peasant School believes that agriculture is the foundation of the national economy. The common people have to eat, and the army also depends on the supply of military food to defend the country. Therefore, the development of agriculture is the top priority of a country's national economy.And businessmen themselves do not create wealth, they just buy cheap and sell expensive with other people's wealth. Therefore, commercial activities are actually a kind of damage to the national economy.Therefore, if a country wants long-term stability, it must resolutely implement the policy of "emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business".In the agricultural scholars' policy of emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business, they do not advocate the banning of commercial activities, but hope that the government will adopt strong suppression measures to limit the development of commercial activities and reduce the profit range of commercial activities to the minimum. scale, giving agriculture sufficient room for development. If we compare the following history, it is not difficult to find that the good wishes of peasant scholars were finally established by the Han Dynasty after the turmoil in the end of Qin Dynasty.Since then, the policy of emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business has become the basic national policy of China's two thousand years of feudal society.During the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods, the farmers did not appear as a mainstream school of thought. Their idea of ​​"food is the first thing for the people" eventually became the foundation of China's feudal economic development. What the heroes of the farm school didn't expect was that the knowledge they devoted their lives to would affect another place they didn't even know after more than two thousand years: Europe. During the cultural exchanges between the East and the West in the 17th century, a large number of traditional Chinese cultural classics were translated to the West, including the classics of the Chinese pre-Qin schools of thought, especially the "Guanzi", which recorded the thoughts of farmers, and was adopted by the missionaries at that time. Matteo Ricci translated into Latin.The Chinese agrarian school quickly caused considerable fluctuations in Western society. The French Physiocrats, which arose in the 17th century, vigorously introduced discussions about commercial activities from farmers and attacked Western mercantilism.The outcome of this debate between mercantilism and physiocratism almost determined the final direction of European capitalization.The theories that originated in the early days of Chinese feudalization can still have a deafening effect on Europe in the Enlightenment Century.