Chapter 7 Chapter Six Emperor Jing Liu Qi

Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty Liu Qi was the grandson of Liu Bang, the founding emperor of the Western Han Dynasty, and the son of Emperor Wen Liu Heng.Liu Qi was born in Dai State (now in Yu County, Hebei Province) when his father was the king of Dai, and his mother was Concubine Dou.Before and after Liu Heng, the king of Dai, entered Beijing to become emperor, the queen of Dai and her four sons died of illness one after another, and Liu Qi became the eldest son of Emperor Wen.In the first year of Emperor Wen (179 BC), Liu Qili was the crown prince, and his mother Dou Ji was the queen.Emperor Wen died of illness in the seventh year of the Yuan Dynasty (157 BC). Liu Qi, 32, came to the throne as Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty, and his mother was the Empress Dowager.

At the beginning of the founding of the Western Han Dynasty, some princes and kings with the same surname were enfeoffed, and these princes and kings had great fiefdoms and power.They owned an army, set up their own official positions, and their political and economic power continued to grow. By the time of Emperor Wen, the two kings of Jibei and Huainan rebelled one after another, and the princes and kings of the Pingfan Han Dynasty had become a serious threat to the central court.At that time, Jia Yi once sharply pointed out that the power of vassal kings was a major disease of the Han Dynasty and must be eradicated; Chao Cuo also put forward the same opinion and advocated the reduction of vassals.But Emperor Wen did not fully implement their ideas.When Emperor Jing came to the throne, the first national urgent task he faced was how to relieve the threat of the power of the vassal kings to the Han Dynasty.On this issue, he fully adopted Chao Cuo's proposition.

Chao Cuo was ambitious, knowledgeable, eloquent, and once served as the prince's family order.After Emperor Jing came to the throne, he appointed him as an internal historian, and then worshiped him as a doctor of imperial history, ranking among the three princes.He is quite familiar with the situation of the feudal king.He thought that the powerful and most dangerous of the vassal princes was Wu Wang Liu Bi.Liu Bi is Liu Bang's nephew. After Liu Bang made him king of Wu, he expected that he might rebel in the future, and he regretted it.After Liu Bi came to the country, he bought people's hearts and developed his power, in an attempt to seize the throne one day.When Emperor Jing was the prince, the prince of Wu Wang entered the capital and competed with him for the road. He was accidentally injured by Emperor Jing and died. Liu Bi held a grudge and stepped up his steps to prepare for the rebellion.By the time Emperor Jing came to the throne, Liu Bi had prepared for 40 years to become the most threatening prince.

Therefore, Chao Cuo advocated cutting the fief of King Wu first.He said to Emperor Jing: "In the past, because the crown prince died at the hands of His Majesty, the king of Wu had a deep resentment towards the court. He pretended to be sick and refused to come to Beijing to worship the emperor. According to the ancient law, he should be executed. Emperor Wen couldn't bear to increase the punishment, and rewarded him with a few sticks. Allowing him not to come to worship, the kindness can be described as great. King Wu will not change his past, but will become more presumptuous, open mountains to make money, boil sea salt, attract fugitives from all over the world, and plot rebellion. Now that his fiefdoms are taken away, he will rebel. If there is no exploitation, there will be rebellion. To exploit, if he hastily rebels early, the disaster will be less;

Chao Cuo's proposition was opposed by his relative Dou Ying, so the matter of cutting Wu had to be put on hold for the time being.However, the other three countries of Chu, Zhao, and Jiaoxi were cut off for their crimes. King Chu cut Donghai County, King Zhao cut Changshan County, King Jiaoxi cut 6 counties, Chao Cuo revised 30 chapters of relevant laws, and the princes were noisy for a while. , the response was strong.The vassal kings naturally regarded Chao Cuo as a thorn in their side, and wished they could eat their flesh and hide their skins.Chao Cuo's father also felt that his son was in danger, so he rushed from his hometown Yingchuan to the capital to persuade his son.Chao Cuo refused to listen, and his father committed suicide by taking poison.Chao Cuo was unmoved, and still insisted on taking away the King of Wu.In the end, Emperor Jing decided to cut Wu Kuaiji and Yuzhang counties.

When Liu Bi, king of Wu, saw that the imperial court was cutting down the vassals, he rebelled.He first sent people to collude with Liu Wu, the king of Chu, and then he disguised himself as an envoy to meet Liu Wu in person in the state of Chu and reached a covenant of rebellion;In the first month of the third year of Emperor Jing's Yuan Dynasty (154 BC), as soon as the edict to cut Wu arrived, Liu Bi first set up troops in Guangling (now Yangzhou). Huaishui, united with Chu soldiers, came to Liang; then Jiaodong, Jiaoxi, Jinan, and Zichuan raised troops and surrounded Linzi, the capital of Qi; Enter.In this way, with King Wu as the leader, a total of seven vassal kings were involved in the rebellion, which was known as the "Rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms of Wu and Chu" in history.

At this time, under the introduction of Dou Ying, Yuan An, who had been Wu Xiang and had a rift with Chao Cuo, took the opportunity to persuade Emperor Jing to kill Chao under the guise of "killing Chao Cuo and sending Jishe" during the Seven Kingdoms Rebellion. Make a mistake to stop the rebellion, and claim it so that the rebellion can be suppressed without bloodshed.Emperor Jing was kind, and remained silent after hearing this.He couldn't bear to think of Chao Cuo's deep friendship with him, and being a powerful minister of the court, but he also thought that fighting together would kill people and cause blood to flow like rivers.Quan came back and forth, and finally said: "It's really like this. For the sake of the stability of the world, I don't cherish a minister." Zongzheng Liu Tong packed up and went eastward to announce that the king of Wu would stop his troops.

Emperor Jing's killing of Chao Cuo naturally made the vassals happy, but his truce edict was mercilessly mocked by King Wu: "I am already the emperor of the East. Who else deserves me to issue an edict?" At this time, Only then did Emperor Jing understand the truth of the matter and realized the seriousness of the problem.On the one hand, he regretted killing Chao Cuo, on the other hand, he abandoned his fantasy and prepared to suppress the rebellion by force.He sent Li Ji to lead a team to attack Zhao, sent Luan Bu to lead a team into Qi, sent Taiwei Zhou Yafu to lead 36 generals to plan to attack Wu and Chu rebels, and called Dou Yingbai as the general to station troops in Xingyang to monitor the battle situation.

Zhou Yafu led his troops to defend Changyi, and sent a surprise army out of Huaisikou to cut off the rebel army's food road.The rebels stormed Liang Guo, and Liang Guo asked Yafu for help, but Yafu refused to send troops.King Liang sent envoys to ask Emperor Jing, and Emperor Jing ordered Yafu to send troops to rescue Liang, but Yafu refused to obey his grandson's attitude of "the general is away, and the emperor's order is not accepted".After persisting in this way for a while, the situation became unfavorable to the rebels.The king of Wu planned to go west, but Liang Guo defended the city and dared not rush into it; he attacked Changyi, but the high fortress of Yafu did not fight;In the end, the king of Chu committed suicide, and the king of Wu fled to Dongyue, where he was killed by the people of Dongyue.Wu Chu rebelled. It was settled in 3 months.Luan Bu led his army to Qi, and soon broke the joint forces of Jiaodong, Jiaoxi, Jinan, and Zichuan, and all four kings were executed.Then Luan Bu returned to assist Li Ji to attack Zhao, flooded the city with water, and the king of Zhao committed suicide.So far, the Seven Kingdoms Rebellion has all been put down.

After the Rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms was put down, Emperor Jing made some adjustments to the fiefs of the rebellious kings, and took advantage of the remaining prestige of suppressing the rebellion. Kingdom officials were demoted from their ranks, and the independent status of the kingdom was abolished.From then on, the princes and kings could only pay the rent and tax of the kingdom of food and clothing, and could not interfere with the administration. They became nobles with titles but no real power, and the threat of the vassal kings to the court was basically eliminated. After Emperor Jing ascended the throne, he continued to follow Emperor Wen's policy of governing the country, maintaining a stable situation, developing production, and recuperating.In order to achieve this goal, he adopted the measures of emphasizing agriculture, reducing income, light punishment and indoctrination internally, and adopted measures of continuing to be pro-Huns externally.

In the first month of the next year when Emperor Jing came to the throne, he learned that the agricultural and animal husbandry resources in various places were unbalanced. Some counties lacked the conditions for farming and animal husbandry, while some counties were sparsely populated, which was good for farming and animal husbandry. At that time, the government did not allow people to migrate, so he announced that he would allow People migrated to areas with vast land and few people to develop production.In order to encourage farmers to work in the field, it was announced in the same year that half of the land rent would be reduced or exempted.Land rent is a land tax levied by the state.In the Han Dynasty, the regular system of land rent was "Shiwu Tax One", that is, one-fifteenth of the harvest was paid immediately; Emperor Jing changed it to "Thirty Tax One", that is, one-thirtieth was paid.Emperor Jing always attached great importance to agricultural production. Until his later years, he continued to emphasize the importance of the foundation of agriculture and mulberry.In order to rest with the people and develop production, Emperor Jing used the power of the people cautiously.During his reign, except for building a small-scale Yangling for himself, he basically did not build other civil engineering projects. Light punishment is also a measure to calm the people that Emperor Jing paid more attention to.Emperor Wen once reduced the punishment, abolished the corporal punishment passed down from generation to generation, and changed the corporal punishment to flogging. He became disabled or even killed, so he continued to reduce the punishment as soon as he took office.The flogging punishment was changed several times by Emperor Jing, which prevented the prisoner from dying under the punishment.Zong Xing was a kind of torture that split the corpse at that time. Emperor Jing changed Zun Xing to abandoning the market.Emperor Jing also pardoned the world several times.In order to avoid wronging the innocent, Emperor Jing gave repeated orders and repeated orders, emphasizing that the prison sentence must be lenient first, even if it is inappropriate, it is not an exaggeration, and reminded the judges not to "use harshness as a judgment, and strictness as a clear", and require that the sentence should be punished according to the law , but if the criminal refuses to accept, it must be re-evaluated, and everything must reflect generosity and kindness. In the field of thought, Emperor Jing pursued Huang Lao's thought of governing by doing nothing, but in academics he adopted an inclusive attitude towards all schools of thought, allowing each school to argue.Wang Sheng, a scholar, is a master of Huang Lao Taoism. He was often called to live in the palace and became the guest of Emperor Jing.While advocating Huang-Lao Taoism, Emperor Jing also paid great attention to the enlightening role of Confucianism.At that time, many doctoral officers were set up for Confucianism. "Poetry", "Spring and Autumn" and other books all established doctors. Emperor Jing appointed Dong Zhongshu and Hu Wusheng, masters of "Gongyang" studies, as doctors. influences.Located in Shu County in the southwest, all ethnic groups live together, and their culture and customs are very backward. The county guard Wen Weng selected more than ten people including Zhang Shu, a small and medium-sized official from the county, to study in Beijing as a doctoral officer, and returned to the county after a few years. The establishment of the first local government-run school in China——Chengdu Xueguan, made the education of Shu County popular, and its culture jumped to keep pace with Qilu and other places.Later, the county schools that became popular all over the country were established based on the model of the Shu County Academy. Diplomatically, Emperor Jing continued to adopt the policy of making peace with the Xiongnu since the early Han Dynasty.In the first year of Qianyuan (156 BC), Emperor Jing sent Tao Qing, a doctor of imperial history, to the frontier fortress of Daijun to discuss peace with the Xiongnu.In the autumn of the following year, peace talks were held with the Huns.In the fifth year of Yuan Dynasty before Emperor Jing, the Han Dynasty sent the princess to marry the Xiongnu Chanyu.Although the Han and Huns were close, the Huns still invaded the Han territory on a small scale from time to time.Regarding the invasion and plunder of the Huns, Emperor Jing started from the overall situation of maintaining the harmony between the Han and the Huns, and never sent troops to counterattack. At most, he only added some cavalry and infantry to guard the defense.In order to maintain the harmonious relationship between the Han and the Hungarians, Emperor Jing also set up a customs city on the border between the Han and the Hungarians to communicate with each other, which greatly promoted and facilitated the economic and cultural exchanges between the Han and the Hungarians.This lenient policy towards Hungary ensured the social stability of the Han Dynasty and played a great role in the recuperation of the people. During Emperor Jing's reign, he followed Emperor Wen's policy of governing the country, maintained stability, and rested with the people, so that the society and economy at that time developed steadily.This period and the period of Emperor Wen are collectively called the "Government of Wenjing" in history, and it is the era of peace in the Western Han Dynasty. The reason why Emperor Han Jing was able to achieve the "Government of Wen and Jing" was not only related to his knowledge of people, his ability to distinguish between right and wrong, but also his gentleness, sincerity, quietness, A benevolent character is not unrelated. For a monarch, it is not easy to be able to recognize talents and choose talents, but it is even more difficult to be able to make decisions without deciding on likes and dislikes, and distinguish right from wrong.In these two aspects, Emperor Han Jing did a good job. Zhi are all harsh officials who enforce the law and do not shy away from the powerful.There is a big and powerful clan in Jinan, and none of the prefects dared to control it. Emperor Jing worshiped him as the prefect of Jinan, and he killed the head of the clan. One year later, Jinan County became a state of Qingming.Later, Emperor Jing appointed Zhidu as the prefect of Yanmen, and the Huns were afraid of Zhidu, so they led their troops away and did not dare to approach Yanmen.Ning Cheng is also a harsh official who enforces the law without avoiding the powerful.Chang'an lived with many dignitaries of the clan, who behaved mischievously, and no one dared to control the officials in Beijing. Emperor Jing transferred Ning to become a lieutenant, and suppressed the clan dignitaries who broke the law in one fell swoop.Cheng Bushi dared to remonstrate directly, so Emperor Jing appointed him as the Taizhong doctor who commented on the government.Shi Fen had the power to shake the Lord, and Emperor Jing appointed him as the Prime Minister of the princes.Zhou Ren kept his mouth shut, and Emperor Jing appointed him as Lang Zhongling, as a close minister.When Emperor Jing employed people, he tried his best to choose talents and make use of their strengths. Foreign relatives have been a sensitive issue in the Han Dynasty since the time of Emperor Gaozu.Emperor Jing was quite able to distinguish each other in this regard, and did not make partial generalizations. He neither allowed his relatives to monopolize power, but also appointed talented relatives to appropriate official positions.Dou Ying was a relative. During the Wu-Chu Rebellion, Emperor Jing inspected the clan Dou, and no one surpassed Dou Ying, so he made him a general and led his troops to guard Xingyang. Dou Ying did not take on important responsibilities.But later, Empress Dowager Dou asked Emperor Jing to worship Dou Ying as prime minister several times, but Emperor Jing did not listen. Empress Dowager Dou was quite complaining. Emperor Jing said: "Don't you think I am reluctant to give him the position of prime minister? He is complacent and behaves frivolously." , the prime minister must be mature and prudent, and he is not competent." After careful consideration, Bai Weiwan became the prime minister. The bus ordered Zhang Shizhi to be a direct minister of Emperor Wen. When Emperor Jing Liu Qi was the crown prince, he and his younger brother Liu Wu, the king of Liang, entered the court together. They did not get off the bus when they reached the Sima Gate. I filed a complaint.The incident alarmed Empress Dowager Bo, and Emperor Wen apologized to Empress Dowager Bo, blaming himself for "discipline in teaching his son", which made the prince quite embarrassed.After Emperor Jing came to the throne, he did not blame Zhang Shizhi, but still let him take the original post of Tingwei.Zhang Shi later became Prime Minister of Huainan and died of old age.Deng Tong, the senior official, was Emperor Wen's favored minister. He had no talent, but was favored by Emperor Wen by chance.Emperor Wen had an abscess, and Deng usually sucked the pus and blood for Emperor Wen with his mouth.Emperor Wen asked Deng Tong who loved him the most, and Deng Tong replied that the prince loved him the most.As soon as Prince Liu Qi arrived, Emperor Wen asked Liu Qi to suck for himself.Although Liu Qi did as Emperor Wen ordered, he looked distressed. Later, when he learned the root cause of the matter, he couldn't help feeling resentful towards Deng Tong.After Emperor Wen's death, Emperor Jing Liu Qi considered that Deng Tong had no talent other than seeking favor from Emperor Wen, so he removed him from his official position and let him go home to live.Later, Deng Tong violated the law by casting money across the border. Emperor Jing only confiscated his family property, but did not punish him with death. Not only for his courtiers, Emperor Jing was also full of benevolence and love for his compatriots, siblings and concubines in the palace. He was considerate and sheltered, and avoided many unnecessary conflicts; Let go, never tolerate and accommodate.The most notable example is the treatment of the younger brother's succession and the establishment of the queen. Emperor Jing's mother, Empress Dou, had 2 boys and 1 girl. Emperor Jing Liu Qi was the eldest son, his younger brother Liu Wu was named King of Liang, and his sister Liu Xing was called the eldest princess, and she married Chen Wu.Emperor Jing's mother and brother only had Liu Wu, so he was inseparable from Liu Wu since childhood.After Liu Wufeng came to the country, he entered the court year after year and was often detained in the capital.Once, Emperor Jing held a family banquet for Liu Wu, king of Liang. At that time, the crown prince had not yet been established in the court. Emperor Jing drank happily and said to King Liang: "When I am a hundred years old, I will pass on the throne to King Liang." Empress Dowager Dou listened, but did not take it seriously.Later, because of his meritorious service in quelling the rebellion of the seven kingdoms of Wu and Chu, coupled with the favor of Queen Mother Dou, he became invincible for the rest of his life.He built a Dongyuan with a radius of more than 300 miles, and expanded the capital Suiyang (now Shangqiu, Henan Province) into a large city with a circumference of 70 miles. Wan Qi is just like the emperor.He also made more soldiers, bows and arrows, and recruited heroes from all over the world. Counselors such as Yang Sheng and Gongsun Gui defected to King Liang one after another.After time passed, Empress Dowager Dou and Liu Wu became serious about the words of "passing on the throne of Liang Wang", and planned to let Emperor Jing establish Liu Wu as the heir to the throne.After Yuan An and his ministers heard the news, they revealed the stakes of this issue to Emperor Jing, which made Emperor Jing firm in his claim that the throne must be passed on to his son.After Liang Wang knew about it, he didn't dare to say anything to Queen Mother Dou, so he hurriedly resigned from Beijing and returned home.After Liang Wang returned to his country, he appointed the prince in court.Soon, Liang Wang died of illness.Emperor Jing deplored his close relatives, and in order to comfort his mother, he made King Liang's five sons kings and his five daughters a fief. When Emperor Jing was the prince, Li Ji gave birth to a son named Liu Rong; after he came to the throne, Wang Meiren also gave birth to a son, Liu Che.When Beauty Wang was pregnant with Liu Che, she dreamed that the sun entered her bosom. She told Emperor Jing about the dream, and Emperor Jing said, "This is a sign of nobility." Because Liu Rong was old, Emperor Jing made Liu Rong the prince and Liu Che the king of Jiaodong.Li Ji was a jealous woman. Emperor Jing only had a few concubines and more than 10 court ladies, but she was still full of jealousy, thinking of ways to control everyone from time to time.Originally, Emperor Jing wanted to make her a queen and entrust her to take care of his concubines and children after a hundred years. Seeing her like this, he remembered the jealousy and cruelty of Queen Lu back then, and decided not to make her a queen.He also felt that since Liu Rong was the crown prince, when Liu Rong came to the throne in the future, Li Ji would still gain power. In order to eradicate the root of the trouble and keep a large group of children, Liu Rong's position as crown prince should be abolished.Just when Emperor Jing was considering whether to abolish the prince, the eldest princess came to praise Liu Che to him again.Emperor Jing himself thought that Liu Che's intelligence was higher than that of Liu Rong. Besides, Wang Meiren still had a dream, so he decided to abolish Liu Rong and establish Liu Che.At this time, it happened that a small court official was tricked by Wang Meiren and persuaded Emperor Jing to make Li Ji his queen, saying that "the son is more valuable than the mother, and the mother is more valuable than the son".Emperor Jing took the opportunity to kill this person and abolished the prince Liu Rong as the king of Linjiang.Soon, Wang Meiren was made the queen, and Liu Che was the prince. Emperor Jing had 14 sons in total, Liu Che was the prince, and the other 13 sons were all crowned kings. Emperor Jing died in Weiyang Palace in the third year of Houyuan (141 BC) and reigned for 16 years.48 years old.On the day Emperor Jing died, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty Liu Che ascended the throne.On the 10th day of his accession to the throne, a funeral was held for his father. He was buried in Yangling (southwest of Gaoling, Shaanxi today), and was given the posthumous title of "Emperor Xiaojing".