Chapter 51 Chapter 2 The Saddest Emperor of the Qing Dynasty

After this incident, history continued to move forward, and finally came to this day. The Opium War is mentioned in all our history textbooks, but we Chinese do not know much about the detailed process of this war.Because there is a political hat on the front, we call it a big disgrace.The same was broken into the country, the Chinese and Japanese have completely different attitudes towards the colonists.We are a century-old national humiliation, and the alarm bells are always ringing, and we have been educating our descendants in this way. Japan, which was later than ours, had been closing the country at first. Admiral Perry of the United States led a fleet to break through the Japanese blockade, bombarded Japan, and finally opened the door of Japan.How do the Japanese view this matter?They still have a bronze statue of General Perry. They believe that it was General Perry who opened their country and let them go to the world, so they are very grateful.

And they never think it is a shame, because their view of history is this: the country at that time was an empire, and the subjects were just slaves, not the masters of the country. The shame of the slave owner is not the shame of the slave, on the contrary, the slave owner The shame may be an opportunity for the emancipation of the slaves. These are two interpretations of a similar historical process by two different peoples.Today, we must re-examine the values ​​of our nation.To examine a value concept, we must first determine the basis and source of this value concept. We all know that the Chinese Empire is a power empire.What is the source of power?There are three: The first is violence, which is the most familiar model to the Chinese. The legal source of power in the Chinese Empire for thousands of years is violence.The second is capital, that is, money.With money comes power, which is unfamiliar to the Chinese, and is extremely disgusted, and it is also the eternal enemy of violent power.The concept of capital and the concept of power are completely contradictory. This is also the internal logic of the Opium War. Why did the Opium War exist?Because capital is demonized, or power does not allow it.So what is the concept of capital?The idea of ​​capital is equality.I just said that if you have money, you have power, so where is equality?The meaning of equality is that you have one dollar and a beggar has one dollar, and their value is the same. This is called equality.And what the expanding British Empire followed was this logic of capital.The third source of power is knowledge and ideas, but it's still a wonderful utopia, a vision of the future.

Under the background that the Chinese Empire is still stagnant in the rules of power, and the capital culture invades from across the ocean, a conflict between the two is bound to occur. Unfortunately, this conflict fell on the head of Emperor Qianlong's grandson, Dao Bald.Speaking of the emperor Daoguang, there are only two words: sad reminder! The reason why Daoguang was able to become emperor was the opportunity given to him by the party.In Emperor Jiaqing's later years, Li Wencheng of the Tianli Society rebelled, and the rebels entered the imperial city.This is the first time in history that a small-scale rebellion has entered the palace.

After the rebels entered the palace, they rushed towards Donghua Gate. At that time, the eunuchs in the gate blocked the gate, while the congregation party piled dry firewood outside the gate to burn the gate, and some climbed up the tower to get in.At this moment, Qianlong's grandson came out.There are records that he held a shotgun and killed two thieves. There are also records that he held a slingshot, and even more outrageous, that he held a slingshot but no projectiles, and he took off a gold button to make a projectile.All in all, however, he secured an empire in this military campaign by guarding the palace.

But since then, Emperor Daoguang's governing style is completely different from his initial performance. Emperor Daoguang can be said to be an extremely immature person, who was bullied wantonly by the eunuchs and played around.For example, Emperor Daoguang once wanted to drink a bowl of noodle soup, so he ordered to go down and say that I want to drink a bowl of noodle soup. After a while, the eunuch came in and said: Your Majesty Qizuo, if you want to drink a bowl of noodle soup, you have to set up a bowl of noodle soup. A special kitchen, special purchasing personnel and special accountants are recruited, and this series is specially paid for 6,000 taels of silver.

Emperor Daoguang felt awkward hearing it, and thought to himself: I want to drink a bowl of noodle soup, so what?So he said: Forget it, I know that there is an alley in the city of Beijing that sells noodle soup, you can send an eunuch out to buy me a bowl, and you can buy it for a few dollars.The eunuch went down unhappy, and came back after a while, reporting: Your Majesty Qizuo, the noodle shop you mentioned is closed. This event is truly recorded in history.Does anyone dare to do this to Qianlong?Does anyone dare to do this to Kangxi?No!The reason why they dare to treat Daoguang like this is because Daoguang's character is completely different from Qianlong and Kangxi.What kind of personality is Daoguang?As mentioned earlier, his character seems to be completely immature, and he seems to be stuck in a child stage.