Chapter 31 Li Shi: The Shining Emperor

The new monarch Li Shi resolutely removed the chief prime minister of the previous dynasty before he got rid of his mourning clothes, and replaced him with a mere fifth-rank Zhongshu Sheren. Don't make people feel bright. And Li Shi's next series of measures set off a dazzling "New Deal" whirlwind in the ruling and opposition parties. ——In the middle of May, Li Shi issued an edict, announcing that he would no longer accept all kinds of tributes from the Quartet casually in the future, and at the same time removed the Royal Art Center (Liyuan) founded by Xuanzong, and dismissed more than 300 musicians.

——On May 17th, a local governor who was ignorant of current affairs presented a "Qing Yuntu" in the name of auspiciousness to flatter the court and whitewash the peace. It is true auspiciousness to promote virtue and promote loyalty. As for things like Qingyun, Ganoderma lucidum, rare birds, strange beasts, strange grasses, and strange trees, which one is beneficial to the people? I am here to tell the world, From now on, no auspicious offerings are allowed." ——A few days later, Li Shi ordered people to exile all the elephants, leopards, fighting cocks, hounds and other animals raised in the palace, and at the same time dismissed hundreds of court ladies.

——At the beginning of June, Li Shi issued an edict: "People all over the world, whoever has a complaint of grievance but the local government refuses to accept it, can go directly to Beijing and file a complaint with Yushitai, Dali Temple, and the Ministry of Criminal Justice; in addition, if the local government accepts the complaint, but People who think the trial is unfair and dissatisfied with the verdict can also go directly to the Sanju Division to beat the "Dengwen Drum" and appeal for grievances." After this edict, the people from all over the world cheered, and there was an endless stream of people who went to the capital to beat the drum every day to express their grievances.

——One day in mid-June, the eunuch Shao Guangchao, who was ordered to go to Huaixi, had just returned to the court, and was ordered by the emperor Li Shi to beat him sixty times, and he was exiled to the frontier on the same day.This incident was extremely sudden, but it is not difficult for a discerning person to know the whole story: when Shao Guangchao was envoy to Huaining, he "according to the usual practice" accepted heavy bribes from Li Xilie, the Jiedu envoy of Huaining, including 700 bolts of silk and two pieces of high-quality tea. A hundred catties, as well as varying numbers of servants, horses, etc.The emperor took Shao Guangchao's knife this time, making it clear that he wanted to kill chickens and monkeys, and broke the practice of "eunuchs must accept bribes when they travel on business" in one fell swoop.After Shao Guangchao's incident, the eunuchs who had just returned from their missions to various places learned the news, threw away all the valuables they had received, and returned to Chang'an empty-handed one by one.In the following years, no eunuch who was ordered to go to a place as an envoy dared to accept bribes from local officials.

—— On July 5th of this year, the imperial court suddenly dispatched an engineering team to forcibly demolish a number of mansions owned by the corrupt official Yuan Zai and others.Soon people learned that this was an order directly issued by the new emperor Li Shi.At that time, the people in all directions were displaced by years of wars, but the ministers, generals, and eunuchs in power exhausted their human, financial, and material resources to build mansions, and each one was more luxurious and magnificent than the other.The common people hated this kind of extravagance of the rich and powerful very much, and called them "civilian monsters" one after another.And Dezong Li Shi was quite dissatisfied with this social phenomenon when he was the prince, so he took this move to level the mansion.When those "civil demons" who symbolized the interests of the rich and powerful fell down one after another, the people in the capital suddenly burst into cheers...

In this way, in just a few months at the beginning of his accession to the throne, Emperor Dezong Li Shi used vigorous means to eradicate all kinds of bad governance, established a new political style, and at the same time conveyed such a message to the subjects of the empire-I, Li Shi Absolutely confident and capable of reviving the imperial court and rejuvenating the country! As an emperor who came to the throne in his prime, Dezong Li Shi's above-mentioned actions are enough to reflect his courage and belief in forging ahead and determined to rejuvenate.However, in order to clean up the mess left by the previous emperors, it is definitely not enough to have courage and faith, but also must have enough courage, strategy and political skills.

So, does Li Shi have these qualities? From the following three things, it is not difficult to draw conclusions. The first thing: Li Shi cleverly weakened the power of Guo Ziyi, the "elder of the four dynasties". As we all know, Guo Ziyi is the leading hero of the Tang Empire, who has served in the Xuan, Su, Dai, and De dynasties, with outstanding military exploits and brilliant achievements.In order to reward him, successive emperors continued to add officials and promote him.By the time Dezong came to the throne, Guo Ziyi had already held countless positions. Here, we might as well make a list of Guo Ziyi's duties: Situ, Zhongshu Ling, Hezhong Yin, Lingzhou Governor, Shanyu Governor, Zhenbei Governor, Deputy Marshal of Guannei, Deputy Marshal of Hedong, Shuofang Jiedushi, The Guannei Zhidu Envoy, Yanchi Envoy, Six Cities Water Transport Envoy, Abbe, Yingtian Envoy, Heyang Road Observation Envoy, etc.

It is not difficult to imagine that any emperor would inevitably feel fear and suspicion about such a powerful imperial hero with more than a dozen positions.Although Guo Ziyi was loyal to Li Tang's court, and he was cautious by nature, and he was very low-key (otherwise, he would have been boiled by rabbits and dogs for his high achievements), but the original Emperor Daizong was still very worried and wanted to weaken him many times. power, but still can't make up his mind, that's why he hasn't done anything. Right now, how to "balance" Guo Ziyi has become a political problem that Dezong Li Shi has to face.

The difficulty of this matter lies in: Although Guo Ziyi himself is quite kind, none of the generals under his command is a vegetarian.Therefore, to solve this difficult problem, there must be an ingenious solution. After careful and careful consideration, Li Shi finally found a simple and safe solution. One word - points. In other words, the power in Guo Ziyi's hands must be "decomposed" and then "distributed" to several major generals under his command.In this way, the imperial court can achieve the effect of killing three birds with one stone: it not only weakens Guo Ziyi's power, but also appeases those arrogant soldiers, and makes those main generals grateful to Dezong from now on.

On the 15th day of the fifth lunar month in the 14th year of the Dali calendar, Emperor Dezong Li Shi issued an edict to respect Guo Ziyi as "Father Shang", conferred the title of Taiwei, retained the order of Zhongshu, and exempted all other part-time jobs; Military positions were awarded to three main generals under his command-Li Huaiguang, Chang Qianguang, and Hun Yu.So far, this problem that has troubled Daizong for many years has finally been properly resolved in the hands of Dezong. The second thing: Li Shi successfully thwarted a coup plot. This conspiracy is neither big nor small.It is said that it is not big because the scope of involvement is not very wide; it is not small because it is related to "abolishing the establishment" and directly threatens Li Shi's imperial power.

There are two planners of the conspiracy: one is Li Gan, Minister of the Ministry of War, and the other is Liu Zhongyi, a high-ranking eunuch (specially advanced, second grade).It is said that Li Gan was "cunning and flattering", while Liu Zhongyi was "greedy and indulgent". A few years ago, before Emperor Dezong Li Shi was established as the crown prince, Li Gan and Liu Zhongyi, who had ulterior motives, tried their best to persuade Daizong to let him make Concubine Dugu the queen, and the son of the Dugu clan, King Li Jiong of Han, as the prince.But Daizong was not bewitched by them, but set up the eldest son Yong Wang Li Shi. After Li Shi came to the throne, Li Gan and Liu Zhongyi were in constant fear of retaliation.At that time, there were many rumors in Chang'an that Li and Liu conspired day and night in an attempt to launch a coup.Of course Li Duan would not take it lightly, so he sent someone to secretly monitor the two's every move. On a dusk in the leap month of the fourteenth year of the Dali calendar, Li Gan quietly entered Liu Zhongyi's mansion in a small sedan chair, talked with him for a long time, and did not leave until late at night.After Dezong Li Shi received the secret report, he immediately took action and ordered the relevant departments to arrest Li Gan and Liu Zhongyi.After interrogation, Li and Liu confessed to their coup plot.Li Shi was furious, and immediately expelled the two from their official positions and exiled them to the frontier for life. On May 27th, Li Gan and Liu Zhongyi had just arrived at Lantian (now Lantian County, Shaanxi Province), when Li Shi ordered people to catch up with them and ordered them to die. The third thing: Li Shi calmly took back the military power of the imperial army from the eunuchs. During the Su and Dynasties, there were two most noticeable chaos in the Tang Empire, one was the rebellion of the feudal towns, and the other was the eunuch's arbitrary power.These two chaos are complementary.It was precisely because of the successive rebellions in the vassal towns that Emperor Li Tang gradually lost his trust in the generals, so he had to hand over the military power of the forbidden army to the eunuchs. Unexpectedly, this led to the eunuchs' favoring power; position, and turned around to collude with various feudal towns, making those domineering feudal towns even more arrogant and difficult to control. In Daizong's reign, Li Fuguo, Cheng Yuanzhen, and Yu Chaoen were three power eunuchs who took control of the imperial army successively, and were successively eliminated by Daizong because of their favor and arbitrariness of power.However, Daizong did not fundamentally solve the problem of the ownership of the imperial army's military power, so he always treated the symptoms rather than the root cause-often, the old generation of power officials had just fallen, and the new generation of power officials rose strongly again. In short, although the eunuchs changed like a lantern, the problem of the eunuch's authority remained the same. When Li Shi came to the throne, he faced Wang Jiahe, the eunuch in power.This person rose up after Yu Chaoen. At that time, he was known as the military envoy and the left leader general. (Volume 225) Li Shi is naturally deeply worried about the lingering eunuch's power of attorney.At the same time, he also knew very well that the reason why Daizong could not completely solve the eunuch problem was because he never dared to hand over the forbidden army to generals. But why bother? Since neither eunuchs nor military generals can be trusted, why not change things up a bit and simply hand over the imperial army to civil servants? In Li Shi's view, the only way to completely solve the problem of eunuchs' unauthorized power is to hand over the imperial army to civil servants! For this reason, as soon as Li Shi came to power, he began to look for suitable candidates among civil servants. In the end, he locked on Bai Xiugui, Secretary of Agriculture. Strictly speaking, Bai Xiugui was not a literati, but a "subordinate official".In his early years, he served as a staff member under Li Guangbi's tent, and he was careful, diligent and scheming.Li Guangbi trusted him very much, took him as his confidant, and often let him participate in major military and political affairs. Such a person is actually in line with Li Shi's standards for employing people: first, he is familiar with military affairs, and he does not have the habit of being rebellious and domineering like ordinary generals; Real problems.So in Li Shi's opinion, this person is definitely the best candidate to take over the Forbidden Army! In mid-June of the fourteenth year of Dali, Dezong secretly summoned Bai Xiugui, expressed his appreciation and respect for him, and told him clearly: I am going to lift Wang Jiahe's military power, and then hand over the forbidden army to you.Bai Xiugui was overwhelmed by the flattery, and immediately swore that she would devote herself to the imperial court and go through fire and water for the emperor! Li Shi was very satisfied, and immediately gave him a new name: Zhizhen. The issue of the ownership of the Imperial Army's military power has been resolved in this way, but the next question is-how can Bai Zhizhen take over the Imperial Army smoothly? Li Shi consulted with Prime Minister Cui Youfu.Cui Youfu thought for a while, and then whispered a word in the emperor's ear.Li Shi nodded slightly, a smile slowly blooming on his face. A few days later, Cui Youfu notified Wang Jiahe that he had something important to discuss with him.Hearing the prime minister's call, Wang Jiahe didn't dare to neglect, and hurried to the Zhengshitang.Cui Youfu received him warmly and cordially.After the host and guest are seated, some pleasantries are inevitable.However, what made Wang Jiahe suspicious and puzzled was that the day's pleasantries were too long. Cui Youfu kept rambling and talking, but never mentioned the serious matter.Wang Jiahe chatted patiently, feeling like sitting on pins and needles, but it was inconvenient to say goodbye. Of course, Wang Jiahe at this moment would not know that while he was sitting in the political affairs hall listening to Cui Youfu's eloquence, Bai Zhizhen was already carrying the emperor's letter of appointment, and was swaggering away as a military envoy and doctor of imperial history. Entered the barracks of the Shence Army. By the time Wang Jiahe walked out of the Zhengshitang, his position had become the envoy of the Eastern Capital Garden. The so-called Dongdu Yuanyuan envoy is to go to Luoyang, the eastern capital, to take care of the royal garden, a leisurely position that is very suitable for the elderly. It is no exaggeration to say that as soon as Tang Dezong Li Shi appeared on the historical stage, he unexpectedly won a lot of applause. After witnessing a series of thunderous methods used by the new king Li Shi, the ruling and opposition parties were immediately full of confidence in his ability to govern, and they all placed high hopes on him-"The world thinks that a peaceful rule is almost in sight." Especially the vassals and towns at that time were full of fear and awe of the new emperor who made his debut.Ziqing Town had the strongest reaction.It is said that the soldiers there once dropped their weapons on the ground and exclaimed to each other: "The Ming Lord is gone, and my subordinates are still against me!" (Volume 225) Ming Jun has appeared, can we rebel again? What's more, in June of the 14th year of the Dali calendar, Li Zhengji, the Ziqing Jiedu envoy who was "afraid of the prestige", took the initiative to donate 300,000 yuan to the court. To accept, or not to accept? this is a problem. Three hundred thousand coins is not a small amount, and Dezong Li Shi was a little hesitant for a while. Accept it, after all, you have a short hand to take people and a soft mouth to eat people, and you will inevitably be in danger of being threatened by him in the future; if you don't accept it, you can't find any suitable reason to refuse. If you refuse firmly, it will definitely arouse the dissatisfaction of the town. Just when Dezong was not sure how to accept the move, Prime Minister Cui Youfu said: "It can't be accepted, absolutely can't be accepted!" Dezong was helpless: "I also think that I can't accept it, but how can I refuse?" Cui Youfu smiled: "It's very simple, borrow flowers to offer Buddha." Dezong was puzzled and asked him what he meant. Cui Youfu said seriously: "Your Majesty, please send envoys to comfort the soldiers of Ziqing, and reward them with the money Li Zhengji gave. In this way, not only can the soldiers of Ziqing be grateful to the court and His Majesty, but also let the Sifang Town know— The imperial court will never value money." Dezong Longyan was very happy, and immediately followed his words. When the imperial envoys came to Ziqing and distributed Li Zhengji's 300,000 coins to the soldiers, the soldiers of Ziqing were ecstatic.They knelt down on the ground at the same time, bowed three times and kowtowed nine times in the direction of Chang'an, and kept shouting long live... Looking at the scene in front of him, Li Zhengji was dumbfounded. Although he was very upset, Li Zhengji still had to admire the court's move. It's just that what puzzled him was: No one in the world doesn't like money, but how can the emperor and the court be so free and easy, taking money as nothing? In fact, it's not that Dezong doesn't like money, he just doesn't like holding hot money.If it came from a legitimate source of money, such as the taxes collected by the imperial court from the localities every year, Dezong would definitely like it, and the more the better. In order to bulge up the imperial court's pockets so that he would be more confident in rejecting the bribes of the feudal towns in the future, Dezong decided to find someone who was good at financial management to be the prime minister. In August of the 14th year of the Dali calendar, under the strong recommendation of Cui Youfu, a minister who had been relegated several years ago was recalled to Chang'an by Dezong, and was immediately appointed as the minister of the door and Tongping Zhangshi. This person who directly joined the cabinet as a prime minister from Daozhou Sima was Yang Yan, the famous finance minister in the mid-Tang Dynasty.