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Emperors in the middle and late Qing Dynasty have always had an obsession with frugality. After experiencing the so-called "Kangqian prosperous era", the Qing Dynasty entered the "Middle Decline of Jia Dao", the Qing court's inventory and silver fell sharply, and financial expenditure increased sharply, while the dynastic crisis became increasingly serious and large-scale civil unrest frequently broke out everywhere. Against this backdrop, the Emperors of the Qing Dynasty thought of a recipe that chinese history has tried and tested— frugality.
As the saying goes: success is due to frugality and failure. Now there is no money to spend, it must be because it used to spend more, where to spend more - the court spent more. Therefore, for more than fifty-five years, Jiaqing Daoguang spent the entire Qing Dynasty desperately fighting for the word "frugality", but they found a very, very strange phenomenon: in the previous Kangqian period, they spent money to expand their financial resources, and the more frugal they were, the poorer they became.
Jiaqing Daoguang didn't want to understand what was going on until he died, so what was the reason for this? Let's take a look.
Above_ Qianlong Emperor (reigned 1736-1796)
First, struggle hard and strive to save the world
In 1799, Mr. Qianlong finally passed away, leaving the imperial throne that he had been in love with for more than sixty years. But what he left for his successor, Jiaqing, was an incomparably rotten stall.
Jiaqing was almost tearless in the face of the Sichuan-Chu White Lotus Sect uprising that was already intensifying at that time. In order to suppress the uprising, the Jiaqing Emperor slept and forgot to eat and changed the generals continuously, desperately operating, and finally controlled the uprising, but after the uprising was suppressed, the Jiaqing Emperor discovered a tragic fact - there was no money, and the Qing Dynasty had no money at all.
In order to suppress this second-largest uprising in the history of the Qing Dynasty (the first of course, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom), the Qing court spent more than 80 million taels of silver, and all the families of the Qianlong Dynasty were exhausted in one breath, totaling more than 100 million yuan of military expenditure ("Since dealing with the bandits, it has been four years, and the number of fees and silver has exceeded 70 million taels").
In order to deal with the White Lotus Sect uprising, the Qing Dynasty also charged an additional 30 million taels of "Chuanchu Case", and if we think about it a little, we will think of the "three salaries" at the end of the Ming Dynasty that completely made the Ming Dynasty go to the grave. A Qing Dynasty that had just experienced a "prosperous world" actually walked to the brink of running out of oil in the blink of an eye, which could not help but make the Jiaqing Emperor tremble all over.
Jiaqing Emperor (1760–1820)
However, this was only the beginning, from the beginning of the Jiaqing Dynasty to the Daoguang Dynasty, the financial expenditure of the Qing court soared all the way, "one was spent on returning to Xinjiang, then on the treasury case, and three on the river decision, and the war of opium in the middle of the leaf, the indemnity for the loss of the teacher, the decline of national strength, and could not be asked." "Before and after the Opium War, the import of opium by the great powers also took a large amount of silver from the Qing court. So-called: "From fourteen to eighteen years, it gradually leaked to more than 30 million taels, in addition, Fujian, Zhejiang, Shandong, Tianjin, each sea mouth combined with tens of millions of taels." "The entire Qing Dynasty was in a serious financial crisis and a silver outflow, and the plundering of the great powers aggravated the soaring price crisis of the Qing court, completely showing the appearance of national subjugation.
Faced with a serious financial crisis, the Jiaqing Emperor, who aspired to "ZTE", and his successor, the Daoguang Emperor, were determined to solve the problem with frugality. In fact, in Chinese history, advocating frugality seems to be the "good medicine for saving the country" of many Ming Emperors, such as explaining that Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang practiced frugality, and Emperor Liu Yu of the Song Dynasty and Xiao Daocheng, the Emperor of Qigao, etc. were all based on frugality, so Daoguang and the Jiaqing Emperor both wanted to use frugality to save the decline of the Qing Dynasty.
Above_ Statue of the Yongzheng Emperor by Yun Li
So how do they do it? In fact, in the hearts of many people now, the most frugal emperor of the Qing Dynasty is not Daoguang Jiaqing, but Yongzheng. However, it may be surprising that the Yongzheng Emperor himself is actually not frugal. We can look at the facts, as soon as Mr. Yongzheng took the throne, he began to expand the Yuanmingyuan on a huge scale, and there was also a "Zhengda Guangming" hall, and Yongzheng alone allocated more than 300,000 taels to build the palace in February of the third year.
As for saying that yongzheng eats in the TV series is all cabbage and rice, there is no meat and no fish, which is even more nonsense. According to the records in the Qing Palace's "Living Records", the pork in the Yongzheng Palace consumes several thousand catties every month, not to mention that Yongzheng also cultivates dan to buy a large number of rare antiques.
But the Frugality of the Daoguang Emperor was absolutely nothing like this, and the Jiaqing Emperor's frugality was not small, and even the post stations dared to be abolished (not afraid of Li Zicheng?). ）。 His son Daoguang's frugality is indeed really "wanting to be frugal." First of all, he said that the garden must not be repaired, as we all know, the emperors of the Qing court like to build gardens and build large buildings. For example, Kangxi's Changchun Garden, Yongzheng Qianlong all expanded the Yuanmingyuan, and the Yuanmingyuan in the Daoguang period rarely stopped the construction of the project. Think about the internal and external troubles of the late Qing Dynasty Cixi Lafayette did not forget her Summer Palace, but I know that this alone is much stronger than many Qing emperors.
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Above_ Part of the Qianlong Emperor's southern tour map
Do not repair the garden can save a million two a year, but this is far from enough, in order to save money and Daoguang there are many "rules", such as the tribute everywhere is halved, Mulan Qiuwei This traditional project of the Qing court has also stopped, in order to save money, he will certainly not learn from Grandpa Qianlong and run out to play, so the southern tour is not.
Daoguang's frugality became more and more perverted in the later period, and he did not listen to the outside Peking Opera, because he asked the opera team to spend money (court acting, all undertaken by the internal supervisor. ), the holiday fireworks are gone, because the smoke costs money (after the fireworks, boxes, detracted most of the damage, still do not abolish the old system, and then stop). It is even said that he even patched his clothes and ate brine noodles, which can be said to be a saving money by racking his brains. (The trousers worn, when worn at the knee, are embellished with a round silk on it, and the customary cloud slap is also.) ）
But the result is very clear to us, and the result of Mr. Daoguang's desperate efforts to save is two words - useless.
The savings of the imperial court at the end of Daoguang were not even as good as during the Qianlong period, when money was spent wildly, so why did the more frugal the Daoguang period, the less money there was?
Above_Daoguang Tongbao
Second, it is difficult to return to the heavy burden, and the twilight is poor
In fact, it is not difficult to explain here, the reason why the more frugal the less money, in fact, there are roughly three reasons:
1. The income is not enough, and the financial resources are exhausted
Moreover, most importantly, due to the sharp increase in population of more than 200 million yuan during the Kangqian period, the rapid decline in per capita land occupation, the frenzied intensification of land annexation, and the bankruptcy of peasants among displaced people, these factors all led to the qing court's fiscal revenue falling too quickly, and even if the emperors could save more than three million taels of silver a year, they still had to face a gap of tens of millions of taels, and naturally they still could not make ends meet.
The Daoguang Emperor, based on a watercolor portrait of Mr. Guan Qiaochang, is taken from The Collection of Mr. Lagerland
2. There are countermeasures at the top and policies at the bottom
The emperor's idea was indeed good, but the financial department of the entire Qing court, especially the internal affairs office directly corresponding to the emperor, did not think so about it. The emperor said frugality, the ministry of internal affairs can not be frugal, for example, although Daoguang used patches for clothes, but was sharply pointed out, a patch of Daoguang is five or two silver, while the patch of the normal minister is three pieces of silver. Five or two pieces of silver is equivalent to the income of an ordinary peasant family for half a year, which shows that the emperor really wants to be frugal, but his subordinates can easily "steal beams and change pillars."
For example, Daoguang once wanted to mend a black fox skin dress, and as a result, the Internal Affairs Office reported that it would cost thousands of taels of silver, which frightened the Daoguang Emperor to give up directly (there was a royal black fox end cover, lined with slightly wider satin, so that the internal attendants would come out, and the skin would be added around, and the inner house would need silver thousand and two, but it was an edict not to add. The Daoguang Emperor's sixtieth birthday was too frightened to celebrate, because it was said that the amount of money reported by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of this celebration made him almost die of anger after reading it. It can be seen that the emperor is only a person after all, no matter how much he wants to save, the people below always have a way to let him spend money, and finally "true frugality" has become "fake frugality".
Above_ Xianfeng Emperor's imperial approval fold
3. Officials are greedy for ink, and there is no decrease
During the Daoguang period, although the emperors were always thrifty and thrifty, the officials were not like this at all. For example, when officials left office, they called it "firing cannons", which was a thunderous thunderbolt, and before leaving office, they had to loot silver two, 5,000 to 10,000 taels at a time, and the new officials also had a famous head when they arrived, called "inverted cannons" more than cannons. Some officials also said that the tax grain they paid was moldy and they would spend money to "buy mold." At this point, you have to collect tens of thousands of taels of silver into the account.
At that time, in order to win the Shaanxi grain road that could master the military grain, the Henan Clan Division and other positions that mastered the tribute silver, the Qing court officials frantically bribed, and they could pay 200,000 taels of so-called "filial piety" at one time, and there were many so-called "ice respects", "charcoal respects", "Nian Jing" and many other names at that time. However, these officials are not stupid at all, such as the Shaanxi Grain Road, hundreds of thousands of taels to return to the capital in a year or two, and can still earn a lot of money. The governors of various places even have 400,000 taels of silver every year "sent in print" which is basically public. Therefore, Li Hongzhang's family property of being the governor of Beiyang for decades can actually be called "normal" if he has tens of millions of silver.
Li Hongzhang (February 15, 1823 – November 7, 1901)
Not only that, at that time, officials could be described as bribery between the government, and all the official positions were clearly marked with prices, such as the Guizhou Clan Division of more than 11,000 taels, leaving Beijing to stay and have to give additional money, at that time, the officials in the capital still cried bitterly every day, saying that they lacked money, so they accepted more fiercely. At that time, when the officials of the capital went to the field, they went to heaven, and actually asked to eat sea bass and seafood in Xi'an, and if they did not have it, they would be furious that their colleagues were not well entertained, after all, they had to continue to live a "hard life" in the capital.
It can be said that under such circumstances, those so-called frugalities are useless, and the dreams of these emperors who want to be frugal and prosperous will inevitably be completely shattered, and the decline of the Qing Dynasty has been irreversible, after all: the anointing blood of the people is exhausted for the arrogance and extravagance of corrupt officials and corrupt officials, and the world is not poor?!
Text: A cloud of smoke and rain
bibliography:
[1] Zhang Jixin's "Records of the Observations of the Daoxian Eunuch Sea"
[2] Records of Emperor Qingren Zongrui
[3] Records of Emperor Xuanzong of the Qing Dynasty
【4】《Qing Palace Live File》
【5】Miscellaneous Records of the Pavilion
[6] Huang Hongshou's "The End of the Chronicle of the Qing Dynasty"
The text was created by the History University Hall team, and the picture originated from the Internet and the copyright belongs to the original author