Zeng Jize, the eldest son of Zeng Guofan, had an intriguing conversation with Cixi on the eve of his mission to England and France.
Empress Dowager Cixi
The dialogue took place on August 28, 1878 (September 24, 1878) of the fourth year of Guangxu. On this day, the autumn rain is long, and the day does not stop. Zeng Jize accepted Cixi's summons in the east of the Yangxin Hall.
First, the dialogue between the monarch and the subject in the sound of rain
September 24, 1878, in Zeng Jize's diary, was the day of "Rainy Day". As the rain continued to fall, there was a long conversation between the monarchs and courtiers.
Cixi: "It is not easy to do foreign affairs. I heard that there are also cases of burning church houses in Fujian, and they will be naughty in the future. ”
Zeng Jize: "The difficulty in handling foreign affairs lies in the unreasonableness of foreigners, and the Chinese do not know the situation. Needless to say, Chinese subjects should hate foreigners, but xu tu must be self-reliant, but he can help, and if he destroys a church and kills a foreigner, he will be considered a revenge for shame. Now Chinese do not know this reason, so there is the matter of Ma Jiali in Yunnan, and the empress dowager and the emperor are industrious. ”
Cixi: "Not really." How can we forget this vendetta for a day, but we must slowly strengthen ourselves. Your words are very clear, if you kill a person or burn a house, you will take revenge. ”
Zeng Jize: "Yes." ”
Cixi: "These people understand this very little. You do such things for the country, and in the future these people will scold you, but you will have to work hard and complain. ”
Zeng Jize: "The subject used to study, to the phrase 'the matter can be done to his body', thinking that the loyalty of a person is to the extreme." Looking closely at the recent current situation, we can see that China's diplomacy involves incidents, and sometimes it is necessary to see that our lives are still on the second level, and we must fight to see the statement as if it does not matter, so as to preserve the overall situation for the country. That is, as in the previous Tianjin case, the minister's father, Zeng Guo (藩), when he left for Baoding, was sick, so he wrote a will, distributed it to his family, and arranged to take his life away. When we arrived in Tianjin, we saw that the affairs were important and could not be done in one death, so we asked for perfection to protect the peace bureau. At that time, there were many scolds in the capital, and the father of the minister blamed himself, sent letters to friends, and often wrote the eight characters of 'external shame and clear discussion, guilt god', which is to spell but gain fame in order to take into account the overall situation. In fact, at that time, the situation was even more helpless to do what the former state (clan) had done. ”
Cixi: "Zeng Guo (藩) is really a man who is loyal to the kingdom. ”
Zeng Jize met without a crown and did not answer.
Zeng Jize, the eldest son of Zeng Guofan
Zeng Jize: "Guo Songtao is always an upright person, but he does not know people very well, and his temperament is impatient, which is his weakness. This time is also to fight for fame, to do things for the country, and to seek the grace of the empress dowager and the emperor in the future, and to always preserve. ”
Cixi: "The boss also knows that Guo Songtao is a good person. After his mission, he did a lot of things, but he was scolded by these people enough. ”
Guo Songtao
Cixi: "The date of delivery of the letter of state is determined by you?" Is it determined by them foreigners? ”
Zeng Jize: "After we go to the other country, we must discuss things with each other." ”
Cixi: "Foreign countries also have prime ministers Yamen?" ”
Zeng Jize: "Foreign countries call it 'external', and the things they do are the same as those of the Chinese prime minister Yamen, and the British have recently changed their name to prime minister Yamen. In fact, foreign languages are different, and they do not call the outside, nor do they call the prime minister Yamen, but they do the same thing. ”
Cixi: "When will you arrive?" ”
Zeng Jize: "As long as Empress Dowager Toray and Emperor Hongfu are safe all the way, there is no delay on the road, and at the end of the year, they can always reach the French capital." ”
Second, the rich information conveyed by dialogue
On the evening of September 24, 1878, and during the day of September 25, 1878, Zeng Jize wrote down the above-mentioned conversations with Cixi in the form of a running account in his diary.
On November 28, 2020, I read about his diary on pages 773-779 of Zeng Jize's diary, which was posted as an excerpt by me. There are three impressions:
◆ Cixi's knowledge of Western studies is quite limited
Founded on March 11, 1861, the Prime Minister of the Qing Dynasty, Yamen, was a diplomatic institution for the Qing Dynasty to coordinate the handling of foreign affairs, and it was a diplomatic institution forced by the Qing Dynasty under western pressure, completely imitating the foreign ministry system of Western countries at that time. Prior to this, qing diplomacy was run concurrently by the viceroys of Liangguang.
Fast forward to 1878, and Prime Minister Yamen was founded 17 years ago. In a conversation recorded by Zeng Jize, Cixi went so far as to ask, "Do foreign countries also have prime ministers Yamen?" When I read this, I was very surprised that Cixi had no idea the ins and outs of the establishment of the Prime Minister Yamen, nor did he know that the foreign institution responsible for foreign diplomacy was the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Prime Minister Yamen
This is not difficult for Zeng Jize. The process of Zeng Jize answering her questions is also the process of popularizing common sense. He carefully replied, "Foreign countries call it 'external,' and they do the same thing as the Chinese premier Yamen," an answer that takes care of Cixi's face.
◆ Cixi's insight is still enlightened
I think the most exciting part of the conversation between the two of them is the part about foreign affairs and foreigners.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty, there was a saying that the people were afraid of the official government, the government was afraid of foreigners, and the foreigners were afraid of the people.
Why are "foreigners afraid of the people"? In the late Qing Dynasty, missionaries ran amok in China, causing widespread popular anger. Just as Zeng Guofan explained in 1870 when dealing with the Tianjin teaching case, he said: "When committing a crime in the church, the priest does not ask right and wrong, qupi the parishioners, and the consul does not ask right and wrong, qupi priest." In the face of civil and religious fighting, the common people will persevere, and the religious people will always win. The more the people of the religion are in flames, the more indignant the common people are, and the more depressed they are, the more they gather and think about it. "One of the ways to vent their anger among the oppressed and depressed people by the clergy was to burn churches. The frequent teaching cases in the late Qing Dynasty made the officials feel pain.
Late Qing missionary
Zeng Jize was a diplomatic talent, so Empress Dowager Cixi took the initiative to mention in this summons that "if you hear that there is another case of burning church houses in Fujian, you will be naughty in the future" and want to hear his opinion.
After hearing Zeng Jize say that "if we don't destroy a church or kill a foreigner, it is a matter of revenge and shame", Cixi expressed her agreement and said, "How can we forget this vendetta for a day, but we must slowly strengthen ourselves." Your words are very clear, if you kill a person or burn a house, you will take revenge. ”
The "vendetta" in Cixi's mouth refers to the second Opium War, when the British and French forces invaded and occupied Beijing, resulting in Xianfeng's death in rehe. Realistically speaking, although Cixi had little knowledge of the West, she generally supported the Foreign Affairs Movement in order to "self-reliance." The defeat in the Sino-Japanese War marked the defeat of the Qing government's foreign affairs movement. In the subsequent Wushu Reform Movement, Cixi stood on the opposite side of restoration and change, which is an afterthought.
◆ Handling foreign affairs is easy to be scolded
In this dialogue, two people, Guo Songtao and Zeng Guofan, appeared, both of whom were scolded by the scholar. Zeng Jize not only vigorously defended his father Zeng Guofan, but also tried to correct Guo Songtao's name.
When handling the Tianjin teaching case, Zeng Guofan adhered to the principle of "but the peace bureau is quick, and does not ask whether the crime should be committed or not", and formulated a treatment plan that was considered to be biased toward foreigners. The national scholars denounced him, and the Hunan Hometown Association in Beijing removed Zeng Guofan from his name. In the eyes of many people, Zeng Guofan's "weakness" in handling the Tianjin teaching case is the "stain" of his life. Therefore, in this summons, Zeng Jize was still grumpy about Zeng Guofan's scolding, and was still explaining his father's painstaking loneliness at that time, which caused Cixi to sigh that "Zeng Guofan is really a person who is loyal to the country." Click to read the wonderful content: Only three of the nine illegitimate children of the fallen official are biological, who dares to prostitute the woman of the "public security director"?
Zeng Guofan
Why was Guo Songtao scolded? Like Zeng Guofan, Guo Songtao was a native of Hunan and was the first minister stationed abroad in Chinese history. In 1875, he was appointed Minister of State for Mission to England. Later, he wrote down his observations in England in a diary, praising western political and religious cultivation, "If China can know its essence and cope with it properly, it will become rich and strong." Strongly advocating learning from the West, his good friend Wang Minyun said that he had been "poisoned by the foreign", Li Ciming reprimanded him for "not knowing what kind of lungs and livers", and some people wrote couplets to scold him, saying that he:
"Out of his class, out of his strength, not tolerated in the world of Yao Shun; if you can't do things to people, you can do things to ghosts, so why go to the country of your parents."
In this recital, Zeng Jize was upset with Guo Songtao, and Cixi said, "The upper head also knows that Guo Songtao is a good person. "He's had enough of these people's scolding." In fact, it is also for Guo Songtao to complain, and it is also a kind of consolation for Zeng Jize.
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