Wei Zhongxian, who was known as a "traitor" by the world, was once powerful and eventually hanged himself for fear of being liquidated by the Chongzhen Emperor. What he didn't expect was that when Chongzhen was desperate to commit suicide, his confidant Wang Cheng'en said a word: If Wei Zhongxian hadn't died, the Ming Dynasty wouldn't have ended up like this! So why did Wang Cheng'en say this? What role did Wei Zhongxian play in the late Ming Dynasty?
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Wei Zhongxian's original name was Wei Si, the family was poor and drunk and gambling, and he owed a bunch of debts to mortgage his wife and children, and the creditor chased after him, frightening him to climb up the tree, promising to repay the money as a eunuch. In order to save his life, under the recommendation of an acquaintance, he really rubbed a knife and became a eunuch. Being a eunuch was too hard, starting from the bottom work of pouring the toilet, Wei Zhongxian worked for more than ten years. Later, he paid for the relationship and went to the emperor's grandson Zhu You's school as an errand boy. This little doll has suffered since childhood, the pet concubine Li Xuanshi beat his mother to death, and also occupied his custody, the purpose is to have the opportunity to listen to the government in the future, only the nursing mother Keshi is the best for him, and Wei Zhongxian and Keshi also have special feelings in the continuous relationship, and finally simply formed a "pair of food".
Later, when Emperor Mingguangzong died, Zhu Yu, with the help of the Donglin Party, escaped the control of Li Xuanshi and finally ascended the throne as emperor. In order to thank the nursing mother and Wei Zhongxian for taking care of him, he ordered the Fengshi clan to be made Lady Fengsheng, and Wei Zhongxian was also made a eunuch of Si Li Bingbi. Then some people here will ask: the former eunuchs Zheng He and Wang Zhen were valued by the emperor because they were talented, but Wei Zhongxian was basically illiterate, how did he climb to the peak of power?
In fact, all this must start from the Donglin Party, which is a group of political groups dominated by Jiangnan scholars, and because they have made great contributions to Zhu You's ascension to the throne, the status of this small group is increasing day by day, and almost all important departments of the imperial court are controlled by them. As representatives of the officials and gentry of Jiangnan, they spoke very well, but many people occupied all kinds of resources, and for their own interests, they even defaulted on taxes and evaded taxes, and also urged the emperor to abolish the industrial and commercial tax. The name is: do not compete with the people, hide rich from the people. Gu Xiancheng, the founder of the Donglin Party, even used his power for personal gain, excluding dissidents in the name of examining the performance of officials.
And when the country was facing war, this group of people had no concept of the overall situation and would only talk on paper, originally the general Xiong Tingbi did a good job, and at one time Nurhaci did not dare to move, because he offended the Donglin Party cabinet, his post was replaced by Yuan Yingtai. This guy only understood water conservancy and did not know how to fight at all, and as a result, in the subsequent war, the two major towns in Liaodong were successively attacked by Nurhaci. Don't look at Zhu You's school every day busy doing carpentry, but Jiangshan belongs to the Zhu family, and Zhu You, who is in a hurry, asks everyone what a good way to do it, but the Donglin Party can't come up with a good idea at all, just blindly quarreling and arguing, and doesn't think about how to resist at all.
And fighting a war requires money, where does the money come from? This gang could not think of any other tricks, and within a year they had shined the private money that Wanli had saved for decades. What if the Ming Empire didn't have silver? The Donglin Party decided to make more copper coins, which is heinous that this group of people changed the copper coins to copper three lead seven in order to gain benefits. It should be known that the Nanjing Mint at that time was their boundary, according to the regulations: the copper coins of the Ming Dynasty should be the content of copper six lead four. Not to mention that they are corrupt, they are also unashamedly neglected, saying that this is to subsidize the national treasury. In this way, the monetary system of the Ming Dynasty was destroyed, and the people were miserable and resolutely resisted.
Seeing that the state affairs were in a mess, but the Donglin party did not listen to the emperor's words at all, how can you think of a person who can fight a group of people, at this time Zhu Youxiao remembered his confidant Wei Zhongxian, so he let him come out as a representative to "fight the fa"! Don't look at this Wei Zhongxian was illiterate before entering the palace, but after entering the palace, he studied in the inner study hall, and the teacher was still a scholar and had strict requirements, who did not endorse the book, wrote badly, etc., or beat or punished kneeling. Therefore, from the perspective of development, Wei Zhongxian is also half a reader. So how did Wei Zhongxian, who was pushed onto the political stage, fight the Donglin Party?
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In fact, in the beginning, Wei Zhongxian was very subservient to this group of people, but unfortunately, this group was mostly reading people and rich people, how could they look up to eunuchs? Therefore, since with the support of the emperor, in public and private, he would not spare the Donglin Party, and as soon as Wei Zhongxian came to power, he collected evidence, deposed dozens of officials Shangshu, Zuo Du Yushi, Libu Shilang, and so on, and also increased Nanjing's commercial tax payments a lot. It should be known that the Donglin Party represents the interests of the capitalists in Jiangnan, these big businessmen do not have to pay taxes, and earn a lot of money, and Wei Zhongxian used the two major institutions of Dongchang and Jinyiwei to collect taxes from these big landlords and officials and merchants and gentry, and collected the previous payment, and the Jiangnan tea tax alone collected 200,000 taels, so that the imperial court had enough silver to deal with the war, and when the people of Henan were affected by disasters, they could also allocate funds for disaster relief and exemption from taxes.
In addition, he also reorganized the army, reused Yuan Chonghuan and other generals, and during his reign, the Ming Dynasty fought several victorious battles, not only seriously injuring Nurhaci, but also causing Emperor Taiji to flee back to his hometown. Of course, Wei Zhongxian also has selfish intentions, and has eradicated dissidents and accepted money in the name of anti-corruption, but objectively speaking, it has made the management of some places better. In contrast, the Donglin Party members, who pride themselves on representing the broad masses of the people, do not want to change at all, knowing that the lives of the people of land annexation are difficult. When the imperial court asked for money, they put heavy taxes on the people, and judging by this alone, Wei Zhongxian seriously violated the interests of the Donglin party. Except for these good things, of course. He and his rabble-rousers, such as the "Ten Children" and the "Forty Grandchildren," also did many bad things, such as mutilating Zhongliang and forcing concubines to die. In order to accumulate wealth, from buying and selling cabinet scholars to small prison prisoners, as long as they give money, they can do anything, and even the treasures of the Nanjing Inner Treasury have been looted by Wei Zhongxian. It's a lot of crime.
The Donglin party members were beaten up like this, but they were very clever, found the letter king Zhu Youjian, and said bad things about Wei Zhongxian to each other every day. After Zhu Youjian ascended the throne, the emperor sent Wei Zhongxian to Fengyang to guard the imperial tomb, and when the ministers heard the news, they immediately united with everyone to expose his guilt. Wei Zhongxian, who was spending the night in the inn at that time, knew that the emperor was going to attack and simply committed suicide by hanging on the beam. Wei Zhongxian fell, the Donglin Party regained control of the government, and as soon as they came to power, they abolished the commercial tax and the mining tax, which was the most important financial revenue of the imperial court. Chongzhen, who lacked experience in struggle, was not only fooled, but even his power was emptied. In the face of the situation that the national treasury is in deficit and the people are not happy to make a living, what should the peasants in various localities do if they are up and the army is short of money? In the past, there was a Wei Zhongxian who could earn money for the emperor, but now no one came out to find a way.
Chongzhen called on officials to donate money to save the country and save the people, but the officials who usually eat the country and the people, even if they have tens of millions of silver, are not pulled out, but they are silent. Later, Li Zicheng put forward the condition that as long as he was given a few million taels of silver, he would truce the war, but he did not expect that a large imperial court could not come up with it. After the rebel army entered Beijing, the cornered Chongzhen had no choice but to hang himself, and before he died, he cursed these ministers: "The ministers have misled the country!" And these ministers, as for those, are busy opening the door and surrendering.
Therefore, history is complicated, although Wei Zhongxian did a lot of bad things, but it was not useless, and some of his measures still played a big role in the Ming Dynasty. However, there is a saying that it is difficult to return from the accumulation of heavy burdens, and the Ming Dynasty faces internal and external troubles, and in the end it is still difficult to escape the fate of being destroyed.
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