In 1644, also in the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng attacked Beijing, and Emperor Mingsizong Zhu Youjian hanged himself at Coal Mountain, and finally Chinese New Year's Eve four years old.
As the last emperor, Chongzhen's life was particularly unlucky.
Some dynasties fell because the level of the last monarch was too poor, such as Hu Hai of Qin II, Yang Guang, the Emperor of Sui Dynasty, and the emperors of the late Northern Song Dynasty to the Southern Song Dynasty, all of which were typical examples of ruining the good situation.
There are also some dynasties that fall because of pure bad luck.
Looking through the whole history, I probably can't find a second era that can be as unlucky as the last years of the Ming Dynasty, and a monarch who can be as unlucky as the Chongzhen Emperor.
Zhu Youjian probably never thought he would become emperor. His throne was neither succeeded by his father nor stolen by himself, but his brother the carpenter Emperor Zhu Youxiao died early and had no son, and this throne fell to him.
Zhu Youxiao was zhu Changluo's eldest son, and Zhu Youjian was Zhu Changluo's fifth son, and there were originally three older brothers in the middle, but unfortunately, they all died prematurely.
And the two younger brothers below, Old Sixth and Seventh, have all died prematurely.
Since Zhu Changluo's time, the haze seems to have hung over this most honorable family of Daming.
The country that Zhu Yu left to his brother was a complete mess. Zhu Yu reused the Donglin Party and favored eunuchs, especially the famous "nine thousand years old" Wei Zhongxian, who was the first person in the harem. When he was dying, he did not forget to tell the Chongzhen Emperor to reuse Wei Zhongxian.
Such a mess was in hand, and Chongzhen was bitter in his heart. Probably to vent his anger, he killed Wei Zhongxian three months after he ascended the throne.
The history books record that in terms of work, Zhu Youjian was a good emperor who was diligent and honest, and his degree of effort simply went straight to his ancestor, the founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang. He is tireless in learning, reads a wide range of books, and keeps his hands on all kinds of classics day and night.
But the last years of the Ming Dynasty were more than just a piece of bad luck that could be described.
While many dynasties faced the problem of foreign invasions, the Ming Dynasty seemed particularly serious. Since Nurhaci was born, the Ming Dynasty border has not had a few good days. Every time these Jurchens went to a place, they took away all the things they could take away, like the young and strong laborers, women, gold, silver, treasures, grain and minerals, and those that could not be taken away could be destroyed, burned, and snatched wherever they went, and this shameless act of aggression caused great harm to the economy, military and people's psychology, and agricultural production of the Ming Dynasty.
The last years of the Ming Dynasty also encountered the Xiaoice River period, the global grain production decreased significantly, even today's Guangzhou and other places are frequently encountered snowfall, and livestock froze to death. Droughts became more frequent, locust plagues followed, and plague began to spread. According to incomplete statistics from historians, during the two plague pandemics during the Wanli and Chongzhen years of the Ming Dynasty, the death toll in the three provinces of Shaanxi, Jin, and Hebei in Northern China was at least more than 10 million.
Although later generations have criticized Chongzhen for being self-absorbed and has various shortcomings in his personality, it has to be said that in such a situation, even if Li Shimin and Liu Che came, they still had no fun.
There are many emperors in history who will not rule the country. Chongzhen probably did not expect that the Wanli Emperor, who had not been in the dynasty for decades, had not perished, but in his own hands, it was like gathering the heavens, the earth, and the people, the great Ming Dynasty, in the blink of an eye, was in danger.