Today I would like to tell you about the eunuch force, one of the factors of chaos in the late Tang Dynasty, tang Wenzong in addition to the famous partisan dispute between the Niu and Li parties, the other force is the eunuch class.
Eunuchs in the late Tang Dynasty became more and more powerful, and there were also factions within them. The court officials and eunuchs were originally incompatible, so at that time there was a confrontation between "Nan Ya" (the location of the imperial officials) and "North Division" (where the eunuchs were located). However, due to the favorable position of the eunuchs, the court officials had to make contact with them. At that time, the attitude of the court officials in the Niu and Li parties toward eunuchs could be roughly divided into three types.
One was that they were more closely related to certain people among the eunuchs. At that time, eunuchs would also support some civilian officials to help enter the position, such as Li Zongmin. It enabled it to compete side by side with the cattle monks and Confucians of the Niu Party, help squeeze out political enemies Li Deyu out of the dynasty, and so on.
For example, Li Zongmin took the position of a person in the Wenzong Dynasty because of the help of eunuchs, and led the cattle monks and Confucians to be ranked side by side in the same year, and excluded the enemy Li Deyu out of the dynasty.
The second is that although they do not collude with the eunuchs, they do not dare to directly teach them and openly resist.
Cow monk letters belong to this type. During the reign of Emperor Jingzong, the eunuch Wang Shoucheng had exclusive powers, and the cattle monks and monks did not dare to say much, but only asked to go out as officials and avoid disasters and self-safety. Song Shenxi plotted to get rid of the eunuchs and was degraded, and the cattle monk Ru happily confessed in front of Emperor Wenzong, showing a political stance that did not agree with Quan Chuang.
The third was to fight against eunuchs to varying degrees. For example, Ling Huke, Li Gu and others belong to this category.
Eunuchs, on the other hand, also made full use of the contradictions and struggles between officials to expand and consolidate their position of power. It is clear that when the Niu-Li party struggle was fierce and changeable, the attention of the imperial officials was mainly focused on the competition between internal political enemies, and there was no time to pay attention to the dictatorship of eunuchs. The eunuch Wang Shoucheng has endured for a long time and has a lot to do with this. Therefore, some people describe the relationship between the outer court (court officials) and the inner court (eunuchs) as a contradictory relationship: the more the outer dynasty sees its movement, the more quiet the inner court becomes; when the outer dynasty turns quiet, the inner court may have to move. The changes in the foreign dynasty in the past half century have naturally provided a good period and opportunity for the immobility and development of the eunuchs in the inner court. In order to buy time and create opportunities for their own development, the eunuchs naturally knew how to make the officials fight endlessly. This cannot but be said to be "an important factor in the protracted struggle between the cattle and the lee party."
When Tang Wenzong was facing the quarrel between the Niu and Li factions, he once said with great sighs: "It is easy to go to Hebei, but it is really difficult to go to this party!" This cannot be said to be not his heartfelt words for a moment. The problem is that he, like the emperors before and after him, while lamenting this, hopes to consolidate his imperial power in the contradictions of various forces, including the disputes between the parties. The result can only be counterproductive. Power was consumed in partisan rivalries, life was controlled by eunuchs, land was divided among feudal lords, and finally, dynasties perished in these contradictions.