Among the four famous ministers of the late Qing Dynasty, Zeng Guofan and Zuo Zongtang had the highest reputation, and they all reached the ideal of "governing the country and the world" in the minds of the ancient literati. Unfortunately, the decline and fall of the Qing Dynasty was already doomed from the moment of "closing the country", and even they could not afford to return to heaven. Sometimes what matters is not how much merit is made, but genuine patriotism that can be truly respected. Who is patriotic, Zeng Guofan and Zuo Zongtang? Their respective reactions after the Yuanmingyuan was burned down were clear at a glance.
In 1857 (the seventh year of Xianfeng), Britain and France provoked the Second Opium War on the grounds that Guangdong officials had gone to British merchant ships to arrest criminals and the killing of a French missionary in Guangxi. In fact, their purpose is to further open up the Chinese market and expand their aggressive interests in China.
In 1860 (Xianfeng Decade), the Anglo-French army arrived in Beijing, the Xianfeng Emperor fled to Chengde, and the Anglo-French army then carried out a crazy raid on the Yuanmingyuan, known as the "Garden of Ten Thousand Gardens". After robbing millions of treasures, they also set a fire to destroy the crime, and burned this unprecedented garden treasure.
In the year that the Yuanmingyuan was burned, Zuo Zongtang was still just a petty official of the "Four Pins Jingtang Candidate". Of course, this petty official is relatively speaking, and Zuo Zongtang does not have much influence for the time being. It is even more impossible to intervene in the burning of the Yuanmingyuan.
But after the Yuanmingyuan was destroyed, Zuo Zongtang was very sad and indignant. Even if he could not sleep peacefully all night, it was this period of humiliating history that made Zuo Zongtang make up his mind to repay the country with his body and rest until his death.
In 1883 (the ninth year of Guangxu), when the Sino-French War broke out, Zuo Zongtang, who was already seventy years old, asked himself to go to Fujian to supervise, but unfortunately, two years later, in 1885 (the eleventh year of Guangxu), he died of illness in Fuzhou.
Zuo Zongtang himself wrote in his last words: "However, this Vietnamese incident and war is a major key to China's strength and weakness. The minister and the overseer went south, and so far they did not extend the tart, Zhang Guowei, regretting his life, he could not look at it! ”
Although Zuo Zongtang failed to change the decadent situation, his loyalty to the country was evident in the day.
And after the British and French allies killed the Yuanmingyuan, what did Zeng Guofan, who was also one of the "four famous ministers", behave? A year after the Yuanmingyuan was burned, that is, in the first year of Tongzhi, Zeng Guofan wrote his views on the matter in his diary:
"Foreigners entered Beijing in August of the tenth year, did not harm our zongmiao temple, and now helped me attack and suppress bandits in Shanghai, Ningbo and other places, both of which have virtue in me." We in China should not forget the big ones and complain about the small ones. ”
Zeng Guofan said that the burning of the Yuanmingyuan was only a "small thing", after all, the foreigners did not destroy the Zongmiao Temple of the Qing Dynasty, and they also helped us to attack the bandits of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in Shanghai, Ningbo and other places, so there was "kindness" to us. Therefore, we should not forget the "great grace" of others, but only grasp the "small transgressions" of others.
Seeing this, I doubt that this is really what Zeng Guofan said? Will there be any shady scenes? If it is really Zeng Guofan's nonsense, then he is not only unpatriotic, but even suspected of "treason". If the burning of the Yuanmingyuan is still a trivial matter, then I am afraid that there will be no major event in modern history. And the "great grace" of the foreigners cannot be said, it is just a play. Could it be that Zeng Guofan really couldn't see through it?