The military and diplomatic failures during the Opium War caused shocks in the government and the opposition, especially causing reflection in the intellectual circles. It is reported that the war has been fought for two years, and Daoguang's twenty-two-year-old edict asked, "How many places are around the country?" How many countries are there? ...... Is there a dry road between England and Xinjiang? Is there any contact?" Ordered his subordinates to "play according to the facts, do not hide". In order to know oneself and know the other, some people of insight have begun to compile the world knowledge books. Among them, Lin Zexu, while smoking in preparation for war, on the other hand, let people translate the Englishman Murray's "Cyclopaedia of Geography" (1834), personally edited and edited into the book "Four Continents", which was the first to open the atmosphere and was called the "first person to open his eyes to see the world" in modern China. Entrusted by Lin Zexu, Wei Yuan compiled the first great work of world history and geography in modern China, the Atlas of the Sea Kingdom (50 volumes in 1843, hundreds of volumes later). Another of China's earlier chronicles of world geography is Xu Jishe's Yinghuan Zhiluo (1848). In addition, Gong Zizhen had already put forward many reform proposals on the eve of the Opium War, so Liang Qichaoyun "emancipated the late Qing Dynasty's thoughts, self-cherishing and meritorious deeds." Feng Guifen had the "Protest of the School Of Honor" (1861), advocating the use of Western studies, the production of western instruments, and the reform of the imperial examination. They are all outstanding intellectual pioneers who pioneered the modern era.
Statue of Gong Zizhen in the former residence of Gong Zizhen in Hangzhou, Zhejiang. As early as before the Opium War, Gong Zizhen had already put forward the idea of innovation, and his ideas influenced the later changes in the law and the improvement of the law.
Gong Zizhen was a thinker and writer in the middle of the Qing Dynasty. Since childhood, he has been guided by his maternal grandfather Duan Yujie and is very knowledgeable. Later, seeing the economic decline and the deepening of social crises during the Jiadao years, he turned to the affairs of the world and advocated "more law", which influenced the later movement to change the law and strengthen the law. In his "Self-Hai Miscellaneous Poems", "Kyushu is angry and thunderous, and Wan Ma Qi is sad." I advise Tiangong to shake things up and demote talents in an eclectic manner", which is popular among the population. His famous essay "The Tale of the Sick Plum Pavilion" also pinned on innovative ideas. There is the "Complete Works of Gong Zizhen" in existence.
During the period of smoking ban, Lin Zexu actively explored the general situation outside the region, and sent people to collect and translate foreign language materials, and the "Chronicle of four continents" was compiled into a book under his impetus.
Translated from the Englishman Murray's "Encyclopedia of World Geography", which briefly describes the geography, history and political conditions of more than 30 countries on the four continents of the world, it was the first systematic world geography chronicle in China at that time, the first to open the atmosphere, and Lin Zexu was thus called the "first person to open his eyes to see the world" in modern China.
Wei Yuan, a thinker of the late Qing Dynasty, advocated new ideas and was a close friend of Lin Zexu. His "Atlas of the Sea Country" is one of the important works of "opening your eyes to see the world" in modern China.
Wei Yuan's Atlas of the Sea Kingdom, first published in 1843, is a comprehensive book introducing the world's scientific, geographical, and historical knowledge, with maps of the Netherlands and Northern Italy in the Atlas of the Sea Kingdom.
According to the preface to the Atlas of the Sea Kingdom, the book is "written for the sake of mastering the art of yi to control the yi", which means to learn the advanced technology of outsiders to curb the intrusion of outsiders. Unfortunately, the "Atlas of the Sea Kingdom" did not play much role in China, but it was later transmitted to Japan, where it was valued and inspired by the Meiji Restoration. In 1862, the Japanese shogunate sent a delegation to the Qing Dynasty, and one of its members, Takasugi Shinsaku, bought books in Shanghai and asked the bookstore if it had books by enlightened intellectuals such as "Chart of the Sea Country" or Lin Zexu, and the bookstore owner replied that there was none. Takasugi wrote in his diary: "The qing people's thinking and the chinese right path are too far apart, and the Qing intellectuals revel in empty words and do not yet learn realistically."
Portrait of Xu Ji in front of Chaoshan Academy of The Ancient City of Pingyao, Taiyuan, Shanxi. Xu Jihu, a scholar of the late Qing Dynasty, was one of the pioneers of china's modern eyes to see the world, and the Yinghuan Zhiluo is his important work.
Published in 1848 (Daoguang Pengshen, see map), Yinghuan Zhiluo contains maps of several countries, including the map of the British Isles as seen above. The author Xu Jihu praised the Western political system in the book, and at that time, his ideas were very avant-garde.
Statue of Feng Guifen in the former residence of Feng Guifen in Mudu Ancient Town, Wuzhong District, Suzhou, Jiangsu Province. Feng Guifen, a thinker and essayist in the late Qing Dynasty, put forward a new proposal of "collecting Western studies, making foreign utensils, preparing for national use, and changing science and technology", advocating "taking China's Lun Changming teaching as the original, supplemented by the techniques of wealth and strength of various countries", and "The Protest of schools and schools" is his important work.
Written in 1861, the Protests at the School of The Lu had an impact on the subsequent reforms of the Qing Dynasty.
The whole book of "School Protest" involves political, military, cultural, production, economic and other fields, and proposes to learn from the West. Among them, many suggestions such as adopting Western studies, making foreign utensils, preparing for national use, and changing the examination of science and technology influenced the later foreign affairs movement. As for the idea of "taking the Chinese Lun Changming Sect as the original, supplemented by the techniques of wealth and strength of the various countries", it was later summarized by Zhang Zhidong and others as "middle school as the body, Western learning as the use", which influenced the theory of changing the law and trying to strengthen the law in the later Qing Dynasty.
The Opium War amazed Chinese the advanced artifacts of foreign ships and other artifacts, and there were researchers who studied them. The picture shows the full map of the steamship in Zheng Fuguang's "Illustration of the Steamship".
The Opium War made more people aware of and studied Western artillery. The picture shows Ding Gongchen's "Acting on the Picture".
Before and after the Opium War, there were so many people of insight in China, why was it difficult to save the decline of decay?
The Qing Dynasty was in decline immediately after the prosperity of Kang Yongqian, and the economy was in a bad state, the officials were corrupt, the army and soldiers were lazy, and the people were in turmoil. Although there was no original large-scale literary prison in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, most of the government and the public were content with the status quo and were unwilling to reuse talents for innovation, and many people of insight not only did not reuse them, but were often dismissed and depreciated. Lin Zexu was dismissed from his post and exiled for smoking bans; Gong Zizhen repeatedly exposed the shortcomings of the times and resigned from his official post and returned to the south; Wei Yuan was dismissed from his post for "delaying the post" and "playing with military aircraft"; in his later years, he immersed himself in studying Buddhism; Xu Jishe was also repeatedly reprimanded or demoted. Of course, even if the Qing court reused talents, it did not mean that it could immediately recover the decline, because at that time, the Chinese elite was born from reading the Four Books and Five Classics, and did not realize that China's backwardness was an essential problem in the system. They always feel that it is enough to learn something superficial in the West, so there are superficial sayings such as "mastering the art of mastering the art to control the yi". Their understanding has gradually deepened in the midst of successive failures.
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