Qianlong, formerly known as Ai Xin Jue Luo Hongli, the longest-lived emperor in Chinese history, called himself the "Ten Quan Old Man" at the age of 89. Many people may not have a good impression of him, but during his reign, he still had great merits. Of course, this was mainly manifested in his youth, such as the Pacification of the Great and Small Zhuo Rebellion, the Dzungar Rebellion, etc., officially incorporating Xinjiang and Tibet into China's territory, and the territory of the Qing Dynasty reached its maximum during his reign, from the sea in the east to the onion ridge in the west, to the Zengmu Dark Sand in antarctica, across the Outer Xing'an Mountains in the north, to Lake Balkhash in the northwest, and to Sakhalin Island in the northeast. Reaching more than 13 million square kilometers, thus laying the territory of modern China, if it is not cut out at the end of the Qing Dynasty, then the current territory of China may be the world's first. Moreover, at that time, the population of the country reached 300 million.
However, there have been meritorious deeds, and when he entered middle age, the four seas were stable, the country was stable, and the national strength was booming. He gradually began to enjoy great achievements, so he began to live a life of corruption and depravity, great construction, and extreme luxury. It was these things he did in his later years that drained the national strength, and the Qing Dynasty gradually turned from prosperity to decline, and finally left a mess for his son, the Jiaqing Emperor, so how far did Qianlong faint in his later years?
In his later years, Qianlong was very happy and neglected government affairs
The largest corrupt official in Chinese history, He Yan, appeared in the Qianlong Dynasty, and the Qianlong Emperor was very favored by He Yan, who went from a third-class bodyguard to a foreman to a foreman military aircraft minister, a leading bodyguard, and was also named a first-class loyal xianggong, a famous courtier of the Qing Dynasty. We usually think that famous courtiers are paired with Ming Jun, powerful ministers, and traitors with Dim Jun, tyrants, although it is very one-sided to think so, but an outstanding monarch must at least be able to know people and do good job, although the Qianlong Emperor favored He yan and had various versions of folklore, but conniving and forming a party for personal gain and arbitrarily manipulating power is indeed a manifestation of the Qianlong Emperor's dereliction of duty.
In addition, due to the increasing corruption of the government, corrupt officials and corrupt officials desperately looted the people's fat and people's ointment, which naturally led to the people's life being worse than death, there is a saying that the officials forced the people to rebel, the people had to rebel, so in the late reign of the Qianlong Emperor, where is the scene of Kangqian's prosperous life? There were many civil uprisings, first the Hui people revolted, and then there were Xiangqian Miao people rebelling, and the most fierce was the White Lotus Sect that gradually became larger in the late Qianlong administration. In the sixty years of Qianlong, the Qianlong Emperor announced his abdication, and Emperor Yan succeeded to the throne as the Jiaqing Emperor, but the Qianlong Emperor was unwilling to delegate power and still firmly grasped the government, which also caused the Jiaqing Emperor to tie his hands and feet everywhere.
Daxing "literal prison" to imprison the people's thinking
When it comes to the faults of the Qing emperors, the literal prison is a topic that cannot be bypassed. There were more than 130 literal prisons arising in Qianlong's later years! The literary prison of the Qianlong period is in the same line as his grandfather and LaoZi. He was uneducated and wrote more than 40,000 poems in his lifetime, almost none of which survived (except for the one selected for the primary school textbook). But it is hard to distort other people's articles. "But to make the Dragon City fly will be, not to teach Humadu Yin Mountain." This was originally a poem that an official slapped on his ass, but it made him furious and almost killed the official.
There are more than 130 recorded literal prisons in Qianlong's time, more than his grandfather, grandfather and Lao Tzu combined. During his reign, he developed the literal prison to its peak.
Good great joy, six under the Jiangnan
After Qianlong reached middle age, his own life began to become luxurious, and he traveled to various places many times, touring the mountains and rivers, and spending a lot of money. Playing in the north was not interesting, so I thought about going to Jiangnan to see. So, at the gracious invitation of a magistrate, Qianlong began his journey down to Jiangnan, and you said that you would get it once, but he was completely fascinated by Jiangnan, and he went back and forth a total of six times. These six times in Jiangnan can be said to have basically consumed the treasury of the Qing Dynasty.
At that time, his entourage in the south was as many as 2500 people, each with a single horse or a double horse, in addition to 400 mule carts, 800 camels, and 3600 trackers. According to statistics, the total cost of Qianlong's six southern tours reached 20 million taels, and how much was the state's annual fiscal revenue at that time? Such extravagance and waste not only cost a lot of manpower and material resources. Moreover, in order to curry favor with him, local local officials wantonly plundered the people, and some officials also took advantage of the opportunity to amass wealth and embezzle and accept bribes, causing the people in the Jiangnan region to suffer unspeakable. On the eightieth birthday of the empress dowager and the eightieth birthday of the Qianlong Emperor himself, the "great ceremony of the Beijing Master flourished", compared with the sixtieth birthday of the empress dowager. Therefore, the upward and downward effects were followed by the big bureaucrats, large landlords, and big businessmen of the time. For a time, the extravagance of the entire capital prevailed, which led to the gradual transformation of the Qing Dynasty from prosperity to decline.
Closed to the outside world
Before the Qianlong Emperor, China's foreign trade had been very developed, the history said:
"The people have the joy of cultivating mulberry inside, and the resources of fish and salt outside."
The Qing government was also very willing to accept new things from outside, widely absorbing foreign advanced cultures, and even the Kangxi Emperor took the lead in learning Western algebra and geometry, and drew the first map of China with the help of missionaries, "Imperial Public Opinion Overview", so that the Qing Dynasty could be so powerful in the early period.
But here in Qianlong, because after the development of his grandfather and father, the national strength of the Qing Dynasty at this time was already very strong, so Qianlong began to become blind. In the face of Magni's request for trade, the Qianlong Emperor arrogantly said:
"The Heavenly Dynasty was rich in products and had everything, and originally it did not rely on foreign goods to have it or not, but because the tea, porcelain, and silk jin produced by the Heavenly Dynasty were necessary for the Western countries and the Erguo countries, it was with grace and compassion that they opened a foreign firm in Macao, so that they could have daily resources and stain the surplus."
At this time, Qianlong was still immersed in the dream of a heavenly kingdom, but what he did not know was that in the decades after Magni's visit to China, the Western capitalist countries were undergoing earth-shaking changes, and the rise of the first industrial revolution made Britain and other Western countries from agricultural countries to industrial countries, and it was precisely because of Qianlong's wrong decision that China missed this historical trend and eventually led to China's tragic modern history.
In his later years, he used force
After Qianlong's later years, due to the corruption of officials and the rampant corruption, the people were not happy with their livelihood, and the class contradictions and ethnic contradictions in the country were further intensified! Peasant uprisings of different sizes and sizes have been set off across the country. Therefore, Qianlong had to concentrate on suppressing the peasant uprising, which was undoubtedly worse for the Qing government, which was already shy. Fifty-three years after Qianlong, the Annam Nguyen clan usurped the country and began to challenge the authority of the Qing government. Therefore, Qianlong began to use troops against Annam, and in the end this war did not take much advantage, on the whole it was a failure, and it was the enemy who lost troops in the battles of Burma and Annam, and finally the other side took the initiative to negotiate peace because of the strength of the Qing Empire. In this way, when the Qing Dynasty was most financially difficult, the large-scale use of foreign troops led to the decline of national strength, and a huge empire gradually began to decline from prosperity to decline, and began to decline from Qianlong's hands.
Comparatively speaking, the Qianlong Emperor was the one who lay on the merit book and ate the old book, and the Qianlong Emperor liked to lie on the merit book very much, because the old book was very delicious. Therefore, some people say that Qianlong is the sinner of the Chinese nation throughout the ages. It was precisely because of his series of erroneous national policies that it led to the national shame of humiliating peace and paying reparations for land cuts in the Opium War.