introduction
Ancient Cloud:
Those who have established great things in the past will not only have supernatural talents, but also have the will to persevere, and also have a broad mind like the sea.
Throughout the ages, if there are people who, no matter where they are, always focus on the overall situation and are informal; whether they are strong and strong, sitting on the majestic soldiers, or self-made people who are in adversity, they all know the great righteousness, this can be described as a true hero. And do not hear that those who have lofty ideals can succeed, break the cauldron and sink the boat, and the hundred and two Qin Guans will eventually belong to Chu; the bitter hearted people will not bear the burden, and the three thousand Yue Jia can swallow Wu. Not to mention that Zhu Yuanzhang, the Ming Taizu who was born in grass and mustard but "added his body" with his own strength, eventually became the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
In the last years of the Yuan Dynasty, the imperial court squeezed the people, and ethnic contradictions were sharp. Under the Mongols, the people were divided into four classes, of which the Mongols were the first class, the Semu people (Westerners, some Khitans) were the second class, the third and fourth classes were Han (Northern Han, Khitan and Jurchen people) and southerners (Southern Han people, roughly Southern Song People), and the four-class system made the politics, office, examination, criminal law, etc. between the various ethnic groups discriminate, as well as various ethnic discrimination policies, such as: The Mongols only need to kill the Han people with a staff for fifty-seven times and pay for burning silver; if the Han people kill the Mongols, they are directly punished by death, and " The property of the prisoners was cut off, and the rest of the people were requisitioned and buried with silver." The implementation of such a top-down policy of ethnic classification and discrimination was only temporarily oppressed by the strength of the Mongols, which temporarily oppressed the large number of Han Chinese. At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the perennial harsh administration and heavy taxes coupled with natural disasters constantly kept the people in the water day and night.
Zhu Yuanzhang was born in a poor Han family in a remote village, because he was a Han Chinese, his ancestors had fled for generations of people because of tax arrears, and the family's wish was only to find a safe place to work as a tenant, so as not to starve to death. His father settled thereafter, working as a tenant under the local landlord Liu De, who deceived the good, feared evil, and was only interested in profit, and the peasants worked all day, but they could only make ends meet. The oppression of the landlord made the Zhu family hungry for a long time and suffered unspeakably. It is difficult to talk about studying in life, so Zhu Yuanzhang helped the landlord Liu De to herd cattle from an early age to reduce the burden on his family. Although his family was poor, he was clever and clever from an early age, and he had an opinion on doing things, and soon gathered a group of small friends of the same origin around him, and later the famous founding heroes Xu Da, Tang He, Zhou Dexing and others were all from it.
Once when herding cattle, the children were hungry before they finished work, at this time Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the calves in the herd and suddenly had a bold idea in his heart. He beckoned his friends, took the lead in killing the calf, and roasted it with everyone. At that time, beef had nothing to do with the peasant children, and the cattle ridden under the crotch were the private property of the landlord. Although the calf is enjoyable, after the full stomach, the children have begun to worry, after this return to the less calf, how should the landlord account. At this time, Zhu Yuanzhang swore to tell everyone that when the time came, he would all say that I had lost it. As a result, after returning home, the landlord Liu De was really furious, and beat Zhu Yuanzhang fiercely with a whip, and also made the Zhu family, who was already shaky, carry the debt of this calf. Although he was beaten severely, Zhu Yuanzhang fully demonstrated his talent as a leader in this incident, dared to take responsibility, and served people with righteousness. After that, Xu Da, Tang He, Zhou Dexing, and others who made great contributions to the Southern Expedition and the Northern War were also out of trust in Zhu Yuanzhang.
When Zhu Yuanzhang was fifteen years old, his life took a major turn. At that time, the rare drought, locust plague and plague in their village occurred at the same time, and by this natural disaster, Zhu Yuanzhang's family first contracted the plague and died, and then his mother and eldest brother starved to death, which was fatal to the Zhu family. Without parents and eldest brothers, only the second brother and a few infant children are left in the family. In such a chaotic world, even if they are on the verge of starvation, they must bury their deceased relatives in the ground. However, Zhu Yuanzhang's family was destitute, and when he paid for the coffin and the cemetery, Zhu Yuanzhang had to go to the landlord Liu De, hoping that he could help. The answer, of course, was no, not only that, because there was no value in squeezing, he even drove Zhu Yuanzhang's family away directly.
After that, the story does not need to be repeated too much, Zhu Yuanzhang began a long wandering, and finally the people were dissatisfied with the cruel rule of the Yuan Dynasty, and uprisings broke out everywhere, and finally, Zhu Yuanzhang ended the chaotic world and unified the world and opened the rule of the Ming Dynasty. After Yi Jin returned to his hometown, he saw Liu De, the landlord of the year, again. When the local lord recognized that the emperor in front of him was the same peasant Zhu Yuanzhang, who had been squeezed by him to the point of no return, Liu De trembled, knelt on the ground and prostrated his head like a garlic, saying that he had no eyes and no pearls, offended the emperor, and begged the emperor to spare his life. Unlike the ruthlessness of the landlord at that time, Zhu Yuanzhang replied: "What Er does is also a constant ear, and there is no need to ask." When I was poor, did I know that today is the Son of Heaven? Such an open-mindedness is in stark contrast to the ruthlessness of the landlords at that time.
epilogue
Throughout history, although China's ancient history is long, there are not many dynasties. The general trend of the world, divided for a long time will be combined for a long time, such as the Qin Dynasty, the dynasties that have perished only for two years are really very few, so the founding emperors of each dynasty and each generation are also few, and in this interval, Zhu Yuanzhang seems to be the most special one, neither born from a famous family nor an asset fief, but eventually unified the world, changed dynasties, all because of his ability to absorb hundreds of rivers of mind, and finally became a generation of Ming Emperors.