"You can kill people with inches of iron, and you can see blood with a knife." When describing Lu Xun's writing style, Yu Dafu once said that Lu Xun's style is concise like a dagger, as long as he grasps the key point, three words and two words can break the theme and see the blood in one sword.
"[The Penghu Reform Law] is an important political reform in China's modern history." To a certain extent, this change of law has promoted people's ideological emancipation, promoted the trend of running schools, and played an important role in promoting the progress of modern Chinese society. However, when the six gentlemen of the Penghu Reform Law generously died, the crowd of onlookers was cheering and rejoicing.
In the glorious history of ancient and modern China and abroad, there have been countless reformers who have changed the law, and Lu Xun published a short article without a title in the "Inch Iron" column of the "National Gazette". When talking about the deliberate smear of some people against others, Lu Xun said, "People who have been prescient have always been forced and squeezed and driven to death by the insidious little people and the faint masses. ”
Insidious villains
"During the reform of the law, former Japanese Prime Minister Itō Hirobumi visited China." In the last years of the Qing Dynasty, the backward feudal system was no longer able to lead people to progress and development, and Cixi and Guangxu, who realized this, had actually begun to gradually carry out reforms before Kang Youwei planned the Hundred Days Restoration.
However, at that time, the reformists were too radical, and Guangxu hoped to be able to seize power as soon as possible, and under the collision of the two phases, the speed of reform was full, and many untimely terms were issued madly, which made not only many conservative forces dissatisfied, but also a large number of people also complained bitterly.
Foreign imperialism such as Japan, which wants to divide up China's territory and forcibly occupy China's materials, is bound to not sit idly by while China becomes strong. At that time, Kang Youwei had very close relations with Japan, and "invited former Japanese Prime Minister Itō Hirobumi (the main figure in planning the Sino-Japanese Sino-Japanese War)" to serve as an adviser to Guangxu.
Guangxu was too desperate to exclude Cixi from the central government and lacked enough experience in political games to realize how dangerous he was doing for himself and for the country as a whole.
In fact, the crazy reforms in the early Guangxu period, and the wanton behavior of Allowing Kang Youwei and other reformers to parachute into the government were all tacitly approved by Cixi. Without Cixi and some of the ministers, Guangxu's large number of measures could not have progressed so smoothly.
Although Cixi also hoped to maintain the backward feudal system, she also understood that reform was imperative. Cixi firmly controlled the power in the early stages, and after Guangxu slowly grew up, he also tried to delegate power and let Guangxu take over the burden, but Guangxu's performance not only disappointed Cixi, but also made Cixi feel frightened.
When Guangxu successively dismissed the humeral ministers of the DPRK and directly let Kang Youwei and others parachute in, Cixi did not take a stance, and when Kang Youwei led the reformists to openly exert pressure in the court, "asking the Qing Dynasty to hire Itō (Bowen) as an adviser" and to give him real power, Cixi realized that it was wrong, but at this time still did not take action, but privately asked Guangxu what he thought of Itō Hirobumi.
It was not until later, at the suggestion of Ito Hirobumi, that Kang Youwei and other reformers wrote to emperor Guangxu requesting the establishment of a "Sino-AMERICAN, British, and Japanese state" and handing over all of China's political and military sovereignty to others, and when the Guangxu Emperor joined forces with Kang Youwei and other reformers to plot to assassinate Cixi, Cixi finally realized that the situation was serious, so he "immediately made a decision and launched a coup." ”
Thanks to the timely response of Cixi and others, in the end, the "Sino-AMERICAN, British-Japanese union" of the imperial powers dividing up China did not come to fruition.
There is precedent
"(South Korea's) first governor was Hirobumi Ito." When kang youwei and others were acting more and more "weird", the Korean minister sniffed something was wrong and quickly compared what was happening in the court with what Japan had done to North Korea at the same time.
At that time, Japan first sent people to unite with the pro-Japanese faction in the Korean government to assassinate the pro-Russian Empress Myeongseong, and then took advantage of the war between Russia and Japan to force South Korea to sign the Korea-Japan Protocol and the first Korea-Japan Entente, causing South Korea to lose its financial and diplomatic sovereignty.
After Japan's victory in the Russo-Japanese War, Japan immediately forced South Korea to sign the Second Korea-Japan Treaty, so that South Korea's foreign relations and related affairs were all under the command of the Japanese unified supervisor in Korea, and the first japanese supervisor was Ito Hirobumi, who was highly recommended by Kang Youwei.
Linking the two events, the assassination of Empress Myeongseong of Korea is like Tan Sitong's lobbying of Yuan Shikai to "kill Ronglu, surround the Summer Palace", and then assassinate Cixi, and the establishment of a "Sino-Japanese-American-British state" and the surrender of diplomatic and military power to the Qing Dynasty is the same as the Rok-Japan treaty that Japan forced South Korea to sign.
Worst of all, Korea was eventually forced into a merger treaty in 1910, completely becoming a Japanese colony. The sinister thoughts of these imperial powers after their hypocrisy may not be understood by Guangxu, and the young reformers such as Kang Youwei and Tan Si may not understand them because of their lack of experience, but it is impossible for Cixi and the ministers who have been "experienced in the battlefield" not to understand.
Long before Cixi launched the coup d'état, the ministers had already frantically written to prevent the Guangxu Emperor from "betraying the country", and the ministers said that they "borrowed foreign ministers, relied heavily on their neighbors and enemies, and endangered the sect's society", which was clearly the practice of chaotic ministers and thieves!
Cixi stepped on the brakes at a critical moment, but after that, Cixi said nothing about the Guangxu Emperor's assassination of himself, and when he ordered the arrest of Kang Youwei and others and the execution of the six gentlemen of Wushu, he did not mention at all that "they are guilty of treason and collaboration with the enemy." ”
Cixi and others also felt that the reason why these radical people, who had angered the interests of the conservative faction, and frantically promoted the Qing Dynasty's trafficking in sovereignty and territory, may only be deceived and deceived by Japan, and they are not really intentional.
Generous to death
"If You Die and China Can Be Strong, Why Don't You Die?" In the later stages of the development of the Penghu Reform Law, when Kang Youwei was already acting in full accordance with Japan's suggestions, and the "radical" law change factions in the DPRK and China were also following suit, in fact, the entire change of law had already been separated from the broad masses of the people.
Kang Guangren, one of the six gentlemen of wushu, vigorously promoted running schools during the period of the change of law, and after realizing that the change of law could not be achieved overnight, he repeatedly advised Kang Youwei to leave the capital and return to the south to give lectures in order to cultivate more talents for restoration, and when the time came, he would launch a large-scale change of law. After his arrest, Kang Guangren was awe-struck, saying that if he died, China would become stronger, and what did it matter if he died!
Although Kang Guangren was able to see the situation clearly, he could not stop Kang Youwei, and he lacked enough appeal among the Fa-changing faction, so he failed to prevent the tragedy from happening in the end.
However, Kang Guangren's bloody sacrifice, his efforts to run around and call on schools everywhere were not in vain. After that, the act of "opening a new style of school" during the reform of the law laid the foundation for the awakening of more people later.
Although Tan Sitong also fell into the trap of imperialism in the process of changing the law, believing that Xinjiang would be sold to Russia and Tibet to England to "repay the arrears of 20,000 yuan", the fundamental in his heart was that he still hoped that the country would become bigger and stronger as soon as possible.
Later, Tan Sitong resolutely stayed behind despite the persuasion of everyone, trying to use his own sacrifice to make a final resistance to those feudal stubborn forces. Tan Sitong said that the changes in various countries have been made through bloodshed, and now China has not heard of people who have shed blood because of the changes. ”
In fact, Tan Sitong and Kang Youwei, who vigorously promoted the Qing Dynasty to sell state land to the imperial powers, did not "understand how the trade of territory between countries was going on." "After all, if you want to save the survival of the map and save the building, it is not enough to rely on a single passion."
When the six gentlemen of Wushu died generously, the people who were already dissatisfied with the series of untimely terms implemented during the reform of the law thought that they had disposed of a bunch of traitors, so they cheered and rejoiced.
And Mr. Lu Xun's sentence that "pre-conscious people have always been forced and squeezed by the insidious villains and faint masses to be exiled and killed" seems to have explained the truth.
brief summary:
"Politics is dirty." In the face of the great powers that deliberately wanted to invade the land of China, the Guangxu Emperor and Tan Si, who had too little experience, were like a group of small white rabbits who had just entered society, and they were completely unaware of the danger.
When the six gentlemen of Wushu generously died, the onlookers who did not know the truth thought that they had executed the traitor, so they cheered. For the enthusiastic law changers, the imperial powers such as Japan, which used the law change faction, were like the "sinister little people" in Lu Xun's words, while the cheering people were the "faint masses" who had not yet had time to awaken.