In 213 BC, in order to celebrate the defeat of the Xiongnu and the subjugation of the hundred yue, Qin Shi Huang held a banquet in Xianyang Palace and drank with 70 doctors, civil and military officials. During the banquet, all the courtiers sang praises for Qin Shi Huang. Among them, Zhou Qingchen, the doctor's attendant, praised Qin Shi Huang: "Your Majesty razed the six kingdoms, unified the world, defeated the Xiongnu in the north, served hundreds of yue in the south, and the land illuminated by the sun and the moon is all ruled by Your Majesty." His Majesty abolished the old system of division and sealing, spread throughout the counties, eliminated the scourge of war, and the people lived and worked in peace and contentment, and no one has been able to match His Majesty's Weed since ancient times." Qin Shi Huang was naturally ecstatic after hearing this.
Another doctor under the seat, Chun Yuyue, who was opposed to the county system, heard Zhou Qingchen's flattery, and was very resistant in his heart, so he stood up and said: "Yin Shang and the Zhou Dynasty have been sitting in the world for more than a thousand years, because they have divided their sons and daughters and relied on these people to assist the imperial court. And now His Majesty sits and owns the world, ranking the honor of the ninety-five, and the meritorious children can only be ordinary subjects. If suddenly there was a Tian clan usurpation like the Qi State and a dictatorship of the Six Qings like the Jin State, without assisting the princes, which one would save that dangerous situation? I have never heard of ruling the world without imitating the ancients and trying to achieve long-term stability. Now that Zhou Qingchen is flattering His Majesty in front of him and fueling His Majesty's mistakes, such a person is by no means a loyal courtier, and should be severely punished to show the world! Chun Yuyue's words swept away the originally joyful and warm atmosphere at the banquet. The brightly lit Xianyang Palace fell silent.
All the courtiers lowered their heads and fell silent, and when Qin Shi Huang heard this, his face was also livid and angry, because Chun Yuyue directly denied his basic national policy, but Qin Shi Huang held back and did not say anything, so he wanted to take this opportunity to unify the opinions of the world. Therefore, he now asks the ministers to state their views. Li Si immediately pointed the finger at the "all the lives", and he further offered a message to the King of Qin: "In ancient times, the Central Plains was chaotic, and no one would unify, so the princes acted chaotically, and in the final analysis, they confused people's hearts with ancient times and not modern times. Now His Majesty has won the world and is extremely respected. And the scholars, who were more specialized in scrolls, opposed politics, and the imperial court was dissatisfied in their hearts, and the people borrowed ancient irony from the present, and if they were not strictly prohibited, the national prestige would not prosper for long. Li Si was elected from one person to a class of people, from one type of person to one type of person to do things, from things to poetry books, and then made a list to ask Qin Shi Huang to announce the ban on book burning. This suggestion was filled with the heart of Qin Shi Huang, so he ordered the book burning, and an unprecedented catastrophe in the history of ancient Chinese culture began.
According to Li Si's suggestion, Qin Shi Huang issued a "book burning order" to the whole country: all historical books outside the Qin state, except for the books "Poems", "Books" and "Hundred Languages" shared by the Doctor's Hall, all the rest were burned, and medicine, divination, and agricultural books were not burned; If there are those who talk about poetry again, "abandon the market". Those who do not expose the past and the present, if the official knows about it and do not expose it, they will be punished, and those who refuse to burn within 30 days of not following the book burning order will be punished with a tattoo punishment.
A fire in Xianyang City opened the curtain on Qin Shi Huang's burning of civilization; The fire burned all over the country. First of all, the national historical archives except the "Qin Ji" were burned, and in less than 30 days, most of the "prohibited" books of the people were reduced to ashes, and only the Royal Library retained a relatively complete collection. However, the fire of the book burning and the strict decree did not completely awaken all the Confucians at that time, and they also tried their best to treasure the book.
If the book burning was a book scandal caused by the controversy of the imperial ministers, then the pit Confucianism was a man-made disaster caused by the emperor's superstition. Qin Shi Huang is famous for his fear of death, he is very superstitious, while delusional to become an emperor for generations, he also whimsically hopes for immortality, and tries in every possible way to find medicine that makes people immortal.
In addition to the more than 460 people killed in Xianyang, a group of people were also moved to the northern frontier. After the incident, Qin Shi Huang's eldest son Fusu Jinjian said: "The world has originally decided, the distant Qian Shou has not yet settled down, all the gentlemen have recited the law Confucius, His Majesty is heavy on the law, and the ministers are afraid that the world will be uneasy." I hope Your Majesty thinks twice. Qin Shi Huang angrily supported Su Duozui and threw him out of Xianyang, sending him to Shangjun (present-day southeast of Yulin, Shaanxi) in the north to carry out the task of overseer. Based on Confucian thought, Confucian scholars criticized and ridiculed the vicious imperial government of the Qin Dynasty, and even more deeply hated Qin Shi Huang, who wanted to get rid of it sooner. Therefore, it is not surprising that Qin Shi Huang shifted the spearhead, took the innocent Confucian out of anger, and counterattacked and persecuted.
However, the development of history did not change because of Qin Shi Huang's perverse actions, Qin Shi Huang burned books for three years and pit Confucianism for two years, but he himself died of illness in the dunes. This generation of overlords, who fantasized about immortality, died at the age of only fifty, and the huge dynasty he tried to "pass on for thousands of lifetimes" also "died in the second life". However, the Taoist doctrine and Confucianism that he destroyed in every way had super vitality, burned inexhaustibly, and did not die, and since the later Han Dynasty, it has achieved the dominance of Chinese social concepts, which has not declined for thousands of years.
The book burning pit Confucianism is the measure taken by Qin Shi Huang in order to consolidate the imperial rule of the Great Qin Empire in the cultural and ideological fields, unify the ideology, and consolidate the political power, this practice is brutal and stupid, and the book burning pit Confucianism did not really serve the purpose of consolidating the royal rule of the Qin Dynasty, but accelerated its demise!