"The emperors of the Ming Dynasty are all wonderful, and the emperors of the Qing Dynasty are almost all Ming Jun"
Through the film and television dramas of the Ming and Qing dynasties, which account for a large proportion, we are basically familiar with the characters and events of this period.
But after reading too many stories, it is inevitable to have questions, for example, in film and television dramas, all the emperors of the Qing Dynasty are Ming monarchs, and no matter how bad they are, they are also the kings of the Ming Dynasty, and on the other hand, the image of the kings of the Ming Dynasty, except for the few few, the rest give people the impression that they are all very strange.
Emperor Jiajing (stills)
So, is this really the case in history? and if so, what is it that causes such similar dynasties to have such different royal abilities?
1. The power comparison of the Ming and Qing emperors
This statement, at first glance, makes a lot of sense.
After all, the Ming Dynasty contributed to history, such as "Grassland Study" Zhu Qizhen, "Mother Lover" Zhu Jianshen, "Super Player" Zhu Houzhao, "Cultivating Immortals" Zhu Houxi, "Invincible Otaku" Zhu Yijun, and "First-class Carpenter" Zhu Youxiao, these six indescribable Ming Dynasty emperors.
According to the calculation of the sixteen emperors of the Ming Dynasty, "abnormal human beings" accounted for more than one-third.
And the remaining ten people, also have their own problems, brutal, suspicious, confused, rich and lustful have their own merits, according to this standard, the Ming Dynasty emperor almost has nothing to do with the word "Mingjun".
Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang
But on the other hand, in the Qing Dynasty, except for the "big smoker" Xianfeng and the last Puyi, among the twelve emperors, even puppets like Tongzhi and Guangxu did not perform too badly.
Guangxu even has a "Wuxu Change" such a free hand, which seems to be much more capable than the emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
In this way, the Qing Dynasty emperor was really much better than the Ming Dynasty emperor?
Wait, it's not that simple.
To clearly explain the comparison between the advantages and disadvantages of the Ming Dynasty emperor and the Qing Dynasty emperor, we are afraid that we must first have a common sense beyond ordinary people's expectations, that is, the power of the Ming Dynasty emperor is to some extent less powerful than that of the Qing Dynasty emperor.
Kangxi
Why do you say that? Actually, we have to start with the comparison of power between the Ming and Qing emperors.
Many people may have heard a sentence, that is, "the Ming Dynasty won the country", the core of this "Guozheng" is that the legal system of the Ming Dynasty is very correct, and the foundation for Zhu Yuanzhang to obtain the world is the so-called "expelling the Tartars and restoring China".
In other words, the Mongols who had ruled the Central Plains for many years were driven back to the steppe, and the Han Chinese dynasty system was re-established.
It seems that the foundation of the Ming Dynasty's rule is very solid and reasonable, but in reality it is not like this.
You must know that the Yuan Dynasty was hierarchical, and its rule itself did not need to consider the psychology of the vast majority of people.
Ming Dynasty Wang
But the Ming Dynasty was different, since the Ming Dynasty claimed to have inherited the "Chinese orthodoxy", then everything had to be done in accordance with the traditional Confucian ruling thinking.
Some people may say that Zhu Yuanzhang didn't play his cards according to the routine? But that was Zhu Yuanzhang, and his own prestige was "rebuilding China," which could barely overpower the traditional values of Confucianism.
But other emperors are different, especially starting from the third emperor Ming Chengzu Zhu Di, because the "Battle of Jingjing" belongs to the behavior of a small sect usurping a large sect, so Zhu Di feels inferior from the root, so he attaches more importance to the ideology of Confucianism, and tries every possible way to establish his image of "respecting Confucianism and ancestors".
Therefore, the power contraction of the Ming Dynasty emperor began much earlier than many people imagined, and the "change of the Ministry of Civil Engineering defeated the nobles and military generals group, resulting in the dominance of the civilian family" on the Internet, which is actually a result, not a process.
Therefore, the emperor of the late Ming Dynasty was very serious in terms of being suppressed by civil officials, for example, the Jiajing Emperor's "Great Rites Discussion" incident, which seemed to be just trying to recognize his father, but in fact he used this incident to take back power from the hands of the civilian clique;
Emperor Carpenter
These two things are actually very illustrative, the power of the Ming Dynasty emperor is not as great as many people think.
Compared with the Ming emperor, the power of the Qing emperor was actually much greater, and it had its own basic plate, that is, the "Eight Banners".
The banner people of the Eight Banners are honorable and noble, and to some extent they unconditionally support the emperor, that is to say, the emperor of the Qing Dynasty has two identities, one is the "Qing Emperor", and the other is the "Eight Banners Parent", and the latter identity is far more important to the emperor than the previous identity.
Therefore, when the Qing Dynasty emperor and the civil officials had a conflict, they could use the power of the Eight Banners to suppress the civil officials, or even ignore the civilian officials to do their own thing, you must know that the Eight Banners are a quasi-military organization: "In the banner for the people, go out for the soldiers".
Such an identity directly made the Eight Banners' voice in the Qing court reach the peak level, with a gun in his hand, of course I have the final say.
Qing Dynasty Yu Wang Image
Therefore, the Qing Dynasty could carry out the "secret establishment of the reserve" unimpeded, which was unimaginable in any previous dynasty.
Politically, civil officials have no say in the issue of successors, and power naturally cannot be inherited, so they can only become proper "workers".
Militarily, it can be seen from Kangxi's personal conquest of Galdan, Qianlong's sweeping of Da and Xiaojinchuan, and the attack on Burma that the Qing emperor's military power completely exceeded the civilian class.
If political and military, civil officials can't speak, then of course they will be marginalized and end up being loyal slaves.
So, some people may ask, what does the analysis of the comparison of the power of the Ming and Qing emperors have to do with the comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of the Ming and Qing emperors?
The answer here is that the relationship is very large, one might even say crucial.
2. In what state will "Mingjun" be born?
In fact, another sufficient condition implied in our concept of "Mingjun" today is "the supremacy of monarchy".
In other words, power is highly concentrated in the emperor, and in this case, it is possible to produce a "Ming Jun".
If you think about it, it is easy to understand, if a Ming monarch has no power in his hands, why should he be a Ming Jun? If everything is manipulated, then this emperor can only be a mediocre monarch.
For example, what Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty and Emperor Ai of the Tang Dynasty are examples, and it can't be said that Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty is also a puppet of "Ming Jun", right?
However, another problem brought about by the concentration of monarchy is that it is highly dependent on the ability of the emperor himself, if the emperor has the ability to do it like Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty and Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, if he is like Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty, he has the ability but not much, and the ambition is big and cannot support it, then it will be a disaster for the country and the people.
Zhu Di
So if we look at the Ming Dynasty after we understand this, we will find a very interesting detail, that is, although there are many strange emperors in the Ming Dynasty, they still live to the "three hundred years" limit of the feudal dynasty.
If the number of "Ming Jun" can determine how long the dynasty lasts, then the performance of the Ming Dynasty is obviously contrary to common sense.
On the other hand, the Qing Dynasty lasted for 268 years from 1644 when it entered the customs and established a national government, which was similar to the Ming Dynasty, and the largest peasant uprising in the Qing Dynasty, the Taiping Rebellion, broke out in the 207th year of the Qing Dynasty's rule, that is, in 1851 AD.
Compared with the uprising of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong that broke out in the last ten years of the Ming Dynasty and destroyed the Ming Dynasty, the Qing Dynasty, the so-called "Ming monarchs of all dynasties", if it had not relied on the blood transfusion of the great powers, I am afraid that half of the world would collapse earlier.
Judging from this analysis, the Qing Dynasty, the "Ming Emperor of the Past Dynasties", does not seem to be very reliable.
There are probably two biggest reasons for this.
Huang Taiji (stills)
First, the emperor of the Ming Dynasty looks wonderful, but he does not have much impact on the country itself, and may even be strange as an emperor.
Second, the state system of the Ming Dynasty was established more perfectly than that of the Qing Dynasty, at least not relying only on the emperor's own ability like the Qing Dynasty, but was able to mobilize the country's talents and serve the country's politics through the power of talents.
Let's talk about the first one, is the emperor of the Ming Dynasty wonderful? There is indeed something wonderful, and we have already mentioned it earlier in the article.
However, please note that the strange personal hobbies do not mean that the emperor's ability to govern the country is also problematic.
For example, Emperor Chenghua, who liked Wan Guifei, who was more than ten years older than himself, during his reign, militarily swept away the Jurchens who were gradually growing in the northeast, so that the Ming Dynasty realized the re-expansion of the territory, politically solved the injustice set off by his father Ming Yingzong, rehabilitated Yu Qian, alleviated the national contradictions, and also resettled the displaced people in various places who began to arise due to the intensification of land contradictions.
Myojin Sect
From the emperor's point of view, can it be said that Chenghua's personal ability is not good?
There is also Wanli Emperor Zhu Yijun, Zhang Juzheng's reform in the first ten years, and later after he came to power, there were "Wanli Three Great Marches", and there was this kind of armed force in the later period of the dynasty, which is very rare.
In addition, even if Emperor Wanli does not go to court all the year round, he can still control the political situation of the imperial court without causing great chaos, and he can still appoint a cabinet chief assistant like Shen Shixing, can this be said to be incompetent?
It can be seen from this that the emperor's hobbies cannot directly indicate that they are not doing well in their own duties, unless they put down their duties and only like hobbies like Song Huizong, they should be criticized.
The strange beauty of the Ming Dynasty emperor, the core is more like a kind of relaxation after work.
As for the second point, needless to say, a sentence of "the Qing Dynasty inherited the Ming system" can explain all the problems; if there was a problem with the Ming Dynasty system, why did the Qing Dynasty still inherit it to the greatest extent? It shows that the Qing Dynasty also recognized that the Ming Dynasty system had its own excellent points, and was especially suitable for ruling a huge country.
The emperor of the Qing Dynasty was certainly not a fool.
3. Which of the Ming and Qing emperors was superior or inferior?
Of course, we still have to be realistic and say that the actual performance of the Qing Dynasty emperor is actually better than that of the Ming Dynasty emperor, which is not necessarily the "light and dark" of personal ability, but a matter of space to play.
Friends who are familiar with history should know that the succession system of the Ming Dynasty princes is "the eldest son", and those who are not the eldest sons of the Ming Dynasty have been "cleaned up" by the strange vassal policy of the Ming Dynasty.
It is impossible not to admit here that the Ming Dynasty's arrangement of the clan is indeed the worst in all dynasties, and there is no one, it has really become a "pig raising".
The Qing Dynasty was obviously much more normal than the Ming Dynasty in dealing with the problems of the clan, allowing the clan to participate in politics, and even directly entrusting important tasks, and one of the advantages brought by this was that all the princes had the opportunity to temper themselves, and those who became emperors had early experience in handling government affairs; those who did not become emperors would not be blinded.
The prince of the Qing Dynasty
Therefore, compared with the emergence of Chongzhen, an "amateur emperor" in the Ming Dynasty who did not receive orthodox political education at all and directly ascended to the throne and blindly commanded, even after a major political accident like Kangxi's abolition of the crown prince occurred in the Qing Dynasty, there was still an alternative among the princes, and there would not be no successor.
On the other hand, the situation that the Qing Dynasty had to deal with was actually simpler than that of the Ming Dynasty, which inherited the mess of the Yuan Dynasty, and everyone in the Yuan Dynasty knew that the level of governance was almost in vain.
After Zhu Yuanzhang came to power, he made great efforts to rectify the political and economic divisions in various places, and then the Ming Dynasty nearly 300 years, the rule of various places was relatively solid, so that after the Qing Dynasty came to power, it basically only needed to restore order, and there was no need to rebuild local politics again.
So whether it is Kangxi, Yongzheng or Qianlong, even if it is Jiaqing later, as long as it is not too dead, in fact, the political book list is good enough.
Yongzheng
According to the ancient Chinese tradition, it is also reasonable to reluctantly become a "Ming Jun".
In fact, if the Qing Dynasty is divided according to actual ability, there is a high probability that the real Ming monarch is four people: Emperor Taiji of the Qing Dynasty, Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty, Yongzheng of the Qing Dynasty, and Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty.
It is especially important to mention here that Qianlong's ability is actually underestimated, and the Qing Dynasty has actually entered a period of stability during his reign.
However, except for the late Qianlong period, in the first 30 or even 40 years of his reign, he had the merit of eradicating the century-old disaster of Jungger and recovering Xinjiang, which opened up the territory and expanded the territory, and provided many internal disaster relief and stabilized the people's livelihood, and more closely integrated the economy of the Jiangnan region and the Central Plains region.
We look at it without prejudice, Qianlong's achievements are indeed worthy of being called "Ming Jun".
As for Kangxi and Yongzheng, not to mention, history has its own public opinion, excellent is excellent, and you can't look at it with colored glasses.
As for Huang Taiji, if it weren't for him, there would actually be no "Qing Dynasty", it was he who completed the transformation of the Later Jin Dynasty from a tribal system to a feudal dynasty, and for the Qing Dynasty, he made great contributions.
Late Qing Dynasty
These four people can indeed be called "Ming Jun", especially the three generations of Kang Yongqian, three consecutive generations of excellent rulers, all dynasties are relatively rare, so the Qing Dynasty is not as bad as the Internet says.
It's just that that's the end of it, Jiaqing, Daoguang and even Xianfeng really have nothing to do with "Mingjun", especially Xianfeng, a proper incompetent.
Moreover, the Qing Dynasty faced "changes unseen in a thousand years", and also gave birth to a ruler like Cixi, who lost power and humiliated the country, which greatly reduced the historical evaluation of the Qing Dynasty.
And such a Qing Dynasty, how can it be said that "it seems that they are all Ming monarchs, stronger than the emperors of the Ming Dynasty"?