How to be a good emperor and how to become a wise emperor? The standard answer given by the Chinese ancestors is: To be virtuous, to be able to carry out benevolent government, and to govern the country to "reduce the people with virtue but not to be strong." This is the so-called "morality in the way, courtesy in all manners, and good in the people's teeth." The typical representative of this is indisputable Song Renzong.
This is the answer of scholars who have never been emperors, how to be a good emperor? Many rulers also gave another answer that "cannot be put on the table": "can draw a big pie," that is, with the help of the powerful imaginative thinking formed by Chinese civilization since ancient times, it stimulates the people's motivation to survive and develop in the face of adversity. To put it bluntly, it is necessary to be eloquent, to be able to act, and to inspire the infinite hope of the common people to seek survival. A typical representative of success in this area should push Liu Bei and win the world by "crying".
But is the premise of Ming Jun really to be virtuous and be able to draw a big pie? If you do these two things, the common people will really support them, and will "the people have the right teeth"? Obviously not, the great leader once said: The soldiers must eat and sleep, and they must walk on two legs, and some comrades do not take into account these actual conditions, and only draw on a map and order a time limit to fight, which is obviously out of touch with reality.
Therefore, how can we become a wise man? It is of course important to be "virtuous and able to draw big cakes" on the bright side, but more importantly, it can be realistic. How can it be realistic? For our world with tangible boundaries, being realistic is obviously about being sensitive to numbers. The following two emperors are examples of success stories of digital sensitivity:
Emperor Zhao of the Han Dynasty: Just by the difference in time and the amount of travel, he saw through the conspiracy of Shangguan Ji to frame him
In 81 BC, the great general Huo Guang was on a military parade, and on the way, he transferred a lieutenant to his general's palace. This move was discovered by the political enemy Shangguan Ji, who immediately ran to Emperor Zhao of the Han Dynasty to complain, and took out the recital of King Yan to show that the evidence was conclusive.
In King Yan's letter, King Yan was very dissatisfied with Huo Guang's etiquette specifications for inspecting the troops, and Huo Guang's private lieutenant must have a conspiracy. At the end of the letter, King Yan was also "filled with righteous indignation" and decided to leave the fiefdom and lead his troops into Beijing to defend the emperor.
When Huo Guang heard that his private transfer of lieutenants had been discovered, and Shangguan Ji had also asked Emperor Zhao of the Han Dynasty for a copy, he immediately trembled and broke out in a cold sweat, feeling that he was about to finish playing. Unexpectedly, the 14-year-old Emperor Zhao of Han threw it aside after reading Shangguan Ji's letter, and comforted Huo Guang, who was still shivering, claiming that someone was trying to frame Huo Guang.
Shangguan Ji was very surprised, he had been plotting this matter for a long time, and all aspects were arranged without leakage, so it was said that there would be no flaws. Emperor Zhao of the Han Dynasty saw his suspicious face, and reluctantly pointed out that there was a flaw in the numbers: Huo Guang's review of the Imperial Forest Army was near Chang'an, and the call of the captain was a recent matter, less than 10 days before and after. King Yan is far away in the north, how could he know about this?
After the interpretation, the ministers suddenly became enlightened, and they all bowed to the young master, and they also sighed that this was a British lord who could not be fooled. Emperor Zhao of the Han Dynasty, who was sensitive to numbers, naturally understood who did a good deed, so with the help of Shangguan's "God-given opportunity" that he was ready to fight desperately, he decisively sent troops and put Shangguan Ji and his gang in a pot.
It's just a pity: this incomparably wise young master didn't live long, and only lived to be 21 years old before he fell ill and died, which is a pity.
Qianlong: Just based on the donation figures, a shocking corruption case was uncovered
Another person who was very sensitive to numbers and ranked among the Ming monarchs was Qianlong.
Objectively speaking, from the prosperity to the decline of the Qing Dynasty, Qianlong's "playing with heart" did play a role in fueling the flames. In his later years, Qianlong became more and more sloppy in his administration and rejoiced in his achievements, which to a certain extent contributed to the atmosphere of corruption and exaggeration.
However, it is also an indisputable fact that Qianlong was the Ming monarch and successful emperor in the history of the Qing Dynasty: he strengthened the integration of multiple ethnic groups, expanded the territory, eliminated maladministration in the early days of succession, rehabilitated many ministers, and stabilized the hearts of the people. Moreover, his control of the ministers and his sensitivity to numbers are towering mountains that cannot be surpassed by later generations.
In the 46th year of Qianlong, there was an armed fight among the people in the Xunhua Hall of Gansu, which was later transformed into an anti-Qing struggle. The leader of the rebel army, Su 43, led his army to besiege the city of Lanzhou. Governor Lehr sent troops to suppress it, and swore that it would be pacified in Half Moon. But after half a month, not only did it not calm down, but it was trapped. Qianlong resent A Gui to investigate, and held Leer accountable for raiding his home. In the process of raiding the house, it was found that there were 20,000 taels of silver hidden in the house of the house slaves, Qianlong heard that he was suspicious, and ordered Ah Gui to carefully check Leerjin.
At this time, Wang Tingzan, then the political envoy of Gansu, feared being implicated, and took the initiative to express his willingness to pay 40,000 taels for military salaries; almost at the same time, Wang Tanwang, who had been promoted to the post of governor of Zhejiang because of his meritorious service in handling the donation of prisoners, committed an accident and asked for a fine of 500,000 taels of silver to donate to the Haitang project.
If you change to an ordinary emperor, or an emperor who claims to be virtuous, he will inevitably be grateful and emotional, and be grateful to the two officials who took the initiative to donate and solve problems for the country, and then set up an advanced model and send it to the provinces to study.
However, when such "advanced cases" arrived at Qianlong, they aroused even greater suspicions: from the 39th year of Qianlong to the 46th year of Qianlong, in just seven years, two feudal divisions in Gansu before and after, one paid 500,000 taels of silver for donating to the Haitang project, and the other paid 40,000 taels for the salary of soldiers. For this reason, Qianlong suspected that there was corruption in the Gansu donation prison and ordered a thorough investigation, and a huge and earth-shattering corruption case surfaced.
Therefore, the emperor who is sensitive to numbers must be the Ming monarch and the British lord, and the people below cannot be fooled. And the emperor who blindly worships virtue and paints a big pie will inevitably be emotionally brainy, and act blindly only on the basis of the so-called praise of virtue, resulting in being used by his subordinates but being kept in the dark.
Although Song Renzong was a model of virtue, the country became weaker and weaker; although Liu Bei was good at painting a big cake with crying, the ending still could not change the situation of Shu being weak and Wei strong. Although under the orthodox pie of "reviving the Han Dynasty", "the country is rich and the people are strong", after the defeat of Wei again and again, it exposed its strength, destroyed the Wei State first, and was the first to withdraw from the historical stage.