The Qing Dynasty was the last feudal dynasty on the mainland, and the Qianlong Emperor of the Qing Dynasty was a figure who had a very profound impact on the modern history of the mainland.
In 1793, the 58th year of Qianlong, the British sent an envoy to meet Qianlong, hoping to negotiate with His Majesty the Emperor of the Qing Dynasty on the matter of the treaty port in the south, but Qianlong sent the British envoy away in an arrogant manner, and he even issued a holy decree to the Queen of England with the attitude of dominating the world, which is now stored in the British Museum.
Looking at it now, Qianlong's holy decree is simply ridiculous, what he doesn't know is that the barbarian land in his eyes will be opened with cannons in a few decades.
The Qing Dynasty's policy of "closing the country to the outside world".
The Qing Dynasty was afraid of maritime trade, and Zheng Chenggong and others recovered the island of Taiwan from the Dutch at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and used it as a base to carry out large-scale activities of "opposing the Qing Dynasty and restoring the Ming Dynasty", relying on the advantage of the sea and the Qing government for a long time. The Qing government believed that Zheng Chenggong's ability to occupy Taiwan was inseparable from the support of coastal residents.
Therefore, the Qing government issued a relocation order, and even burned down all the houses within 25 kilometers of the coast, cutting off the connection between coastal residents and Zheng Chenggong. In the Qianlong Dynasty, he continued to use the "law of the ancestors" and increased the sea ban. Qianlong believed that the Celestial Empire was rich in materials and did not need to obtain anything through maritime trade. This is where the policy of "closing the country to the outside world" comes from.
There is already a gap with Western society
However, the external environment of the Qianlong Dynasty was no longer the same, and when we were still blindly insisting on agriculture, the West had already begun the industrial revolution and embarked on the road of overseas trade. The British East India Company had always wanted to open up the Chinese market, but the Qing government only opened four treaty ports. The large demand for trade and the complexity of personnel will inevitably produce contradictions, and the Qing government will naturally not have a good impression of Britain.
Later, as there were more and more trade disputes between merchants, Qianlong directly ordered that only one treaty port in Guangzhou should be left in the 13th Bank, for which the British sent merchants to explain the situation to Qianlong, but they were expelled by Qianlong. Qianlong's resolute attitude also led the British to repeatedly send delegations to persuade him.
In 1793, the Magalny delegation arrived in Beijing to meet Emperor Qianlong, and Qianlong learned of the mission's intentions, and after refusing to trade with him, he issued a decree to the British, a total of 976 words, which was full of the arrogance of the Celestial Empire and the contempt for small countries. But what Qianlong didn't know was that the country standing in front of him was already one of the best in the world today, and had surpassed the Qing Dynasty.
The gates of the country that were bombarded by artillery
In order to meet Emperor Qianlong this time, Magalni prepared more than 500 gifts, Qianlong thought that he was here to celebrate his birthday, and the two sides also had a dispute over some etiquette, but in the end they still met Emperor Qianlong. But the harvest was not Qianlong's will to agree to trade.
Rather, it is a general content, the arrogant will of the Celestial Empire that the Celestial Empire is rich in materials and is not allowed to trade with foreign countries, which is full of contempt and contempt. Qianlong will eventually pay the price for his arrogance, and when the British warships arrived in Nanjing in 1840, I don't know what the mood of the reigning Daoguang Emperor was at this time. Is he still as arrogant as his grandfather Qianlong?
After the Opium War, China's gates were bombarded open by artillery, and a number of treaty ports were forced to open, along with China's nearly 100-year history of humiliation.
Epilogue:
"If you are backward, you will be beaten", Qianlong paid a terrible price for his arrogance, and this price was the price of China's humiliating history of nearly 100 years.
Fortunately, however, we survived in the end, and under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, we overthrew the three mountains and established a brand-new new China, and the people stood up from then on.