Yongzheng is a controversial emperor in the history of the mainland, some people say he is a great tyrant, others say he is a good emperor who is diligent and loves the people.
To say that Yongzheng is the most powerful, it is naturally his "Yin Yang Emperor Technique", only three aspects, which are beyond the reach of future generations.
How powerful is Emperor Yongzheng's "Yin Yang Emperor Technique"? It can be said that there is no one before or since!
Dedicated to the good of the people, the emperor
Yongzheng is a good emperor who loves the people, there is absolutely no doubt about this. He is still the most loving of all the emperors of the Qing Dynasty, even Kangxi is not as good as him, how can he see it?
After Yongzheng succeeded to the throne, he promulgated many policies to benefit the people, such as apportioning the land into the mu, emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business.
If you want to say that the people's favorite is to spread the land into the acre, the benefits of this policy are too many.
In the past, taxes were collected according to the number of people in the family, so the more children the family paid more taxes, but later Yongzheng ordered that it should not be used and changed to collect according to the acres of land, which made the people happy.
At any given time, ordinary people either have no land to plant, or there is very little land, because most of the land is monopolized by those officials and landlords.
If the landless people want to survive, they can only work for those who have a lot of land.
Therefore, as soon as the policy of apportioning the land into the mu came out, many officials wrote against it one after another, because they had a lot of land.
In ancient times, as long as there was enough land, the goal of the rich side could be achieved, so many officials tried all kinds of ways to get a lot of land.
How could Yongzheng not know about their behavior? Therefore, the apportionment of the acres was also set up to target these officials who monopolized the land.
Like those landless people, they don't have to pay taxes all of a sudden, which greatly reduces their living burden.
In addition, Yongzheng also encouraged the common people to reclaim wasteland, and whoever reclaimed it belonged to him, and the state would give them special powers.
With the encouragement of Yongzheng, the land area of the Qing Dynasty has directly increased by more than 1 million hectares.
As soon as this policy was promulgated, the revenue of the Qing Dynasty increased significantly, after all, officials still had a lot of money in their pockets.
Then another policy promulgated by Yongzheng made the people applaud, that is, the policy of paying grain for the official gentry.
No matter when it was in ancient times on the mainland, officials did not have to pay taxes, but they had to start paying taxes from the beginning of Yongzheng.
This means that the more money an official earns each month, the more taxes he pays.
So as soon as this policy was issued, many officials again wrote to express their opposition: "There has never been such a policy for thousands of years, why are you so strange?" ”
In the face of the dissatisfaction of the officials, Yongzheng did not think so.
The smartest thing about Yongzheng is that he knows very well who is the richest in the whole country, and it is naturally those officials.
They usually not only take a stipend, but someone asks him to do things to collect some money, and the land planted by the family collects some money, and they earn a lot every year.
Therefore, the little tax paid by the officials is not harmful to most officials at all.
In addition, Yongzheng has also launched other policies in the economy, such as the return of fire consumption to the public.
Under the influence of these policies, the economy of the Qing Dynasty directly moved to a new level, and the reason why Qianlong was able to develop the Qing economy to the peak was thanks to these economic policies of Yongzheng.
Therefore, what we often say about the prosperous era of Kangqian is that it plays a role in connecting the upper and lower levels, which is these perfect economic policies of Yongzheng, otherwise where would there be the so-called prosperous era!
When Kangxi was about to die, the domestic economy was already in chaos, so in a strict sense, it should be the prosperous era of Yongqian.
Painstakingly seek centralization
Qianlong is also very unkind, after he succeeded to the throne, he used the perfect policy left by his father, and then his usual style of doing things was learned from Kangxi, because he wanted to reproduce his grandfather's demeanor.
However, there is one thing to say, the resumes of Qianlong and Kangxi are quite similar. Both of them worked hard when they were young, and they were quite slack in their old age, worthy of being grandparents and grandchildren!
After the economic aspect is settled, the next step is the military aspect. In this regard, Yongzheng's most prominent performance is the reuse of many controversial generals, and Nian Qianyao is a good example.
Under normal circumstances, when there is a major event in the country and many soldiers need to be dispatched to pacify it, it is usually the emperor's relatives who lead the troops to the battle.
Even if it is not good, this general is from the Eight Banners Manchu clan. Under normal circumstances, it is rare for generals of other nationalities to lead a large army out, why is that?
After all, the Qing Dynasty was founded by the Manchus, and people are more at ease with their own people, and they are afraid that the Han or Mongols will take the soldiers away.
After Yongzheng succeeded to the throne, he personally ordered the pacification of the war in the northwest. To everyone's surprise this time, Yongzheng actually asked Nian Qianyao to go to pacify as the main general, so many ministers wrote one after another: "Your Majesty, this can't be done!" ”
In an instant, there was opposition from the entire court, but Yongzheng didn't pay attention to them.
Nian Qianyao was born in the Eight Banners of the Han nationality, and although he was also a member of the Eight Banners of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, he was not a Manchu after all.
When the nine sons won the heir, Nian Qianyao was also a supporter of Yongzheng, although he did not really support it, but Yongzheng was very optimistic about others.
At that time, if there was anything in the military aspect, Yongzheng would usually discuss it with Nian Qianyao.
In addition to Nian Qianyao, Yongzheng also personally promoted many Han generals.
In Yongzheng's view, there is no clan boundary for generals, as long as it is a talent, it will have to be reused, which is very good compared to the Yuan Dynasty.
In addition, during the reign of Yongzheng, there was also a large-scale expansion of the army.
After all, the country has money, and in order to deal with the imminent danger, it is reasonable to recruit more troops to defend this bit of family property.
Although Yongzheng still left some problems in the military aspect, these problems were not too serious and did not fundamentally affect Qianlong later.
So if you want to say that the happiest emperor of the Qing Dynasty, it is naturally Qianlong, after all, Dad not only set a good example, but also left a rich country.
In addition to the economic and military aspects, there is also the very important political aspect.
The political aspect is nothing more than the word imperial power, although it is just two simple words, but it is very troublesome to solve.
In view of the political chaos in the last years of Kangxi, Yongzheng also made corresponding solutions after succeeding to the throne.
The first of these is the improvement of the secret folding system. This system actually existed at the time of Kangxi, but it was more perfect here in Yongzheng.
This system is not difficult to understand, if officials have any secrets that they want to tell the emperor, it is enough to write a secret letter.
The secret fold will not go through the hands of institutions or officials, and he will be personally delivered to the emperor by the emperor's close ministers, so that the content of the secret fold will be known by God, the earth, the ministers, and the king, and there will be no fifth.
Yongzheng basically never went out during his reign, he stayed in the palace every day, and he relied on these secret folds to know the world's affairs.
Cathode Emperor
During the Yongzheng Dynasty, there were more than 1,300 officials involved in the secret fold, which was 13 times that of the Kangxi period.
According to the statistics of the relevant officials at that time, Yongzheng's daily rest time was only about 5 hours, not too much, and he wrote a total of tens of millions of words on the secret folds of the instructions, which is worthy of being the most diligent emperor of the Qing Dynasty!
Kangxi and Qianlong both liked to go out hunting or travel at that time, but Yongzheng had no interest in these, he just stayed in the palace and worked silently every day.
So if you look at it this way, Yongzheng is very likely to die of exhaustion in the end, so we must pay attention to the combination of work and rest, overwork is too harmful to the body.
Then the second measure is to set up a military aircraft department, which must be familiar to everyone, and we can see it in history textbooks.
The ministers of the Military Aircraft Department are all personally selected by the emperor, and they only obey the emperor's orders, which seems to be a bit similar to the Jinyi Guard of the Ming Dynasty.
What is even better about Yongzheng's military aircraft department is that these ministers are his fixed cronies, and the imperial power is relatively more centralized.
After this series of reforms by Yongzheng, the imperial power was greatly strengthened. To a certain extent, it can be regarded as avoiding all kinds of unfavorable situations that occurred in the Kangxi Dynasty back then.
These are the strengths of Emperor Yongzheng in the "Yang Emperor Technique", especially in the handling of the economy, which is indeed unprecedented.
What are Yongzheng's representative works in terms of "Yin Emperor Technique"? The most obvious of this is the literal hell.
Strictly speaking, there is a literary prison in every dynasty, which is nothing more than saying the wrong thing and being arrested and put in prison, so why was the Yongzheng period so prosperous? This is naturally related to the policy implemented by Yongzheng.
Everyone must have heard the saying: "Reform will definitely touch the interests of some people." ”
Take Yongzheng's economic reform policies as an example, they are indeed very friendly to the common people, but they touch the interests of those who are officials, most of whom are literati.
If you offend the literati, then the reputation of this emperor will not be too good, after all, history is written by others, and if people are unhappy, it is natural that this emperor is nothing.
Therefore, under the misdirection of these literati, many people think that Yongzheng is a tyrant, but in fact, he can be regarded as the best emperor for the common people in the history of the mainland.
There are some literati who are not afraid of death, and they will often speak disrespectfully, so it is very normal for them to be arrested and put in prison, which is the reason why the literary prison flourished in the Yongzheng Dynasty.
To say that these officials are not good people, while holding the money, while secretly slandering the emperor behind their backs, such people have no conscience at a glance, and they deserve to be arrested and put in prison.
It turned out that this was Emperor Yongzheng's "Yin and Yang Emperor Technique". In a sense, it completely cleaned up the mess left by Kangxi and left Qianlong a peaceful and prosperous era.
I have to say that the prosperous era of Kangqian can also be said to be the prosperous era of Yongzheng alone, and he can be regarded as the last good emperor in the history of the mainland.