For a period of 682 years, from the establishment of the Kamakura shogunate to the reign of Emperor Meiji, the Emperor remained the titular supreme ruler. However, with the progress of society and the development of the times, the special political structure of the shogunate was eventually crumbling under the impact of Western guns and culture; especially after the signing of a large number of treaties of loss of power and humiliation, a large number of people were quite dissatisfied with the shogunate.
A large number of scholars influenced by Western culture began to attack the incompetence of the Edo shogunate, and under the control of those who had the heart, the call for "honoring the king" suddenly spread widely, which made the Edo shogunate feel very stressed, and this was undoubtedly a huge challenge for Tokugawa Keiki, who had just succeeded the shogun of the Edo shogunate. Because before Tokugawa Keiki succeeded him as shogun, the Edo shogunate had already been forced to destroy and was defeated by the Fallen Shogunate in the Choshu Battle.
In order to get out of the predicament, Tokugawa Keiki, under the guidance of the French Minister Rochelle, carried out major reforms in the shogunate, the main contents of which were three points, one was to abolish the old military system, the second was to establish a centralized bureaucratic government agency, and the third was to set up a joint company with France; it is clear that the French minister Rocheel did not really want to help Tokugawa Keiki, because these three points were more beneficial to France, the first of which was to borrow six million dollars from France.
In fact, Emperor Hyomyō still approved of today's reform measures of Tokugawa Keiki, which was equivalent to indirectly supporting King Shōjō. However, Emperor Takamitsu died on the tenth day after Tokugawa Keiki became a shogun, which caught Tokugawa Keiki by surprise, after all, the emperor was still the nominal supreme ruler of Japan, and if the shogunate wanted to reconcile with the fallen shogunate, the emperor would need to reconcile it; as a result, when he saw hope, Emperor Takamai, who supported him, died.
The new emperor was the later famous Meiji Emperor, who was much more domineering than Emperor Takamitsu, but he did not want the shogunate to honor the king, he wanted to monopolize power; in addition, there were Iwakura in the court who regarded the operation of the core figure of this fallen shogunate and moved around, echoing the fallen shogunate led by Kito Takayoshi of Choshu Domain, Okubo Ritsuru of Satsuma Domain, and Takamori Saigo. The speed with which this situation changed was unexpected for Tokugawa Keiki.
However, the two sides had become a situation of equal fire and water, and Although Tokugawa Keiki fought back vigorously, he was not an opponent of the Fallen Shogunate faction, and after the defeat of the shogunate army, the Fallen Shogunate army marched towards Edo Castle. Tokugawa Keiki knew that the general situation was gone, and after repelling the request of the main war faction, Oguri Tadashun and Takeyoshi Yukimoto, and others to fight to the death, he negotiated with Saigo Takamori, the general staff officer of the Eastern Expeditionary Army, to achieve Edo's "bloodless opening of the city" and save Edo from the catastrophe of war.
However, Tokugawa Keiki was not without his own considerations, if it was invaded into Edo Castle by the Fallen Shogunate army, then the Tokugawa clan would be completely wiped out, and if it was his own initiative to seek peace, he could also negotiate some conditions. As Tokugawa Keiki had predicted, the Fallen Faction, after a series of negotiations, finally decided to impose a lenient policy on the Tokugawa clan, saving The Tokugawa Keiki's life; the Tokugawa Clan continued, except that the governor was replaced by Tokugawa Keiki's adopted son Tokugawa Ieta (Tokugawa Clan) and gave 700,000 stones to Suruga Castle as a shogunate.
What happened to Tokugawa Keiki? Although no longer the ruler of the world, Tokugawa's celebration days were more elegant; he took the initiative to stay away from politics, had no pressure, no burden, and was keen on photography, hunting, folk song research, and other interesting life, and he became a generation of great photographers, enjoying a certain place in the history of Japanese photography; in his later years, Emperor Meiji separated him from the Tokugawa clan and became a family of his own, still Chinese.
Later, he was made a duke and awarded the title of duke and the Grand Order of the Rising Sun, first class; and it turned out that he could live a long life with less hard work and more of what he liked, because Tokugawa Keiki lived to be 75 years old, and among his previous shoguns, Tokugawa Ieyasu died of overwork at the age of 35 due to overwork, Tokugawa Iemo died of beriberi at the age of 21 during the Choshu Expedition, and The Meiji Emperor, who later came to power in Japan, also died of uremia at the age of 60.
Most people have spent their whole lives struggling for ambition, chasing fame and fortune, and chasing power, and as a result, many people have died early due to hard work; on the contrary, those who want to open up and understand, live a more moist and dashing life, and live longer; but there is a prerequisite here, that is, they have reached the point of material freedom, just like Tokugawa Keiki, who was earlier as a shogun, and although he surrendered later, his treatment was still not low, so he could do what he liked to do at will, so, man, Or first realize material freedom before talking about life.