Chapter 253 We Have No Choice
"If he doesn't try, how can Junshi know that he will inevitably fail?" Wang Anshi asked in return.
"Jiefu, why are you so stubborn? What will happen even if you succeed?"
Sima Guang said earnestly: "Shang Gong's reforms made Qin rich but the people poor. Although Qin eventually swept across the six kingdoms and unified the world, it also laid the seeds for the demise of Qin II!"
Sima Guang liked to study history and had in-depth research on various dynasties.
Unlike others who attributed the demise of the Qin Dynasty in the second generation to the tyranny of Qin Shi Huang and Hu Hai, Sima Guang believed that the seeds of the Qin Dynasty's demise had actually been sown since Shang Yang's reforms.
The core of Shang Yang's reform was to enrich the country and impoverish the people.
In order to achieve rapid results in the reform, a high-pressure policy was implemented and law enforcement was extremely harsh.
Historical books say that Qin Shihuang was a tyrant, but little do people know that the strict laws of Qin State itself had a great influence on the Qin monarch.
It is said that when the First Emperor died, the world was in chaos.
However, after carefully studying the history of the Qin Dynasty, Sima Guang came to the conclusion that even if Qin Shihuang had not died, the Qin Dynasty would still be in chaos.
The Qin State's exploitation of the people was too severe, and the Qin State was overwhelmed.
However, the Qin State was able to unify the world by exploiting the people, strict laws and military merit system.
Qin Shi Huang had tasted the sweetness, so even if he found problems, he would not make adjustments, but would only suppress them with more severe means.
Even if Qin Shihuang lived another ten or twenty years, the people would only be exploited more severely, and Qin Shihuang might not be able to suppress them at that time.
Of course, all of this is hypothetical, but it is certain that the demise of the Qin Dynasty had a certain relationship with Shang Yang's Reforms.
It cannot be said that Shang Yang's reforms were the cause of both the success and the failure of the Qin Dynasty. The demise of the Qin Dynasty was only partly due to Shang Yang's reforms.
Shang Yang's reforms played a great role in the unification of the Qin Dynasty, but Sima Guang did not quite agree with it.
The reason why Shang Yang has always been called Shang Gong is just out of respect for the sage.
Sima Guang firmly disagreed with Wang Anshi's reforms and was even willing to sever ties with him. It was not just about the reforms.
Historically, Sima Guang and Wang Anshi's evaluation of each other was "although their tendencies are different, their ultimate goals are the same."
What this means is that although the two people have different opinions, their general direction is the same.
However, Sima Guang was very resolute in opposing Wang Anshi's reforms.
When Emperor Shenzong appointed Wang Anshi to carry out reforms, Sima Guang wrote a letter to stop it.
Shenzong did not accept the proposal. In order to appease Sima Guang, he appointed him as the deputy envoy of the Privy Council.
But Sima Guang refused to accept the offer and asked to leave Beijing, which showed that he did not want to serve under the same roof as Wang Anshi.
The reason why he opposed it so resolutely was more because of Wang Anshi's proposal for reform.
Wang Anshi's reform proposal was that the people should not be taxed more and the country should have enough money.
This means that there is no need to increase taxes on the people, and the country has enough money to use.
Simply put, Wang Anshi advocated increasing revenue, while Sima Guang advocated reducing expenditure.
Although the two people's views are different, they can coexist.
However, Wang Anshi's target of opening up new sources of income was almost entirely the common people.
In Sima Guang's view, although the Song Dynasty had many shortcomings, the most serious one was the three redundancies problem.
The three redundancies should be solved through official administration to ease financial pressure.
If the administration is clean and honest, the people of the court will naturally become rich.
Open source is fine, but we shouldn’t focus on the people.
Sima Guang was well aware of the sufferings of the people and knew that they were already overwhelmed, as evidenced by the frequent rebellions in various places.
Wang Anshi's reform strategy seems to be harmless to the people, but will benefit them instead.
But in Sima Guang's view, if the administration of officials is not clear, no matter how good the policies are, problems will arise when they are implemented.
But Wang Anshi didn't think so. In Wang Anshi's view, the three redundancy problems must be solved.
But we should first find ways to ease the financial pressure on the court.
The three redundancies problem, in the final analysis, can actually be seen as two redundancies.
Redundant officials and soldiers lead to redundant expenses. To solve this problem, we have to target civil and military officials and touch upon their interests, but the resistance is too great.
At the beginning, Prime Minister Fan's new policy was intended to solve the problem of redundant officials and soldiers, but it encountered great resistance.
However, the court was under tremendous financial pressure, and the new policies showed little effect. Instead, they caused unrest in the court and ultimately led to their failure.
Having learned from the lesson of Prime Minister Fan, his reform strategy at the beginning was not to tackle the three redundancies, but to increase revenue.
On the one hand, it was to ease the financial pressure on the court, and on the other hand, it was to give the officials some benefits.
In this way, the government can be determined to reform. This is not entirely wrong. Why did Shenzong support Wang Anshi's reform so firmly?
Apart from the fact that the accumulated problems of the Song Dynasty were indeed very serious, the most important thing was that Wang Anshi made him see the benefits.
Although Wang Anshi's reforms increased the burden on the people, it is an indisputable fact that the court's fiscal revenue increased at the beginning of the reform.
Emperor Shenzong was not stupid. Despite being cursed by the people, seeing no benefits, and being opposed by a lot of people, he still insisted on reforming.
In addition to face, it is also because of the tangible benefits gained.
"Jun Shi, I understand what you said, but when things get tough, you have to think about change. You want to seek stability, and you don't want to use drastic measures that would shake the foundation of the country. However, the court has too many problems, and simply seeking stability will not solve the problem."
Seeing that Sima Guang wanted to speak, Wang Anshi said, "Junshi, please listen to me."
"After the Qingmiao Law was implemented, the landlords and gentry sent a large number of tenants to borrow money in order to prevent the implementation of the Qingmiao Law. At that time, I went to ask His Highness for a solution. His Highness said that if the problem cannot be solved, then the person who created the problem should be solved. This sentence made me suddenly enlightened!"
“If you can’t solve the problem, then solve the person who created the problem?” Sima Guang muttered to himself, savoring the thought carefully.
Wang Anshi saw Sima Guang's thoughtful expression, paused and continued: "I just want to solve the problem through reform, but you want to solve the people who created the problem. Neither of us can convince the other. After hearing what Your Highness said, I thought at first that Your Highness had the same idea as you.
But then I thought about it carefully. If Your Highness had the same idea as you, why did you ask me to implement the Qingmiao Law?
I thought about it for a long time and finally realized that we were all wrong. "
Sima Guang came back to his senses, looked at Wang Anshi and asked, "Why?"
"I wanted to solve the problem, but I ignored that the problem itself was caused by people. Just like the implementation of the Qingmiao Law this time, the landlords and gentry wanted to stop it, and many officials in the counties of Kaifeng Prefecture colluded with it.
Even if other new laws are implemented, the effect will be greatly reduced and may even become a policy that harms the people.
You want to solve the problem through official administration, but how long do you have to administer it? Who needs to be administered? And how can you ensure that your official administration policy can be implemented smoothly and be effective?
I originally thought that Your Highness wanted to reform the law, but later I realized that for Your Highness, whether to reform the law or not is not the key. Your Highness wants to use the reform to screen out those who have problems, and then solve these people, so that all problems can be solved. "Wang Anshi said.
Wang Anshi's inference was not groundless, but had certain basis.
Zhao Xing allowed him to implement the Qingmiao Law. When the landlords and gentry were in trouble, Zhao Xing was very restrained. He only carried out a small number of actions to kill the chicken to scare the monkeys, and did not involve too many people.
There was strong opposition in the court, and Zhao Xing had made some preparations, but he gave in in the court and promised not to promote the Qingmiao Law nationwide. Even in Kaifeng Prefecture, it would only be implemented for one or two years before being stopped.
Afterwards, those people did not take any action.
Zhao Xing didn't seem to be very enthusiastic about the reform. If that was the case, then what was the purpose of Zhao Xing doing all this?
Wang Anshi thought for a long time and, based on what Zhao Xing had said before, came to a conclusion that Zhao Xing didn't really care about reforming the law or not, his goal had always been people.
The reason why he didn't move was because he was still the crown prince and it was not convenient to move.
"Not everyone who opposes the reform has selfish motives!" Sima Guang frowned.
Wang Anshi said that Zhao Xing deliberately pretended to want to reform in order to screen out those with problems and get rid of them.
The so-called problematic people are those who oppose the reform out of selfish motives.
Solving the problem does not mean killing them all, but using some means to demote or send them away so that these people cannot become obstacles.
But not all those who opposed the reform had selfish motives. He did not agree with the reform, but he had no selfish motives.
"When that time really comes, will these be important?" Wang Anshi asked in return.
Sima Guang fell silent after hearing this. Perhaps someone would be wronged, but sometimes necessary sacrifices were unavoidable.
Since you can't tell whether it is an obstacle or not, the best solution is to clear it all away.
Although he was cruel, he understood the principle that a kind person should not be in charge of an army and a righteous person should not be in charge of money.
"How will Your Highness handle so many people? And Your Highness wants to intimidate everyone in this way, but will it really work?" Sima Guang said after a long silence.
Even if these people are cleared out, the vacant positions will need to be filled by officials drawn from local areas.
Will these people be more obedient than before?
The reason why he used the word "obedient" is because if what Wang Anshi said was true, Zhao Xing just wanted to clean up some disobedient officials and at the same time use this method to deter the remaining officials from becoming obedient.
The Song Dynasty and the literati ruled the world together. The literati had a very high status and could even unite to fight against the imperial power.
If the Song Dynasty is regarded as a company, the government is the chairman, and the literati are the senior executives of the company, and they even have shares.
The scholar-officials do not need to all unite. Only those with higher status among them need to unite to influence the situation in the court.
Over time, the government's prestige declined greatly, and officials no longer had real respect for the government.
The fundamental purpose of everything Zhao Xing did was to re-establish the royal authority and make the royal family superior to the literati again.
Let the so-called co-governance of the world with the literati become empty talk.
What is co-governance? It means consultation and negotiation.
In Sima Guang's view, it is unrealistic to achieve this.
"Whether we can do it or not is a matter for the future, but Junshi, we have no choice. Only by assisting Your Highness can we realize our ambitions," said Wang Anshi.
Thanks to Brother Yang123 for the reward.
(End of this chapter)