Qiming 1158

Chapter 1207 Master Qingtian will never appear in front of Shunmin

Because he had just become emperor not long ago, Zhao Buxi paid special attention to the attitude of officials towards him, and repeatedly reprimanded officials who behaved improperly, so as to establish his own dignity.

In the final analysis, he is an emperor who is recommended by everyone. He has no cronies or personal soldiers. He sits on the throne entirely by everyone's recommendation and situation. The emperor's throne is not so stable.

Before sitting on the throne, Zhao Buxi didn't have any ideas. After he took the throne, he didn't know why he paid special attention to the attitude of others towards him.

In the past two months, more than a dozen officials have been reprimanded and punished by him because of their improper attitude.

So Chen Yongyan panicked and knelt down quickly.

"This minister does not dare to be disrespectful to His Majesty, this minister is only bothered by state affairs and worried about the fate of the country. At this critical moment, the state treasury is empty and can't make money. This is a terrible thing for any country. How can the imperial court continue to maintain its renunciation?"

Zhao Buxiu looked at Chen Yongyan for a long time before he sighed deeply and put away his resentment.

"Get up, why don't I know what you're talking about? It's just that I can't wait to do what I want to do in the current situation. If I can, why would I be unwilling? The truth is equal, who doesn't understand it?"

"So……"

"But in life, you can't help yourself."

Zhao Buxi sighed and said: "Taxing the big households in Sichuan and Shu will make the big households in Chuan and Shu feel dissatisfied, fight violently, and become enemies with the imperial court. Taxation, so...they can only be taxed on the common people."

Chen Yongyan was stunned for a moment, then shocked.

"Your Majesty, the taxes borne by the civilians in Sichuan and Shu are already very heavy. If they continue to collect them, they will not even have enough food to eat! Back then there was a rebellion by Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun in Sichuan, but now if the civilians are being forced too much... it's not just the towns. The machine operator is in trouble."

"But if you don't do this, before they make trouble, the court will be gone."

Zhao Bunyi said with a gray face: "The lesser of the two evils, this is helpless, if there is no way, I don't want to do it, but the court is the most important, the Song Dynasty is the most important, we are the most important thing. The last group of people who are still insisting on maintaining the orthodoxy of the Great Song Dynasty."

"But……"

"Okay, don't say any more, follow my orders, don't question."

Zhao Buxi waved his hand and stopped listening to Chen Yongyan's persuasion.

Chen Yongyan sighed and walked out of Zhao Buxi's "palace" with his head down.

"Drinking poison to quench thirst, even if you can survive for a while, you will eventually die of poisoning. The story of Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun is not far away. The kings of all dynasties have kept in mind that they dare not forget, and dare not be too harsh on the people of Shu. Now that everything is back to the original point, wouldn't it make the people of Shun feel dissatisfied with their virtues?" ? Does it really make sense to establish a court here?"

He shook his head and left.

The next day, Chen Yongyan handed in his resignation to the Chengdu court.

He couldn't convince himself to do something he knew would have irreversible consequences.

The conscience in his heart and the fear of the future made him unable to just look at the present and not the future anyway.

And more importantly, he knew that Ming had a liquidation policy of [pursuing war criminals].

If he does this, then the Chengdu court will fail in the future, and he will become a war criminal wanted by the Ming Dynasty. He will face disastrous consequences. Instead of regretting it at that time, it is better to resign now and get out of this sea of ​​flames .

At that time, maybe you can still have a reputation of conscience, which is better than being buried with the people of the Chengdu court, isn't it?
After Chen Yongyan's resignation was submitted, Zhao Buyi was very unhappy at first and refused to agree to Chen Yongyan's resignation, asking him to continue working.

Chen Yongyan once again applied for resignation, but Zhao Buxiu refused to agree, Chen Yongyan still submitted his resignation letter, and Zhao Buxiu asked Chen Yongyan to start working.

Chen Yongyan was always unwilling to obey the imperial edict.

After repeating this for three times, Zhao Buyi finally realized that Chen Yongyan would not stay and serve him, even if he killed him, and Chen Yongyan, as one of Ma Yongkang's cronies and an important member of the civil servants from other places, Killing it is tantamount to self-destructing the Great Wall.

Faced with this situation, Zhao Buxi had no choice but to compromise.

He finally approved Chen Yongyan's resignation and let him go home.

But he said he was going home, but Chen Yongyan is from Jiangsu and Zhejiang. Now that the road out of Sichuan is blocked, he can't go home at all. He can only find a house in Chengdu or the surrounding counties of Chengdu and wait for the situation to change.

Either the Chengdu court killed Chuan and Shu, or the Ming army and the army of Jiangnan entered Sichuan and Shu together.

There is no doubt that the latter is 1000 million times more likely to occur than the former.

Some people are willing to do what Chen Yongyan is unwilling to do.

There are smart people in this world, but also stupid people.

Of course, there is no shortage of silly and bad things.

Chen Yongyan's former deputy, Jiang Fu, took over Zhao Buxiu's edict at this time and decided to help Zhao Buxiu with his affairs. Zhao Buxiu was very happy, and immediately acted as Jiang Fu's post as the Minister of the Household Department, taking over Chen Yongyan's position.

Jiang Fu doesn't care so much, he is a typical Confucian bureaucrat.

Serving the superior, serving the leader, serving those who can offer him a path to advancement and other benefits.

As for the people at the bottom...

Ha ha.

It's just a stepping stone for him to climb up and reach the pinnacle of power.

So for Zhao Buxiu's order, Jiang Fu accepted all orders, carried them through without making any amendments, and resolutely carried them through to the end. Some people raised concerns, thinking that such a ruthless attack would bring a huge impact to the people, and might cause huge damage at that time. influences.

The uprising of Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun has never been forgotten by the people of Shu!

But Jiang Fu persuaded them, or persuaded them in one sentence.

"Who promoted you as officials? Is it the imperial court, the emperor, or that group of bad people?"

The bureaucrats of the Ministry of Finance look at me and I look at you, but they can't say anything except a long sigh.

Nonetheless, the new policy promulgated by Mr. Zhao after his research made them tremble.

His new policy is actually to cancel all the preferential treatment policies for the Sichuan region in the Northern Song Dynasty and the Southern Song Dynasty, and then start to increase taxes.

Yes, special preferential treatment policy.

To be honest, Song Ting's rule over Sichuan has special preferential treatment at the national level.

At its root, this special preferential treatment policy was not because they showed mercy and changed their temperament, but originated from the Wang Xiaobo Li Shun uprising during the reign of Zhao Guangyi, which greatly shocked Song Ting.

Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun's uprising army, with the simple ideal of equalizing the rich and the poor, punished the powerful landlords in Sichuan and robbed the rich to help the poor.

This uprising not only broke the situation of high-intensity land annexation left over from the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, and eradicated a large number of landlords and tyrants, but also dealt a heavy blow to Song Ting's punitive predatory policy in Sichuan.

The rule of Sichuan in the early Northern Song Dynasty was really doing everything except personnel affairs, and no one from military officers to civilian officials did anything good.

Commanded by Zhongwu Army Jiedushi Wang Quanbin, the Shu army had no military discipline at all. As soon as the Song army entered Chengdu, Wang Quanbin and other leaders had banquets day and night, regardless of military affairs, and allowed the soldiers to plunder the children and property of the people in Chengdu. The bad incident of Song Bing generals [cutting off the breasts of civilians' wives and killing them].

It was only 66 days after the Song army destroyed Houshu. Houshu surrendered. Without resolute resistance, it did not cause a lot of damage to the Song army, but the Song army was able to treat the Shu people with methods close to massacring the city.

To say that they are from the underworld is to flatter them. They are treating Sichuan as a colony, not as their own country.

The military officers directly harmed the people of Shu with physical means, while the civilian officials tortured the people of Shu with policy means.

The Kaifeng court led by Zhao Kuangyin and Zhao Guangyi treated Sichuan extremely harshly. They not only plundered all kinds of Sichuan's wealth and went to Kaifeng, but almost emptied Sichuan for more than ten years, and later set up various monopoly policies.

Sichuan's pillar economic industries such as salt, tea, and silk were all monopolized, and private operations were not allowed, only the government could operate.

At that time, natural disasters occurred frequently, and agricultural production suffered brutal blows, and the Song court also imposed strict agricultural taxes on Sichuan and Shu.

It means that the industrial and commercial people and the peasants of Sichuan have come to a dead end together, and the right time, place and people broke out together, and Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun's uprising seemed logical.

Although this uprising failed in the end, it shocked the Song rulers so much that it almost overturned Song Ting's rule over Sichuan and destroyed Song Ting's bureaucracy in Sichuan.

A large number of Song court bureaucrats were killed in the uprising, and the death conditions were extremely tragic.

After the failure of the uprising, because of Sichuan's special geographical location and the persistent strong anti-Song sentiments among the people, the Song rulers felt fearful under strong pressure and had to make compromises.

They could not continue to treat Sichuan as a colony, so they could only continue to send officials with integrity and reputation to serve as officials in Sichuan to crack down on unjust officials and soldiers, so as to appease the people of Sichuan and re-establish the image of the Song court.

For example, Zhao Guangyi selected Zhang Yong, who has a reputation for integrity and integrity, to be the prefect of Yizhou after the outbreak of Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun’s uprising. Zhang Yong had a special talk with him before he set off, and told him that he should be a little bit biased towards the people of Shu and do something to protect their interests. matter.

After Zhang Yong arrived in Chengdu, he lowered the price of salt so that the people could afford it, reduced taxes and reduced the burden on the people, and severely punished officials, officers, and soldiers who plundered people's wealth.

This wave of actions has somewhat appeased the hearts of some people.

However, the Shu people suffered too much, and they were still seriously dissatisfied with the Song court, and the attributes of the Song government as a feudal government could not be fundamentally changed. There are still many things that make the people dissatisfied in the land of Sichuan and Shu.

As a result, nearly 60 years after the failure of Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun's uprising, the people of Shu even shouted a slogan similar to the slogan of the Yellow Turban Uprising back then [the year is in the Jiawu period, and there are changes in Shu].

This slogan kept reminding people of the Wang Xiaobo Li Shun Uprising back then, so that after it spread to Kaifeng, Song Renzong was so scared that he could not sleep at night, and the entire Kaifeng court was worried about the fire in the backyard.

So in the fifth year of Huangyou, and one year before the Jiawu Year, Song Renzong, who was very worried for fear of changes in Sichuan and Shu, sent Cheng Kan, who had a good reputation in the court, as the prefect of Yizhou, and then issued an edict to rectify the local officials. Deal with those who are corrupt and harsh and harm the people.

In the next year, while the Song government cracked down on lawless officials in Sichuan and Sichuan, it also successively issued policies to benefit the people in Sichuan, such as reducing tax rates, inspecting salt wells, reducing and exempting silk for supply, and so on.

Through a series of means, the Song Dynasty changed Sichuan from a high-tax area in the early Northern Song Dynasty and an area with the most serious imperial monopoly into a low-tax area, which was equivalent to giving the status of a special economic zone, and the problems of salt and so on were also improved. Prevent Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun's uprising from reappearing.

This wave of actions finally prevented Sichuan from being chaotic again. Although there were still rumors that Nong Zhigao tried to use the forces of Sichuan and Shu to launch a counterattack during the uprising of Nong Zhigao, it did not come true after all. Dangerously passed.

Since then, whether the agricultural tax, commercial tax, or even the price of salt, Sichuan has been relatively low compared to other regions.

This policy made the economic conditions of Sichuan and Shu far better than other regions, and it continued until the Southern Song Dynasty.

Unlike other places, the taxes were almost taken away by the imperial court, so that the local government was in a state of semi-incompetence, not only unable to resist foreign enemies, but even some thieves.

From this point of view, it is not without reason that Sichuan has become the strongest area and the strongest fortress against Jin and Mongolian invasions.

Therefore, there has been almost no peasant uprising in Sichuan and Shu since Song Renzong, and the pressure on the people living here is relatively small compared to the Song people in other areas.

So struggle to survive.

Feudal rulers would never give up their interests easily. They were greedy, cruel and extremely selfish. If they adopted a non-coercive policy or even made concessions, it must be the result of the heroic struggle of the local people.

They only give money to groups that make them difficult and difficult to deal with.

Master Qingtian will never appear in front of Shunmin. The more submissive he is, the more corrupt officials he will attract.

Master Qingtian will only appear in the areas where the struggle and resistance are the most intense, lowering his stance to seek reconciliation with the angry fighters, making the fighters mistakenly believe that the court can reason.

The results of the heroic Sichuan people's resolute struggle, bloodshed and sacrifice have been enjoyed by their descendants for a hundred years.

Originally, if there was no such thing as the Ming-Song War and the establishment of the Chengdu court, this achievement would continue to last until the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, making Sichuan a strong fortress against the invasion of Mongolia and Yuan, and the struggle would not stop.

However, historical changes have made this route impossible to go on.

Zhao Buxiu's Chengdu court lost an important source of taxation, and the court's expenses soared, and it couldn't support it anymore. If there was no increase in taxes, the Chengdu court would be doomed.

Although they knew that drinking poison to quench their thirst would kill people, the fear of dying immediately was a little bigger than dying from poisoning slowly. In order to survive, they would do anything to survive.

With the order of the Chengdu court, the Southern Song government’s original policy of benefiting the people in Sichuan and Shu was cancelled, the tax rate was raised, and the price of salt was raised. Tax subjects that did not exist before were launched one after another, and tax collectors were immediately arranged to go to the countryside to collect taxes.

You have almost enjoyed the century-old national favor, now it is time to serve the country, hurry up, and dedicate all your property to the imperial court!
This is probably the real thought in Zhao Buxing's mind.

Of course, this is only aimed at the ordinary peasants in Sichuan.

For this soft persimmon that looks easy to bully, the Chengdu court did not hesitate to attack.

As for the large households in Sichuan and Shu, Chengdu not only did not increase taxes, but also promoted tax reduction policies to appease people's hearts and make up for the losses of large households.

(End of this chapter)