The Happy Life of Small Officials in Northern Song Dynasty

(Thanks to yjj and Three Yellow Teeth for their monthly tickets!)

Three years and one year of Qingli was an extraordinary year for the Great Song Dynasty. First, after experiencing the food crisis and famine in the second year of Qingli, the entire Great Song Dynasty fell into a crisis-ridden situation. Make a decision, send Su Jin to act resolutely and resolve the food shortage crisis with Yangzhou grain affairs as a breakthrough. The new year of Qingli three years will be a tragic year.

After the food crisis, the Xia and Liao countries jointly put pressure on the Song Dynasty. The Liao people used force as a threat to take advantage of the fire to rob and make a fortune. At the beginning of the peace talks, they wanted to use a big victory to increase their weight on the negotiating table, but Su Jin burned the army's food and grass, and returned in defeat, and was forced to sign an unequal treaty.

The turbulent waves in the first half of the year did not overthrow the big ship of Song Dynasty. Although it was the result of the joint efforts of the top and bottom, several major events cannot be separated from the participation of one person, that is, a new star rising like a comet. Su Jin is an all-rounder in civil and military affairs.

But none of these things can compare to another thing that caused Song Dynasty to shake up and talk about it, and became a topic that was always quietly discussed in the streets and alleys, and that was the new coup initiated by Fan Zhongyan and others. [

Starting from the impeachment of Wang Juzheng, the deputy prime minister by the four admonishing officials, Lu Yijian, who was seriously ill but dominated the government, was impeached and fell down immediately, and died in depression; Officials who held important positions became the targets of the four admonishers and fell.

In September, Ouyang Xiu, Han Qi, Fu Bi, Ouyang Xiu and others formally drafted ten strategies for reform. Except for one item of military reform, which was approved by Zhao Zhen, the other nine started from the three aspects of official administration, prosperity of the country, and rule of law. , Suppression of luck, fine tribute promotion, selection of chiefs, equalization of public land, thick farming and mulberry, kindness, heavy orders, reduction of corvee and other reform measures, clarify the goals and detailed rules of the reform, and promulgate the world vigorously.

For a time, the world was in an uproar, and everyone was scrambling to talk about the content of the New Deal. Everyone had their own opinions, and those who agreed with it were crowned with celebration. If these nine articles can be implemented, the court will definitely take on a new look, and the Great Song Dynasty will be strong and the country rich and the people will be just around the corner; The curse of heaven and earth, once this reform measure is implemented, the many officials and dignitaries in office will be the first to suffer. Their vested interests will be greatly damaged, and their privileges will be greatly weakened from then on.

Take the Ming Dynasty of the reform as an example, that is, the system of the promotion and promotion of officials is strictly enforced.It changed the disadvantages of promoting and descending officials without asking about their work and rest, and regardless of their political achievements, but only based on their seniority.Let officials not seek meritorious service, but seek faults, follow the rules, and change the style of their actions.The reform proposes the assessment of political achievements, exceptionally promoting those with great contributions and obvious achievements, and the dismissal of guilty and incompetent officials, so as to prevent the mediocre people from being oblivious to their positions; A large number of officials from all over the country were replaced and relegated, and everyone felt sad for a while.

Take Jungong Tian as an example.Public land, or job land, was one of the fixed incomes of local officials in the Song Dynasty, but the distribution was often uneven.As a result of uneven supply, how can officials do their best, and the reform proposes that the court balance the income of officials in the field; those who have not been paid in the field, will be distributed to them according to their ranks, so that they have enough income to support themselves.Then, they can be supervised to be honest and honest; those who violate the law can also be punished or removed from their posts, and those who occupy too much average land will be taken back, and officials who violate the standards of average land and occupy public property privately should be severely punished After this move, there are basically no incumbent officials who do not share the land, but there are many more.

Take the case of suppressing luck again. Suppressing luck means restricting the way to become an official and get promoted by luck.Every year, the officials of the Song Dynasty have their children serve as Beijing officials. For an official with a bachelor's degree or above, after 20 years, 20 brothers and grandchildren of a family will serve as Beijing officials.Entering the imperial court one by one in this way not only increased the state's expenditure, but also these dudes didn't do business, but only knew to protect each other and form cliques for personal gain.Therefore, the reform is for the sake of the clarity of the country's politics and the reduction of financial expenditures, to limit the privileges of high officials, and to prevent their children and talents from taking up important positions in the cabinet; More talents served as important positions in the court.

These nine articles are basically a copy of Su Jin's ten disadvantages of policy theory. Anyone who has read Su Jindian's policy theory knows this. Fan Zhongyan can endure humiliation, although he has these thoughts in his heart, but for some reason, he has a high degree of similarity with Su Jin, which makes him feel qgu. As for the culprit, Su Jin will certainly not be so stupid as to come out and say yes I plagiarized his memorial.

In the first month of the implementation of the reform, under the strong support of Zhao Zhen, there was a thunderous momentum. I have to mention one thing here. Zhang Dexiang, who took over as the prime minister of the foreign generation, did not recognize the limelight, and actually wanted to exercise the power of the prime minister and vetoed it. He proposed several reform strategies, which immediately led to the impeachment of the four admonishing officials. Poorly, he was forced to step down after only four months of being a prime minister.

The position of prime minister is vacant, but the best candidate has not been released for a long time. It is surprising that Du Yan, the privy envoy, made great efforts to take over Yan Shu, which surprised people; Zhao Zhen, who originally wanted Yan Shu as prime minister, hesitated for a long time. In the end, he accepted his request; what is even more instructive is that Yan Shu, who was bound to win the position of prime minister, refused to be the prime minister.

A series of accidents made the officialdom in the capital a mess, and no one could figure out what was going on, but everyone involved knew it well. When discussing this matter with Han Qi and others in private, Fan Zhongyan made it clear: "Du Yan and Yan Shu just knew that Yan Shu didn't quite agree with the proposal of the reform, so he pulled him to fight against us together. As for Yan Sansi's reluctance to take over, it was also because he refused to stand on the cusp of the storm and sing against us in an extraordinary period; as for the emperor's Thoughts, we don't have to guess, what the holy will is is beyond our ability to speculate."

If Su Jin heard this, he would definitely tell them that the holy will is unpredictable, but in this matter, it is obvious that the emperor obviously does not want Yan Shu to be the target of public criticism, and he will keep Yan Shu in the dark. If there is any change in the future , Yan Shu can come out to turn the tide; and all of this has exposed the emperor's lack of firmness in reforming the law. road.

But in the end, Yan Shu was appointed prime minister in October, but Zhao Zhen added a condition that the prime minister had to intervene in the matter of political reform, and entrusted the deputy prime minister and deputy privy envoy Fan Zhongyan to take charge, thus completely severing the two factions The possibility of direct confrontation is not unreasonable.

When Su Jin was busy making money, reforms were also in full swing. From the capital to the localities, the winter thunder was rolling all over the Song Dynasty. In some people's eyes, the winter of the third year of Qingli was very cold, extremely cold.

However, reform is easy, and there are no difficult things in the world. As the saying goes, old habits die hard, and it is difficult for a person to change his own habits, let alone a country's nearly a hundred years of bad habits.

Nearly a hundred third-level officials in the prefecture and county of the Song Dynasty were dismissed in a few months. Except for a few of these people who think they are unlucky, most of them have backers and backgrounds. At least they have some background in the court, and it depends on the owner to beat a dog. How can the owners sit idly by when a group of dogs are beaten; Zhao Zhen backed up and treated everyone equally.

This lack of strategy soon led to rebellion. When the first snow fell in early November, Su Jin was taking Yan Biyun and others back to Beijing to sell his Baoshan charcoal cakes and briquettes. A movement is quietly brewing.

The weather after the snow was extremely cold. On the sixth day of November, after the early imperial court, in the large square outside the Yide Gate in Miyagi, thousands of people, old and young, in thin clothes appeared out of nowhere. These people collectively knelt In front of the Yide gate, the Yide gate was tightly blocked, and all the officials of the next court, big and small, were blocked inside the gate and could not leave the palace.

Most of the people kneeling were familiar faces, especially for Fan Zhongyan, Han Qi Fubi and others, these people couldn't be more familiar, not only the faces were familiar, some even knew their names; For some reason, the officials gathered together outside the palace gate and knelt in the ice and snow.