Do you know: I am the crown prince

Chapter 452 Persistence
But change also requires courage. For him, change is to allow the Zhao family to rule the world longer. If the change will shake the Zhao family's rule over the world, it will naturally be shaken.

This is also the reason why he eventually canceled the New Deal.

Later he reflected on it and realized that he understood what Zhao Xing had just said.

But the turmoil Zhao Xing stirred up this time was too big. There were more than 30 officials involved, all of whom were high-ranking officials in the court.

Although the officials in the court are called civil and military officials, there are actually more than a hundred people.

But moving so many people at once would also affect the operation of the court.

The most important thing is that with so many people involved, other officials will definitely be involved, so the number of people will be even greater.

"If you do this, it will affect the stability of the world." said the emperor.

"Father, Emperor Taizong of Tang said that we can learn from history to understand our gains and losses. Although I do not fully agree with this statement, it does make sense. The Song Dynasty has been established for a hundred years. Those dynasties that have been established for a longer time have all had various drawbacks and hidden dangers within a hundred years of their establishment. But which dynasty is as serious as the Song Dynasty?" Zhao Xing said.

The reason why Zhao Xing said he did not fully agree was because the Song Dynasty was the one that learned the most from history.

The most common problems in all dynasties, such as the monopoly of power by eunuchs and relatives of the emperor's wife, and the rebellion of royal family and military generals, were all absent in the Song Dynasty.

Why not? It is because we have learned from history and established a strict prevention system.

"In other dynasties, the various drawbacks arose mostly because of incompetent emperors, powerful ministers or military commanders who controlled their own armies, as well as the fact that those systems had been used for too long.

But have the emperors of the Song Dynasty been incompetent since Emperor Taizu? Except for a few emperors such as Emperor Qin Shi Huang and Emperor Wu of Han, the emperors of the Song Dynasty were not worse than other emperors. However, although there were no extremely incompetent emperors in the Song Dynasty, the drawbacks were getting bigger and bigger.

The reason for this lies in the system of the Song Dynasty.

"I am not saying that the system established by Emperor Taizu was wrong. Given the situation at the time, there was nothing wrong with the system established by Emperor Taizu," Zhao Xing said.

When the Song Dynasty was first established, the country was in turmoil, rituals and music were in disarray, and people had no idea what loyalty and righteousness meant.

Although Taizu had certain selfish motives in placing importance on scholars, it was indeed beneficial to the stability of the country at that time.

Although Zhao Xing did not quite agree with Confucianism, it cannot be denied that Confucianism was of great benefit to the stability of the world after the unification of the country.

"So what's the problem?" the emperor asked after a long silence.

"It's right to emphasize culture and it's right to suppress military power, but both are a bit too much. Since ancient times, there are many policies and rules that are still used today, but they are a minority after all. Most policies have no obvious disadvantages at the beginning, but the disadvantages will become greater and greater in long-term use.

When the Song Dynasty was first established, there were few scholars, so it was acceptable to make use of scholars, give them preferential treatment and encourage them to study.

But now there are too many scholars, and these people blindly suppress military generals, which leads to the military weakness of the Song Dynasty. Facing Liao and Xia, it is always at a disadvantage.

What's more, although these scholars talk about benevolence, righteousness, and morality, in fact most of them are selfish.

Your Majesty, please ask yourself, if the new policies promoted by Prime Minister Fan can be implemented thoroughly, can they solve the long-standing problems of the Song Dynasty?
However, the new policy, which was clearly capable of solving long-standing problems, encountered tremendous resistance and ultimately had to be stopped.

Where is the loyalty of those ministers?" Zhao Xing said.

The retired emperor fell silent upon hearing this. He never thought that there was anything wrong with Prime Minister Fan's new policy.

The reason for stopping it was that many people criticized Mr. Fan for using the new policy to win over his cronies.

In fact, this matter cannot be considered a complete frame-up.

Before becoming prime minister, Grand Prime Minister Fan had impeached then Prime Minister Lu.

It is said that he controlled the government and had countless cliques within the court.

However, he also won over many people during the impeachment process.

In the eyes of the emperor, isn't this also a manifestation of faction?

It is said that those who are involved in the matter are often confused, while those who are not involved can see things more clearly. In fact, when looking at ancient problems, we cannot look at them through the lens of history, but rather we have to put ourselves in their shoes.

Grand Chancellor Fan gathered a group of people to impeach then-Chancellor Lu. In his opinion, he was working for the country and the people, and those people were not his cronies, but like-minded people. If it were any other emperor, he would be terrified.

However, the Empress Dowager still reused Mr. Fan, but few emperors in history could compare with her in this respect.

But if we say that the emperor is magnanimous, he is not magnanimous enough.

What happened at that time still left a thorn in the heart of the emperor.

When Prime Minister Fan implemented his new policies, his like-minded people naturally participated.

Therefore, when Prime Minister Fan was impeached for taking advantage of the new policy to cultivate his own clique, the thorn in the retired emperor's heart flared up.

In fact, in Zhao Xing's view, the failure of Prime Minister Fan's new policy was only due to resistance, and the most important factor was that he was not a lone minister.

All intellectuals have a common problem, which is that they never take themselves seriously.

When others stick together, they are called cliques; when you stick together, you are like-minded.

But in the eyes of those in power, they are all the same.

It was precisely because of that thorn that Prime Minister Fan’s new policy ultimately failed.

"I heard that the Grand Chancellor has resigned?"

The Emperor was silent for a long time and then said, "The whole court, including the Prime Minister, does not support it. Have you ever thought about the consequences?"

"Father!"

Zhao Xing smiled slightly and said, "Although the system of the Song Dynasty has led to the current serious problems, this system also has an advantage."

"What benefits?" the emperor asked puzzledly.

"Power is dispersed. The power of both civil officials and military generals is very dispersed. As long as I am resolute enough, no matter how these people make trouble, they cannot shake the rule of the Song Dynasty." Zhao Xing said lightly.

If you take a closer look at the Song Dynasty, you will find an interesting phenomenon.

Although the Song Dynasty had powerful officials, their power was dependent on the emperor.

Simply put, it means gaining the emperor's trust.

However, these powerful ministers could not make the emperor afraid. If the emperor wanted to deal with them, it would only take a word.

This was completely unheard of in other dynasties.

The root cause is the dispersion of power.

No matter whether they are civil officials or military generals, they cannot control absolute power.

Take the Ming Dynasty for example. In the middle and late periods, the power of civil servants was still very strong.

Although she did not completely control the imperial power, she could still make the emperor very wary.

Even if the emperor had enough courage, he did not dare to suppress it by force. He could only use various means to beat some and pull some back.

However, the Song Dynasty had no such concerns at all. As long as it had enough courage, it could have suppressed the movement by force.

The emperor heard from Zhao Xing's words that he was determined to take action against those officials. After thinking for a long time, he sighed and said, "Forget it, forget it. You can do whatever you want. Now that I am still here, even if I can't finish it in the end, I can still clean up the mess for you."

"Don't worry, father. I can handle this matter. I won't let you clean up the mess for me." Zhao Xing said confidently.

"I hope so." The emperor sighed silently as he looked at Zhao Xing who looked confident.

Zhao Xing chatted with his father for a while before taking his leave.

(End of this chapter)