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Volume 3: A blow of destiny, the king appears Chapter 46: Commentary on merits and demerits

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    The so-called "nothing is greater than the Qin Emperor and the Han Dynasty" means that in terms of martial arts, no king in the past dynasties was as powerful as Qin Shihuang.

    There are many people and politicians from past dynasties who have praised Qin Shihuang.  For example, Sang Hongyang, a famous official in the Western Han Dynasty, affirmed in his writings that Qin Shihuang's achievements in unifying China were as great as mountains and mountains, and his fame would be passed down to future generations.

    Li Shimin, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, once said: In modern times, the only people who could level the world and expand borders were Emperor Qin and Emperor Wu of Han.

    Li Bai, the great poet of the Tang Dynasty, wrote in his poem "Ancient Style": The king of Qin sweeps away, how magnificent is the tiger's gaze!  Swing your sword to cut through the floating clouds, and all the princes will come to the west.  The clear judgment comes from the apocalypse, and the roughness leads to the talents.  Withdraw the troops and cast the golden man, and open Han Valley due to the east.  Inscribed on the Kuaiji Ridge, galloping towards Langyatai.

    Liu Zongyuan, a thinker of the Tang Dynasty, pointed out in his famous work "On Feudalism" that Qin Shihuang abolished the feudal system and established the prefecture and county system, which was in line with the objective and inevitable trend of historical development.

    Zhang Taiyan, a thinker in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, also praised Qin Shihuang in his 1913 Qin Zheng Ji, saying: Although there were four, three, and six emperors, they were not as good as Billung.

    Liu Yimou, the pioneer of modern Chinese history, commented in "The History of Sinicization": The legal system in the First Emperor's era actually had a great spirit. The use of one government to control thousands of miles of China was the evolution of the state's form, and it was also the evolution of the state.  That was the evolution of thought at that time.  The year when Yingzheng proclaimed himself emperor was actually the ending of the previous two thousand hundred years and the starting point of the next two thousand hundred years. It can be said to be a key moment in history.  However, although Qin had the merit of managing and unifying the country, it failed to implement its strategy of planning and unifying.  All the political affairs of Qin were carried out by Han.  The people of Qin started the process, and the people of Han followed it.  .

    He also had a very high evaluation of Qin Shihuang. He said: Qin Shihuang is an expert who values ??the present but ignores the past.  , Confucius and Mencius are idealists, Xunzi is materialism, and they are the left wing of Confucianism.  Confucius represents slave owners and nobles.  Xunzi represents the landlord class.

    Said again.  In Chinese history, it was Qin Shihuang who really did something, while Confucius only talked empty words.  , we should be fair.  Qin Shihuang was much greater than Confucius, but he was scolded for thousands of years.  , Qin Shihuang was the first person to unify China.  It not only unified China politically, but also unified Chinese characters and various Chinese systems, such as weights and measures. Some systems have been used ever since.  There is no second feudal monarch in China who can surpass him.  But it has been scolded by some people for thousands of years.

    I agree with Qin Shihuang, but I don¡¯t agree with Confucius.  Because Qin Shihuang was the first to unify China, unify the country, build a broad road, and not build a country within a country, but use a centralized system.  The central government sends people to various places and changes them every few years, without the need for a hereditary system.

    Historian Guo Moruo presented the "Ten Batch of Books" and after reading it said: I advise you to criticize Qin Shihuang and burn books and humiliate Confucian scholars for discussion.  The soul of the ancestral dragon is still alive in Qin after his death. The name of Confucianism is Gao Shi Chahu.  Qin's political laws have been implemented for hundreds of generations, and the "Ten Batch" is not a good chapter.  Familiar with the Tang Dynasty's "On Feudalism".  Do not return to the king from Zihou.  The most successful politicians in the past dynasties, those in the early feudal society, were all Legalists.

    These people advocate the rule of law and will be beheaded if they break the law.  It advocates favoring the present over the past.  Confucianism is full of benevolence, righteousness and morality, but it is full of male thieves and female prostitutes. They all advocate the emphasis on the past and the neglect of the present.

    On some occasions, he even said that he was Marx plus Qin Shihuang.  But I am not completely sure about Qin Shihuang.  He also said: Qin Shihuang, as a historical figure, must be divided into two parts.  The progressive role of Qin Shihuang in the process of historical development must be affirmed.  But after unifying the six kingdoms, he lost his enterprising aspect, became complacent, indulged in idle pleasures, begged gods, built palaces, brutally oppressed the people, wandered around, wasting his time, and was very bored.  Chen Sheng and Wu Guang rose up against the Qin Dynasty, including against Qin Shihuang. This was completely just.

    When evaluating emperors of the past dynasties, Zhong Che said: In the history of the world, among the emperors who created huge empires, none ranks as high as Qin Shihuang, because whether it is Cyrus the Great of the Persian Achaemenid Empire or the Asiatic Emperor of the ancient Macedonian Empire,  Alexander the Great or Caesar the Great of the ancient Roman Empire. Their empires no longer exist, and their impact on the world is far from comparable to that of Qin Shihuang.  In fact, even when they were in power, their reorganization of the unity of the empire was far less than that of Qin Shihuang.

    Faced with criticism of Qin Shihuang¡¯s tyranny, some historians have pointed out that it is necessary to distinguish Qin Shihuang¡¯s personal violence from the violence of the times, society and the system.

    Because many of the tyranny promoted by Qin Shihuang had to resort to violence to complete drastic and huge social changes. This kind of violence is essentially the tyranny of the times, society and system that occurred in the context of great transformation and change, and  Qin Shihuang personally didn't have much to do with it.

    There is no objection in history that the Qin government was tyrannical and harsh, and the people were enslaved by the tyrannical Qin and lived a miserable life, especially during the time of the First Emperor. There is no objection in history; positive evaluations of the Qin Dynasty or Qin Shihuang mainly focus on the significance of unification and centralization of power to future generations.  Unification and centralization are very important for maintaining stability, but they prevent the process of social self-improvement and make social change very difficult. In the end, violent means are often required to eliminate the old ruling group and establish a new ruling group.

    ?But because the concepts of unity and centralization are deeply rooted, the new ruling group will soon repeat the mistakes of the old group.  This resulted in an obvious boom and bust cycle for Huaxia Ming.  When making a positive evaluation of Qin Shihuang, we cannot ignore the flaws of the system he designed.

    Qin Shihuang was a monarch who was dictatorial, imposed excessive taxes, severe punishments, and lived a luxurious life. He became a symbol of tyrants in Chinese culture.

    The Qin Dynasty died in only fifteen years after unifying the world, and it also started a rule of more than two thousand years in China, which had far-reaching influence.  The contention of a hundred schools of thought and the explosion of ideas in the pre-Qin period disappeared after the Qin Dynasty.

    The Qin Dynasty used highly organized government agencies to manage people and resources, and used harsh punishments to ensure the implementation of decrees (all of them who failed to arrive at their destinations on time were executed was the direct reason why Chen Sheng and Wu Guang led the people to revolt).

    Qin Shihuang promoted the Legalist theory of ruling the country by law, while all Chinese rulers from Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty onward promoted Confucianism with benevolence, love and moderation at its core.  Moreover, Qin Shihuang's extreme measures of burning books and harassing Confucian scholars offended the world's scholars (i.e., the intellectual class).  Therefore, Qin Shihuang often appears as a negative example in various scattered and historical records.

    Qin Shihuang¡¯s construction projects, including the Great Wall of Qin, Qinchi Road, Lingqu, Afang Palace and Qin Shihuang¡¯s Mausoleum, were extremely large in scale and required the entire country¡¯s population to build them. Many officials blamed the deaths and injuries caused during the construction of the projects.

    Judging from the current archaeological discoveries of the Epang Palace ruins and the Qin Emperor's Mausoleum, a large amount of labor and materials were used to satisfy Qin Shihuang's personal vanity.

    But on the other hand, some projects have also further developed transportation in various places, which will help future transportation, economy and trade, national security and the integration of various ethnic groups.  Therefore, whether these projects were great or too great has always been a point of debate among historians.

    Regarding the Great Wall, some people pointed out that the Great Wall built at that time was not the Great Wall we see today (the current Great Wall was built by the Ming Dynasty). The main purpose of the Qin Great Wall was to mark the defensive baseline with the Xiongnu. The First Emperor still sent Meng Tian to send three troops.  One hundred thousand troops attacked the Xiongnu. Later generations commented on this: they raised troops to attack from far away, they were greedy for external forces but limited for internal affairs, and they wanted to expand the territory without worrying about the harm.

    Not long after Meng Tian died, the Xiongnu easily crossed the Qin Great Wall, not only regained the original lost territory, but also occupied Yan, Dai and other counties.  It can be seen that whether the Great Wall was meaningful in the war against nomads in later generations is still a controversial topic, but at least in the era of Qin Shihuang, its role was minimal except for wasting national power.

    In the process of destroying the six kingdoms, Qin Shihuang put the maids of the destroyed countries into his own palace ("Historical Records" Qin Shihuang Chronicle Sixth: Every time Qin defeated the princes, he wrote about the palaces and palaces, which were written on the north bank of Xianyang, adjacent to Wei in the south, and from the east of Yongmen  To Jing and Wei, the palaces and houses were restored to the Zhou Pavilion, and the bells and drums of the princes and beauties were collected.)

    After the death of Qin Shihuang, Qin II ordered all the maids who had no children in the palace to be buried. After Qin Shihuang was buried, the tomb door was closed and the craftsmen were buried alive ("Historical Records" Qin Shihuang Chronicle Sixth: The second emperor said: If the late emperor does not have children in the harem, he will be buried alive.  It's not appropriate. They are all ordered to die, and there are many dead people. It may be that the craftsmen are aware of it, and Zang Zhong will be released soon. After the important thing is done, Zang Zang will be closed, and the outer Xian gate will be closed.  (There is no comeback)

    From the above two paragraphs, we can imagine that there are really countless maids and craftsmen who died for the burial of Qin Shihuang.  It was Qin II who executed it, so how could he know it was not Qin Shihuang¡¯s intention?

    In addition, archeology has discovered that there are a large number of burial pits, sacrificial pits and secondary burial pits distributed in the Qin Emperor's Mausoleum.  A pit of rare birds and animals and a pit of copper chariots and horses were unearthed from the burial pits. They were all painted and decorated with a large amount of gold and silver, and were quite gorgeous and exquisite.  The victims in the tomb were both male and female, and they were buried together after being killed.  The burial pits are arranged densely and orderly. There are kneeling pottery figurines and horse bones buried in the pits. They are probably palace stables and servants who raised horses.  The tyranny of the Qin government is evident.

    There are many people in the past dynasties who have criticized Qin Shihuang, for example:

    Jia Yi, a thinker of the Western Han Dynasty, pointed out in "On the Passage of the Qin Dynasty": One man is in trouble and seven temples are destroyed, and he is killed by others. What is the reason for the laughter of the world?  If the benevolent heart is not used, the offensive and defensive momentum will be different.  King Xu of Zhou had his way for more than a thousand years, but it was lost at the end of Qin, so it could not last long.  From this point of view, the safety and danger are far apart.

    Sima Qian, a historian of the Western Han Dynasty, wrote in "Historical Records of the First Emperor of Qin": The King of Qin had a greedy heart and the wisdom of self-improvement. He did not believe in meritorious officials and was not close to the people.  Then benevolence and righteousness began with tyranny for the world.  The one who combines husband and wife is high in deceit, and the one who is stable values ????obedience to power. This means that taking and keeping are different skills.

    Du Mu, a scholar of the Tang Dynasty, commented in "A Fang Gong Fu": The heart of one person is the heart of thousands of people.  Qin's love is extravagant, and people also miss his family.  However, if you take all the baht and use it like sand, people in the world will not dare to speak or be angry.  The heart of a single husband is becoming increasingly arrogant.

    "Those who destroy the six kingdoms are the six kingdoms, and they are not Qin; those who belong to Qin are Qin, and they are not the world."  Sigh!  If the six countries love each other, it will be enough to reject Qin; if Qin loves the six countries again,A man can become a king in three lifetimes and become a king in all lifetimes. Who will win and his family will be destroyed?  The people of Qin had no time to mourn for themselves, so that future generations would mourn for them; if future generations mourned without taking note of it, they would also cause future generations to mourn for future generations again.
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