The history in ancient books is the traces of ancient people's lives, their understanding and thinking about the world. Every ancient book is a witness to history and a treasure of culture.
Let's walk into ancient books, explore the long river of history, and appreciate the charm of ancient culture.
In 1602 AD, Zhu Yijun, the Wanli Emperor, felt that his condition was getting worse and worse, and he might not even recover. He knew that as an emperor who was about to die, the most important thing he needed to do was to arrange his afterlife.
Therefore, he immediately summoned Shen Yiyi, the first assistant of the cabinet at the time, and a group of scholars, and began to care for the orphans on his deathbed and explain the aftermath. In his will, Emperor Wanli expressed his regret and deep concern for the young lord Zhu Changluo, and hoped that the ministers could do their best to assist him.
He also made special mention of his widows and orphans, hoping that they would be treated well. In addition, he reminded ministers to pay attention to the handling of unjust, false and wrongful convictions, and to release prisoners who had been in detention for a long time to atone for their crimes.
Although the Wanli Emperor's testament looks ordinary, one of his special instructions is worth pondering for the ministers. This directive is for ministers to take into account not only the needs of the country but also the well-being of the people when dealing with the affairs of the state.
This was Emperor Wanli's expectation of his subordinates, and it was also his last concern for this vast empire.
After the death of the Wanli Emperor, the mining tax system was immediately stopped, much to the great distress of the ministers. The mining tax system was originally intended to increase the revenue of the state treasury, but it was not an easy task.
During the reign of the Wanli Emperor, the expenditure of the state treasury increased, and additional funds were needed. Therefore, the Wanli Emperor sent eunuchs to various places to find ore veins and make money for the imperial court. However, these eunuchs lacked the expertise to mine the ore effectively.
Unable to complete their tasks, they began to use their power to extort wealthy people and collect bribes in disguise. What began to be an effort to increase state revenues turned into a nationwide extortion.
During the reign of Emperor Wanli, in addition to extorting wealthy households, he also assigned eunuchs to collect mining taxes among the people and loot the people's money. Since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, the commercial tax has always been 30 taxes and 1, and individuals only need to pay one-thirtieth of their annual labor income to the state.
With the development of the Ming Dynasty, the economy recovered, and the people's lives recovered, it was necessary to reformulate taxes, but Wanli appointed eunuchs to collect taxes unreasonably. The eunuch is not a full-time person in the tax system, and the source and place of the money collected are not clean, basically three or seven points are divided, three points are into the inner treasury of Wanli, and seven points are filled by the eunuchs.
This extortion of taxes can provoke social contradictions and put the state's finances in opposition to morality. During Wanli's serious illness, he learned from the pain and decided to stop the mining tax system immediately after his death.
Although Shen and the scholars wept, the author thinks that they were more happy because the mining tax system was finally stopped. Shen had drawn up an edict with the scholars that night, intending to publish it after the emperor's death.
Forbidden City Wenyuan Pavilion) Shen has always waited in Wenyuan Pavilion, and he did not wait for the news of the funeral in the palace until dawn. It turned out that Emperor Wanli mistakenly thought that he was seriously ill and about to die, but after a good night's sleep, he regained his energy and found that he was fine.
Emperor Wanli regretted that he hastily asked his ministers to abolish the mining tax system last night, and now he realized that he was not dead, that the palace and banquets were still going on, and that the mining tax system still needed to be enforced.
Emperor Wanli immediately sent eunuchs to the cabinet to find Shen Cheng and demand the surrender of last night's edict, as if nothing had happened. According to the "History of the Ming Dynasty", the Wanli Emperor said that yesterday's incident, the mining tax system could continue to be enforced, and the matter of releasing ministers was also ruled by Shen Zheng.
However, Shen consistently rejected Wanli's request and decisively drove away the little eunuch who came to ask for the edict.
Emperor Wanli once swore in tears that he would abolish the mining tax system, but soon his face changed. This kind of behavior of his made Shen always feel very excessive, because Wanli knew that the mining tax system was wrong and harmful to the people, but he still insisted on being wrong.
Emperor Wanli sent more than 20 eunuchs to ask for the edict, and these eunuchs did everything they could, some begged bitterly, some reprimanded loudly, some splashed and rolled, and some even knelt on the ground and kept kowtowing.
Shen had no choice but to return the holy decree. But instead of releasing the prisoners as agreed, Wanli did not stop the mining tax system, but ignored the ministers' pleas even more.
Emperor Wanli thought he was smart, but in fact, most of the wealth scavenged from the people fell into the pockets of the eunuchs in charge of specific matters, as well as the hands of the handlers of all classes, and very few really fell into his private pockets.
His actions eventually led to the failure to abolish the mining tax system, which caused great harm to the country.