"How many years have you been a widow? ”
It has been 14 years since I returned to the Queen Mother. ”
You are also a hard-working person, mourning your family, 39 years. ”
This dialogue took place in Xi'an in the 26th year of Guangxu (1900).
In that year, the Gengzi National Rebellion, and the Empress Dowager Cixi, who had lived in the Forbidden City for a long time, was forced to take Emperor Guangxu to embark on the road of "Western Hunting". Along the way, Cixi and Guangxu were embarrassed. The dignified Queen Mother and the Emperor were reduced to the point of sitting on a bench at night with their backs and sleeping with their backs to each other. This dilemma was not improved until Zhou Ying, the richest woman in Shaanxi, made a move.
Faced with this folk woman who also had the experience of widowhood and was willing to take the initiative to rescue herself, Cixi seemed to sense the same traits as herself in Zhou YingThe determination of holding power and the sorrow of troubled times
At that moment, she decided to accept Zhou Ying as her daughter, and waved her hand to signal Li Lianying to give an order to praise Zhou Ying. Obviously, she cherishes Zhou Ying.
Zhou Ying finally became a legend of the late Qing Dynasty under the care of Cixi. Cixi herself, on the other hand, continued to be mired in internal and external difficulties, becoming the woman referred to by Qianfu.
Empress Dowager Cixi. Source: Internet.
39 years before the Gengzi National Rebellion (1861), that summer, the 31-year-old Emperor Xianfeng died in a summer resort.
In the wild history, this son of heaven who created the "Daoxian declining world" has always ruled the world with an image of indulgence and poor health. In fact, Xianfeng also inherited the tradition of diligent government of his ancestors. Zhang Jixin, a minister of the late Qing Dynasty, mentioned this merit of Zeng Guofan in a letter to his staff: ".Where there is an urgent report in the military plane, although it is late at night, (Xianfeng) will order the internal supervisor to kneel in front of the bed to read. The big one, that is, the candle is draped up, and the royal couch is lined up with a few small ones, and there are pen and inkstone stationery on it, and the rate is answered by several batches, or the Zhu pen summons the minister, all of them take measures immediately, and there is no delay for a moment. Its ordinary trivial matters, after the end, will be folded in the original fold, and when the dawn is approaching, the military aircraft will be announced.
In order to deal with government affairs in a timely manner, Xianfeng summoned Concubine Yi, who gave birth to his only son, to serve him. Concubine Yi was later Cixi. Her mother is expensive and works in calligraphy, so Xianfeng likes to let her review the music on her behalf.
Xianfeng's health deteriorated. He was very uneasy about the country behind him. While his mind was still clear, he began to deal with the distribution of imperial power.
At that time, in addition to Concubine Yi and Queen Niu Hulu, Xianfeng also had 15 harem ladies at all levels. And his only ** person, the prince Zaichun, was only 6 years old at this time, and how to achieve a smooth transition of imperial power was a great test of the political wisdom of the son of heaven.
The eldest princess and the eldest brother of the Heting Evening Fishing Map", the eldest brother is the later Tongzhi Emperor Zaichun. Source: Internet.
After careful consideration, Xianfeng decided to order eight close ministers such as Sushun, Duanhua, and Zaiyuan to form a team of ministers to assist the government of Zanxiang, and respectively bestowed the empress and Zaichun with the seals of "Imperial Reward" and "Tongdaotang" to exercise imperial power. Due to the young age of Zaichun, the "Tongdaotang" has been kept by Concubine Yi since the date it was given.
Xianfeng was very satisfied with his arrangement, but he didn't realize that such an operation made the court situation even more obscure: the group of auxiliary ministers headed by Su Shun and Zaiyuan, the new emperor group led by the empress, Yi Guifei, and the prince Zaichun, and the emperor's closest brothers such as Prince Gong and Wang Yiyun of Alcohol County, formed three different opposites.
As soon as Xianfeng died, the Qing court immediately began to implement the last arrangements before his death: the emperor Zaichun was appointed as the emperor, and the era name was changed to "Qixiang"; His biological mother is the Queen Mother, and the Queen Niu Hulu is the Queen Mother.
After the end of the Xianfeng mourning period, the cabinet issued an edict to honor the Empress Dowager as the Empress Dowager Ci'an, and the Empress Dowager Our Lady as the Empress Dowager Cixi.
The 27-year-old Cixi officially stepped onto the stage of history, and the gears of fate began to turn.
The trend of history is really as accurate as it is objectively presented.
As soon as Su Shun ascended to the throne, he took the lead in giving Cixi a dismount. On the grounds of "not conforming to the ancestral system", he removed the Queen Mother from the funeral list of the Daxing Emperor.
Immediately afterwards, according to the edict of Emperor Daxing, the eight ministers told the queen mothers: ".The edict was drawn up by the minister, but the queen mother was sealed, and the Buddha had to be changed, and the chapter was not presented to the inside. In other words, the eight ministers are responsible for drafting the decree, and the queen mother of the two palaces is only responsible for stamping. As for what is written on the edict, I don't bother with the emperor.
This annoyed Cixi.
In the Qing Dynasty, where imperial power was supreme, no matter how powerful the auxiliary ministers were, they were just royal "slaves". Cixi, who had received a traditional education of loyalty, would categorically not agree to the arrogance of Su Shun and others, whether out of the dignity of the Qing emperors or out of selfishness to preserve their mother-son status.
So, under the leadership of Cixi, the empress dowager of the two palaces".Talking about the huge vat, the plan is very closeA consensus was quickly reached. In response to the remarks of Su Shun and others, Cixi took the lead in grabbing the statement in the emperor's edict asking the eight ministers to "praise all government affairs".
The so-called "praise and government affairs" literally means to assist and make suggestions from the side staff. Cixi specializes in chewing words, and the eight ministers have no choice. After consultation, Su Shun and others finally decided that the text of the edict should be drafted by them and submitted to the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces for preview. If the Queen Mother agreed, she would take out the seal given by Emperor Daxing and stamp a seal on the top and bottom according to the previous agreement. If there is a link that requires the approval of the emperor Zhu, it will be replaced by the jade seal after the queen mother of the two palaces is seen.
In order to prevent others from gossiping, Su Shun and others also asked the empress dowager of the two palaces to share the power of appointment and dismissal with them - the candidates for the governors of each province are named by the eight ministers, and the empress dowager of the two palaces is asked to decide.
The reason why Su Shun and the others are so generous is just because they want to be deferential, they think that as long as they don't go out of the summer resort, this is still their world.
However, the Eight Ministers underestimated Cixi's shrewdness.
Cixi knew that if she gave up on this, she would definitely suffer in the future. And throughout history, most of the widows of the royal family can only be "marginalized" for the rest of their lives, which is obviously not what she wants.
Therefore, from the moment she took back power, she made up her mind to completely eradicate the eight ministers, this group of "thorns in the eye and thorns in the flesh".
Cixi realized that the only people who could help her were the group of brothers of the Emperor Daxing.
She first set her hopeful eyes on Xianfeng's seventh brother, Wang Yiyun of the Alcohol County. This person is not only a close relative of the royal family, but also his brother-in-law. But at this time, Yi Xun was just a young man in his early twenties, and he had little political experience, so Cixi could only retreat to the next best thing, and secretly arranged for his cronie eunuch An Dehai to summon Prince Gong Yi to the summer resort to discuss major matters.
Yi was the sixth son of Emperor Daoguang and a strong competitor to the throne of Xianfeng. Before Xianfeng's death, he was in Beijing to negotiate with Britain, France and other countries on behalf of the imperial brother on the aftermath of the "Beijing Treaty". It wasn't until Cixi's people found him that he knew what had happened at the summer resort.
Prince Gong Yi. Source: Internet.
Cixi is worthy of being a person who knows how to do things according to the rules.
When sending someone to announce the meeting with Prince Gong, Cixi asked to see Ci'an on the grounds that she "did not want the first emperor to have civil strife in one day", and asked Ci'an to issue another secret decree to Prince Gong, inviting him to the summer resort to discuss important matters.
Ci'an has always defended her husband, and when she heard that Cixi took Xianfeng first, she suddenly felt that the other party was reasonable, so she ordered someone to urgently urge Prince Gong to meet her.
On the other hand, although Su Shun did not deprive Prince Gong, King Alcohol County and other royal relatives of the right to mourn Xianfeng, they used Xianfeng's mouth to inform the royal family relatives who stayed in Beijing."Needless to rush to Rehe
After An Dehai rushed back to the capital, he immediately visited Prince Gong and conveyed the decree of the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces to the royal family.
After receiving the distress signal from the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces, Yi did not dare to delay time, and immediately rushed to the summer resort with the prince and ministers of the prince and minister of the county under the banner of mourning for Xianfeng, and secretly went to the Queen Mother to listen to the instructions as soon as possible.
No one knows what Prince Gong and the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces talked about secretly. However, it can be inferred from Prince Gong's later deployment that Cixi was probably ready to seize power a long time ago.
In order to avoid a lot of dreams at night, after worshipping Xianfeng, Prince Gong informed Duanhua, Zaiyuan and others that he wanted to return to Beijing on the grounds that the government affairs of the Beijing division were cumbersome. In this regard, the eight ministers did not pay enough attention, they only regarded this as a godsend opportunity to control the government, and did not realize that a big net to arrest them was about to be opened.
After Prince Gong returned to Beijing, his ally, Zhou Zupei, a bachelor who stayed in Beijing, immediately instructed his protégé, Yushi Dong Yuanol, to give a recital to the Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces, and respectfully invited them to listen to the government. Although this performance failed to work in the end due to the strong opposition of the eight ministers, the "smoke bomb" released by Prince Gong was enough to make the eight ministers still indulge in the quagmire of fighting for power and profit with the emperor and queen, unable to extricate themselves.
Taking advantage of this gap, Prince Gong immediately convened a meeting of the military leaders stationed in Beijing in the name of the Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces and declared martial law in Beijing. At the same time, he sent a letter to the monks Lingqin, Shengbao and others who were still on the front line to defend the enemy, asking them to lead troops to defend the Beijing division and protect King Qin at any time. Finally, he used his influence to send a note to Britain and France to suspend the signing of the treaty.
After the promulgation of these stability maintenance measures, on September 23, 1861, Xianfeng's Zigong finally set off for Beijing.
At this time, Cixi asked to separate from the soldiers of Zigong on the grounds that the emperor was still young and he was not qualified to participate in the Xianfeng funeral. Su Shun agreed to the Empress Dowager's request, but at the same time ordered Zaiyuan, Duanhua, Jingshou, Mu Yin and others to accompany him, in an attempt to monitor Cixi's every move.
Portrait of Fucha Jingshou, one of the eight ministers. Source: Internet.
Unexpectedly, as soon as the two teams separated, Cixi's confidant Rong Lu came to escort him with a team of elite forbidden troops. Subsequently, Shengbao, who rushed back from the front, also led the troops of the Beijing Division to meet him. In this way, the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces arrived in the Forbidden City four days earlier than Zigong, and waited here for Su Shun and others to "throw themselves into the net".
On September 30, the Xinyou coup d'état broke out. Before Su Shun and others could figure out the situation, they received three major charges: first, during the overall management of government affairs, improper planning, which led to the burning of the Old Summer Palace by the British and French forces; the second is to cause the first emperor's holy body to violate the harmony, and the dragon controls the guests; The third is the dictatorship of government, arbitrarily and recklessly, and arbitrarily bending the law.
Under the instruction of the Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces, Su Shun, Zaiyuan, and Duanhua were sentenced to death, and the rest of the auxiliary ministers were either dismissed or sent to the border.
Cixi embodied the side of "benevolence", and Tegarn dismissed the family ties of the eight ministers and ordered people to burn the letters exchanged between Sushun and the ministers of the court in public, thus maintaining the stability of the political situation in Beijing.
At the same time, she changed the yuan for her son. At this point, the two palaces ruled the world together, and Cixi became the big winner behind the scenes.
When Cixi really touched the supreme authority of the Qing Dynasty, she regretted her competitiveness a little. Because, what Xianfeng left her to govern with the little emperor was a bullied and devastated world.
Just before and after Tongzhi ascended the throne, Li Xiucheng, the "loyal king" of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, had just led his army to take Hangzhou, the capital of Zhejiang Province. Although in the end, with the efforts of Zeng Guofan, Zuo Zongtang and others, the Qing army regained the lost territory, but the temporary loss of the southeast wealth still caused irreparable losses to the Qing court.
As the actual decision-maker of the two palaces, Cixi was unable to do so at this time.
Since the fall of the Eight Ministers, Prince Gong has become a powerful figure in the court. He is the king of parliament, the chief minister of military aircraft, the prime minister, the minister of trade and commerce of various countries, and many other important positions, and his status is second only to the queen mother of the two palaces. This situation instantly activated Cixi's protection mechanism for her own power, and she became increasingly jealous of this little uncle. And Prince Gong faced the sudden increase in his power, and there was also a slight expansion of ambition. On the surface, he still obeys the orders of the queen mother of the two palaces, but in fact, he always wants to use the identity of the imperial uncle to seize the imperial power in the hands of the two palaces and control the court.
Prince Gong Yi. Source: Internet.
Yi's "enterprising" did not arouse the dissatisfaction of the ministers of the DPRK and China. On the contrary, this group of ministers, who had long been dissatisfied with the dominance of the female protagonist, admired Prince Gong's snort, and often discussed with Yi first in case of trouble, and then fed back to Cixi after reaching a conclusion.
The Manchu Dynasty's disregard for the two palaces inevitably reminded Cixi of the unbearable time before the Xinyou coup. So, she saw the opportunity and gave Prince Gong a dismissal.
In the fourth year of Tongzhi (1865), with the acquiescence of Cixi, a petty official **Prince Gong.
This person's name is Cai Shouqi, and he is a royal day speaker. He didn't have the opportunity to go to court on weekdays, but with his imagination, he still listed it for Prince Gong."Greed, arrogance, power-grabbing, favoritism"and other four major crimes, requiring the imperial court to deal with them seriously.
Cai Shouqi's fabrication is in the heart of Cixi. She couldn't wait to summon Prince Gong and toss him the other party's recital, asking him to give her a reasonable explanation.
Prince Gong knew that the other party was maliciously framed, so he asked the two palaces to handle it impartially and return himself to justice. Speaking of excitement, he even threatened to kill Cai Shouqi.
As a result, Cixi was furious and summoned Zhou Zupei, a scholar, and Zhu Fengbiao, a scholar of the ministry, to ask them to condemn Prince Gong for the matters Cai Shouqi had stated.
Zhou Zupei and others did not want to offend the bigwigs of the two parties, so they reinstated their lives with "there is a reason for the incident, and there is no real evidence". This conclusion completely annoyed Cixi, and she complained to the ministers with tears in her eyes: ".Wang (Yi) planted the party to govern well, and gradually became embarrassed, and wanted to punish the king's crimes! The ministers should remember the first emperor and the fearless king. The king's sin should not be punished, and it should be discussed quickly!
This time, Zhou Zupei and the others will not be able to be rectified. They stood where they were, and on the grounds that "only the two palaces are broken", they asked Cixi to make the next steps clear.
The atmosphere was already in place, Cixi took out the pre-prepared Zhu edict while the iron was hot, and asked Zhou Zupei and others to follow the instructions to the court. In this edict, Cixi wrote in the name of Emperor Tongzhi: ".Since Prince Gong was in power, he has been arrogant and arrogant, and he has been (relying on) his lordship and power, and he has no king. Looking at the age of me, many coercion (system) often know (dark) the beginning (make) the discord, can not be asked in detail; Summoned every day, arrogant, between words, a lot of tricks, full of nonsense, heirs (like) this situation, how can you do state affairs in the future!
Except for a few typos, Cixi basically agreed with Cai Shouqi's list of four major crimes. It can be seen that Cai Shouqi played for no reason, and there must be Cixi's instigation behind him. It's just that what she didn't expect was that the news of the dismissal of Prince Gong caused an uproar.
Prince Yi Cheng, Wang Yiyun of Alcohol County, Wang Zheng of Tongzheng and others took turns to write to intercede for Prince Gong, and Ci'an, who was on the same front as Cixi before, also had compassion at this moment, thinking that his handling of the "sixth uncle" was too much. Under the oppression of **, Cixi, who was good at playing power, had no choice but to restore Prince Gong's posts as Minister of the Inner Court and Minister of National Affairs of the Prime Minister.
Portrait of the Empress Dowager Ci'an. Source: Internet.
But even so, Cixi's goal of killing chickens and making an example of monkeys was achieved. After this change, Prince Gong's vigor was much less than before, and many things were no longer stubborn, which may have indirectly led to the final miscarriage of the Westernization Movement.
When Cixi desperately defended the power of the mother and son, her son Emperor Tongzhi began to "sing the opposite".
In the twelfth year of Tongzhi (1873), the 18-year-old Tongzhi finally got the opportunity to be pro-government. A year before he became pro-government, he had just held a big wedding, and the Empress Arut was the daughter of Chongqi, the only banner man in the Qing Dynasty, and she was also his most satisfactory wife. However, this result made Cixi very dissatisfied.
Empress Alut is the granddaughter of Duanhua, one of Cixi's political enemies and one of the "Eight Ministers of Gu Ming", and if it were not for her relationship with the Empress Dowager Ci'an, she would not have been eligible to run for the empress. And Cixi's Manchurian nobleman Fucha who was recommended by the emperor was named Concubine Hui by Tongzhi and subordinated to the empress. Cixi was so angry that she was on fire. In order to regain decency, she used court etiquette to trouble the Arut clan, and at the same time, on the grounds that the emperor had many personal affairs, she prevented the young couple from being gentle and asked them to abstain from sex.
Cixi's excessive demands are probably the stress reaction of an old mother who has been widowed for many years and is neglected after "losing" her son. But even so, as Dong Conglin said in the book "Coup and Coup": ".The most fundamental reason is also that she does not allow her authority to fail and takes revenge.
Due to Cixi's blatant interference in the life of his husband and wife, Tongzhi became depressed. In addition, the diet of the Qing Dynasty has always been based on the golden rule of "if you want to be a child, three points of hunger and cold", and within two years of Tongzhi's pro-government, he died in the Yangxin Palace in December of the thirteenth year of Tongzhi (January 1875) due to long-term malnutrition and gaffe, at the age of 19.
Portrait of Emperor Tongzhi. Source: Internet.
At this time, from Emperor Daoguang down, the inheritance of the heirs of the royal family has been severed. Choosing which descendant of the collateral line as the future king has become a headache for the princes and ministers. However, after the pain of losing her husband and child, Cixi appeared to be more calm than others.
As the de facto ruler of the Qing Dynasty at that time, she did not sink into grief, let alone reflect on whether Tongzhi's death had anything to do with her. As soon as Tongzhi died, she ordered someone to take a breath and quickly ordered Li Hongzhang's Huai army to enter Beijing to escort her. After Li Hongzhang and other important ministers arrived, they announced the news of Tongzhi Long's control of Bintian.
Similar to Xianfeng's death more than ten years ago, at this time, Cixi also believed that the country could not be without a king for a day, which was not only related to the safety of the Qing Dynasty, but also related to her own name and power. Therefore, the choice of the heir to the throne whether to concurrently reign with Xianfeng or with Concurrently has become the key to the problem.
Cixi tendedThe former
The queen mother of the two palaces ordered the ministers to discuss the succession to the throne, and everyone understood that this was a major royal event, so they kept silent. Seeing that everyone was silent, the Empress Dowager Ci'an had to take the lead in making a suggestion, recommending Prince Gong's son, Beile Zaicheng, to succeed to the unification and take over Xianfeng.
But Zaicheng's reputation in the imperial family is too bad, and when Tongzhi was alive, he did not encourage the little emperor to go out of the palace to be a prostitute, and he also lost his title for a short time. Therefore, as soon as Ci'an's proposal came out, Prince Gong couldn't even say it. He told the Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces that according to the order of succession, Pei Zi Pulun was the king who should be established, because he was the heir of Yiwei, the eldest son of Emperor Daoguang.
Beizi Pulun. Source: Internet.
However, Yiwei did not leave an heir, Pu Lun was the son of his heir Zaizhi, and they were originally the twelfth son of Emperor Qianlong, Prince Yongying. The princes of the close branches, led by Prince Yi Cheng, objected, saying, "The Pulun clan is too far away to be established." Cixi immediately seized the opportunity to echo: ".There is no one who stands in the Pu generation.
In this way, it is finally a foregone conclusion.
Subsequently, Cixi threw the "olive branch" to her brother-in-law, and ordered Yixun's son Zai Yan to succeed to the throne. This is Emperor Guangxu.
Emperor Guangxu was only 4 years old when he entered the palace, leaving his biological parents, and he was naturally more timid than the children who grew up in the palace on weekdays. I don't know if it's because of this, Cixi actually had a "mother's love" at the beginning. She once said to her subordinates, ".The emperor often sleeps on my couch during the day, when it is cold and warm, he adds or subtracts his clothes, and saves his diet ......I taught the emperor to read and write, and I read the "Four Books" and "Book of Songs" orally.
Because Guangxu was still young, Cixi once again enjoyed the dividends of listening to the government.
However, regaining her authority, she is still facing the world that has been ravaged by foreign powers. Not only that, but compared with the time when Tongzhi ascended the throne, the trend of decline of the Qing Dynasty was more obvious.
In the northwest, the princes of the Kokand Khanate in Central Asia, with the support of Tsarist Russia and the British imperialists, instigated riots in an attempt to divide Xinjiang. In the southeast, the coastal defense from Guangdong to Zhili has been a "tourist attraction" for the great powers since the end of the Daoguang period. The Qing Dynasty was like a dilapidated house with wind on all sides, and how to remedy and revitalize it became the primary task of Cixi and the loyal ministers of the Qing Dynasty.
In this regard, Zuo Zongtang, the governor of Shaanxi and Gansu, and Li Hongzhang, the minister of Beiyang, put forward their respective views.
Li Hongzhang believes that Japan's rise will certainly take the more fertile Middle Earth as an imaginary enemy, and there will definitely be a war between China and Japan. Zuo Zongtang believes that Xinjiang's strategic position is very important. He said".Those who value Xinjiang protect Mongolia, and those who protect Mongolia protect Beijing. The northwest arms are connected, the situation is complete, and there is no gap to take advantage of. If Xinjiang is not solid, then Mongolia is uneasy, and the non-special Shaanxi, Gansu, and Shanxi sides are invaded from time to time, and it is impossible to prevent it.
Even if Cixi no longer understands military affairs, she also knows the relationship between Xinjiang, Mongolia and Beijing, and she is unwilling to lose the support of foreign vassals from the Qing Dynasty, let alone become a national sinner who has lost her land in everyone's mouth. Therefore, as soon as Zuo Zongtang's words came out, she immediately appointed him as the minister of the Qincha, with full responsibility for the military affairs of Xinjiang and the expedition to the west. Zuo Zongtang did not live up to expectations, and recovered most of the territory of Xinjiang except Ili in just over a year after his expedition, effectively safeguarding the territorial integrity of the country.
Time flies, in the thirteenth year of Guangxu (1887), it was time for Emperor Guangxu to be in power, and Cixi's inner insecurity began to flood again.
She was reluctant to give up her power and position. As early as the beginning of Guangxu's accession to the throne, she told the world that if Emperor Guangxu gave birth to a prince in the future, the prince must inherit Tongzhi, so as to cut off the connection between Guangxu and his family.
Of course, an edict is not enough for Guangxu to willingly surrender to her when he grows up.
According to the "Wuxu Reform Law Materials", "The Empress Dowager of the West treated the emperor with a fierce voice, and when she was a teenager, she scolded her every day, and when she was a little unsatisfactory, she was often whipped or ordered to kneel; Therefore, after accumulating power for a long time, the emperor saw that the Queen Mother of the West was like a lion and tiger, trembling, so he was bold
With the blessing of the stick, Emperor Guangxu, who was already timid, spent a more frightening "adolescence". He had to bow his head to Cixi, and he didn't dare not open his mouth to call Cixi "dear father". However, the rebellion in his bones is more complete and decisive than Tongzhi.
Portrait of Emperor Guangxu.
In order to exert more complete control over Emperor Guangxu, Cixi ordered him to marry his niece Jingfen, who later became Empress Dowager Longyu. Guangxu obeyed the order, but he wanted to have a sweet love in his heart. Concubine Zhen, who entered the palace at the same time as Longyu, soon won the young emperor's special favor because of her lively personality.
In this regard, Cixi did not object to it at first. She was even attracted by Concubine Zhen's talent and intelligence, and ordered someone to teach her to paint, hoping to use her hand to mend the relationship between herself and Guangxu.
However, Concubine Zhen's next move disappointed Cixi.
According to Hu Sijing's "Guowen Beicheng", there was a businessman Lu Boyang who wanted to be an official at that time, and sent 40,000 taels to Concubine Zhen through secret channels. Shanghai was one of the treaty ports of the Qing Dynasty, and in order to better deal with foreigners, Su Song Taidaotai usually selected candidates who were familiar with customs affairs. Lu Boyang suddenly "parachuted", which attracted the attention of Liu Kunyi, the governor of Liangjiang at the time. Only one month after Lu Boyang took office, Liu Kunyi's "small report" hit Cixi. As a result, Concubine Zhen's betrayal of the official ** incident occurred.
Anyone who wants to meddle in the government and fight for power with it, Cixi can't tolerate it, let alone the emperor's concubine? Therefore, she called Emperor Guangxu to scold her, and reiterated the family rules of the Qing court - the palace is not allowed to interfere in politics, and forced Emperor Guangxu to issue a decree to punish Concubine Zhen severely.
When Concubine Zhen was punished, she was just in time for the First Sino-Japanese Naval Battle. In that year, the uprising of the Donghak Party broke out in Korea, and Japan deliberately provoked the Sino-Japanese war by increasing its troops in Korea under the pretext of protecting its overseas Chinese. At this critical moment, Concubine Zhen's cousin Zhirui and her mentor Wen Tingshi strongly persuaded Emperor Guangxu to fight the main battle, and wrote a letter to criticize Li Hongzhang, Sun Yuwen and other important ministers for their proposals for peace.
Although Cixi also supported the war in her subjective consciousness, this year, she was burdened by the government for most of her life, and she also ushered in her sixtieth birthday. As the saying goes, ten years old is a hurdle. On the eve of Cixi's 40th birthday, Emperor Tongzhi died; Around the age of fifty, he caught up with the Sino-French War. Therefore, she regards her 60th birthday as more important than anything else.
Just after Cixi's fiftieth birthday, he asked Emperor Guangxu's father, Prince Yixun, to build a summer palace for himself as a place to retreat and recuperate. At present, war is about to break out, and if the new navy strengthens its armament to fight against Japan, it will inevitably affect the Summer Palace project. Cixi Gong openly said cruel words: ".What makes me unhappy today, I will also make him unhappy for life.
But Emperor Guangxu was unwilling to be a puppet and the king of the country. Seeing the successive defeats of the Qing army, he stepped up his efforts to urge Li Hongzhang to prepare for the Beiyang division, and put pressure to stop the construction of the Summer Palace, and tried his best to do a good job in the logistics support work before the Sino-Japanese naval war.
However, this naval battle not only failed to save face for the Qing court, but also defeated the most successful reform project since the Westernization Movement, the new navy.
The depressed Guangxu Emperor wanted the Qing Dynasty to bring about a change similar to the Meiji Restoration in Japan. His wish was soon supported by the majority of Juzi.
In the twenty-first year of Guangxu (1895), 3,000 scholars from Yiweike participated in the examination in Beijing. Among them, Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao wrote more than 18,000 words of "The Book of the Emperor of the Past and Today", and invited people from 18 provinces to jointly sign a letter to the Metropolitan Procuratorate**.
Kang, Liang and others believe that the essence of the West's prosperity and strength does not depend on the production of advanced equipment and equipment, but on a political system that is completely different from that of China. Liang Qichao even said that when the Westernists talk about "changing the law," they only know about the minor reforms at the level of military training, mining, trade, railways, ships, banks, postal services, agriculture, manufacturing, and so on, and do not explore the "origin." He believes that "the foundation of changing the law is in cultivating talents, the prosperity of talents, the opening of schools, the establishment of schools, and the change of imperial examinations." All in all, without changing the official system, it is absolutely impossible to pull the Qing Dynasty out of the quagmire.
Liang Qichao. Source: Internet.
The propositions of Kang, Liang and others stirred up a thousand waves with one stone, and Emperor Guangxu was quite moved after seeing it, and issued several edicts in a row, asking the local governors to hurry up and collect opinions and prepare for trial implementation.
After experiencing the First Sino-Japanese National Disaster, the high-level Qing court also had a certain degree of recognition for Kang and Liang's ideas. Zhang Zhidong, the governor of Huguang, once said after he wrote on the bus: "The mud method is weak, and the law is changed to become strong." With the support of these governors, Emperor Guangxu was naturally full of confidence in changing the law.
But on the other hand, the changes of Kang, Liang and others are not limited to institutional innovation, they hope that through the power of Emperor Guangxu, the leaders of the first will be replaced, so that more people who support the reform can get the opportunity to serve as officials, so that the reform can be implemented more thoroughly.
For this reason, Kang, Liang and others pointed the finger at Cixi. They believe that the crux of China's unsuccessful reform lies in this old woman.
Kang Youwei instructed Yang Shenxiu to give Guangxu a fold and secretly told Cixi that she had a small treasury in the Summer Palace. Then, he contacted Yuan Shikai and formulated a plan for "killing the queen of the garden". It's just that Cixi had a "knowing grace" to Yuan Shikai, and Kang Youwei and others not only failed to complete their ideas as planned, but also caused themselves to be killed.
In the twenty-fourth year of Guangxu (1898), the "Hundred Days Restoration" led by Kang and Liang and supported by Emperor Guangxu was aborted. Under the anger of Cixi, she imprisoned Emperor Guangxu, Kang and Liang fled overseas, Tan Si and the other "six gentlemen" were bloody in the market, and the reform of the law was dealt a near-devastating blow.
Tan. Although Cixi was very disgusted with Kang, Liang and others, she herself did not have much resistance to changing the law. After dealing with the hidden dangers left by Kang, Liang and others, she announced: "All the new policies for self-improvement, which are related to the national economy and people's livelihood, should be held urgently with strength, that is, those who have not yet been established, should also be promoted." ”
But it was too late, and after the entanglement of change and unchanging power, the Gengzi Kingdom Revolution broke out. Cixi took Guangxu to "hunt in the west" and fled to Xi'an. Subsequently, Cixi was forced to implement a new policy. In December of the 26th year of Guangxu (January 1901), she issued an edict in the name of Emperor Guangxu, and the new policy reform of the Qing court was officially launched.
According to many discussions and studies, the New Deal was implemented in two main steps: the first stage was to follow the Meiji Restoration within the system to complete changes in the fields of politics, economy, military, culture and education, and social life; After that, it was reformed to address the imperial system that had been in place in China for more than 2,000 years.
In order to let everyone see the best determination to reform, Cixi sent five ministers, including Zai Ze and Duanfang, to Japan, Europe and the United States to inspect constitutionalism and accumulate experience. After Zai Ze and the others returned, Cixi immediately ordered people to revise the "Nine-Year Preparatory Constitutional List" and set a schedule for the preparation of the constitution to conform to the will of the people.
In this way, Cixi responded to the cries of the people, in essence, she still wanted to retain the supreme power she had held for decades. After Zaizawa returned to China, he once referred to Japan's constitutional monarchy to Cixi's advice: ".The constitution can ensure the perpetuation of the throne, the external troubles will gradually lighten, and the internal strife can be eliminated. In other words, as long as Cixi follows the tide of the times, regardless of whether there is a substantial change in the constitution, she is still the most powerful woman in the world. And the Qing Dynasty, which had long been riddled with holes, was still a regime that the subjects had to maintain.
Zai Ze's statement, Cixi was very satisfied. However, God didn't plan to give her too much time.
On October 22, the 34th year of Guangxu (1908), the Empress Dowager Cixi, who had actually ruled the Qing Dynasty for nearly 48 years, passed away. The day before, Emperor Guangxu, who had been illegally imprisoned by her for ten years, also ended a tragic life.
The wheels of the times rolled forward, and the sudden death of Cixi and Guangxu failed to give the Qing Dynasty high-level leaders who had been seeking to "live" enough vigilance and reflective wisdom. Continuing Cixi's desire for power, the regent Zaifeng lost the entire country when he tried his best to protect the imperial power. And countless people are living or dying like ants in the advance and retreat of those in power.