Today is the first official match of the Cuju Competition. The two teams are the Huangtian Team and the Grassroots Team. Before the start of the game, and even within the first forty minutes of the first half, the audience present and all the team leaders watching the game thought that today’s
The winning side of the game will be the Huangtian team. But no one expected that in the 40 minutes of the first half, the grassroots team took advantage of a defensive counterattack opportunity and created a single goal. The only forward sent by the grassroots team
Player Luo Wen completed his task excellently and scored a goal with five minutes left before the end of the first half. Therefore, although the Huangtian team had the absolute initiative in the first half,
, but at the end of the half, the score was that the Grassroots team led 1-0.
This made Yan Shu feel helpless. Originally, he wanted to take advantage of the intermission to introduce Wang Anshi's abilities to Zhao Zhen. The reason why he chose this time was because Yan Shu also felt that the Huangtian team should be on top.
After making some achievements in the half, Zhao Zhen was in a good mood. In front of these officials who came to watch the game, it should be a good choice for him to recommend Wang Anshi to Zhao Zhen. Yan Shu also knew in his heart that the emperor actually felt deeply towards Wang Anshi.
I am somewhat biased. Although I have not watched the entire incident, it is no longer a secret.
As we all know, Wang Anshi worked as an errand in Bianliang for a period of time. He was an errand in the capital. Coupled with Wang Anshi's ability, he would definitely come into contact with Emperor Zhao Zhen, so that happened.
When Wang Anshi was 22 years old, he entered the official career as the fourth Jinshi. He had outstanding achievements as a local official and was good at poetry and articles. He had his own opinions on many things. But on the other hand, Wang Anshi had a stubborn and eccentric personality, and he often published some
He talked about strange things and did some shocking things. So there were two voices at that time. One voice believed that Wang Anshi was the seed of the prime minister and would definitely benefit the world in the future; the other voice believed that Wang Anshi should never be reused. The so-called "Anshi Guo"
If you use it, the world will be troubled." However, Song Renzong, who was in power at the time, was inclined to the latter voice and even concluded that Wang Anshi was a treacherous person. What is going on?
This starts from a fishing incident. It is said that Wang Anshi was very famous at the time. After serving as a local official for several years, he was recommended to Renzong as the Zhizhigao. His main responsibility was to draft edicts for the emperor. Initially, Renzong was very interested in Wang Anshi.
I am quite satisfied, the young man is very talented and the edicts are written very well.
On one occasion, Renzong invited some ministers to enjoy flowers and fish in the back garden of the palace, and everyone had fun together. Wang Anshi, a close minister around Renzong, was also invited. After the fishing activity started, everyone was placed next to
There were several tables with fish bait on them in gold dishes, and everyone concentrated on fishing.
Fishing requires quietness and patience. However, Renzong had no intention of fishing. He preferred to take this opportunity to observe ministers, especially those young ministers. Through fishing, one can see a person's character to a certain extent.
All the other ministers were calm and calm, waiting for the fish to take the bait. Only Wang Anshi was restless and secretly eating. Renzong took a closer look and saw that Wang Anshi was actually eating the bait placed next to him, and he quickly finished the whole plate of bait.
I don't know what the bait is made of and why it smells so good. Renzong saw it and his face turned dark, but he didn't say anything. The next day, Renzong talked about the matter with the ministers and said rudely
Said: "Wang Anshi is a treacherous person. If he were an ordinary person, he would be forgiven for accidentally eating a pill by mistake, and he would stop eating it after discovering it. But Wang Anshi still ate it all even though he knew it was fish bait. This is
It’s really against human nature.”
Why did Renzong conclude that Wang Anshi was a treacherous person just through this small incident? Try to analyze it, there are probably several reasons: first, Renzong felt that Wang Anshi was impatient, could not calm down, and was a person who liked to toss;
Second, Wang Anshi probably ate it by mistake at first, but after knowing it was fishing bait, he still ate the bait, knowing his mistake and not correcting it, leading to a dark road; third, and most importantly, why did Wang Anshi do this?
?Could it be that the taste is unique, the same as that of fish? Obviously it is not so weird. So, did he do this to gain attention by grandstanding, or to express his disdain for the emperor and other ministers? No matter what the motive was, Renzong was extremely disappointed.
He felt uncomfortable and even suspected that he had ulterior motives. At this time, Renzong was already in his old age and his thoughts were relatively conservative. Therefore, "the emperor was not happy about it" and asserted: "Wang Anshi is a liar."
After this incident, Renzong became prejudiced against Wang Anshi and believed that he could not be reused. Later, Wang Anshi wrote many times to request reform, but Renzong put it on the shelf and refused to adopt it. Wang Anshi was therefore dissatisfied with Renzong, and Renzong was hailed as the emperor of Han Dynasty while Wang Anshi was still alive.
He often wrote poems and essays to ridicule Emperor Wen of Han Dynasty, which was actually a metaphor for Renzong.
In addition, Song Renzong had not reformed the system of the Song Dynasty before, but it attracted opposition from many people, so the reform had to fail. Because of this, Song Renzong gradually became conservative, and he was unwilling to change the system of the Song Dynasty.
system to avoid unnecessary trouble.
Moreover, when Song Renzong appointed Wang Anshi, he was already in middle age. The most troublesome thing for Song Renzong at that time was his future succession to the throne. Those of us who have watched "Qing Ping Le" know that Song Renzong had very few sons.
, forget about the young ones, but all of them did not live long, which was also an important reason why Song Renzong had to choose Song Yingzong to succeed him.
That is to say, at this juncture, Song Renzong actually had no intention to consider reform matters at all, and extending his heirs was his top priority.
Therefore, Wang Anshi was not reused during the Renzong period of the Song Dynasty, but he had the opportunity to show his talents during the Song Shenzong period. The main purpose of Wang Anshi's reform was to enrich the country and strengthen the army. The starting point was correct, but his approach touched the conservatives at the time.
interests, so less than a year after the promulgation of the law, fierce fighting between the old and new parties broke out.
Yan Shu actually didn't know what happened in the later period, but Yan Shu knew about eating fish bait. Naturally, Lu Yao also learned about this matter from ancient books. To be honest, Lu Yao couldn't understand what Wang Anshi did.
What is the purpose and motivation of an action? However, it is absolutely true that this incident aroused Zhao Zhen's resentment towards Wang Anshi.
Place
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Therefore, Yan Shu originally thought that he would tell Zhao Zhen about the recommendation while he was happy. Even if Zhao Zhen was biased against Wang Anshi, he would not get angry. Who would have thought that this Cuju competition would
Without Yan Shu's intention, the first half ended with the grassroots team taking the lead. Now Yan Shu's situation is very embarrassing. Should he stand up at this time, or should he give up recommending Wang Anshi to Zhao Zhen today?
Well. According to the chance probability, today is indeed an excellent opportunity, because I am equivalent to recommending Wang Anshi in front of Zhao Zhen and a few ministers. If he is recommending in front of Manchu officials,
Opposition will definitely appear by then, and it will not be easy to make a successful recommendation without having other people present to testify.
Of course, as the prime minister, Yan Shu could meet with Zhao Zhen for private discussions, but in Yan Shu's view, this method was not weighty enough. At that time, there was still no way to attract Zhao Zhen's attention, and Wang Anshi would still have to be punished in front of other ministers.
Push it up so that you can convince the public.
Wang Anshi, when Yan Shu was conducting the investigation, had a wide range of friends and strong abilities, but as many like-minded people as there were, there were people who disliked him. Therefore, even if Wang Anshi is not in the court now, he is actually behind the scenes.
There are definitely a lot of people talking and slandering him.
It is precisely because of this that Yan Shu chose to recommend Zhao Zhen on such an occasion instead of in a public occasion like the morning court, at least there would be fewer doubts.
As for Yan Shu himself? He can't say he likes Wang Anshi very much, but he can't say he hates him very much. If he doesn't care about the person, the idea of promoting peace through war proposed by Wang Anshi is enough for people to recognize his strength.
As long as this person's views are good for the Song Dynasty, he will recommend him to others. This is Yan Shu's way of conducting himself in the world.
Lu Yao looked at the area where Zhao Zhen was. Yan Shu had already told Lu Yao when he arrived today that he would find an opportunity to recommend Wang Anshi later. Lu Yao agreed very much. At this stage, Lu Yao felt that Ouyang Xiu and
Han Qi should have supported Wang Anshi to make a difference. Those who really opposed Wang Anshi's reform were during the Shenzong period of the Song Dynasty. Now Ouyang Xiu, Fan Zhongyan, and Han Qi should still support such a powerful person as Wang Anshi. This is also at this time.
, the Renzong period was the period when Wang Anshi could really play a role.
After the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, in view of the lessons learned from the segregation of vassal towns in the late Tang Dynasty, a set of political reforms was carried out to centralize the three major powers of local administration, finance, and military in the central government. After the reforms, the Northern Song Dynasty weakened the local threat to the central government and strengthened the centralization of power.
; Weakened the status of military commanders and implemented the rule of the country by civilians. However, because the ancestor of the Zhao family usurped the throne and ascended the throne, and had a guilty conscience, his reforms were a bit over the top.
For example, Zhao Kuangyin was afraid of the centralization of power by ministers, so he adopted the strategy of one official with multiple positions. This kind of imagination of one official with multiple positions also exists in contemporary society. One authority is divided into several functional departments, and if you want to do something, you have to travel more than a dozen times.
Of course, doing so weakens the power of officials and prevents them from taking over power. But the price is that there are a huge number of officials, the distribution of powers is not clear, and they blame each other when there is an accident. They are just a group of people who only get paid but do not work.
Moreover, the level and remuneration of officials in the Northern Song Dynasty were not low. The imperial court had a heavy burden every year just for official salary expenses.
In addition to the burden on civil servants, the military burden and land annexation in the Northern Song Dynasty were also two major problems. The main problems of the army were two points, one was that the army had too many people, and the other was that the army's combat effectiveness was weak. The reason for these two
The problem was caused by two aspects: First, the Northern Song Dynasty suffered from serious foreign aggression. In order to deal with the threats from Xixia and Liao, it was necessary to maintain a large army; second, the Emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty was afraid that the army would rebel, so he set up a system to prevent military generals from taking power.
The restriction system has caused the problem of soldiers not knowing the generals, and the generals not knowing the soldiers. The result of the soldiers not knowing the generals is that although the soldiers are many but not skilled, the cost of foreign wars is huge, and the rewards of war are very touching.
Maintaining officials, raising soldiers, and fighting wars all require expenditures, so where does the money come from? Collect taxes from the people. But the problem is that the Northern Song Dynasty did not restrain land annexation, and the gentry frantically annexed the people's land, and the gentry did not need to pay taxes, and the people had no land.
Taxes still had to be paid. The result was that the court could not collect taxes, but the people suffered a heavy burden. Both the court and the people were victims, and only the gentry benefited.
Since there is such a serious problem of wealth inequality in society, reform is inevitable. Before Wang Anshi's reform, Ouyang Xiu, Han Qi and others during the Song Renzong period were representatives of those who advocated reform. However, the purpose of their reform actually had many implications.
Great utilitarianism. As a bureaucratic class, they will not work for the ruling class without tangible benefits. How to understand this sentence? In other words, the starting point of the reforms of Han Qi, Ouyang Xiu and others is not simply
Instead of enriching the country and strengthening the military, they promoted themselves through reforms. At best, it was for the country and the people, and to put it bluntly, it was for their own political future.
After the death of Song Renzong, Song Yingzong died four years after he succeeded to the throne, and then entered the era of Song Shenzong. After Shenzong succeeded to the throne, the civil and military affairs of the entire dynasty went through the elders of Renzong and Yingzong. Shenzong's prestige was very shallow, after all, he was a
They were only 20-year-old young men. Newcomers like Han Qi and Ouyang Xiu, who were still young at the time, had been promoted to old reformers during the Shenzong period. So why did Song Shenzong want to reform? On the one hand, it was indeed because the country was tired.
It was in dire straits and needed reform; on the other hand, it hoped to achieve the goal of seizing power through reform and drive out all the old reformers during the Song Renzong period.
Wang Anshi's reforms happened to be in line with Shenzong's interests. First, his reform ideas could indeed make money for the court and relieve financial pressure; second, his personal character was also in line with Shenzong's potential purpose of suppressing the old reforms. Driven by this win-win situation,
, Wang Anshi and Song Shenzong hit it off right away. However, it is inevitable that reforms based on such impure purposes will be resisted.
First of all, the gentry and the common people opposed him. It is easy to understand why the gentry opposed him. After all, Wang Anshi had touched the interests of the gentry. Why did the common people also oppose the reform? This is because the purpose of Wang Anshi's reform was to enrich the country rather than the people. He took away the rights of businessmen, landlords and farmers.
Benefits belong to the country, wealth belongs to the country, and it has nothing to do with the people. In other words, Wang Anshi’s reform did not
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Alleviating the gap between the rich and the poor has offended both landlords and farmers. The common people have been relieved of some of their original burdens because of the reform, but the reform has also added new burdens to them. After this back and forth, the burden of the common people has not actually been relieved.
Secondly, officials are opposed to the reform. This seems normal, but the interest relationship behind it is very complicated. Some people are really hurt by their interests and resolutely oppose Wang Anshi; some people simply want to avoid suspicion. These people are Han Qi,
The old reform faction represented by Ouyang Xiu. They do not oppose Wang Anshi's reform measures, but they just want to oppose the reform. Because their status is prominent, they no longer need to raise their political status through reform. Their opposition is actually a
This is self-protection. That is to say, they can give some advice to the reform, so that if the reform fails, they will not be blamed. Moreover, they also know that the underlying purpose of Song Shenzong in appointing Wang Anshi to carry out the reform is to use Wang Anshi's hand to seize power, and then take them.
All the old people were kicked off the stage.
So when Wang Anshi used the reform to engage in party strife, these old reformers were even more unacceptable. They were very disgusted with Wang Anshi's use of the reform to secretly provoke conflicts between the prime minister and the censor, so that the power of the prime minister was forced to depend on the imperial power. Because once he became the prime minister
If Quan is completely reduced to a puppet of the imperial power, the remonstrative power of the censor will be completely isolated by the imperial power and the prime minister, and he will eventually become a puppet of the imperial power. After Wang Anshi stepped down, the hidden worries of Ouyang Xiu and Han Qi were verified. The successors Wang Gui and others
People are all puppets who have no independent opinions and only follow the emperor's instructions. The censor has also been completely reduced to a thug in the struggle between the imperial power and the prime minister's power. There is no power to check and balance. Later, Song Huizong was fatuous and harmed the country. What did he want to do?
No one could persuade him, which eventually led to the outbreak of social conflicts in the Northern Song Dynasty.
So why did Sima Guang and Su Shi oppose Wang Anshi? In fact, the starting point of their opposition was different from that of Han Qi and Ouyang Xiu. Su Shi believed that the emperor did not rule the world with the people, but ruled the world with the scholar-bureaucrats. We scholars have been studying for ten years
Hanchuang is just for the welfare of being an official. If you don’t put the interests of scholars first, then why should we work for you? This kind of thinking is simply unreasonable. Later, Su Shi was demoted to a local official and after witnessing the suffering of the people
, the three views immediately changed. He did not act like a scholar, but sincerely worked for the benefit of the people, and even his attitude towards the new law changed. The whole person gave people a refreshing feeling, and he wrote so many
Bold poems. This is a man who is upright and upright! Sima Guang, he and Wang Anshi are the same generation. They are in direct competition and have direct conflicts of interest. This conflict of interest has nothing to do with the reform. It is simply that one mountain cannot tolerate two tigers. Without him, Sima Guang would not be able to
Wang Anshi, with Wang Anshi there would be no contradictions like Sima Guang.
Therefore, at this period, Sima Guang has not yet become a leader, and Han Qi and Ouyang Xiu will support Wang Anshi for their own political interests. Therefore, Lu Yao feels that it is a very correct decision to let Wang Anshi onto the political stage now.
Yan Shu seemed to have made up his mind. He took a step forward and said to Zhao Zhen, who was waiting for the start of the second half: "Your Majesty, today's Cuju competition is a big day. I have another news to tell you.
Your Majesty, I have found a capable person."
What Yan Shu didn't expect was that Zhao Zhen looked at himself and then squinted his eyes, as if he wanted to see through him.
Zhao Zhen said: "Are you talking about Wang Anshi?"
Yan Shu stood there, unable to come to his senses for a while. It is said that Wang Anshi came to Beijing the same day he left Fan Zhongyan, and he believed that the confidentiality work had been done to the extreme. However, the emperor is the emperor after all. What happened in the inner city of Bianliang
It is not strange for him to know all the things. With this thought in his mind, Yan Shu's expression returned to his natural state and he said: "Yes, it seems that His Majesty already knows."
Zhao Zhen smiled. Although he had some prejudice against Wang Anshi because of the fishing bait matter, Tang Long had actually told him about Wang Anshi's coming to Beijing before. This naturally included Wang Anshi's first visit to Bianliang after he came to Bianliang.
After meeting Yan Shu, he went to see Lu Yao about the matter.
It's just that Zhao Zhen didn't understand. According to Wang Anshi's age, it was understandable that he went to see Yan Shu first. After all, he was the prime minister of the dynasty, but why did he go to see Lu Yao later that day? Lu Yao had not left since he was born.
Having passed Bianliang, and in terms of age, Lu Yao did not seem to be someone who could interact with Wang Anshi, which made Zhao Zhen more interested.
However, Lu Yao's current thoughts are on the new Cuju competition, and Zhao Zhen also knows this. However, Yan Shu mentioned this matter today, so he wanted to ask about it.
So Zhao Zhen said: "I want to know why you want to recommend Wang Anshi this time? In my opinion, he is just a guy who likes to be smart."
Yan Shu knew that the fishing bait incident had become something that Zhao Zhen could never forget. However, fortunately, Yan Shu came prepared today. He would not be so stupid as to recommend Wang Anshi to Zhao Zhen without any preparation.
So, Yan Shu went on to tell Wang Anshi's views on the issue between Song and Xia, which was the method of promoting peace through war. Yan Shu felt that with the emperor's IQ, he would definitely know how powerful this method was.
Sure enough, after Zhao Zhen listened to Yan Shu describe Wang Anshi's thoughts, he immediately called the accompanying personnel and asked them to formulate a decree and quickly convey the new Song Dynasty's policy towards Daxia to Fan Zhongyan and Han Qi.
As for Wang Anshi, Zhao Zhen also felt that the method he proposed was indeed good, and since Yan Shu was the recommender, he might have had some misunderstandings about him before, so he decided to take the imperial examination after the imperial examination.
Ask Wang Anshi to come to Beijing and have a detailed discussion with him.
Yan Shu finally breathed a sigh of relief after receiving Zhao Zhen's reply. It seemed that Zhao Zhen had agreed to his request for recommendation. At least, Wang Anshi had a chance to meet the emperor. If it hadn't been for this recommendation,
Perhaps during the Renzong period, Wang Anshi would never be reused because of the fishing bait incident.
After the matter was done, Yan Shu left the original rest area with the excuse of going to the toilet. Then he came to find Lu Yao and told him the news. However, both of them were a little surprised that Zhao Zhen knew about Wang Anshi before.
