Chapter 4141 The people are more important than the king
Fang Jun and Li Xiaogong stood on the corridor, watching the crowds wearing coir raincoats and bamboo hats and holding umbrellas busily passing through the large courtyard. The lanterns gave off a dim yellow light. The rainwater fell on the roof ridges and gathered along the tiles, and then flowed down the tiles. Pour into the shallow ditch reserved at the base of the wall, and your vision is a little hazy.
The "big burial" is an extremely important ceremony. After the body is buried, it will never see the light of day again, so relatives and old friends have to see each other for the last time. Children of the clan, concubines in the harem, princes and princesses, civil and military officials, relatives of the emperor and the country. We must attack and support the emperor's remains.
Even though there was a fierce battle outside Chengtian Gate and many people living in the city were unable to come, more than a hundred nobles of various statuses who had previously stayed in the palace came one after another. In the heavy rain, their clothes were soaked and they lined up with depressed expressions. Stand still...
There was rainwater splashing on his clothes. Fang Jun shook his sleeves and asked: "The 'big coffin' is about to come, but the prince of Jiangxia County has not arrived yet. I don't know why?"
Li Xiaogong put his hands behind his back and looked deeply: "I don't know either."
Fang Jun rolled up his wet sleeves and looked sideways: "You just came back from Xuanwu Gate. Don't tell me that you have never met the Prince of Jiangxia. If he avoids you, I should now Hurry up and inform His Highness the Prince to escape through the secret passage, otherwise the troops stationed at Xuanwu Gate are likely to rush into the palace in the next moment. ”
Xuanwumen is the lifeblood of Taiji Palace, so he naturally pays attention to it all the time. Li Xiaogong quietly went to meet with Li Daozong and Li Daozong was delayed in attending the "big funeral". He naturally noticed something and was inevitably worried in his heart...
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Li Xiaogong sighed, still staring at the crowd in the courtyard, and said slowly: "Everyone has his own ambitions, how can we force it? Let him go. In any case, we cannot disturb the late emperor's 'big coffin'. We can talk about it after the coffin is closed and the coffin is buried." This is a common thing in the world.”
Whether it is the reason not to disturb His Majesty's deceased soul, or the reason to complete the "big burial" as soon as possible to confirm the identity of the new crown prince, the "big burial" cannot be delayed, and it must be carried out smoothly even if the sky falls.
Fang Jun's face was gloomy. He looked at the stream of rainwater pouring down from the eaves and onto the shallow water channel made of bluestone at the base of the wall, splashing a mist. There was a hint of exhaustion, a hint of helplessness, and a hint of anger in his voice: "You guys People are always tall You are superior and only focus on your own interests, whether it is fame or profit, but who of you care about the life and death of the hundreds of millions of people in this land of China? Maybe they are just like ants in your eyes, who can be wiped out with a snap of your finger, but don't forget it? You were once one of them A member of the family came to prominence by chance, and then generations worked hard to get to where we are today. Do princes, generals, and generals have the guts to wait until you don't care about the lives and deaths of common people like them, and only know how to plunder and oppress them? , one day They will also rise up, rush into the city of Chang'an, burn down the palaces, and massacre the royal family. They will also sit on the throne of the Ninth Five-Year Plan. Whether it is the new emperor or the previous emperor, even the great ancestor, how are they different from those ants?"
Water can carry a boat, but it can also overturn it. This is a truth that everyone understands, but what they don’t understand is that when they are in a high position, everyone treats the people as slaves who can be squeezed and bullied at will, completely forgetting that dynasties come and go and that imperial power During the rise and fall, which time was it not destroyed by these ants?
The aristocratic family also comes from Li Shu, but they have accumulated more generations of wealth than others and are ahead of others.
Without these hundreds of millions of people, who would support you in becoming emperor?
Who can you be the emperor for?
Li Xiaogong was a little confused. He didn't often hear this kind of argument. Even an official from a humble family like Ma Zhou would regard himself as a superior class once he entered the official career. Being diligent and caring for the people was already the limit, but he never He will not regard himself as a member of Li Shu, and has taken protecting Li Shu's interests as his own duty.
Mencius said this, and perhaps Confucius also said it, but who would remember it?
Fang Jun sighed softly, not expecting Li Xiaogong to give an answer. In fact, even if it takes another thousand or two thousand years, the term "public servant" will not really be put into practice.
He sighed and said: "In the journey of the great road, the world is the same. This is a truth that the ancients understood, but no one has ever practiced it to prove such a truth. All people are water, and the king is a boat. The water is unpredictable, and the boat capsizes and people die. ...since the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors Since the beginning, imperial power has changed from generation to generation, dynasties have risen and fallen one by one, and many splendid civilizations have risen and fallen. We are struggling in such a whirlpool, but we have never seriously thought about the truth. ”
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"Family in the world" actually doesn't matter. The people don't care who becomes the emperor. They just want someone to live and work in peace and contentment. They hope that "the old friends will not only kiss their relatives, nor will they only have their children, so that the old will have a good life, the strong will be useful, and the young will be useful." "Be good at something", this is the noble and simple ideal of the Chinese people.
As long as this is achieved, this ethnic group will burst out with unparalleled vitality, always running wildly on the road of pioneering and enterprising, leaving all other lazy, greedy, and barbaric ethnic groups behind, until they rule the planet, and then move towards the vastness The boundless progress of the universe, never ending.
However, the reality is that generation after generation of Chinese people rise and fall amid internal strife and sink under foreign abuse. Countless people continue to try to open up that glimmer of light, but they always sink and fall into reincarnation.
In the distance, Prince Xu, Prince Huo and other princes filed into the courtyard and bowed their hands to Li Xiaogong from a distance.
Li Xiaogong raised his hand in greeting and asked casually: "Before his death, the late Emperor once told me that you lacked respect for the imperial power, especially when he met you outside Luoyang City and personally ordered you to stay out of the Guanlong Rebellion. However, you But he turned a deaf ear, disobeyed orders, and desperately assisted the prince to defeat Guan Long and keep his position as prince... Can you tell me what you really think? "
"Mencius said, 'The people are the most valuable, the country is second, and the king is the least important.' What do the princes think?"
Li Xiaogong frowned: "This is indeed what Mencius said, but later generations have often misunderstood and elaborated on it. The 'jun' in this sentence refers to the monarchs of feudal countries all over the world. If they cannot care for the people's livelihood, they should be replaced, but it is not Refers to the emperor.”
In ancient times, the emperor established a feudal world, and all feudal states had monarchs who acted according to the emperor's orders. If they did not respect the orders of the world, they should be replaced.
The Son of Heaven is the son of Haotian. He is appointed by Heaven. How can it be changed?
Fang Jun said with a smile: "But the Zhou Dynasty has passed away for eight hundred years. The so-called emperors in the mouth of the princes have changed countless times. Dynasties have risen and fallen. Only these nine states are always called China. Only this land The Li Shu people are still called the descendants of Yan and Huang. The people are the foundation of the country, and the sages have already made up their minds, but we are too caught up in our own interests to admit it."
Li Xiaogong had naturally read books. He was quite speechless when he heard Fang Jun first use the words of Mencius and then use the words of "Shangshu" and other masterpieces of pre-Qin scholars.
But he already understood Fang Jun's attitude.
He was loyal to the Tang Dynasty, loyal to the world, and loyal to the hundreds of millions of people. As for whether he was loyal to the emperor, it needed to see whether the emperor was wise and mighty, whether he loved the people like a son, and whether he could make the world live and work in peace and contentment, and the world was peaceful.
Just as His Majesty Li Er said during his lifetime, Fang Jun was a rebellious son with a serious lack of respect for the imperial power, but he was full of compassion for the common people in the world and full of enthusiasm for thousands of miles of mountains and rivers. Could it be that he was really a noble character like the ancient sages? ?
"The reason why you oppose the King of Jin is because the powerful family fully supports him. After he ascends the throne, the power of the government will be controlled by the powerful family, and you will be idle and far away from the center?"
"I always thought that I was an acquaintance with the county prince for many years. We are very compatible with each other. We have the same views on many things and can cherish each other... But I didn't expect that the county prince would actually regard me as someone who is in love with power. If I really wanted power, why bother in the first place? disobey Will I help the prince defeat the Guanlong rebels? With your majesty's trust in me, as long as I obey my words, I will be a high-ranking official and have great power, and I will only have a few more years of experience to be the head of the family. Disaster, others may not know it, How could you not know, Prince? The world is in turmoil, and the sky is full of wars, but where are the flames of war started by ordinary people? strength, If things fail, they will return to Wubao to change their ways, and choose the strong to rely on. If things succeed, they will transform themselves and dominate the world, treating all people as ants and squeezing them at will... Don't deny it, you Li Tang royal family did the same thing."
Li Xiaogong was speechless.
This is indeed the case. At the end of the Sui Dynasty, dozens of rebels were raging across Kyushu. They all used banners to pray for the people, but the injured and dead were all ordinary people. Dou Jiande was only one step away from conquering the world in Hebei, but by the time he was defeated, he was defeated. , in the land of Hebei, ten houses and nine are empty, bones are covered in the fields, there are no roosters for thousands of miles, and weeds have almost annihilated the dilapidated city walls.
Even Guanzhong, known as the land of abundance, only returned to its former prosperity after more than ten years of recuperation and hard work during the Wude and Zhenguan dynasties.
This is still the land of Gyeonggi, what about those remote places?
Even today in the "prosperous age of Zhenguan", there is still no enough food to eat, no warm clothes to wear, no medical treatment for diseases, and no care for children. If there is any natural or man-made disaster, it will be the tragic situation of Yi Zi cannibalizing... But those who are high above the temple Who cares about these aristocratic families with dignified officials and ample warehouses?
The more natural disasters, the more man-made disasters, and the more people are deprived of raw food, the better the opportunity for aristocratic families to grow and develop. They mix the old grains in the warehouses with sand and sell them ten times or twenty times as much as they usually call them. The villagers and elders then bought their property, fields, wives and children at very low prices and used them as slaves, until the streets stretched across the country, there were thousands of buildings, and there were thousands of servants...
The glorious gates of aristocratic families are painted with the blood of common people. But the world has been like this since ancient times, why did it happen to Fang Jun that it became an unforgivable sin for the family?
(End of chapter)