Late Ming Dynasty: So what if Emperor Chongzhen was inactive?!

Chapter 251, Phase Two: Benefiting All Under Heaven
Spring rain is as soft as butter and as precious as oil. Even after the Lantern Festival, the palace lanterns in the Forbidden City have not been taken down, still retaining some of the festive atmosphere.

Zhu Xieyuan, a veteran official who had served four emperors, walked alone on the bluestone path of the inner court, holding an oil-paper umbrella. In the past, he would be escorted by eunuchs when entering the inner court, but this time he was left to wander freely. This made him feel extremely uneasy, and he could only lower his eyes and stare intently at the road beneath his feet, not daring to look around.

The inner and outer palaces were not suitable for opening to outside officials. He was already this old; even if someone wanted to harm him, did they really have to resort to such despicable means to ruin his reputation? Zhu Xieyuan felt increasingly pressured. Even when he had less than two thousand men and was besieged in Chengdu by She Chongming's tens of thousands of rebel troops, he had never felt this tense.

The speculations swirling in his mind were almost suffocating him. His wrinkled but still strong hands trembled slightly.

The eldest prince is only three years old, and the empress is weak; Consort Sun is powerful, but she is not the prince's biological mother, and her father is a powerful regional official; although Wei Zhongxian is lying low, the psychological shadow left on them by his control of the court has not completely dissipated; although he is the Minister of War, it is hard to say whether the army will listen to him.

The moment Zhu Xieyuan entered the palace, he regretted it. He even wanted to turn around and run away, but since he had come, there was no turning back. He himself was not afraid of death, but what about his family?! The short distance of a few hundred steps felt like months to Zhu Xieyuan before he finally reached the end of the road and arrived at the agreed location.

Zhu Xieyuan slowly raised his head, looking with his dim eyes, and was immediately stunned. The umbrella fluttered in the wind, raindrops hitting his gray hair, but he didn't care. Instead, he raised his hand to rub his eyes, making sure he wasn't seeing things, and then showed a crying-laughing expression, his mouth splitting into a smile, while tears streamed down his face.

Logically speaking, at his age, having experienced countless life-and-death situations, he shouldn't be shedding tears so easily. But it's good that the emperor is alright! That damned Wang Chengen, he summoned him to the palace with a deadpan expression, and when asked what happened, he refused to answer! I really want to hang that damned eunuch up and beat him!
At that time, Zhu Youjian was sitting inside the house, staring blankly at the raindrops outside the window, feeling troubled and did not immediately notice Zhu Xieyuan's arrival.

Eating too much can easily lead to overthinking. Zhu Youjian once tried to unify the thinking and bridge the contradictions in the court, so as to unite the forces as one, but in the end he found that his own thinking was flawed.

Lying down doesn't mean you've achieved enlightenment; it's merely an avoidance strategy when faced with an insurmountable predicament. Knowing the root of the problem yet being unable to solve it, what else can you do but give up? Hang yourself?!

Mencius said, "When poor, one should cultivate one's own virtue; when successful, one should benefit all under heaven." Previously, Zhu Youjian faced a desperate situation at the end of the Ming Dynasty: externally, there were powerful enemies almost insurmountable; internally, there were countless unresolved social contradictions. At that time, Zhu Youjian himself lived a precarious existence, trapped in a dark forest, unsure if he would see the sun rise tomorrow.

Because he only went from being a "pig-riding vassal king" to the nominal supreme leader of the country, he had neither military power nor financial power, nor even a loyal bureaucratic group.

If it were a prince or nobleman from the classical era, who could establish his own government and have his own loyal followers and community of interests, he might not have such a dilemma. But he has nothing.

Under those circumstances, Zhu Youjian's desire to ensure his own survival was perfectly legitimate, just like the peasant rebels in northern Shaanxi. Wanting to live was not wrong. At that time, Zhu Youjian could comfortably slack off because he was still "poor," his own safety was not guaranteed, and he had no way to care about others.

However, as the situation changed, external enemies were defeated, internal conflicts eased, and the nation's financial and military strength increased, along with the emperor's authority, this logical loop broke down. Zhu Youjian could no longer comfortably "sleep" like this; he needed to enter the second stage of "benefiting the world."

This is not simply a matter of a change of heart; it involves the fundamental logic, or ethical code, of feudal society. Later generations generally despise these ethical codes, habitually refuting all authority and deconstructing all universal values. It's said that "the more you debate, the clearer things become," but arguments can also lead to deeper ideological confusion.

In the pre-Qin period, this was a "collapse of rites and music"; in the Wei, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties, and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, it was a "disorder of social order"; and in later generations, it manifested as "internal strife" and "the controversy between universal values ​​and freedom and democracy." It's easy to smash the old order, but very difficult to rebuild a new one: from the Wei to the Sui Dynasty, 369 years passed; from the Tang to the Song Dynasty, 72 years!
This ideological confusion and the collapse of the old order foreshadowed the arrival of a chaotic era. The late Ming Dynasty was precisely a period of intense ideological clashes: some people dragged Confucius out to criticize and denounce him, some began to question the power of the emperor and the autocracy of the monarch, and many more were dissatisfied with the various rigid feudal hierarchical systems established by Zhu Yuanzhang, and were committed to smashing this corrupt system in every aspect.

The Han people's desire for unification was not a monarch's morbid pursuit of imperial power, but rather a bloody reality that forced people to take this path as the only way to establish order.

"Better to be a dog in times of peace than a human in times of chaos." Even the worst order is still an order; at least it allows the majority of people in society to survive and, most of the time, satisfies their need for safety. It was precisely because Zhu Youjian understood this that he tried his best to avoid drastic social changes.

His position dictates that he can only carry out top-down reform activities. In the world, there are many successful precedents for such reform activities, but in China, there is often no room for compromise, and the restart of society can only be achieved in the most intense, bloody and cruel way.

……

The umbrella fell to the ground with a loud thud. Zhu Youjian looked in the direction of the sound and was startled. He had only come to question the old man, so why was he crying so loudly?! He quickly got up and went to greet him. Damn Wang Chengen, what did he say to the old man? Didn't he tell him not to talk nonsense?!

Zhu Youjian asked the old man why he was crying. The old man was vague and embarrassed to say it. He couldn't very well tell the emperor that he had just thought the emperor had been assassinated and died young, could he? Zhu Youjian looked at the old man strangely. Zhu Xieyuan's eyes were filled with a hint of resentment, but also seemed to be mixed with pity, or perhaps some other emotion. In short, his eyes were very complicated, so much so that Zhu Youjian could not interpret them.

Zhu Youjian did not press the matter further. He had originally intended to confront the old man, but upon actually meeting him, he felt somewhat guilty.

(End of this chapter)