The Analysis Of The Patriotism Of Scholar-officials Between The Two Opium Wars

The outbreak of the Opium War in 1840 opened a modern China's liberation movement against imperialism and feudalism, and is also the beginning of the Patriotism in modern China, at this time, the patriotic scholar-officials as the most senior level of knowledge, their thinking represent the highest level in the development of thinking history. On behalf of the patriotic scholar-officials, such as LinZhexu, WeiYuan, BaoShichen, YaoYing, XuJiyu, and so on, they take practical actions to reflect their awareness at the Patriotic Salvation Movement. Their thinking is expressed in the Reform advocates before the war, no-smoking attitude, the understanding of the West before and after the war, and the idea of the patinopecten system stratagem etc. The appearance of a series of books which introduce the history, geography, customs, equipment, skills of Western is a sign of the advanced Chinese people begin to open eyes to see the world, and the appearance of various patinopecten system stratagem is on the results of the idea that how to resist the enemy of the scholar-officials class. This article is divided into three parts to study the background and performance of the patriotic thinking of the scholar-officials before and after the war.Part 1: the earlier thinking of the scholar-officials after the first war. This part can be divided into two. (A) The new ideas of the thinking period before the first Opium war. The patriotism of the scholar-officials is the continuation of the prewar classic thoughts. They find many social problems so that they propose the reform which is related to social politics and economy; it is represented by GongZizhen, LinZhexu, Weyuan and BaoShichen and so on. But by this time, their reform has no revolution to the ultimate system, only to try to make some measure to the part of the feudal system. But the prewar classic thought before the war is the basic of the new idea after the war. (B) The attitude of the current situation of the scholar-officials after the first Opium war. The attitude to the political situation of the scholar-officials and some patriotism scholar-bureaucrat after the outbreak of the war shows that the worry about the calamity to the country and people resulting from the Opium war, the criticism about the muddleheaded and incompetent government officials and the eulogist of the behavior of fighting against British. The national pride and social responsibility of the scholar-officials is singularly reflected by the war.Part 2: the formation of new world concept after the first Opium war. After the outbreak of the war, the understanding of the outside world of the people is getting more. This part can be divided into two. (A) The ignorance of the outside world.Including the ignorance of the world situation before the war and the ignorance of the Britain after the war of the ruling class consists of the scholar-officials, yet even from the blind arrogance concept of Chinese; the outbreak of the war impels the scholar-officials begin to understand the Western, and open a new direction of their understanding. (B) The beginning of the world concept. There is a huge shock in the thinking of the ruling class because of the advantage of Britain's military; the scholar-officials begin to understand the West, the books which introduced the Western are the most prominent. These books not only introduce the advantages of equipments and skills, but also introduce the political system of the Western; it is an important way for the Chinese people to study the Western, and at the same time it is a basis of the liberation of the modern ideology.Part 3: The development of controlling foreigners between the two wars. This part can be divided into five. (A) The ideas of"By means of pacify to stop the war of the Western capitalist countries."It is a brief introduction of the formation reasons and performance of some nobles and senior officials of the ideas. It is lack of the courage of campaign by comparison of the ideas of LinZexu, etc. (B) The ideas of"By controlling the dominance of business in order to avoid the Western countries further aggression."This idea is agreed by both the scholar-officials who are keeping resist with the West and the officials who are keeping make peace with the West. The formation of the initial idea is the misunderstanding of the purpose of doing business with the West, they think that china's tea and rhubarb is the lifeblood of the West, as a result they sum up the ideas of controlling the dominance of the business in order to avoid the Western countries further aggression. HuangEntong is a member of having this idea, the highlights of his idea is that he knows the misunderstanding of the idea, and at the same time he suggest a new point of view that equal trade. However, the idea is useless in the conditions of the unequal treaties which are signed by the force of the invaders, and there is no basic system of the political and military to ensure the trade. (C) The ideas of"Active deployment, use the power of the people to resist the Western countries."After the summary of the advantages of the Britain, the scholar-officials find a new way to resist the Western. Strengthen military deployment ability, and make up for the shortage of the army is the major concept of the idea. On the one hand, the power of the people can be found, but on the other hand, the rulers of the landed class are afraid of the power of the people. As a word, they have the opinions that both side with the people at the same time with anti-people strategy. (D) The ideas of"By using the conflict between the powerful invaders to maintain the security of the feudal dynasty."The idea is suggested by some advanced scholar-officials at the time, according to some basic understanding of the West, they try to use the conflict between the powerful invaders to maintain the security of the feudal dynasty. The idea doesn't make an actual effect because of neglecting the collusion between the powerful invaders and taking the effective diplomatic action. (E) The ideas of"Study the advanced technology of the Western countries, in turn, respond to their aggression."The idea is summarized by the advanced scholar-officials that are represented by WeiYuan, under the condition of researching the skills of the Western. It is sure that the skills of the Western. They begin to learn from the Western from the concept of stronger than the Western, and make sure that study the advanced technology of the Western in order to respond to their aggression. The strong spirit of patriotism shows the ideological level of the scholar-officials, and this idea is succeed by the Westernization Group. It is a beginning of learning skills from the West in modern China, but also a breakthrough from feudal society to the modernization.Conclusion: the patriotism of the modern scholar-officials is must be sure, but most of their patriotism is limited by the times and the class, and their understanding of Western is mainly about the equipment or skills. They do not really understand the reasons of the powerful Western, they have no real awareness to change the feudal system, and the concept of social change is limited to the nuances. At the same time, the various patinopecten system stratagem is also have their own limitations. It does not work that the invaders use force to open the door, and use the unequal treaties in order to trade. The means of using the power of the people to resist the Western countries is limited by the concerns of the ruling class and the powerful play of the people. There is no possibility of the ideas of"By using the conflict between the use powers to maintain the security of the feudal dynasty", it is also proved in the second Opium War. There is a distinct progressive of the ideas of"Study the advanced technology of the Western countries, in turn, respond to their aggression", but it is neglect at the times. The reasons of fail in the struggle with the invaders are restricted by the China's political, economic, military and other areas behind the Western; it is a good idea of saving the country and resisting the invaders, but the idea of the scholar-officials is not related to the nature of the problem of failing in the war of China. And therefore it did not really turn the situation around.