An Analytical Study Of Tang Zhen's Anti-despotism Thought

Along with the development of China despotism, anti-despotism thought had come into being, developed and actually matured between the Ming and Qing dynasties. The period between the Ming and Qing dynasties was the late stage of China feudalism society, in which China had an overwhelming change just like giant earthquakes and landslides. Thinkers between the Ming and Qing dynasties criticized and rethought despotism in Ming dynasty. Anti-despotism thought between the Ming and Qing dynasties had been very indispensable for emergence of democracy thought, and enlightening persons and the capitalists in the period of time that was close to the present derived nourishment from it ,besides, it played an enlightening role in capitalists'reform and democratic revolution movement. Tang Zhen was an outstanding representative thinker on anti-despotism thought between the Ming and Qing dynasties, of which thought was quite fierce and bold .Tiding up his thought facilitates us to deeply grasp the progression of anti-despotism thought between the Ming and Qing dynasties.The feudal despotism had developed and intensified in the late Ming dynasty, and secret service acted rampantly, and the eunuch controlled the political situation and power of dynasty, and the emperor was incapable and unable to tell right from wrong. In brief the despotic rule of the Ming dynasty became more and more dark. The Qing dynasty didn't only follow all old conventional despotic form and content, but also its despotism (especially about national despotism with discrimination character) degree was more than that of the Ming dynasty. Besides in the late Ming dynasty, the manor of imperial households, relatives of a emperor on the side of his mother or wife, the eunuchs, and the bureaucrat became larger and larger, and the behavior of annexation of land by landowners was extremely intense, and exorbitant taxes and excessive levies also became more and more heavy. The Qing dynasty occupied the people's land, and constantly suppressed the nation's resistance. The masses were squeezed, whose lives were quite hard and poor. In addition, the rule for ideological and cultural region was brutal in Ming and Qing dynasties, and the two dynasties repeatedly raised the imprisonment or execution of an author for writing something, and intellectual stratum suffered from oppression cruel more than ever before.Facing this society, Tang Zhen gave the cry that emperors from the Qin dynasty were thieves. Having attacked the phenomena in that society, Tang Zhen put forward economic equality, and then proposed the personality of equality about emperor, officials and the masses and the equality about male and female. Based on the view that all men are equal, Tang Zhen drastically criticized monarchs. He who regarded the monarch as the thief boldly attacked despotism. He deduced the viewpoint that all emperors were thieves by way of the logic that killing a man was a behavior of a thief, so killing all the people was a behavior of the thief, and demonstrated the viewpoint through the history of the emperor Liu Bang and Liu Xiu. He believed that the two emperors were even so, not to mention others. For capturing emperor's seat, most historical emperors plundered all the wealth, and maltreated all the masses. The one of the essences of despotism is that the monarch put his interests on all the people's interests, and enjoyed himself at the cost that all the people weren't in the right place. Obviously Tang Zhen was aware of the essence. Having attacked despotic power, he further recognized that despotism from the Qin dynasty was the root of the national confusion, and resulted in the masses separating from one another.On how to reform real despotism, thinkers in the early Qing dynasty put forward a view of restricting the monarch's power, which was different from the former thinkers'view. To turn it to reality, Tang Zhen was ready to take the measure of putting up and appointing prime minister with a good virtue, and the six ministers taking their right place. Thinkers in the early Qing dynasty believed that the one reason for despotism of Ming dynasty becoming darker was that the prime minister's power was deprived of. Thus Tang Zhen advocated that a virtuous person should be assigned to the prime minister and should manage all the affairs. The prime minister replaced the monarch to manage affairs when the monarch was in, and the prime minister directly managed all the affairs when the monarch was not in. Besides putting up the prime minister, the six ministers took their right place, and do their own things. The monarch also restrained himself on his own initiative, and leaded a thrifty and simple life, and listen to opinions. The monarch should restrain himself on his own initiative, and learn modestly from all kinds of person, and treated officials courteously, and cannot bully the masses. The present monarch should learn from the old monarch, and advocate thrifty, and get rid of the luxury, and make himself an example. The monarch should listen to others opinion, and encourage the free airing of views, and regard officials and the masses as teachers, and permit them to remark and discuss the national affairs, and choose the better views. At last, Tang Zhen claimed that the monarch should administer a country by laws, and make the whole society keep normal order, and prevent the people from suffering.Tang Zhen stood the masses'position to recognize the despotism, so it was natural to emphasize the importance to the masses, and love them. He thought that four aspects which were land, national treasury, imperial government, and officials embodied the state power. There had being the state power as long as the masses being, that is to say, the masses were the basis of the four aspects. As the masses'parent, the monarch should take the masses to his heart. Now that the monarch treasured the masses, he should make them rich. He should allow the masses make their own profit, and not intrude their lives too much, and not only do so, but also apply good policies to create good environment for them.At last, the author has made the assessment on Tang Zhen's anti-despotism thought.First of all, under certain historical environment, Tang Zhen carried forward predecessors'thoughts, and come up with his own view of equality. Compared with thinkers'thoughts in the same time, Tang Zhen's thought about equality was quite outstanding. He thought that all things on earth were equal, so human beings were equal as well, although the monarch, officials and the masses had different political status, they were equal on personality and the male and the female should be equal. It was scarce for Tang Zhen to insist that economical equality was the basis and the guarantee for other equalities. What's more, the view of the emperors being thieves was bold, which was extremely sharp and incisive more than Huang Zong xi and Wang Fu zhi's thoughts about anti-despotism. In that dark and inaccessible time in which despotism was dominant, his viewpoint was a stone which stirred thousands of sprays, and lots of persons with breadth of vision begun to pay attention to it, while feudalists were hostile to it and cursed and attack it. The reformers Liang Qi chao in the period of time that was close to the present called Tang Zhen's view"speech that was heart-stirring and soul-stirring". In addition, Tang Zhen realized restrict monarch by restricting monarch's power, and conceived of several measures. He also realized the importance of laws, and proposed that the monarch acted according to principles and laws. Last but not least, Tang Zhen realized the importance of the people, and put forward a proposal that the monarch should love the people.Tang Zhen's criticism on despotism showed the personality of thinkers, and in some certain represented style and feature about the trend of thought between the Ming and Qing dynasties as well. His anti-despotism thought was the heresy in that period, even was the essence, and provided the thought information for later generations. However, his thought source stemmed from tradition, which made him hardly get rid of the tie from traditional thoughts, and took great limitation. Firstly, Tang Zhen's view of equality was built on the basis of the thought that all things balanced. His economical equality was only limited to the average distribution of material wealth. I must point out that the equality in Tang Zhen's equality thought was a conception that borrowed from the present conception of equality. Secondly, Tang Zhen's anti-despotism thought only opposed monarch's centralization of state power and tyrant and tyranny, and did not deny the monarch's position, and dictatorial system. The idea of the monarch and state being stable was supreme pursuit in their subjective psychological level. He criticized the despotism on purpose to perfect the dictatorial system. Thirdly, Tang Zhen realized that monarch's power should be restricted, but he did not recognize the form that power should be restrained by power was the best effective form for the power in present society. It was hardly possible to come true that the monarch set up a prime minister, and gave him some power, and let him manage all affairs. The monarch did not give some power to the prime minister provided the monarch grasped all the power, so the prime minister became a consultancy service. Several measures such as the monarch restraining himself, leading a thrifty and simple life, and listening to opinions were the expression that Tang Zhen sincerely believe in moral factors. He hoped that emperor on the throne who was like the monarch in ancient times had noble character and excellent wisdom, and controlled the power by them, and ruled the whole China, that is to say, the monarch used the perfect character to purify the power. Thus, he unavoidably entered into the long-standing mistaken ideas. All in all, his anti-despotism was only remedy on defects and rectification on errors on the premise of not affecting the dictatorial system.As for Tang Zhen's anti-despotism thought, although some research accomplishments in the whole study and documents refer, or monographic studies mention and permeate, there are mainly not special books or writings on Tang Zhen's anti-despotism thought (because it is possible for me not to look up information entirely), so the author's study on Tang Zhen's anti-despotism thought fills in this gap in some certain.