From "Shang Jun Shu" To "Han Fei Zi"—The Evolution Of Legalism Thoughts And Qin Politics

Shang Yang and Han Fei are important representatives of legalism school in the pre-Qin period,and also are two important figures who affect the implementation of Qin policy before and after the Qin unified China.Comparing the thought of Shang Yang school with that of Han Fei's legalism,it both has commonality and evolution in terms of the ideological content and practical effect.Commonness is mainly reflected in:rewarding agricultural war,heavy reward and severe sentences,advancing with the times,which have a strong practicality and utilitarian,and relate to Qin political closely.Similarly,to promote the development of Qin politics,the legalism thoughts of the two also have some differences and evolution:the decline of the status of the rule of law,the neglect of subjects' abilities,cultural dictatorship and ideological control more serious,the contradictory attitude of virtue and the neglect of the force.These changes not only reflect the differences in the doctrine of proposition,but also promote the rule of law in the Qin Xiao Gong era and the unified rule of law after the establishment of the Qin Dynasty generate the qualitative change.This change not only promote the Qin political development but also hinder its progress.Such as Shang Yang's legalism thought contributes to the rise and domination of the Qin dynasty,and Han Fei's doctrine lays the theoretical foundation for the dynastic political system of the authoritarian centralism.The differences and evolution of legalism thought also leads to the rapid effect but unsustainable development of Qin regime which gradually lose the hearts of scholars,go to the road of torture and eventually die.Although there is still controversy whether the legalism thoughts should be directly responsible for the rapid death of Qin,but that the legalism thought and Qin politics are closely related is undeniable.This paper analyzes the commonness and evolution of legalism ideology Shang Yang and Han Fei,and discusses the relationship between the flourish and decay of Qin and further analyzes the reason why Qin thrives suddenly and die violently in a deeper and clear way.This has always been one of the most important topics in ancient Chinese history research.