Chapter 1: History Debate ()

"The lakes and seas wash my chest, and the rivers and mountains float my shadow..." The music of the mobile phone alarm sounded at the right time. Tang Kexiao picked it up and looked at it, but found that it was only 7:30 now. After looking at it, it was Sunday, so he put the phone back to his pillow. He was half asleep and half awake and muttered: "It must be that I forgot to turn off the alarm clock. It's still early, so I'll go to bed and go back to my sleep." Then he turned over and fell asleep again.

Fifteen minutes later, Tang Kexiao suddenly jumped from the bed: "Damn, I forgot that I was going to the library to listen to a lecture today. I said why did the alarm clock be set?" While complaining about his forgetfulness, he hurriedly got out of bed and put on his clothes. After washing it casually, he picked up the breakfast prepared by his mother in the living room and hurried out.

Tang Kexiao is a man who just graduated from university and worked in a small company. In order to find a job in the future, he ignored the history major he was interested in when filling out his application form and instead studied other things. He didn't want to end up not finding a job, which made him very unhappy. But at the same time, his interest in history has not decreased. On weekdays, he always reads some historical books, just to quench his thirst.

In this small small county, there are no big cities like Shanghai, where there are always historical scholars to teach some courses. Two days ago, Tang Kexiao finally knew that a doctor who studied Ming history came to the library to give a lecture. It was exactly 8:30 this morning, so he set the alarm clock at this point before going to bed last night.

After riding an electric bike, Tang Kexiao headed to the library east of the city as fast as possible. Now he is still happy that he is in this small county. In the past, he always dreamed of going to big cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, but now he thinks that there are benefits of small cities in small cities. For example, the roads are not crowded, and his home is not far from the library, so it is enough time to get there in time.

At 8:20, Tang Kexiao walked into the conference room on the second floor of the library. When he looked at the big classroom with only fifty people, most of them were gray-haired people, he felt uncomfortable. He finally knew why there were no scholars in this city to teach, and even those scholars would not come.

Seeing that it was still early, Tang Kexiao began to attack his breakfast. As soon as he wiped out the breakfast, he saw an old man in Zhongshan suit walking into the classroom under a look of an administrator. After trying the microphone, the staff gave the podium to the old man.

At the beginning, Tang Kexiao was able to concentrate on listening to what the professor said, but after listening for nearly an hour, he couldn't listen anymore, because what the professor said was nothing but what he knew, and his position was not distinctive. The late Ming Dynasty was nothing more than saying that the court was incompetent and the people suffered, and the peasant uprisings in various places broke out, leading to the demise of the Ming Dynasty. In the end, the professor also concluded: "So at that time, the demise of the Ming Dynasty was inevitable. The emergence of the Qing Dynasty was to replace this backward and corrupt dynasty with more advanced and progressive forces." These words made Tang Kexiao roll his eyes repeatedly, and he regretted spending his rare sleep time on this lecture.

After talking about his own opinions, the professor also learned from famous professors that they would ask the audience below to ask questions, and then answered them by themselves. However, most of the people below were idle old people. Although many of them were interested in history, they did not want to show off and ask questions, so after the professor waited for two or three minutes, no one came to ask questions.

The professor looked at the scene below with awkward embarrassment. When he pushed the glasses on the bridge of his nose to say the ending, he heard a voice coming from below: "I have a few questions to ask for advice."

Tang Kexiao didn't know what he did, but since he had already screamed, he certainly couldn't sit down again. Seeing that someone finally gave him a look, the professor was very happy and said hurriedly: "If you have any questions, just ask me, I will try my best to help you."

After sorting out his thoughts, Tang Kexiao said: "This professor, I cannot agree with the evaluation of the late Ming Dynasty. In fact, it is not as unbearable as you said. In the book, I saw that the economic development in the late Ming Dynasty was already very fast, the people's lives were not bad, and even the budding of capitalism appeared. The Qing Dynasty was just a regime with inconspicuous productivity and culture in the Northeast at that time. They were not advanced at all, let alone any progress."

The professor didn't expect that the person who asked the question was to question it, and he was not prepared for a while. After a long time of stunned life, he said: "Although what you are talking about is an objective fact, history tells us that the Ming Dynasty was eventually destroyed by the Qing Dynasty? If it weren't for the Qing Dynasty's progress than the Ming Dynasty, how could it destroy the Ming Dynasty? And as I said before, the rulers of the Ming Dynasty were not wise rulers for several generations. Like Wanli, he did not attend court for thirty years, and Tianqi favored Wei Zhongxian, which made the people live in poverty."

At this time, Tang Kexiao had forgotten that he was in front of many people and just considered it a debate with others, so he said: "What you are talking about is the emperor, but the cabinet really held power in the Ming Dynasty, so the emperor's care or not was actually not very effective in the Ming Dynasty. Moreover, according to the records in history books, Emperor Wanli did not seem to be completely indifferent to state affairs. He just did not attend court. This is the same as some people nowadays do not go to work in the company but just work at home. You can't say they have no jobs, right?"

The professor obviously did not expect that the person who asked the question could speak so well, and he could not resist it. However, before Tang Kexiao finished speaking, he continued: "And the reason why the Ming Dynasty finally perished was due to natural disasters. It was because of natural disasters that made the people live in poverty, which eventually led to uprisings in various places, and the country that was destroyed under the double blow of the Later Jin and the uprising army. Let's take a look at the Qing Dynasty you mentioned. After more than two hundred years of development, the Qing Dynasty actually caused our nation to be invaded by foreigners. The rulings at that time, such as Cixi, only cared about their own enjoyment. Is this the advanced one you mentioned?"

The professor was even more unable to resist. He looked at the audience below and found that everyone was looking at him with great interest, knowing that he had to continue talking, so he could only say with a tough bullet and said: "Of course it is unreasonable to a dynasty in his later period, but it is much better than the Ming Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty. It launched the Westernization Movement, allowing capitalism to begin in our country..."

"Professor, you seem to have forgotten. I mentioned just now that in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the budding of capitalism had already appeared in our country. This is something recognized in history books. This is no less than a few hundred years earlier than the Westernization Movement you mentioned. Moreover, the Qing government at that time launched the Westernization Movement to learn from Western guns and cannons. However, during the Ming Dynasty, our Chinese firearms were still at the advanced level in the world. How could our firearms retreat when they reached the hands of the advanced people you mentioned?" Tang Kexiao was completely in a state and asked questions continuously without waiting for anyone to finish speaking.

In this way, the professor felt even more blind. After staying for a while, he said, "What you said makes sense, but history has no change. Anyway, the fact that the Ming Dynasty was replaced by the Qing Dynasty was irreplaceable." Then after thinking about it, he said, "And from the situation in the late Ming Dynasty, if it was the Ming Dynasty who was attacked by Western powers, I am afraid that their fate would be worse than that of the Qing Dynasty."

Tang Kexiao's anger was also ignited by his last sentence: "Why are you sure that the Ming Dynasty will be worse than the Qing Dynasty after changing roles? You should know that until the Wanli period, our Ming Dynasty's army could still help Korea defeat Japan's invasion, but the Qing Dynasty was beaten by Japan at that time to sign the Treaty of Shimonoseki. This is an indisputable fact. In addition, even if you take a step back, even if the Ming Dynasty could not defeat the great powers and was bullied by others, it would sign a foreign enemy with the Qing Dynasty.

There are different unequal treaties. You should know that the master of the Central Plains is us Han people, and the people of the Qing Dynasty just robbed our land and people. It would be fine if they robbed them, but in the end they would lose power and humiliate the country to that point. It doesn’t matter if my property was corrupted by myself, but after robbing my money, one person squandered my money, and told me that if the money was squandered in my hands, it would be clean and thorough. What logic would be this?" He said and looked at the professor above.

The professor couldn't speak at once. In fact, he was just a half-baked teacher. He came here to give lectures just to make some money. Unexpectedly, he was speechless today, which made him very embarrassed. The staff next to him also found that the professor had no rebuttal, so he could only come up and rescue him: "Thank you for the opinions raised by this enthusiastic gentleman. Because of time, our lecture today ends here. Thank you for your visit. Welcome everyone to come again next time!"

With the help of the staff, the professor was able to walk down from the podium, and his face was already covered in sweat.
Chapter completed!