New Year’s Eve was approaching, and the capital’s lively, prosperous, festive atmosphere continued. Before the year’s end, those responsible for handling various affairs were mostly caught up in a stretch of busyness—summarizing the year’s affairs, closing out the accounts. As for looking ahead to the new year and reflecting on the past, that would be next year’s business. In short, after all the bustle, whether it was shops and inns or government offices, everyone entered a slightly more leisurely lull. Even the disturbance stirred up by something like Zhang Jue’s killing was beginning to subside. At year’s end, people preferred to press such matters down in their hearts, leaving whatever problems remained to be dealt with once spring came.
In any case, whatever was said, Zhang Jue was already dead, the Jin forces had withdrawn and returned home, and the new year had arrived… so there would be a few good days to be had, at least.
Within the residence of the Right Chancellor, the initial busyness was likewise winding down. On the day Qin Siyuan received news of Zhang Jue’s death, he had nearly fainted, but before long he recovered. He was, after all, a man who had weathered countless storms; the blows he had endured in this life were far from just one or two. But now, advanced in years, after this shock, most of the government affairs were pushed onto him being temporarily set aside, at the insistence of his family and a group of advisors—if one set aside the north, there was in truth little harm in his not personally handling many of the long-standing domestic matters. So over these past few days, riding the New Year atmosphere, he had quieted down somewhat.
Ning Yi and the others often went over to chat idly with him, and Yao Zunian had likewise hurried in from his home outside the city to check on his condition. Apart from resting, he still spent most of his time holding a book, sometimes picking up his brush to mark and annotate. For a great Confucian scholar such as himself, compared to the press of official business, marking up these texts was a kind of leisure pastime, and so as long as he didn’t keep at it too long, no one much objected.
As for the matter of Zhang Jue, at least for this stretch of time, he had stopped mentioning it entirely. For several days the court had been in an uproar over the affair—first Qin Hui submitted a memorial impeaching Wang Anzhong, which touched off a great debate at court. In the end, the verdict was that Wang Anzhong had labored painstakingly and endured humiliation in silence; there were certainly faults to be found, but it was wrong to blow the matter out of proportion—anyone placed in that position likely could not have made a better decision.
With right and wrong thus settled, Emperor Zhou Zhe rejected Qin Hui’s impeachment, but still decided to transfer Wang Anzhong away from Yanjing come the new year, choosing another minister to take charge there instead. In truth, Wang Anzhong was already unhappy serving in Yanjing at this point. After Zhang Jue’s death, Guo Yaoshi had once said to him: “When the Jin demanded Zhang Jue, you handed him over. If they come demanding me, Yaoshi, will you hand me over too?” Afterward, though Wang Anzhong had gone to him seeking understanding, he still felt something was deeply wrong, and his petition requesting to resign was, in truth, already on its way.
This light handling of Wang Anzhong’s case quieted the public criticism of the Emperor’s decision-making. In fact, Qin Hui and the Right Chancellor’s residence still exchanged visits often at this time, on good terms. But when the topic of Qin Hui came up, Qin Siyuan only said: “Huizhi understands the sovereign’s intentions all too well.”
On the second day after he had fainted, perhaps because his spirits were too low, that day when Ning Yi and the others came to see him, he had spoken to a few of them about the beginning and end of his falling-out with Zuo Duanyou, the severing of ties between them.
“…Back then, His Majesty had only just ascended the throne—brilliant and bold, with the ambitions of a sage ruler. For those of us serving as officials, it was rare to encounter such an enlightened lord, and we were duty-bound to serve him with all our strength. I, Wang Qisong, Liang Mengqi, and Zuo Duanyou had the wild idea of establishing the Secret Investigation Bureau, because Liao and our Wu dynasty had traded with each other for a hundred years, and Liao had long since been assimilated by our own extravagant and dissolute ways. Though the extravagance in our own dynasty ran even deeper, if we had an outstanding ruler, perhaps that could bring about a resurgence. That is… how the Secret Investigation Bureau came to be…”
“What came after, Elder Nian mostly knows already, and Ji Kun, you’ve been at my side for many years, so you understand as well. Only the reason Lord Zuo severed ties with me after the Black Water Alliance—that I have never told anyone. In truth, this is a matter that should not really be spoken of to others.”
“We were all deeply favored and trusted by His Majesty in that era, showered with unmatched grace. And having once tutored His Majesty in his studies, taught him the way of a ruler—His Majesty was clever, learning quickly, and before long he had drawn his own inferences, forming… views of his own. After that, though, he grew distant from us. This in itself was no great matter. Later, when the Liao forces marched south, we strongly advocated fighting to the death. His Majesty had already put much effort into secretly stirring up trouble to the north, but seeing the Liao troops advancing steadily southward, His Majesty… decided to play along and seek peace talks ahead of time. Zuo Duanyou, being of a fierce temperament, urged me that a general in the field need not obey every order from the sovereign—though the Liao troops were advancing swiftly south, they still had to maneuver through the vast territory north of Bianliang, and if we could just drag things out, the wealthy men of Liao would be the first to oppose a war that was hurting their business. That is what he said, but I could not act on it. Under His Majesty’s repeated urging, I had no choice but to negotiate peace… you know that it was after this that Lord Zuo broke off relations with me…”
“What outsiders knew as the reason at the time… was mainly that Lord Wang’s entire household of sons died for the country. But the deeper reason was not that. Lord Zuo’s thinking bore some resemblance to Liheng’s. He said something treasonous—he said… the sovereign… has great ambition but shallow talent. Had we known, the Secret Investigation Bureau should never have been established. With no real strength of our own, secretly risking everything on scheming and intrigue—if the unorthodox and the orthodox cannot work in concert, our Wu dynasty will only keep exposing its own weaknesses to others. What might otherwise have prolonged the dynasty’s mandate for many more years would instead, like a clown leaping about on stage, only hasten its own death…”
“I had no way to refute his words. In the end, he shut down part of the Secret Investigation Bureau under his management. But as for me, given how things stood in the world, if I did not act this way, what other path was there? Even amid such extravagance and dissolution, we could only grit our teeth and endure—this one time, if we could just get through it, there would be open skies ahead. But now… I suppose he must be laughing at me… heh, a clown leaping about on stage, hastening his own death…”
“After my return to office, I understood in my heart that His Majesty valued balance and calculation—whenever he lifted one thing up, he would inevitably want to suppress something else. I was prepared for this. In the past at court, I would occasionally make some mistakes on purpose, letting him see them, hoping that by striking those down, he might be willing to support certain other proper matters. This time, with the disaster relief, I knew full well I was offending many people, but I only thought to myself—if after the relief effort I became the target of public outrage, and His Majesty went along with the tide… he always needs to ensure the northern campaign goes forward. Perhaps with these old bones of mine, I might have managed to scrape through. But I never expected that in this rise and fall… the fall would land on Zhang Jue’s head…”
Perhaps it was because he was exhausted in body and mind—there was, in these words, a good deal that he would not normally have said. Fortunately, those present were the core advisors of the chancellor’s residence, whose own fates were bound up with Qin Siyuan’s. In truth, Qin Siyuan’s account had actually been rendered far too gently. In the Secret Investigation Bureau’s intelligence, Ning Yi had long since studied the patterns of the many policies enacted during the Jinghan era. The Emperor did indeed value balance and calculation, but that did not mean he genuinely respected the art of balance itself—in some sense, Ning Yi felt he merely used the idea of balance as a plaything.
Since ascending the throne, Zhou Zhe had indeed made a number of bold moves, including the Secret Investigation Bureau, and also the Flower and Rock Convoy. At first, Zhou Zhe had continued the Flower and Rock Convoy because there wasn’t enough silver available for state affairs. After the Black Water Alliance, the silver flowing out of the country dropped sharply, and political stability meant the treasury’s income grew by the day—but the Convoy was not stopped. He had already grown to enjoy it too much to give it up to others? Fine, then he would keep it for his own amusement. He gave heavy responsibility to men like Cai Jing and Wang Fu to requisition valuable goods from all over; when someone submitted a memorial protesting, he would scold them soundly as a show of suppression—and after suppressing them, feeling a twinge of guilt, he would hand back a bit more power.
By the end, though Wang Fu and the others were scolded plenty, their power kept climbing higher day by day. The Emperor earned a reputation as an enlightened sovereign. Years of this “training” also led the Censorate, the reform-minded clean officials, and the channels of remonstrance to learn, to a masterful degree, how to weigh their words and second-guess the sovereign’s intentions. They submitted countless memorials, “allowing the hundred officials to all speak freely, cleansing the political sphere”—without ever touching the surface.
If one were to analyze it from a psychological angle, this was Ning Yi’s view: a rebellious teenager whose worldview had not yet settled, who, upon receiving a great deal of information, believed he had seen through the world. At his core, this Emperor did not trust anyone. He did not believe that matters of the world had a clear right or wrong. He did not believe Cai Jing acted for the good of the country and its people, nor did he believe Qin Siyuan or Li Gang did either. From this point of view, behind every single person there was only self-interest—Cai Jing sought power and status for his family, to hold sole sway over everything; Li Gang and Qin Siyuan sought to leave a name in history, seeking momentary vain glory.
In truth, for someone in a position of power, holding such thoughts is not necessarily a grave mistake in itself. When one’s own capacity for logical reasoning is insufficient, falling back on grand principles for everything is nothing unusual—such people can still find paths to success. However… as an emperor, his tolerance for pressure was simply far too shallow.
Not long after arriving in the capital, Ning Yi had already formed a rough impression of the present Emperor. Of course, whether that impression was right or wrong was hard to say, since he never dealt with the man directly. But then the Zhang Jue affair happened, and it left him feeling utterly helpless.
For Qin Siyuan and the others, the Zhang Jue affair was certainly painful, but their worry was probably not extremely deep—the Jin were not that numerous after all, and there might still be room for things to turn around. Only Ning Yi understood, in his heart, that the Jin were very likely to march south regardless, and after this incident, that only deepened his sense of despair.
Over this failure at the final hurdle, he was seething inside, but with the year’s end upon them, there was nothing he could do about it. Facing a convalescing Qin Siyuan, it was of course inappropriate to say anything on the matter—he could only, in his own mind, drastically readjust his plans for Bamboo Records… The Emperor’s word was law, after all; if that was how he wanted it, what could you possibly do?
So he would often go sit at the chancellor’s residence, chatting idly with Qin Siyuan, Yao Zunian, Ji Kun, Wenren Buer, and the others, all the while turning over in his mind the things he himself needed to do. One afternoon, he came to the residence, and after sitting down in the warm study and chatting for a while, Qin Siyuan smiled and brought out some books to show them—apparently his own writings.
Those books, encompassing the Four Books and Five Classics, were hand-copied by Qin Siyuan himself; alongside the copied text, he had written in his own extensive interpretations. Ning Yi picked one up and flipped through it casually. Qin Siyuan, though by now a man of such cultivation that he was unmoved by honor or disgrace, showed a faint trace of pride on his face as he showed these things to everyone. Yao Zunian and the others read with reverence, and before long their brows furrowed, showing expressions of deep regard. Ning Yi, on the other hand, flipped through casually—not because he could not understand these ideas, but because his mind carried the hidden influence of a thousand more years of Confucian tradition, and so everything in the book appeared to him as simple, self-evident Confucian principles.
Qin Siyuan lay back in his chair and slowly began to speak: “I began writing these things when I had resigned my post and was living at home, discussing them together with Kang Mingyun and others. Later there were several revisions, and after returning to office, the revisions and annotations continued off and on—though the revising itself was the largest part. This is the first time I’ve actually shown them to everyone like this.”
He closed his eyes, hands folded across his chest, fingers tapping lightly. “In this life of mine, I first made a name for myself as a Confucian scholar, and afterward did a great many things that were hard to reconcile with the Confucian way. After entering officialdom, my path was never as upright as Chancellor Li’s. Speaking objectively, in order to bring about good outcomes, I have made rather excessive use of scheming and stratagem. Fortunately, I have always managed to preserve a bit of a literary reputation, and so in the end I was never too heavily attacked for it. But over these years, reading this Confucian scholarship even as I take such devious paths in practice, a doubt has always lingered in my heart—or perhaps I should say… a hope: if the affairs of this world were upright and just, why would I need to resort to scheming at all…”
“Over these years, in my reading, I’ve had many idle conversations with Elder Nian and other great scholars. During this time, Liheng, who calls himself no Confucian, has nonetheless offered the most penetrating insights on certain matters. I remember Liheng once discussing with me how, throughout the dynasties, whenever a dynasty was on the verge of collapse, there would often be treacherous men stirring up chaos and bringing ruin to the state—Han had Dong Zhuo, Tang had An Lushan, Jin had Jia Nanfeng, and the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun were ceded away because of Shi Jingtang. These men are nailed to the pages of history, cursed and reviled day after day. But had Dong Zhuo lived under Emperor Wu of Han, would there still have been the chaos of the Three Kingdoms? Had An Lushan encountered Li Shimin, would there still have been the incident at Mawei Slope? Had Jia Nanfeng met Sima Yi, would the Eight Princes have dared to rebel? In every such case, people at the time all believed it was treacherous men who ruined the state. In truth… just as with this famine, if it weren’t for all manner of parasites weakening the state to a certain degree, hollowing out an entire country from within, how would outsiders ever dare covet this land!”
“During this famine, in order to ease the pressure at court, I, drinking poison to quench my thirst, secretly encouraged certain merchants to manipulate public opinion, to submit petitions lobbying on behalf of the merchant class. Liheng once discussed commerce with me—if commercial ways were to flourish greatly, how could this Wu dynasty, as it stands now, possibly restrain the spread of a mentality that puts profit above all else? Whether this push of mine, working behind the scenes, was good or bad, I find it hard to feel at ease about it either way. And yet so many people simply want to go on living, and I had no choice but to act as I did. Thinking it over afterward, these sets of books are, in a way, my compensation for this matter—and also for the excessive scheming of these many years…”
Ning Yi raised his head slightly… When Qin Siyuan had decided to resort to such methods, Ning Yi had already guessed that the old man must have gone through a long period of psychological preparation before making that decision. Later, the trend at court toward rehabilitating the reputation of merchants—Ning Yi had likewise suspected the old man’s hand was behind it. Although Ning Yi himself had risen from a merchant background, in his heart he had always believed that the later era’s purely profit-driven, naked form of capitalist thinking was a poison this era simply could not touch. He had guessed that Qin Siyuan must have some follow-up plan in mind, but he never would have guessed that the follow-up would be these books…
What was he trying to do… Ah, he meant to loosen, just slightly, the rigid class structure of scholar, farmer, artisan, merchant, and then bind it again with a more detailed, more precise set of principles. That was indeed one way of thinking about it…
As Ning Yi leafed through the book in his hands, this was the line of reasoning running through his mind. At the same time, he was still considering his own plans, and he felt a good deal of admiration and agreement for the old man’s carefully interlocking scheme—in any era, those who accomplish great things are never simple people… But then, only a moment later, a flash of thought crashed through his mind like thunder, blasting him completely out of that train of thinking.
“People of this age are, for the most part, ignorant,” the old man was saying. “The writings of the sages exist precisely to lead people out of such ignorance, onto a path. For thousands of years, the sages have taught people how to view matters, how to make choices, how to make decisions. All disagreements, in the end, come down to differences in how far or how near one’s vision extends. When Zigong ransomed captives on behalf of the state of Lu and declined the reward, thinking this noble, Confucius said that by promoting such nobility, he would in fact do harm to the state. Nowadays we advocate repaying resentment with virtue, but Confucius said: with what, then, would one repay virtue? Repay resentment with uprightness, and virtue with virtue. In this world, whoever tries to please everyone without principle is, more often than not, a thief of virtue. What is virtue? So-called morality and virtue arise from the Way—this Way is both moral principle and reason itself; it is the path by which we can make this world better… How, then, should this path be walked…”
“People of this age look only after themselves, and not their families; they look only after their families, and not their state. This is the blinding effect of human selfish desire—the distinction between selfish desire and heavenly principle. The principle of Heaven and Earth dictates that when people live together and unite into families and states, they must, at the proper time, set aside some of their selfish desires, so that the state may grow stronger and more prosperous, so that it may flow and circulate through time, ceaselessly generating and regenerating. We who study scholarship are likewise trying to find such a path—trying, as much as possible, to make these two interests into one. In Liheng’s words, as he once put it, this is the distinction between the greater self and the lesser self.”
Qin Siyuan sat in his reclining chair with his eyes closed, tilting his head up slightly, and drew a breath.
“And for my part, I mean to guide human desire toward heavenly principle.”
At that moment, the wind stopped.