Chapter 518: Debating the Classics

Years ago, after his ignominious flight from Chang'an, Wang Mang had imagined all sorts of scenarios for meeting Diwu Lun.

Yet every one of them had rested on the premise that Grand Minister of Works Wang Yi and Dou Rong would defeat the Greenwood, turn the army back to rescue the throne and crush the rebellion, and annihilate Diwu Lun — a fantasy shattered after the Battle of Kunyang.

Later, Wang Mang had indulged the extravagant hope that the mighty Red Eyebrow Army would fight its way back to Chang'an and pull Diwu Lun from the imperial throne; if he himself were still alive by then, he could reveal his identity face to face and have a final reckoning with him — though Wang Mang's lips spoke endlessly of the Land of Bliss and the Land of Joy, deep in his heart he had harbored a sliver of "borrowing the Red Eyebrows for revenge."

But now even that hope was dead, and he could only come here resolved to die for the Way. Yet when he saw Diwu Lun utterly without shame, fury surged in Wang Mang's heart, and he forgot all about his plan to take the blame and beg amnesty for the Red Eyebrows.

When enemies meet, their eyes blaze red. Wang Mang could not manage the "magnanimity" he had shown when rebutting Dou Rong; he simply pointed at Diwu Lun and squeezed two words through clenched teeth.

"Traitorous subject."

"Traitorous subject Diwu Lun, you stand before the Son of Heaven — why do you not kneel and pay homage?"

But Diwu Lun only laughed. "Old Wang, Old Wang, you really haven't changed. It's barely noon — how many cups of wine have you had today already?"

Diwu Lun waved a hand, as if bidding farewell to yesterday, just as Dou Rong had. "The bond between lord and subject — that is all in the past."

He pointed at Wang Mang, then at himself. "You are a Son of Heaven, and I am a Son of Heaven. You are a former Son of Heaven, a deposed Son of Heaven, while I am the reigning Son of Heaven. If anyone should kneel, it is Old Wang who should kneel to me."

Seeing Diwu Lun take this attitude, Wang Mang grew angrier still. Spotting a young Palace Gentleman off to the side, brush in hand, recording — presumably their conversation — he was instantly re-energized. Sneering, he cursed: "The ancients spoke of Heaven's nobility and man's nobility. Benevolence, righteousness, loyalty, trustworthiness, delighting in goodness without weariness — these are Heaven's nobility. How many of these, benevolence, righteousness, loyalty, trustworthiness, do you, traitorous subject, possess? A king takes Heaven as father and Earth as mother; he is the son of Heaven. What virtue, what ability do you have to presume to occupy this position?"

In Wang Mang's view, all those so-called emperors — the various Han claimants Liu Xuan, Liu Yong, Liu Ziyu, and that Gongsun Shu of Chengjia, and Diwu Lun — were self-proclaimed false emperors, fake Sons of Heaven! The true line of the Son of Heaven since the Three Dynasties still rested with him!

Diwu Lun, however, replied: "People say I answered the mandate to become emperor — the Jing River silting its banks, Venus traversing the heavens, even Old Wang dreaming of five golden men standing in Changle Palace, piecing together a complete set of Five Virtues. In truth, these are all fabricated associations."

"Just like the twelve auspicious omens when Old Wang abdicated and took the throne — they count for nothing." For propaganda purposes, such things were bandied about to some degree, but Diwu Lun himself would never believe them.

"Since I do not rely on talismans and Heaven's mandate, what I rely on, naturally, is the hearts of the people."

Diwu Lun continued: "Old Wang, go and ask around. Among the common folk of the north, who does not long for me to sweep the realm clean and restore peace to the world? And of course, there is one more thing — strong soldiers and sturdy horses!"

He picked up the fire tongs and added charcoal, stoking the stove hotter. "Without those first tens of thousands of Boar-Rush Braves, I could not have driven Old Wang out of Weiyang Palace. Without a hundred thousand tiger warriors, the Red Eyebrows would not have crumbled at the Heji region."

Wang Mang was stunned. He had assumed that, true to Diwu Lun's consistent hypocrisy and false benevolence, the man would certainly engage him in a round of moral quibbling. He never expected Diwu Lun to be so brazen, treating this violation of "the bond between lord and subject" not as a disgrace but as a point of pride.

He's changed — his transformation is simply too great! It was as if, once in power, he had ripped off his past disguise in one motion, making Wang Mang wonder: is this still that Diwu Lun? I truly was blind back then.

Wang Mang, for a moment unable to find the right words, could only glare at Diwu Lun and continue his moral assault. "To disrupt Heaven's constancy and defy the great Way — that is the act of a petty man!"

To his surprise, Diwu Lun took no offense and directly admitted it. "I am indeed a petty man, and from Old Wang's perspective, I am indeed guilty of treason."

These words so frightened the attending Palace Gentleman Zhu Di, who was keeping the record, that he stopped his brush. Only after a meaningful glance from Diwu Lun did he shakily resume writing. According to Diwu Lun's instructions, today's record was to be sealed away in secret, not to be opened for a hundred years.

Diwu Lun lowered his head and prodded the venison on the grill. "But what of Old Wang? When you served the Han house, did you not also proclaim yourself loyal and upright? You carried the child Ying on your back, weeping, vowing with every breath to return the government after three years. Who would have guessed that three years would become three more, and three more again — from Acting Emperor to Acting Emperor to true Emperor. That in itself is no matter; the realm was never the private property of one family or one surname. Let the virtuous possess it — that is only right. But after the abdication, Old Wang imprisoned the child. If your conscience were clear, what would you have to fear?"

Diwu Lun raised his head after speaking. Look at him — facing the old villain Wang Mang, his conscience was perfectly clear.

Can political figures be judged by private morality? I'm dirty — are you clean? No need to pile up a heap of high-sounding reasons about saving the world. Today Diwu Lun could not be bothered to preach grand principles. Neither of us gets to stand on the moral high ground — let's both stand on level ground and talk facts!

Wang Mang's words caught in his throat. At every stage of his life, he had spoken what he believed — what else could he have done? Through all his rises and falls, he had now come to admit that he had indeed been wrong back then. But the wrong was not in replacing the Han; it was in inheriting the tyrannical Qin's imperial system — that was the root of all evil...

Old Wang Mang had this much self-awareness, but before he could use his self-styled lofty "abolish the imperial system" argument to leave Diwu Lun speechless, Diwu Lun gave him no reprieve.

"Old Wang lied, Old Wang deceived, Old Wang stole... stole a state. On this point, in my view, there is room for debate — but at least in the eyes of the Han house and the Liu clan, it is indeed so."

"And me? I too am full of lies. I have deceived enemies, friends, ministers, powerful clans, even captives — but I have never once deceived the soldiers or the common people."

Diwu Lun's hand clawed at the air. "And this throne of the Son of Heaven — I did not deign to steal it. I simply took it outright!"

"Since Old Wang also admits that the realm is not the realm of one man..."

"Since you have thrown the realm into chaos and are unworthy to be the Son of Heaven..."

Diwu Lun dipped the roasted venison in sauce, ate it directly, and chewed with relish right in front of Wang Mang, smiling. "Then naturally, I'll do it myself!"

"You... you!"

Wang Mang did not fear Dou Rong debating right and wrong, morality and principle with him — good, that was precisely what he excelled at; let them have a proper debate.

But Diwu Lun knew this too, and pointedly refused to debate the classics with him. This was a scholar meeting a great villain — the reasoning could not be made clear, and what was more, Wang Mang had no reason on his side.

For a moment, only a few thoughts remained in old Wang Mang's mind.

"Diwu Lun — his name is Lun, yet he speaks not of human relations."

His era name is Wude, yet he speaks even less of martial virtue! He, an old man past seventy, the former Son of Heaven, to be so humiliated!

And so, just as Diwu Lun was placing venison onto Wang Mang's plate, wanting to have a proper conversation with him, Wang Mang suddenly collapsed backward onto the ground! His eyes rolled back, and in an instant he seemed to lose all consciousness.

This startled Diwu Lun so badly that the venison fell from his hand, and he shot to his feet. If Wang Mang died just like this, his entire slate of plans would be utterly ruined.

"Faking it?"

But it didn't look like it. Diwu Lun was forced to rush over personally, supporting Wang Mang and letting him rest his head on his own leg, then fiercely pressing the philtrum, shouting all the while:

"Old Wang, Heaven is my witness — from beginning to end... until just now, I never once laid a hand on you!"

Dou Rong was very fond of a passage once spoken by the Warring States thinker Shen Dao.

"The dragon rides the clouds, the soaring serpent glides on the mist. When the clouds part and the mist clears, the dragon and serpent are no different from earthworms and ants — for they have lost what they rode upon."

A worthy man sometimes cannot out-argue an unworthy one, because his authority is light and his position low; an unworthy man sometimes can make a worthy one yield, because his authority is heavy and his position high.

Yao as a commoner could not govern three men; but Jie as the Son of Heaven could throw the whole realm into chaos!

"This is the reason Wang Mang could throw the realm into chaos."

When Wang Mang was the Son of Heaven, no matter what he said or did, Dou Rong could of course only bow and obey.

But now, Wang Mang had lost everything and become a commoner. Dou Rong's authority was greater than his, was it not? Yet poor Dou Rong, the Duke of Zhou, still could not out-argue him. Though his words were full of righteous indignation, his heart was hollow — after all, the bond between lord and subject was something etched into the minds of everyone in this age. Only by becoming utterly shameless could Dou Rong bark at his former lord without guilt in his heart.

But he could not do it. After cursing Wang Mang, Dou Rong felt nothing but misery inside.

Watching Wang Mang enter Jiyang Palace, Dou Rong only thought to himself: "Yao taught among the subordinate classes, and the people would not listen; but when he faced south and ruled the realm, his orders were carried out, his prohibitions observed. Yet Wang Mang, having lost the imperial throne, could still beguile Fan Chong among the Red Eyebrows and make the Red Eyebrow Army reform itself into a republic."

"From this, it is clear that Wang Mang is by no means a man utterly without virtue or ability. Otherwise, he could never have deceived the whole world into believing he was a living sage in the first place. Though his deeds were absurd, at least when it comes to debating the classics, I fear one would have to bring out Liu Xin to deal with him."

But old Liu Xin, though he had entered Wei from Liang Province, was already like a dying lamp, his days numbered. He could no longer travel far and still remained in Chang'an.

So Dou Rong worried that Diwu Lun had summoned Wang Mang perhaps to gloat as the victor — but given the Emperor's level of classical scholarship, if he ended up humiliating himself instead, that would be disastrous.

Yet what surprised Dou Rong was this: old Wang Mang had only been in the side hall of Jiyang Palace for a brief moment when, with a loud cry, he was hastily carried out on a stretcher, the imperial physician urgently pressing his philtrum alongside.

Everyone was astonished. An even stranger thought arose in Dou Rong's mind: could it be that His Majesty the Emperor, unable to out-argue Wang Mang inside, had abandoned martial virtue and laid hands on the old man?

But when they entered the hall, they saw Diwu Lun still sitting there calmly roasting meat as if nothing had happened, while the attending Palace Gentleman Zhu Di, who had been keeping the record, shook his head slightly and said only that Wang Mang had...

"Anger. Rage attacking the heart."

After saying this he added: "Your Majesty only spoke five sentences to him…"

Dou Rong was astonished. Earlier outside the city he had delivered a lengthy, grandiose speech, and Wang Mang had been utterly indifferent to it — how had Diwu Lun managed to anger Wang Mang into collapse in just five sentences? Every word must have stabbed straight to the heart and drawn blood! Was this the gap between himself and His Majesty the Emperor?

Zhu Di naturally dared not speak. What was recorded today would be stored in the secret archives, never to be shown to anyone — he had to sew his lips shut to be worthy of His Majesty's trust.

The man involved, Diwu Lun, naturally would not speak of it either. He had been quite flustered just now — if he had simply angered Wang Mang to death, how dull that would have been.

Only after hearing the imperial physician report that Wang Mang's life was not in danger did Diwu Lun breathe a sigh of relief and say with a smile: "A little anger does him good."

It was also Wang Mang's fault for being too easily provoked — Diwu Lun had only just begun, and the man had collapsed. But no matter; the time they would spend together from now on would not be short.

Seeing that Dou Rong and the others had things to say, Diwu Lun raised a hand to stop them: "What you gentlemen wish to say, I already know in my heart. Wang Mang has committed great evils against all under Heaven. He — must die beyond doubt! You will not have to wait long; I will certainly give the people of the realm an accounting. Worry not, my lords."

"But I still hope that Wang Mang will accept judgment with a heart that admits his crimes."

This was what Diwu Lun insisted upon. Destroying a man's flesh is easy, but making him sincerely convinced is very hard. And his state had just reached the conclusion that "the Han house's mandate is exhausted" — next it was the Xin Dynasty's turn. They should seize this opportunity to reach a fitting conclusion on the Xin's rise and fall, its successes and failures!

But seeing how Wang Mang still carried himself as the ultimate sage even now — it would not be easy.

Yet Diwu Lun had his own methods.

Diwu Lun said: "In the past, Wang Mang concealed his ailments and shunned physicians, hearing far too little honest speech. Even the deathbed remonstrance of my teacher Ziyun — he never had the chance to hear it."

"Now that is remedied. Let him hear his fill of words as piercing as those spoken today."

"Not only hear — he must also see! Let Wang Mang know exactly where he went wrong in the beginning, and what enormous evils and great crimes he committed, that brought the realm to such a state!"

"Once Wang Mang awakens, have someone attend to his meals. The congee must be boiled soft — his teeth are nearly all gone. Pour him some ginseng broth and look after him well."

The Emperor was so considerate — anyone who did not know the truth would think Wang Mang was also the Emperor's father-in-law…

"First take him to meet Fan Chong." After making these arrangements, Diwu Lun turned and asked Dou Rong again.

"Dong Xuan, Dong Shaoping — has he reached Jiyang?"