Manchu Emperor Guangxu / Kwangsu / Kwang Hsu - 1875-1908
The child Tsai t'ien had been posthumously adopted as the son of T'ung Chih and was now placed upon the throne under the name of Kwang Hsu, "Illustrious Succession." The placing of another child upon the Dragon Throne enabled the masterful Dowager, mother of the late Emperor, to exercise an almost undisputed power for the greater part of the new reign. Kwang Su acceded to the throne in January, 1875. He was not then four years old, and his accession attracted little notice outside of China, as the supreme power continued to be vested in the two dowager empresses whose long regency had been only nominally determined in favour of the emperor Tung Chi when the latter attained his majority in 1873—the empress Tsu An, principal wife of the emperor Hsien Fung, and the empress Tsu Tsi, secondary wife of the same emperor, and mother of the emperor Tung Chi.
The emperor Tung Chi succumbed to an ominously brief and mysterious illness. The dowager empresses solved the question of the succession by placing Kwang Su on the throne, a measure which was not only in itself arbitrary, but also in direct conflict with one of the most sacred of Chinese traditions. The solemn rites of ancestor-worship, incumbent on every Chinaman, and, above all, upon the emperor, can be properly performed only by a member of a younger generation than those whom it is his duty to honour. The emperor Kwang Su, being a son of Prince Chun, brother to the emperor Hsien Fung, and thus first cousin to the emperor Tung Chi, was not therefore qualified to offer up the customary sacrifices before the ancestral tablets of his predecessors. The accession of an infant in the place of Tung Chi achieved, however, for the time being what was doubtless the paramount object of the policy of the two empresses, namely, their undisturbed tenure of the regency, in which the junior empress Tsu Tsi, a woman of unquestionable ability and boundless ambition, had gradually become the predominant partner.
Those who gained access to the Emperor from the outer world reported favorably of his intellectual capacity and character, and there can be little doubt as to his genuine desire for reform. But probably he combined with his good intentions some lack of judgment and a by no means unexplainable inexperience of affairs. It is in any case evident that his personality had in it nothing which could make headway against the masterfulness of his aunt, who certainly in these years deserved the description so often applied to her, of "the only man in China."
In March, 1889, the marriage of the young Emperor took place with unusual splendor. The lady honored by the Imperial choice (*. e. not of Kwang Hsu, but of the Empress dowager) was Yehonala, a niece of Tsi Thsi. The festivities were on an extraordinary scale, and a large number of honors were distributed to signalize the occasion. The event marked also the assumption of sovereignty by the Emperor and the end of Tsi Thsi's second regency. An Edict issued at the time announces: "The Emperor is now advancing to manhood, and the greatest respect which he can pay to us will be to discipline his own body, to develop his mind, to pay unremitting attention to the administration of the Government, and to love his people." Two years later Kwang Hsu gave his first audience to the foreign ministers, held, as the audience of the reign of T'ung Chih had been, in the Hall of the Tribute-bearers. It was given out as the Emperor's intention to hold these audiences annually in the first month.
The year 1891 was rendered notorious for the anti-foreign and anti-Christian riots in Hunan and the Yangtse Kiang valley. The vilest calumnies had been spread broadcast against the Christians, notably by one Chow Han, a scholar of sufficient culture to know better. The Tsung-li Yamen was powerless to check the riots and the payment of money indemnities but poorly atoned for the cruel murder of missionaries and their converts. One good result, however, was the issuance of an Imperial Edict to this effect: "The propagation of Christianity by foreigners is provided for by treaty, and Imperial decrees have been issued to the provincial authorities to protect the missionaries from time to time. . . . The doctrine of Christianity has for its purpose the teaching of men to be good."
The agitations in the Empire had hitherto been largely in the hands of the secret societies and had had for their object little beyond the vague program, "Destroy the Ch'ing; restore the Ming." From this time onwards a new spirit was abroad in the land. It was the result of many cooperating causes. The success of Japan had been clearly due to the fact that the Island Empire had adopted Occidental methods. The infiltration of Western learning, through the labors of missionaries and others, was beginning to tell. Most effective of all, there were personalities at work with a very definite end in view.
The result of such influences as have been described, aided by the natural intelligence of the Emperor and his interest in western toys and scientific experiments, was soon apparent in his acts. "We do not lack," he said, " either men of intellect or brilliant talents, capable of learning and doing anything they please; but their movements have hitherto been hampered by old prejudices." Kwang Hsu was at least resolved that this should no longer be true of himself. In the early part of 1898 he is said to have bought a hundred and twenty-nine foreign books, a Bible, maps, globes and charts.
He was determined to make things move outside the palace and there is something pathetic in the eagerness with which he launched, one after another, those twenty-seven ill-fated Edicts of July, 1898. They provided, with bewildering haste, and with little or no attention to the means for carrying them into execution, for every reform which his somewhat visionary instructors had suggested to his enthusiasm. There was to be a new university at Peking, universal reform in education, extension of railways, developments of art, science and agriculture, together with the immediate abolition of all that had hitherto retarded the advance of the Empire. It was a beautiful dream, but the dreamer was destined to a very sudden and rude awakening.
The Empress Dowager was no novice at a coup d'etat. It had become manifestly a case for instant action if she were to save herself and her friends from the consequences of the new movement. She also held the sincere belief that the new craze for western materialism was likely to play into the hands of the greedy European powers ever on the alert for the partitioning of China. It is no reflection on her patriotism that she believed drastic measures were necessary for the Empire's salvation. Yuan Shih-kai has been blamed by some for warning the Empress of what was taking place in the Royal Palace. He too may be credited with the belief that hot-headed, inexperienced young enthusiasts were not the real leaders the time necessitated. So the blow fell; the reform leader Kang Yu-wei escaped with difficulty to live henceforth with a price upon his head. Most of his associates were ruthlessly beheaded; the poor young Emperor was from this time forth practically deposed and a prisoner.
On November 14, 1908, according to the official account, the Emperor, whose health had manifestly suffered from his semi-incarceration, passed away. On the following day the Dowager Empress Tsz hsi followed her nephew to the shades of the ancestors. Rumors of a violent ending in either or both cases were not unnaturally rife, and in some instances circumstantial accounts were given of a great Palace tragedy, but the matter may perhaps best be left in obscurity undisturbed by speculation.
One may certainly be permitted to lament the ineffectuality of a character like that of Kwang hsu, genuinely disposed towards reform, yet condemned to beat helpless wings against the barriers imposed by circumstances, and by personalities stronger than his own. Perhaps his great mistake was an overrash enthusiasm in 1898. Even on this point he may be permitted to make his own defense:-"I have been accused of being rash and precipitate, and of attempting great political changes without due consideration. This is an entire mistake. I have thought over the condition of my country with great seriousness for several years. Plan after plan has come before my mind, but each one I was afraid to put into action, lest I should make some blunder that would bring sorrow upon my Empire. In the meanwhile China is being dismembered. Shang tung has been occupied by the Germans. The Liao tung peninsula practically belongs to the Russians, and Formosa has been given over to the Japanese. Whilst I am waiting and considering, my country is falling into pieces, and now, when I attempt heroic measures I am accused of rashness. Shall I wait till China has slipped from my hands and I am left a crownless King?"
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