On Military Campaigns論征伐第三十五

In the winter of the ninth year of Wude the two khans of the Tujue, Xieli and Tuli, came with their host of two hundred thousand to the north of the Bian Bridge on the Hua River. They sent their chieftain Zhishi Sili to enter the court and spy out what he could, and he spread abroad the noise of their strength and said:

"The two khans lead a million soldiers, and they have already come."

Then he asked leave to go back and report. Taizong said to him:

"I made peace and kinship with the Tujue face to face and of my own will, and you have turned your backs on it. I have nothing to be ashamed of. How is it that you suddenly bring soldiers into the counties about my capital and boast of your strength? I ought to put you to death first of all."

Sili was afraid and begged for his life. Xiao Yu and Feng Deyi and the rest asked that he be treated with courtesy and sent away. Taizong said:

"Not so. If I set him free now, they will surely say that I am afraid."

So he had him shut up. Taizong said:

"Xieli has heard that our state has newly had trouble within, and he has heard that I have only now come to the throne. That is why he leads his soldiers and his host straight here, saying that I will not dare to stop him. If I shut the gates and hold them, the barbarians will surely loose their soldiers and plunder greatly. Which side is strong and which weak rests today on a single plan.

"I shall go out alone to show that I make light of them, and I shall let the array of the army shine, so that they know I will surely fight. The thing will come against their thought and break the design they began with. The pressing down and subduing of the Xiongnu lies in this one move."

So he rode forward on a single horse and spoke to them across the ford, and Xieli could not fathom him. Before long the six armies came up one after another. When Xieli saw how great and flourishing the array of the army was, and knew as well that Sili had been seized and shut up, he was greatly afraid because of it, and he asked for an oath and withdrew.

In the first years of Zhenguan the several prefectures of Lingnan sent word that Feng Ang and Tan Dian, chieftains of Gaozhou, had barred the way with soldiers and rebelled. By edict the general Lin Mo was to raise the soldiers of several tens of prefectures of Jiangnan and Lingnan and strike them. Wei Zheng, director of the palace library, remonstrated:

"China has only now been settled, and its wounds are not yet healed. Lingnan has pestilent vapors, its hills and streams are barred and deep, soldiers and carriage are hard to keep up, and plagues rise there now and then. If it does not go as we wish, we may repent and not be able to overtake it.

"And if Feng Ang were truly rebelling, he would have had to seize the time when China was not yet at peace, to join himself with distant men, to divide his soldiers and cut off the narrow places, to break and plunder the prefectures and counties, and to set up officers of his own. For what reason have some years passed since the report, and his soldiers have not come out of their borders? This then is a rebellion whose shape has not been formed, and there is no ground for setting a host in motion.

"Your Majesty has not yet sent a man to go there and look, and so even if he comes to court, I fear the truth will not be made plain. If you now send an envoy and make the matter clear to him, you will surely not put the army to trouble, and he will come to the palace court of himself."

Taizong followed this, and all beyond the ridges of Lingnan was settled. A minister in attendance said:

"Feng Ang and Tan Dian in past years were forever making war on each other, and Your Majesty sent out a single envoy and all beyond the ridges grew quiet."

Taizong said:

"At first the several prefectures of Lingnan spoke loudly of Feng Ang's rebelling, and I was set on striking him. Wei Zheng remonstrated again and again, holding that if we only embraced him with virtue he would surely come of himself without being struck. Having followed his plan, I have come to have no trouble beyond the ridges. To settle it without toil is better than a host of a hundred thousand."

Then he gave Wei Zheng five hundred bolts of silk.

In the fourth year of Zhenguan the office concerned sent up word and said:

"The barbarian state of Linyi is not obedient in its memorials and letters. We ask that soldiers be sent out to strike it."

Taizong said:

"Soldiers are an ill instrument, used only when there is no help for it. Therefore Emperor Guangwu of Han said, 'Every time I send out soldiers, my hair and beard turn white before I know it.' From of old there has been no one who spent his soldiers and his arms to the utmost and did not perish.

"Fu Jian trusted in the strength of his own soldiers and was set on swallowing the house of Jin, and he raised a million soldiers and perished at a single stroke. The ruler of Sui too was set on taking Goguryeo, and year after year he wore the people out with forced labor, until the people could not bear their resentment and he died at last by the hand of a common man. As for Xieli, he came in these last years again and again to raid our state, and his tribes were worn out with campaign and labor, and so he came to ruin.

"Seeing this now, how should I suddenly send out soldiers? Besides, we should have to pass over hills and narrow places, and the land has much pestilent vapor. If our soldiers fall sick, then even though we conquer and cut down these barbarians, what would it profit? A matter of words is not worth taking to heart."

In the end he did not strike them.

In the fifth year of Zhenguan the state of Kang asked to come over and give itself up. At that time Taizong said to the ministers in attendance:

"Among the emperors and kings of former ages many worked at widening their lands, seeking an empty name for after their death. It was no profit to themselves, and their people were sorely distressed. Even if there were profit to myself and loss to the people, I would surely not do it. How much less should I seek an empty name and take from the people?

"If Kang comes over to our court, then when it has a pressing trouble we cannot but save it. If soldiers march ten thousand li, how should there be no toil for the people? To toil the people in search of a name is not what I desire. Their asking to come over is not to be accepted."

In the fourteenth year of Zhenguan Hou Junji, minister of war, struck Gaochang. When the army halted at Liugu a scout horseman said:

"Qu Wentai, king of Gaochang, is dead, and a day is set to bury him, and the people of the state will all be gathered. If we fall upon them with two thousand light horse we may take them all."

The second commanders Xue Wanjun and Jiang Xingben both thought it right. Junji said:

"The Son of Heaven, holding Gaochang to be proud and insolent, has made me carry out with reverence the punishment of Heaven. But to fall upon their burial among the graves and mounds is not enough to be called martial, and this is not an army that asks after a crime."

So he held his soldiers back and waited until the burial was over, and after that he moved the army forward, and in the end he brought that state to order.

In the sixteenth year of Zhenguan Taizong said to the ministers in attendance:

"The Di of the north have robbed and troubled us from age to age, and now Yantuo is stiff-necked, and a place must be made for him early. I have thought it over well, and there are only two plans. To choose a host of a hundred thousand, strike them and take them captive, and wash away that ill breed, so that there is no trouble for a hundred years. That is the one plan. Or else to grant what they come and ask, and make a marriage with them. I am father and mother to the multitude of the living, and if it can truly do them good, how should I grudge a single daughter? The customs of the Di of the north follow for the most part what is done within the household, and once a son is born he is my own daughter's son, and it may be known outright that he will not raid China. Speaking from this, the borders would have enough to be free of trouble for some thirty years. I have set out these two plans. Which of them comes first?"

Fang Xuanling, minister of works, answered:

"We come after the great disorder of the house of Sui, and more than half the households are not yet restored. Soldiers are an ill thing and war is a danger, and the sage is wary of them. The plan of peace and kinship is truly a great good fortune for all under Heaven."

In the seventeenth year of Zhenguan Taizong said to the ministers in attendance:

"Gaesomun has killed his lord and taken away the government of his state, and it truly cannot be borne. With the strength of the state today it would not be hard to take him, but I cannot set soldiers and hosts moving at once. Suppose for now I let the Khitan and the Mohe shake and trouble him. How would that be?"

Fang Xuanling answered:

"When I look at the several states of old, there was none where the strong did not press down the weak and the many did not do violence to the few. Now Your Majesty soothes and nourishes the multitude of the living, your officers and soldiers are keen and bold, and though you have strength to spare you do not take him. This is what is called making the stopping of the spear into martial power. Long ago Emperor Wu of Han struck the Xiongnu again and again, and the ruler of Sui made three campaigns into Liaodong, and that the people grew poor and the states fell truly came of this. May Your Majesty look into it closely."

Taizong said:

"Good."

In the eighteenth year of Zhenguan Taizong, holding that the mangniji of Goguryeo had killed his lord like a robber and was cruel and violent to those below him, took counsel on striking him. Chu Suiliang, grand master of remonstrance, came forward and said:

"Your Majesty's grasp of the moment in war and your divine reckoning are what no man can know. Long ago, in the disorder and breaking apart at the end of Sui, you overcame and settled the trouble of the robbers, and when the Di of the north raided the border and the tribes of the west failed in propriety and Your Majesty would order your generals out to strike them, there was not one of the assembled ministers who did not remonstrate bitterly. Only Your Majesty, with clear counsel, decided alone, and in the end you cut them down together.

"Now that we hear Your Majesty will strike Goguryeo, all our minds are troubled. Yet Your Majesty's divine arms and shining fame are not to be set beside the rulers of Zhou and Sui. If the soldiers cross the Liao, the thing must be brought to victory, and if by one chance in ten thousand it is not won, there will be no way to show your awe to distant regions, and you will surely grow angry again and set soldiers and hosts moving once more. If it comes to that, peace and danger are hard to reckon."

Taizong thought him right.

In the nineteenth year of Zhenguan Taizong was about to go in person against Goguryeo, and Yuchi Jingde, holding an office opened for him with rank equal to the three high ministers, sent up word:

"If the imperial carriage goes of itself to Liaodong, and the crown prince watches over the state at Dingzhou besides, then the two capitals of east and west, where the storehouses lie, will in the end be empty, though there be garrisons holding them. The road to Liaodong is far, and I fear there may be a turn of affairs such as Yang Xuangan made.

"And it is a small state in a corner of the border, not worth the toil of the lord of ten thousand chariots in his own person. If you win, it is not enough to be called martial, and if by chance you do not win, it becomes a thing to be laughed at. I bow low and ask that you entrust it to a good general, and it may be broken and destroyed in its season of itself."

Although Taizong did not follow this remonstrance, those who knew held it right.

Li Daozong, minister of rites and Prince of Jiangxia, followed Taizong in the campaign against Goguryeo. By edict Daozong and Li Ji were made the vanguard. When they had crossed the Liao and overcome the fortress of Gaemo, the soldiers of the enemy came on in great numbers. In the army all wished to dig their ditches deep and hold the narrow ground, and to wait until Taizong came and then move slowly forward. Daozong gave his counsel and said:

"It cannot be. The enemy have hurried from far off to a pressing matter, and their soldiers are truly worn and blunted. They trust their numbers and make light of us, and one battle can break them. Long ago Geng Yan did not leave the enemy to his lord and father. My charge is already with the forward army, and I must clear the road and wait for the imperial carriage."

Li Ji greatly approved his counsel. Then he led several hundred swift and valiant horse and drove straight into the enemy's ranks, passing in and out on the left and the right, and Li Ji joined the attack because of it and broke them utterly. When Taizong came he rewarded and consoled him deeply. Daozong had hurt his foot in the ranks, and the emperor himself set needle and moxa to it and gave him food from his own table.

In Taizong's Difan it is said:

"Weapons and armor are the ill instruments of a state. Though the land be wide, if war is loved the people wither, and though China be at peace, if war is forgotten the people are in danger. Withering is no art of keeping the state whole, and danger is no way of facing an enemy. They cannot be wholly done away with, and they cannot be used always.

"Therefore practicing arms in the spare days of farming is the practice of an awe-inspiring bearing, and ordering the soldiers once in three years is the sorting of grades and ranks. So Goujian bowed from his carriage to a frog and in the end made himself overlord, while Xu Yan cast arms aside and lost his state at last. Why was it? Yue practiced its awe, and Xu forgot its readiness.

"Confucius said, 'To go to war with people who have not been taught is to throw them away.' So it is known that the awe of bow and arrow is used to profit all under Heaven, and this is the charge of him who uses soldiers."

In the twenty-second year of Zhenguan Taizong was about to strike Goguryeo once again. At this time Fang Xuanling lay ill and grew worse, and he looked round at his sons and said:

"All under Heaven is now clear and quiet, and everything has found what befits it. Only the striking of Goguryeo in the east is the chief harm to the state. If I know it and do not speak, I may be said to go into the ground with a grudge held in my mouth."

So he sent up a memorial and remonstrated:

I have heard that soldiers hate not to be put away, and that martial power holds the stopping of the spear dear. What the sage transformation of these days reaches out to is so far that there is nowhere it does not come. Those whom high antiquity could not make its subjects, Your Majesty has been able to make subjects, and those whom it could not hold down, you have been able to hold down.

When I look closely at old times and new, nothing was ever a trouble and a harm to China beyond the Tujue. Yet in the end you set divine plans in motion while seated, and without coming down from your hall the khans great and small bound their hands one after another, took their share of the palace guard, and held halberds in the ranks. After that Yantuo stretched itself like an owl and was soon cut down and destroyed, and the Tiele longed for your righteousness and asked that prefectures and counties be set among them, so that north of the desert there was no dust for ten thousand li. And when Gaochang broke away and scattered in the flowing sands, and Tuyuhun wavered like a rat at Jishi, a part of the army struck them lightly and all was settled.

Goguryeo escaped punishment age after age, and no one could strike it. Your Majesty rebuked its rebellion and disorder, its killing of its lord and its violence to its people, and led the six armies in person to ask after the crime at Liaodong and Jieshi. Before ten days had passed you took Liaodong, and those captured before and after were reckoned at several hundred thousand, and when they were shared out among the prefectures there was no place that was not filled. You washed away the long shame of former ages and covered the dry bones of Xiao. Set your merit beside theirs and measure your virtue, and it is ten thousand times that of the kings before you. This the sage ruler knows of himself, and how should a mean servant dare to set it out in full?

Moreover Your Majesty's benevolent wind covers the whole land, and your filial virtue is made manifest as a match for Heaven. When you see that the barbarians will fall, you point to the season and name the years, and when you give a general his orders, you decide the moment ten thousand li away. You count on your fingers and await the post riders, you watch the shadow and look for the letter, and the tally answers as though by a spirit, and no plan is left out of your reckoning.

You raise up generals from among the ranks and take up officers from the ordinary and the base. A single envoy of a distant barbarian you do not forget once you have seen him, and the name of a small servant you have never had to ask twice. Your arrow pierces seven thicknesses of armor, and your bow draws six jun.

Besides this you set your heart on the old records and give your mind to writing, and your brush outstrips Zhong You and Zhang Zhi, and your words exhaust Jia Yi and Sima Xiangru. When the point of your writing is stirred, the notes fall into harmony of themselves, and when your light brush flies for a moment, the blossoms open in rivalry.

You soothe the myriad families with kindness and meet the assembled ministers with propriety. You praise a goodness of an autumn hair's breadth and loosen a net that could swallow a prefecture. A remonstrance that grates on the ear you always hear, and a slander that soaks in through the skin you cut off. With your virtue that loves the living you forbid the blocking and barring of rivers and lakes, and with your benevolence that hates killing you have stilled the sound of the knife in the butchers' stalls. Ducks and cranes receive the favor of rice and grain, and dogs and horses the kindness of curtain and cover. You lowered your honor to suck the wound of Simo, and you climbed the hall to stand beside Wei Zheng's coffin. When you wept for the soldiers fallen in battle, your grief moved the six armies, and when you bore firewood to fill the road, your feeling moved Heaven and earth. You hold the great lives of the black-haired people heavy, and you give your mind above all to the many prison cases.

My mind and knowledge are dark and confused, and how should they be enough to speak of the depth and reach of your sage merit, or to tell of the height and greatness of your Heaven-like virtue? Your Majesty holds all these excellences together and there is nothing you do not have. A mean servant, for Your Majesty's sake, holds this dear and holds it heavy, loves it and treasures it.

In the Zhou yi it is said, "He knows how to go forward and does not know how to draw back, he knows how to remain and does not know how to perish, he knows how to gain and does not know how to lose," and again it is said, "He who knows going forward and drawing back, remaining and perishing, and does not lose what is right in them, is he not the sage alone?" Speaking from this, in going forward there is the meaning of drawing back, in remaining there is the sign of perishing, and in gaining there is the principle of losing. What an old servant holds dear for Your Majesty's sake is most likely this.

In the Laozi it is said, "He who knows enough is not disgraced, and he who knows where to stop is not in danger." I would say that Your Majesty's awe and name, merit and virtue, are enough, and that the widening of the land and the opening of the borders may also stop here.

That Goguryeo is a mean sort of border barbarian, not worth treating with benevolence and righteousness, and not to be rebuked by ordinary principles. From of old they have been kept like fish and turtles, and it is fitting to follow a broad and easy way with them. If you are set on cutting off their breed, I greatly fear that a beast at bay will fight.

Again, whenever Your Majesty passes sentence on a prisoner under death, you always have the case looked over three times and reported five times, and you take plain food and stop the music, and this is because a man's life is a heavy thing and moves your sage kindness. How much more so now, when the host of soldiers have not one crime among them and are driven for no reason into the midst of the battle lines and given over beneath the blade, so that their livers and brains smear the ground and their souls have nowhere to return. It makes their old fathers and orphaned children, their widowed wives and loving mothers look for the hearse and cover their faces and weep, and hold the dry bones and break their hearts, and it is enough to move and change the shadow and the sunlight and to wound the harmony of the air. Truly it is a wrong and a pain to all under Heaven.

Again, soldiers are an ill instrument and war is a dangerous matter, used only when there is no help for it. If Goguryeo had broken and lost the duty of a subject, it would be right for Your Majesty to cut it down. If it had raided and troubled the people, it would be right for Your Majesty to destroy it. If it could long be a trouble to China, it would be right for Your Majesty to remove it. If one of these were so, then though you killed ten thousand men a day, it would not be enough to be ashamed of.

Now these three counts are wanting, and you trouble China while seated, within to wash away the grudge of an old ruler, and without to avenge Silla. Is this not to keep what is small and to lose what is great?

I wish that Your Majesty would follow the warning of the imperial ancestor Laozi about stopping and having enough, and so keep a towering name for ten thousand generations. Send out a favor that pours down like rain, hand down a great edict of leniency, spread your bounty in keeping with the spring sunlight, allow Goguryeo to make itself new, burn the ships that were to cut the waves, and dismiss the host that answered the levy. Then of themselves the Chinese and the barbarians will count it good fortune and lean upon you, and the far will be orderly and the near at peace.

I am one of the three high ministers, old and ill, and I shall go into the ground morning or evening. What I grieve for is that in the end I have added not so much as dust or dew to the sea and the mountain. I reverently spend what is left of my soul and my breath, and take this beforehand in place of the faith that ties the grass in return. If it should be granted me that this sorrowful cry is set down, then my bones will not rot though I die.

When Taizong saw the memorial he sighed and said:

"This man is in such danger and such a heavy state, and still he can be anxious for my kingdom."

Although he did not follow the remonstrance, it proved a good counsel in the end.

In the twenty-second year of Zhenguan the armies were often set moving and palace buildings rose one after another, and the people had no little toil and weariness. Xu, a lady of the rank of chongrong, sent up a memorial and remonstrated:

Since the Zhenguan years began, more than twenty of them, the wind has been even and the rain obedient, and year by year the grain has risen and ripened. The people have had no trouble of flood or drought, and the state no disaster of famine.

Long ago Emperor Wu of Han was an ordinary ruler who kept what was written, and still he climbed to the tally cut in jade, and Duke Huan of Qi was a mean ruler of a small state, and still he did the business of the gold smeared with clay. Yet I see Your Majesty putting merit away from you and taking from yourself, yielding your virtue and not dwelling in it. The millions incline their hearts to you, and still the rite of announcing the achievement is wanting, and Yunyun and Tingting stand waiting for your visit, and still the ceremony of sending up the offering to Heaven is not unfolded. Merit and virtue such as this are enough to chew up a hundred kings and to net a thousand ages.

Yet a man of old has said, "Though it be excellent, call it not excellent," and truly there is a reason for it. To keep the beginning and to hold the end are rarely joined even in the sage and the wise. So it is known that he whose work is great grows proud easily, and I wish Your Majesty to hold this hard, and that he who begins well ends with difficulty, and I wish Your Majesty to make this easy.

I see in private that of late years the labors have been laid one upon another. In the east there is the army of Liaohai, in the west the labor of Kunqiu. Officers and horses are worn out with armor and helmet, and boats and carts are weary with carrying and shifting.

And when men are levied for labor and for garrisons, those who go and those who stay carry the pain of life and death, and blocked by the wind and stopped by the waves, both men and rice are in danger of drifting away and sinking. One man plowing with all his strength does not get a few tens of measures in a year, while one boat lost overturns several hundred measures of grain. This is to carry over the work of farming, which has an end, to fill up the great waves, which have none, and to plan for a host of others not yet gained while losing our own army already made.

Although the removing of the ill and the striking of the violent is a standing rule in a state, the fouling of arms and the toying with soldiers is what the wise of former days warned against. Long ago the First Emperor of Qin swallowed the six states together and thereby hurried on the ground of danger and disaster, and Emperor Wu of Jin held the three regions entire and thereby made a work of overturning and defeat. Was it not that they boasted of merit and trusted in greatness, threw away virtue and made light of the state, planned for profit and forgot harm, gave rein to their feelings and let their desires loose?

So they made it that the far-reaching six directions, wide though they were, could not save them from ruin, and that the crying black-haired people brought their own disaster about through their distress. So it is known that wide land is no art of lasting peace, and that a people in toil is the very spring of disorder. I wish Your Majesty to spread your bounty and let it flow to the people, to pity the worn and relieve the wanting, to lessen the trouble of labor and campaign and to add to the favor of rain and dew.

I have heard again that the root of governing lies in valuing the doing of nothing. I see in private that works of earth and timber cannot be carried on all together. The northern palace was newly raised and Cuiwei built in the south, and before the season had even passed, Yuhua was begun. It is not only the toil of framing and building, but there is no little spending of strength and means. Though you show restraint again with thatch of reeds, still you stir up the weariness of timber and stone, and even if men are taken on and paid their hire, there is no want of the trouble and disturbance it brings.

Therefore a lowly palace and plain food are what the sage king rests in, while a golden house and a jade terrace are what a proud ruler thinks beautiful. So a ruler who has the Way gives ease to men by his own ease, and a ruler without the Way gives pleasure to his own body by pleasure. I wish Your Majesty to set men to work in their season, and then their strength will not be used up, and to let them rest after using them, and then their hearts will be glad.

Now rare playthings and skill and cunning are the axe that loses a state, and pearls and jade and brocade and embroidery are truly the poison that leads the heart astray. I see in private that clothes and ornaments are fresh and splendid, as though they had changed out of nature itself, and that the rare things brought in tribute are as though a spirit had made them. Though they run to show in the fashion of a late age, they truly ruin the plain ground of an honest manner.

So it is known that the lacquered vessel is no way of calling up rebellion, yet when Jie made it the people rebelled, and that a jade cup is no art of calling down ruin, yet when the tyrant Zhou used it the state was lost. Now indeed it is proved that the spring of extravagance and splendor must be dammed. If a rule is made in frugality, one still fears it will run to excess, and if a rule is made in excess, with what will those who come after be governed?

I bow and consider that Your Majesty shines clear upon what has not yet taken shape, and that your wisdom goes round without a limit, that you have gone to the depth of the hidden and the secret in the Qilin Pavilion and searched out all that is deep among the scholars. The tracks of order and disorder under a thousand kings, the traces of peace and danger through a hundred ages, the reckoning of rising and falling and withering and disorder, the signs of gaining and losing and succeeding and failing, are truly held within your heart and turned about within your sight. This the ruler's mind has long looked into, and there is no need to borrow a word or two of mine.

Only it is not the knowing that is hard, but the doing that is not easy, and the will grows proud when the work is manifest, and the body grows idle when the times are at peace. I bow low and wish that you would hold down your will and cut your heart to measure, that you would be careful of the end and so complete the beginning, that you would pare away light faults and add to weighty virtue, and choose what is right today in place of what was wrong before. Then your great name will be without end as the sun and the moon, and your flourishing work will be at peace forever as Heaven and earth.

Taizong thought her words very good, and gave her a generous gift in great abundance.