the
literati who had failed to make their way at court, and who lived on
their estates in Central China and were trying to gain power themselves.
This group was opposed to Wei Chung-hsien, who ruthlessly had every
discoverable member murdered. The remainder went into hiding and
organized themselves secretly under another name. As the new emperor had
no son, the attempt was made to foist a son upon him; at his death in
1627, eight women of the harem were suddenly found to be pregnant! He
was succeeded by his brother, who was one of the opponents of Wei
Chung-hsien and, with the aid of the opposing clique, was able to bring
him to his end. The new emperor tried to restore order at court and in
the capital by means of political and economic decrees, but in spite of
his good intentions and his unquestionable capacity he was unable to
cope with the universal confusion. There was insurrection in every part
of the country. The gentry, organized in their "Academies", and secretly
at work in the provinces, no longer supported the government; the
central power no longer had adequate revenues, so that it was unable to
pay the armies that should have marched against all the rebels and also
against external enemies. It was clear that the dynasty was approaching
its end, and the only uncertainty was as to its successor. The various
insurgents negotiated or fought with each other; generals loyal to the
government won occasional successes against the rebels; other generals
went over to the rebels or to the Manchus. The two most successful
leaders of bands were Li Tzu-ch'eng and Chang Hsien-chung. Li came from
the province of Shensi; he had come to the fore during a disastrous
famine in his country. The years around 1640 brought several widespread
droughts in North China, a natural phenomenon that was repeated in the
nineteenth century, when unrest again ensued. Chang Hsien-chung returned
for a time to the support of the government, but later established
himself in western China. It was typical, however, of all these
insurgents that none of them had any great objective in view. They
wanted to get enough to eat for themselves and their followers; they
wanted to enrich themselves by conquest; but they were incapable of
building up an ordered and new administration. Li ultimately made
himself "king" in the province of Shensi and called his dynasty "Shun",
but this made no difference: there was no distribution of land among the
peasants ser