Cai Jing provided the emperor with a list of the Yuanyou◎◎ Party, which included Sima Guang, Su Dongpo, Su Che, Huang Tingjian, Cheng, who were renowned for their character and official reputation at the time and shocked the past and present for their cultural achievements. Yi, Fan Chunren and hundreds of others. At that time, when Zhang Dun was fighting against his political enemies, he once suggested that the emperor dig up Sima Guang's grave and whip the corpse three hundred times. Now Cai Jing is not so rough and violent, so childish, but more feminine and sophisticated. He pointed his focus directly at what these political opponents cherished most during and after their lives: the eternal honour, the dignity of future generations, and their real lives.
Emperor Huizong used his elegant and superb calligraphy art to write the stele of Yuanyou Party members twice, and engraved it on the stone stele of Duanli Gate and the east wall of Wende Palace Gate respectively. Cai Jing, who was equally skilled in calligraphy, wrote and promulgated it to prefectures and counties all over the world, ordering stone tablets to be erected in various places to punish evil and promote good. It is said that such stone tablets can still be seen in some areas to this day. From 1102 AD to 1104 AD, that is, from the first year of Chongning to the third year of Chongning, this political persecution campaign had a considerable degree of depth and breadth: at that time, most of those people who were included in the party list had already Therefore, the edge of persecution was mainly directed at their writings and future generations.
Many people listed in the ◎◎ Party are contemporary academic leaders or literary leaders. This makes it imperative that their writings not be destroyed. Jie Cao Tingjian, the founder of the Jiangxi Poetry School, is known as one of the Four Scholars of the Su family. His sentence "Where does spring go?" once asked the poetry world of Shiyuan to be eclipsed for a time. Compared with Su Dongpo, this poet with great influence can only be ranked second-rate. However, he was the first to bear the brunt of the ban on destroying party writings. The reason is quite trivial and boring:
After Huang Tingjian was admitted to the ◎◎ People's Party, he was demoted to Gouyulongguan, Hubei Province, which is a sinecure position second only to dismissal from office. The Hubei transit judge's name was Chen Ju, who wanted to use Huang Tingjian's literary name to increase his own worth. Therefore, when Huang Tingjian was invited to write an inscription, Chen Ju asked to add his name to the inscription of the inscription writer. Huang Tingjian was unwilling and refused. Therefore, Chen Ju, who was equivalent to the secretary-general in charge of daily work at the provincial level, excerpted some words and phrases out of context from the inscription and reported Huang Tingjian for slandering the government. He intentionally handed the report to Deputy Prime Minister Zhao Tingzhi because he knew that Zhao Tingzhi was at odds with Huang Tingjian. Sure enough, Zhao Tingzhi immediately reported to Song Huizong. As a result, there were two consequences: First, Huang Tingjian was further demoted to Lingnan and died there; on the other hand, a large-scale campaign was launched to ban the destruction of ◎◎Party writings.
To this end, the great artist Emperor Huizong issued a series of edicts. He first ordered that all steles, tablets, lists and foreheads written by Su Dongpo in the world should be destroyed; he also ordered Su Xun, Su Shi, Su Zhe and his son, as well as the four Sumen scholars Huang Tingjian, Zhang Lei, Chao Buzhi and Qin Guan to be destroyed. As well as the collected works of Ma Juan and others, Fan Zuyu's "Tangjian", Fan Zhen's "Dongzhai Chronicles", Liu Xun's "Shihua", Seng Wenying's "Xiangshan Wild Records" and other books were all burned; in Cai Jing's Instigated, the emperor further issued an edict to burn Su Shi's "Dongpo Collection" and the printing plates of the latter collection; to destroy the portraits of Sima Guang, Fan Chunren and others. Sima Guang's great historical work "Zizhi Tongjian" was also burned.