Spring returns in February. At the south gate of Xiangyang, in the intermittent spring rain, the three Jesuit missionaries of Westin, Hemid, and Luo Nige, together with Shen Rong and Liu Jiyuan, two devout believers, accompanied by more than a dozen strong and powerful believers, finally set out on the road, leaving Xiangyang, where they had stayed for half a year, and marching towards Hunan and Guangdong further south. This made the three Jesuit missionaries, Westin, Ha Mide, and Lockney Court, very happy.

Westin, the earliest of the three to come to Macau, China, has lived in China for 20 years, and the youngest has 15 years, and all three of them speak fluent Chinese. Westin even speaks Cantonese and Nanjing Mandarin. In this era, every Jesuit missionary who came to China was much more noble than the descendants who walked into China seventy or eighty years later. Because the missionaries of this era are just very simple missionaries, there are not so many ghosts and ghosts, at least their hearts are not so 'big'.

After the Western missionaries experienced the short-term glory of Nan Huairen and Tang Ruowang in the early days of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, they suffered serious losses with the anger of Kang Mazi's dragon face, and when the second ban on religion came in the early Yongzheng period, the Jesuits almost completely withdrew from China, except for the lair of Macao, only Beijing was left with a little color. By the middle of Qianlong, the Jesuits were far from regaining their original momentum.

But you can't help but say that the resilience of these people is absolutely top-notch. With the advent of the Qianlong era, China's closed door to the Jesuits slowly revealed a crack, Cheng Jili, Liang Hongren, Wei Fangji, [Austrian] Nan Huairen and others established many churches in six prefectures and counties, including Wuyuan County, Chizhou Prefecture, Huainan Prefecture, Wuhu County of Taiping Prefecture, Zhili Prefecture of Chuzhou, and Wuhe County of Sizhou, to attract believers; In cooperation with Western missionaries, Yao Ruohan, a believer from Huizhou, went to Haimen, Jiangsu, and Shen Rong, a believer from Shidai in Chizhou, each went to Gucheng, Hubei Province to preach.

When Shen Rong re-swayed the glory of the Society of Jesus in the remote and declining Valley City Shenya Church, there were Shi Ruohan and Nan Huairen in the front, and then Westin, Hemid, and Luo Nige, Jesuit missionaries came one after another, and really regained a foothold in Gucheng in Xiangyang Prefecture, Hubei, and there were thousands of people in its heyday. But all this with the rise of Chen Ming, with the attack of the Fu Han army on Hubei, everything was annihilated.

Hao Qiang, the local landlord in Gucheng who was very hostile to the Jesuits, drove out Westin, Hemid, Luo Nige, Shen Rong, Liu Jiyuan and others before the arrival of the Fu Han army, and they relied on the tenants armed in their hands, and the latter had no choice but to flee from Xiangyang City.

When Chen Ming stationed troops in Xiangyang twice, he would never have thought that there were still a group of missionaries and believers in Xiangyang City.

Now that the main force of the Fu Han army has moved south, leaving only a small number of people in the three towns of Wuhan to confront the Qing army, the chaos and disorder in the vast areas of central and western Hubei have slowly dissipated over time.

Westin, Hamid, and Lornico immediately decided to leave. Because Xiangyang City was so bored with them, they did not receive any attention from the Chinese government during their months in the city, and Luo Nige almost fell ill and died. The foolish and foolish healers of the city, which they hated, regarded him as a demon because he was a foreigner, and refused to heal this sincere servant of God.

Luo Nige is fateful, and was saved by Liu Jiyuan, who knows a little bit of Chinese medicine, when a blind cat collided with a dead mouse. But in the hearts of these three missionaries, the entire city of Xiangyang was evil.

Therefore, Westin, Ha Mide, and Luo Nige have no nostalgia for the city of Xiangyang. If they had a choice, they didn't want to stay in Xiangyang City for a quarter of an hour, but they didn't have a choice.

The city of Xiangyang, garrisoned by the official Chinese Tatar army, was the safest and luckiest place in Hubei for half a year. Didn't you see that Jingzhou and Wuchang had fallen? Westin, Ha Mide, and Luo Nige have been in China for so long, but they are well aware of the power of the generals and governors stationed in the Eight Banners, and they know the influence and importance of these two cities.

After all, a county magistrate in Xiangshan County can shout at Macao, and the Portuguese have a very, very clear understanding of the power of the governor of Liangguang and the general of Guangzhou.

As the group moved away from Xiangyang City, a series of complaints erupted from the mouths of Westin, Ha Mide, and Luo Nige. Of course, these three are also decent people, and they will not scold no matter how much they spray. Complaining and swearing are two different things. Especially in front of Shen Rong, Liu Jiyuan and others.

In the drizzle, the day's time didn't make them much longer.

After several months of war and chaos, they used up too much money, and they only bought two donkey carts when they came out of Xiangyang City. So they can't go fast, Westin, Hemid, Luo Nige, Shen Rong and Liu Jiyuan, five cores plus more than a dozen devout believers, the little twenty people are not two little donkey carts can carry. The two little donkey carts were loaded with more tents, bedding, food and clothing.

Heading south from Xiangyang City, they also officially saw the devastation caused by the war. Westin: They are well aware of the richness of China in this era. This empire, with a population larger than all of Europe, has created great wealth with every breath.

When they came to Jiangnan from Macau, it was heaven on earth; When they came to Anhui from the south of the Yangtze River, the place they went to was the richest in Anhui and the Yangtze River, and finally they came to Gucheng, where the Shenya Church is located in the west of Gucheng County one hundred and fifty miles away, bordering Fang County, located in Longfeng Mountain, Mopan Mountain, Tongluoguan three mountains stand along the west edge of the Chayuangou Basin, is one of the oldest monotheistic churches in China, and is also one of the poorest places in the whole Xiangyang. But even so, the people here are well fed and clothed. Compared with the poor in the West, the poor here are better off for Chinese.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, Jesuit missionaries began to preach in Gucheng, and monotheism, as a foreign religious culture, had fierce contradictions and conflicts with traditional Chinese politics and culture in the process of spreading in China. At the end of the first year of Yongzheng, the Ministry of Rites requested that Catholicism be banned throughout the country, and except for the attendants who served the court in Beijing and were allowed to carry out religious activities in Beijing, the rest of the missionaries were ordered to return to China. After the promulgation of the second "ban on religion", the coastal provinces took the lead in banning the spread of monotheistic religions, and then the mainland also vigorously searched for monotheists. It can be said that it was precisely because of the Qing court's "ban on religion" that monotheism could not gain a foothold in big cities, but it persevered in the remote place of Shenya, Gucheng.

This is also why there are missionaries to Gucheng, why Shen Rong will travel thousands of miles to preach, and the Jesuit Society itself has a foundation in this place of Shen Ya. And why hasn't Chen Ming heard about it? Shen Ya is too remote. It is even said that when the soldiers of the Fu Han Army pressed the border, Westin and the landlords were bombarded away by the local squires and landlords, why didn't they see the government intervene, even if it was just a sound, it was because Shen Ya was too remote. It is one hundred and fifty miles away from the county seat, and it is completely submerged in the mountains.

"I don't know what kind of attitude the Chinese rebels have towards the Lord."

After the beginning of the Qianlong era, the Qing government had relaxed the strict prohibition on proselytizing, but more than 30 years later, the Qing government still did not show the slightest sign of publicly abolishing the ban, which made many missionaries very disappointed.

"Don't kill yourself. The Tatar empire has unrivaled wealth and power, and these rebels can prevail for a while, but they will not prevail for a lifetime, and they will eventually be wiped out by the Tatars. ”

"Don't get involved, Andro." Westin called Lorney's name. Remember, the glory of God is left in the last glimmer of light in this fertile land. If the glory of God is completely extinguished in this land because of our faults, our souls will sink forever in sin......"

"Don't worry, Westin, that's all I said. I won't act recklessly. "Luo Nige hated the house and Wu, and he hated the government in Xiangyang City very much, so he also hated the rule of the Tatars. But his mind is clear, and he is well aware of the strength of the Qing Empire.

Well, in the eyes of Westerners, wealth means power. Because in the West, as long as you have money, you don't have to worry about not being able to buy anything you want. Do Westerners really not understand China's backwardness in armament at all? The trade between the two sides lasted so long. But at this time, Westerners always regarded the Qing Empire as a huge and powerful empire.

Maybe it's more of a cognitive error, right? As Napoleon said: China is a sleeping lion.

This is actually to contact Napoleon's next words. After the complete defeat at the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon was forced to abdicate and was soon imprisoned by British troops on the island of St. Helena in the distant Atlantic. In the third year of his imprisonment, Amsterd, the second British diplomat to go to China after George Macartney, returned from China in despair. On his way home, he happened to pass through the island of St. Helena. When Amsterd heard that Napoleon I, the world-famous man was being imprisoned here, he was eager to meet him and hear what the legendary man had to say about China. With the consent of the governor of the island, Amster met with the former emperor. Amsterd recounted his own experience in China, arguing that only by knocking on China's door through war could China's rulers understand that opening the door was beneficial to both sides. At the time, Napoleon was full of contempt for British approach, commenting on the British idea of using war to solve problems: "It is the greatest folly in the world to fight against this vast and rich empire." He continued: "At first you may succeed, you will seize their ships and destroy their military and commercial facilities, but you will also make them understand their own power." They will think; They will build ships, equip themselves with artillery. They will bring in gunners from France, the United States, and even London, to build a fleet and defeat you. Amsterd retorted: "Behind China's superficial strength is a giant with feet of clay, very weak. "But Napoleon believed that China was not weak, it was nothing more than a sleeping lion." Today, it seems that the lion is asleep, and even a fly dares to fall on its face and scream a few times. Napoleon went on to say: "When China is awakened, the world will be shaken." After this sentence came from the mouth of Napoleon, it produced a strong sensational effect, and "a sleeping lion - China" quickly spread throughout Europe and the world.

But what is the essence of this sentence?

It's not that China has to go through the 'awakening' to become strong, but that China itself has extremely strong strength, and they just need to 'bring in gunners from France, the United States and even London to build a fleet', and that's it!

Europeans are such a point of values, and Napoleon's view of China is not that he is alone, but that his views themselves represent the values of quite a few Europeans.

As long as you have plenty of wealth, you can have it all. When Napoleon said this, he must have thought of the financial difficulties of the second half of his empire, and was full of envy for the richness of China. He did not understand the true state of the Qing Empire, so twenty years after his death, the British opened the closed doors of China through war.

Westin, Hamede, and Lornico now see the same thing as the unborn Bonaparte Napoleon. Compared with the fact that the Fu Han army really overthrew the Tatar empire, they believed in their hearts that the Qing Empire would eventually suppress this rebellion. Even Luo Nige, a person who was full of negative feelings towards the Qing government.

"I heard that the rebels' cannons are very powerful, maybe the emperor of the Tatars needs a second Nan Huairen, a second Tang John ......"

"Then God willing. The glory of the Lord will shine on the earth, and our circumstances will change dramatically. (To be continued.) )