Emperor Taizong once said, "Using bronze as a mirror, one can straighten one's clothes and hat; using history as a mirror, one can understand the rise and fall of dynasties; using people as a mirror, one can recognize one's gains and losses." The Tang Dynasty endured nearly three hundred years of turmoil and prosperity, but today it is no more than a mirror. Looking to the past to illuminate the present, life inside the mirror and beyond it is all the same: in the end, it is nothing but flowers reflected in water and the moon reflected in a mirror. Let later generations take this as a lesson!
This book draws on the Comprehensive Mirror to Aid in Government, the Old and New Books of Tang, and other works.
My Dear Wife, I Really Don't Want to Take the Imperial Exams
The Turbulent Tang
The Carefree Young Noble