The First Emperor held a banquet at the Xianyang Palace and seventy doctors came to celebrate his birthday. The martial minister Zhou Qingchen sang a eulogy: "In the past, the Qin territory was only a thousand miles, but thanks to Your Majesty's divine wisdom, you pacified the country and exiled the barbarians. Wherever the sun and the moon shine, everyone is submissive. The princes are divided into counties, and everyone is happy and peaceful, without the danger of war, and it will be passed down for tens of thousands of generations. Since ancient times, no one has ever come close to Your Majesty's power and virtue." The First Emperor was pleased. Doctor Chunyu Yue from Qi said: "I heard that the kings of Yin and Zhou lived for more than a thousand years, and they granted their sons and nephews meritorious officials and made themselves branches and assistants. Now Your Majesty has the whole country, but your sons and nephews are ordinary people. Finally, you have ministers like Tian Chang and the six ministers, but no one to help you. How can you save each other? It is unheard of that things can last long without learning from the ancients. Now Qingchen is flattering you to make Your Majesty's mistakes more serious. He is not a loyal minister." The First Emperor agreed to his proposal. Prime Minister Li Si said: "The Five Emperors did not repeat each other, and the Three Dynasties did not succeed one another. Each ruled in its way. They were not contradictory, but the times changed. Now Your Majesty has created a great cause and established a merit that will last for tens of thousands of generations. This is beyond the knowledge of foolish scholars. Moreover, what Chunyu Yue said was the affairs of the Three Dynasties, why should we follow it? In other times, the princes fought each other and invited scholars to travel over. Today, the world has been settled down and the laws have been issued. While the common people are devoted to agriculture and handicrafts at home, scholars should learn the laws and prohibitions well. Now if the students do not learn from the present but learn from the past, they would criticize the present and confuse the people. Prime Minister Li Si said without hesitation: In ancient times, the world was scattered and chaotic, and could not be unified. Therefore, the princes fought together, and all talked about the past to harm the present and embellish the truth with false words. People were good at what they learned privately to criticize what the emperor had established. Now the emperor has unified the world and made clear what is black and what is white, and all were set with one supreme standard. If private schools teach illegally, when people hear the order, they will discuss it with their own knowledge. If they go in, they will disagree with it in their hearts, and if they go out, they will gossip about it. They will boast of their master for fame, and take different things as superiority, and lead the subordinates to slander. If such behavior is not prohibited, it will undermine the authority of the monarch and cause the cliques below to collude with each other. It is convenient to prohibit it. I ask the historians to burn all the records that are not from the Qin Dynasty. If anyone in the world dares to keep poems, books, and the words of the hundred schools of thought that are not the duties of the doctoral officials, they should all be taken to the governor and the lieutenant to be burned. Anyone who dares to talk about poems and books even occasionally will be executed. Anyone who compares the past with the present will get his own clan wiped out. Officials who know about it but do not report it will be punished with the same crime. Anyone who failed to burn the books within thirty days of the order would be tattooed and sent to build the Great Wall. The books that are not removed are books on medicine, divination, and tree planting. If you want to learn the law, take the officials as your teachers. " The first emperor Qin Shi Huang issued an edict saying, "Yes."
始皇置酒咸阳宫，博士七十人前为寿。仆射周青臣进颂曰：“他时秦地不过千里，赖陛下神灵明圣，平定海内，放逐蛮夷，日月所照，莫不宾服。以诸侯为郡县，人人自安乐，无战争之患，传之万世。自上古不及陛下威德。”始皇悦。博士齐人淳于越进曰：“臣闻殷周之王千余岁，封子弟功臣，自为枝辅。今陛下有海内，而子弟为匹夫，卒有田常、六卿之臣，无辅拂，何以相救哉？事不师古而能长久者，非所闻也。今青臣又面谀以重陛下之过，非忠臣。”始皇下其议。丞相李斯曰：“五帝不相复，三代不相袭，各以治，非其相反，时变异也。今陛下创大业，建万世之功，固非愚儒所知。且越言乃三代之事，何足法也？异时诸侯并争，厚招游学。今天下已定，法令出一，百姓当家则力农工，士则学习法令辟禁。今诸生不师今而学古，以非当世，惑乱黔首。丞相臣斯昧死言：古者天下散乱，莫之能一，是以诸侯并作，语皆道古以害今，饰虚言以乱实，人善其所私学，以非上之所建立。今皇帝并有天下，别黑白而定一尊。私学而相与非法教，人闻令下，则各以其学议之，入则心非，出则巷议，夸主以为名，异取以为高，率群下以造谤。如此弗禁，则主势降乎上，党与成乎下。禁之便。臣请史官非秦记皆烧之。非博士官所职，天下敢有藏诗、书、百家语者，悉诣守、尉杂烧之。有敢偶语诗书者弃市。以古非今者族。吏见知不举者与同罪。令下三十日不烧，黥为城旦。所不去者，医药卜筮种树之书。若欲有学法令，以吏为师。”制曰：“可。”
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