There are many factors that contributed to the collapse of the Ming dynasty. However the most significant factor that led to the decline was caused by the weaknesses within the center of the state due to incompetent emperors who were unable to properly control their government. As a result many uninterested and unintelligent emperors allowed dangerous weaknesses into the Ming dynasties social structure that created its downfall. This is shown through the emperor’s incompetence that led to greedy eunuchs taking power, not properly controlling tax revenues that led peasant uprising and rebellions along with harsh external threats and invasions that led to its downfall. This could have been prevented if the emperors of the Ming dynasty were more efficient and had the financial stability along with the will to make changes. Eunuchs are known for holding tyrannical power throughout imperial China. This was especially notable within the Ming dynasty where eunuchs were able to get immense control among the people many incompetent and disinterested emperors who often turned to eunuchs as confidants, giving the favored ones extraordinary access to power within the court. Although this made life easier for the emperor it also created problems that helped contribute to the Ming’s downfall. Since emperors allowed eunuchs to gain access to large amounts of power, courts were unable to have cohesion and were prevented developing good policies. When Zhu Yuanzhang took the throne as the Hongwu emperor in 1368 and became founder of the Ming dynasty he was stern about limiting the number and influence of the eunuchs. He established laws to make sure that eunuchs would not be allowed to interfere with any affairs outside the palace and were not permitted to correspond with officials or become illiterate. Hongwu was cautious about who he trusted and did not want the eunuchs to have too much power because he knew that the corruption of high officials occupying positions made extortion and accepting bribes easy. Unfortunately even Hongwu did not follow his own rules as he brought three hundred and sixty-one eunuchs into his household. He even added seventy-sex more to work in his inner court in 1383 and he selected two literate eunuchs to watch over the flow of information from government agencies. Many purges also took place five years later, bringing about the execution and exile of thousands of officials and their relatives and by the 1380’s eunuchs not only had become imperial instruments for political purges and surveillance of people the emperor did not trust, but also functioned as a beginning of Ming tyranny. After the reign of Hongwu, the imperial power grew larger and more emperors relied on eunuchs to help handle the burdens of their increasing palace chores. Emperors also relied on their trusted eunuchs to contain the literati (those who managed state affairs) and some emperors, such as the Yongle emperor (r. 1402-1424), even allowed eunuchs to command gigantic fleets of ships designed for international missions. As a result emperors allowed power to gradually slip out of their hands and into the hands of the eunuchs. Another example of an emperor giving too much power to eunuchs is the thirteenth emperor of the Ming dynasty, Wanli (r.1572-1620). By 1580 emperor Wanli had grown tired of court affairs and the frequent political quarreling amongst his ministers so he decided to stay behind the walls of the Forbidden City (an area closed to all except the imperial family and their personal attendants). He began neglecting his duties by remaining absent from court audiences for years and lost interest in studying the Confucian classics or discussing key political events. As a result, the court eunuchs gained considerable power and by Wanli’s time there were over ten thousand eunuchs in the capital. Eunuchs became important intermediaries between the outer bureaucratic world and the inner imperial one so any senior official who wanted to discuss state matters with the emperor had to persuade powerful eunuchs with a bribe to have their messages sent. Unfortunately the eunuchs asked for fees in return for these services and the more powerful eunuchs were even bribed by officials. Eunuchs became tyrannical as the emperors increased their rights over the civil bureaucracy and in the 1590’s emperor Wanli even assigned them to collect revenues in the provinces. They took control over wealthy provincial families, and used an elite group of military guards to enforce their will and to impr