In the summer of the thirteenth year of Wanli, a heavy rain turned the south of the Yangtze River into the color of ink.
Lu Shude had no intention of admiring the misty rain in Jiangnan, and only had a gloomy look on his face.
However, the hired farmers in the major towns in the south of the Yangtze River became even more idle because of the heavy rain. They went to the wine shops in twos and threes to have a good time.
Only the newly opened village social school still had the sound of reading aloud, appearing in the hazy mist and rain, making people stop and stop.
Lu Shude also relaxed after hearing the sound of reading. Although he did not want to see people being lazy, he wanted to see children study hard and read well.
However, without the sound of the shepherd boy playing the flute, it would be another unsatisfactory thing for Lu Shude.
Yes.
Lu Shude searched for a long time, but he could not find a shepherd boy playing the flute under the thatched hut.
This gave Lu Shude the feeling that all the children in Jiangnan were already enrolled in school.
"Returning to the public, there are more children studying now than before, and there are indeed fewer children herding cattle for the wealthy families!"
"Therefore, several of our husbands and even Mr. Xiaolian have started to set up private schools, not just to train the children of the clan, but to make money!"
"The number of villagers who are willing to spend money to send their children to school is increasing year by year. Especially this year, with the Qing army's conspiracy to collude with the army, no matter how stubborn people are, they would rather work harder and spend money. Send your children to study for fame!”
"And what makes students worried now is that with more and more people studying, it will be harder for us old Gongsheng students to win the exam. But we cannot stop people from studying, not to mention, we are still relying on Teach your children to make plans for rice."
When Lu Shude was resting at a post station in Gaoyou, he specifically asked Mao Qide, a local old Gongsheng student, and Mao Qide told Lu Shude about the local phenomenon.
Lu Shude nodded after hearing this: "In this way, the common people have indeed become a lot richer due to the New Deal. It is no wonder that some officials are eager to use the Qing army's hookup to rob the people. But now, although the Qing army is not allowed to hook up with the army, it is not allowed. It is not allowed to use sergeants in violation of the regulations and make the gentry suffer. It is really too much, and it will inevitably be suspected of choking."
"That's what he said!"
"But even if the court doesn't do this, the sergeants will not be as easy to serve as before!"
Mao Qide sighed.
After hearing this, Lu Shude asked: "What do you mean?"
"Because since Mr. Gangfeng mobilized the people to set up agricultural and industrial cooperatives when he was the governor of Nanzhi, now the common people have become more popular in establishing cooperatives!"
"There are also so-called soldiers and bravery mutual aid societies among the sergeants, and even the postmen near the post stations also have mutual aid societies. If the government does not give money and wants to use them directly, they will make trouble. In short, there are more and more fierce people, and they even coerce and bully the gentry and scholars. It’s also becoming less and less respected.”
Mao Qide replied.
As Mao Qide said, from the first year of Wanli to the present, the Ming Dynasty has been reforming for more than ten years, and has deepened to the point of changing etiquette and laws, and clearly uses the national policy of external expansion to gain foreign profits to benefit the people and enrich the country. Therefore, even if the powerful bureaucrats are in the distribution system The government still took most of the increased cake, but it was inevitable that the people's income would also increase through various direct and indirect methods.
After people have money, especially when there is no pressure to survive, they will actively pursue the quality of life, and also pursue respect and freedom in personality, and even more power.
The same goes for the common people, so by now in the Ming Dynasty, individualism has begun to appear.
Because a large number of common people have copper coins on their bodies, they will pay more attention to themselves, pay more attention to enjoyment, and are more willing to consume and buy all kinds of good goods to satisfy themselves. They are also more willing to read, pay attention to society, and improve their understanding of the world. Officials no longer have any fear.
In addition, the trend of reading has indeed become more popular, and people are more willing to spend more money on themselves and their children.
The same was true for the people of the Ming Dynasty, especially in the Jiangnan area. A large number of common people's children were studying. Not only men were studying, but even women were beginning to study.
Because the large-scale textile industry and pad-dyeing industry have emerged, a large number of female weavers have changed from home-based production to factory-based production, and the emergence of better textile machines requires female weavers to have a certain amount of literacy. Easy to manage.
Therefore, schools have sprung up like mushrooms after a rain, and private schools for girls have begun to appear.
Lu Shude was also on a high building, and through the rain curtain, he saw an old layman teaching many girls to read. For a moment, he didn't know whether he should be happy or worried.
originally.
He was happy to see more and more people reading, but he couldn't help but wonder if more and more people read, maybe scholars would become less and less worthy of being respected.
A kind of contradictory psychology spread in Lu Shude's heart, just like he supported the restructuring but could not see the reformists such as Shen Shixing becoming more and more arrogant, so that the Yanguan did not even dare to hear what he said casually. Anyone found to be false will be punished.
certainly.
Lu Shude is not the only one who has conflicts between officials and gentry.
Many wealthy gentry families are still enjoying most of the benefits brought by the New Deal reforms by taking advantage of their families' advantages in knowledge and connections, but they also feel conflicted because the New Deal increasingly challenges their old privileges and status. I don’t know whether to criticize the court verbally or to praise him.
Most of the time, they can only compromise, saying coquettishly that the emperor is wise and good at governing, while at the same time angrily smearing only individual officials. In the end, they become anti-power ministers rather than anti-emperor, and anti-specific policies, but No longer denying the entire direction of restructuring.
In any case, the increase in people's income has indeed promoted the expansion of the domestic demand market.
Moreover, the Qing army's hookup with the army actually promoted people's consumption, which was a blessing in disguise for the entire Ming Dynasty.
Therefore, this directly leads to a surge in demand for industrial products.
In particular, industries such as cotton processing, ceramic smelting, agricultural tools, vehicles, clocks and other equipment manufacturing, and mineral development.
Because the common people need industrial products, while the nobles need handicrafts even more. After all, handicrafts can show nobility better.
Therefore, industrial products can bring about mass production, which in turn leads to the emergence of industrialization.
Because crafts require craftsmen with artistic talent, and the nobles prefer to spend more money on limited edition crafts, what they pursue is to be unique, so even if the crafts technology is exquisite, it is difficult to mass-produce them.
It can be said.
The prerequisite for industrialization is that there must be a large consumer group, which must be able to afford the sales of cheap goods produced in batches.
But now, because the reforms in the early years of Wanli have not been interrupted and have been deepening, and benefiting the people has always been as important as enriching the country and strengthening the army, this has led to an increasing demand for industrial products among the people of the Ming Dynasty.
The Qing army's actions to disturb the people, which were not initiated by the central government, also acted as a catalyst, catalyzing people's consumption and increasing the demand for industrial products.
The surge in demand for industrial products also led to the transformation of handicrafts into industrialization.
"The order quantity for carriages yesterday increased by 30% compared with the day before, but we don't have enough craftsmen. Even if the processing money allows the craftsmen to stay up late to work, they still can't complete the order."
"Look, what should we do?"
Xu Minshi, who participated in the political affairs and was responsible for the official affairs of Yingtian Chief Secretary, specifically asked Sun Wei about this matter.
After hearing this, Sun Wei asked: "This is a question. What do you think?"
Xu Minshi thought for a while and said: "I have a way to recruit more young men who don't know the skills as apprentices, and let them do simple things with the old craftsmen first."
Sun Wei asked: "It is easy to leak secrets if there are too many people. The skills of our government-run car dealership are the new carriages developed by Shaozuka Prime Minister Shen Gong when Ren Yingtianfu was in charge. The best thing about it is that it will not change after the addition of our own smelted springs." Keep being so shaky! Once this secret is leaked, we may not be able to handle any private business."
"The official has also considered this!"
"We can completely let these young men only need part of the skills and be responsible for only part of the manufacturing. In this way, even if they want to leak it, they can only leak part of it. In the end, they will not be able to learn the key points. They may even not be allowed to learn the core parts. Only reliable officials and craftsmen should learn it."
Xu Minshi said.
After hearing this, Sun Wei jumped up and said, "This is a good idea. Then I will issue an order to recruit a group of young people as apprentices. This institute will also request an order to allow Yingtian to set up a government-run mechanical school."
Xu Minshi bowed his hands and said yes.
Therefore, due to the background of increasing demand for industrial products, in areas with developed commodity economies in the south of the Yangtze River, even government-run industries began to recruit people on a large scale to learn manufacturing techniques and strive to achieve larger batch production, and also came up with the idea of assembly line production.
After Zhu Yijun received Sun Wei's memorial, he was also very happy: "This Xu Minshi is flexible in thinking. He ordered the praise and responded to what Tianfu played."
(End of chapter)
