Prince Zhu Changzhen, who was sitting in front of Qian Menggao, heard what he said and said, "Master Qian, what you said is wrong!"
Qian Menggao was slightly startled.
"If the king dares to ignore the dignity of the life of one common man today, he will dare to ignore the dignity of the life of a hundred thousand common men tomorrow, and even the people of the world in the future."
Zhu Changjun continued to explain his views at this time.
He was deeply taught by Zhu Yijun's words and deeds in the past, and he developed a character that dared to question his teacher.
Qian Menggao had no choice but to say yes, and then honestly told Zhu Changjun about the Four Books.
When the lecture was over, Qian Menggao came to the official residence of the Chief Fu and met Shen Shixing: "Yuan Fu."
"How about I ask you to test His Highness? Can you tell whether His Highness is wise or not?"
Shen Shixing asked.
Qian Menggao smiled and said: "You are smart enough to think proactively!"
Shen Shixing nodded: "Your Majesty's guidance is good."
Qian Menggao echoed: "That's what Yuan Fu said."
Then, Shen Shixing walked into the study room and gave Qian Menggao the newly printed book that still smelled of ink: "This is a new textbook compiled by several Hanlin Academy officials based on the original textbooks used by Xingming Academy. Currently, only three subjects have been re-edited, namely Chinese Literature, Arithmetic, and National History. In Chinese Language, we have selected the opinions of various representatives of various schools of thought and articles, poems, songs, and poems by great literati of the past dynasties. The textbook does not praise or criticize the opinions and works, but only explains them clearly. The meaning is then allowed to be understood by oneself; the same is true for arithmetic. In addition, history has selected the most heart-wrenching historical events in history, such as Wei Huoping to defeat the Huns, pharmacists to destroy the Turks, and Wu Mu to fight against the Golden Cavalry; and the most heartbreaking historical tragedies, Such as the Five Husbands’ Rebellion in China, the Rebellion of the Five Dynasties, the Disgrace of Jingkang, etc.”
"According to the imperial edict, this will be the teaching material that you will study as the prince next. You will all follow this teaching when talking about officials. You are responsible for the Chinese language."
Shen Shixing said at this time.
Qian Menggao looked stunned after hearing this, and then took the textbook.
"This textbook does not preach. It only allows His Highness to perceive the greatness and shortcomings of China from the context and heroic stories. This is to train Your Highness in a new way. It seems to have no purpose, but in fact it has a purpose. The purpose is to let Your Highness Generate thinking, and then generate knowledge. Once this happens, in the future, even if you are not a master, you will also be a saint!"
"Shenwu County teaches the prince like this, simply to make the prince become a powerful king again. It is still difficult to separate the master and the saint!"
When Gu Xiancheng met with Yingtian Xunzong Du Ruoqi, he also received a letter from Qian Menggao. From Qian Menggao's letter, he learned that Zhu Yijun and Shen Shixing were directly compiling new teaching materials to prevent the prince from being taught bad things. He asked the officials in the East Palace to teach the prince according to the textbooks, and because of this he started to complain about Du Ruoqi.
Du Ruoqi also slapped the table angrily and stood up and said: "The saints have already clearly written down the principles of the human world. How can we, today, be so virtuous that we can compile our own teaching materials instead of classics? And it is not written with the words of a saint. , it only presents stories of advocacy without any criticism, which is equivalent to allowing His Highness to grow freely. If Your Highness becomes crooked because of this, are they worthy of our ancestors, the emperor, and the world?!"
As Du Ruoqi spoke, he spread his hands and looked at Gu Xiancheng.
"The matter has come to this, there is nothing we can do!"
Gu Xiancheng said with a wry smile, and then said: "But you don't need to worry too much about this matter. Although Your Highness is smart, it is a general trend that people in the world want to protect the old rituals and orthodoxy. Even if the prince is like this, it will be difficult to reverse the trend." .”
As he spoke, Gu Xiancheng pointed to the scholars who were already standing outside the courtyard and said to Du Ruoqi: "Look, sir, these are all people who came to my Donglin to listen to the lectures in the name of Duke Mu. This shows that they, like the Duke, want to be more conservative." The etiquette is orthodox, and they are the bureaucrats who will form the entire temple in the future. No matter how powerful your highness is, you cannot completely deviate from them. The reason for this is that the candidates in the examination room are still mainly the children of officials like us, and their exams are Officials are also members of our official ranks. It’s okay for a man to have one or two fish leap over the dragon’s gate, but who would really want to let most of them become nobles?”
“Therefore, we still don’t know who will be the master of new and old rituals in the future!”
Du Ruojia nodded: "Then let's start lecturing. The New Party teaches the prince, we teach the gentry, and leave all the affairs to the next generation!"
Gu Xiancheng said: "Exactly!"
As soon as Du Ruojia and Gu Xiancheng came out, the scholars who came to listen to the lecture all raised their hands and bowed: "Mr. Donglin, Mr. Self-Examination!"
After Gu Xiancheng founded Donglin Hall, many scholar-bureaucrats who lived in the countryside gradually came here to find their own kind, so as to complain and complain.
As a result, Gu Xiancheng quickly gained the title of "Mr. Donglin".
"Thanks to the invitation of Mr. Dong Lin, I am here today to show off to all the talented people. In my opinion, as a human being, one must first value morality. If morality is not correct, nothing can be accomplished..."
Du Ruojia also said this at this time, and began to explain his ideas to these scholars.
Time flies, and unknowingly it has arrived in August of the 16th year of Wanli, and the provincial examinations in all provinces of the Ming Dynasty have just ended.
Yingtian's chief examiner Zuo Zhongyun Min Shouzheng has been locked in the Gongyuan to review the recommendation papers for each room.
However, when he reviewed the papers, he did not read the contents of the articles. Instead, he silently counted the number of "z" characters that appeared in each article.
Min Shou nodded after finishing counting, and then he read the article seriously. After leaving the tribute courtyard, he said to Yang Yingkui:
"Many of the articles in The Officials' Disciples are really not elegant. I ruthlessly deposed some of them to give them a better memory, so as not to look bad in the future. Most of the beautiful articles written by the descendants of the officials are not on the list, but as a result, the articles written by the Officials' Disciples are too many. , I really hope that the officials’ children can study more diligently.”
"I am going to ask the emperor to issue an edict to make the world's academic inspectors stricter. We cannot allow the officials' children to be idle and degenerate, blindly not taking their careers seriously."
Yang Yingkui therefore replied.
But in October, when the results of the Yingtianfu Township Examination were released, as Gu Xiancheng expected, most of the Chinese-style candidates were still the children of famous officials.
"Failed again."
"My family raised me for nothing again."
"How come Master Pan, who often visited brothels in school and didn't even know that Tang Yin had won the Jie Yuan, actually won the Ya Yuan?!"
Many poor students still felt extremely disappointed when they saw the results, and started complaining one after another.
Bo Chen Tongwen, the former ceremonial official of Yingtian Mansion and now the recorder of the Gongyuan Courtyard who is responsible for collecting and processing the scrolls, saw that his son was also not successful, so he had an extra thought and took advantage of his position to not process the scrolls but to He took it home and read it all night, and then he discovered the clues in it and told his son about it.
However, Chen Tongwen did not intend to report this matter to the informant box of the inn. Instead, he went to Min Shouzheng and said: "I discovered your secret. If my son is not included in the supplementary record, you will Don’t even think about it!”
It turns out that after Zhu Yijun came to the throne, he repeatedly issued edicts to recruit candidates, so there was a situation where he would be supplemented after the results of each imperial examination were released, in order to avoid wasting time because the next increase in quotas would take one or three years. , we might as well re-enroll after a period of time. It’s just that there aren’t many places for re-enrollment, but the gold content is the same.
Chen Tongwen now wanted to use this to threaten Min Shouzheng.
Min Shouzheng smiled slightly after hearing this: "Okay, don't worry, but how did you find out?"
Chen Tongwen told Min Shouzheng the reason for his discovery.
Min Shouzheng didn't say anything after hearing this and just let him go home.
But that night, Chen Tongwen's house suffered a fire.
As soon as Chen Tongwen ran out, he stabbed a man in the chest who rushed towards him. The man whispered to him: "Our master asked me to tell you, you humble subordinates, according to the ancestral teachings of Taizu, You are not worthy of being an official or taking the imperial examination! How dare you threaten an official? You are simply not worthy of being a human being!"
(End of chapter)
