The light released by the burning oil lamp was still carelessly leaning towards Emperor Liu's face. Emperor Liu's breath in the shadows became much thicker, and Yan Tuo's heart trembled.
After observing for a while, he tentatively said: "Please calm down the officials and take care of yourself! It seems that these ungrateful and lawless people only want to punish others in order to set an example, but it is really not worth worrying about..."
Yantuo's consolation seemed to have some effect. Emperor Liu glanced at him, pondered for a while, and then said: "How many people in the world are there in the world who are like Kang Baozhen?"
"I don't know." Yantuo had been trained out of his shadow by Emperor Liu, so he didn't say much even when asked directly.
"Is it because I don't know, or because I don't want to tell you?"
"I don't dare!" Yantuo hesitated for a moment. Seeing the old emperor's face darkening and worsening, he still hesitated and said: "From my perspective, Kang Baozhen may be the only one. After all, he is willing to spend 100,000 yuan. Guan, and the Kang family is such a wealthy family, which directly affects the Heavenly Officials and Ministers to organize for them. There are only a few people in the world who can do this..."
Yan Tuo knew in his heart that if Emperor Liu listened to what he said, the fate of the Kang family and his son might be even more miserable, and even the entire Kang family might not have a good outcome. After all, one of them died just a few days ago. Uncle Hechuan.
Sure enough, Emperor Liu said in a solemn tone: "A small businessman, relying on some bad money, dares to reach inside the imperial court and interfere with the promotion and selection of imperial officials. How can we tolerate this kind of people?"
Yantuo didn't dare to answer these words. There was silence at the imperial desk for a while, and Emperor Liu murmured softly, "Using money for personal gain has its limitations after all, but what about those who use power for personal gain?"
Obviously, Emperor Liu was more concerned about this case than just the issues presented on the surface. He was very good at making connections. However, it is very common to use power for personal gain, and Emperor Liu has long been used to it. It is just a subconscious behavior for him to use an excuse to launch another rectification campaign.
What Emperor Liu thought more deeply about was the current evaluation standards and promotion channels for officials. Except for the matter of Kang Baozhen, Emperor Liu could not help but think about the system itself.
Emperor Liu has always advocated meritocracy in terms of employment standards. To this end, he has constantly added patches, revised methods, and improved the court's selection system for military and political talents.
If in the early days, I practiced this with certain ideals and ambitions, then as I sat in the position of emperor for a long time, my understanding of the world deepened, and my understanding of the current rules for the operation of society increased. Deeply involved and even dominant, Emperor Liu's goals are constantly changing, his original intention has long been deviated, and the bottom line and lower limit are constantly being lowered.
As early as more than 20 years ago, what Emperor Liu did was no longer for the sake of fairness. The fundamental purpose of all measures was to consolidate imperial power and maintain rule. The improvement of various systems for the selection and appointment of officials, assessment and promotion was just The desired effect is to restrict an overly concentrated political force and solidified class factions through means.
However, things often backfire, especially in governing the country. Either new contradictions replace old problems, or good scriptures are distorted. This has been fully reflected in Emperor Liu's decades of administrative career. Basically, it can be said that what he implemented No policy develops exactly as he expected, and no decree can achieve a perfect result.
On a deeper level, the Kang Baozhen case was another slap in the face to Emperor Liu's policies and a reminder, which was specifically reflected in the way officials were selected and promoted.
In this regard, Emperor Liu has always practiced diversified selection channels and a fair promotion assessment system. After decades of development, the Han Dynasty had already formed a complete system for the selection and promotion of officials. The original intention of building this system is to avoid class solidification as much as possible, and while satisfying the interests of the upper class elites, try to give the lower class ordinary people the needs and space for advancement.
In the early years, the effect was very good. There were many wise men and women in the Han court, including many capable officials from common people and even commoners. But as time went by, the situation gradually changed, and the upper class of the Han Dynasty, including the highly mobile bureaucratic class, inevitably became solidified.
If ordinary people want to become an official, the difficulty will increase exponentially, and the competitive pressure will also increase unprecedentedly. Now that I think about it, the initial surge of talents and so many gratifying examples of "carp jumping over the dragon's gate" were mainly due to the general environment. In the early days, there was an overall lack of talents both inside and outside the court. Anyone with skills could be employed within the system. They can find a position and get an appointment, but once the hunger for talent is solved and the bureaucratic class system belonging to the Han Dynasty is perfected, ordinary people will be shut out if they want to get in.
At present, in the Han Dynasty, if you want to become an official, it is much more difficult than the public examination in the previous life. The public examination is fiercely competitive and difficult, but at least there is still the possibility of hard work and basic fairness. In the Han Dynasty, it is even greater. , but after working hard to the end, I found that there were no more steps to climb.
Not to mention anything else, just one practical matter that accounts for an increasingly important part of the scientific examination questions can block 90% of the scholars in the world. After all, ordinary scholars have no opportunity to practice. Those who have experience in officialdom are just blank for most scholars.
In the early years, scholars could enrich their experience and hone their talents by studying and working in local government offices. At that time, for some noble people, it was simply a matter of sacrificing their ambitions.
But now, even being an official is not something you can just do if you want to. The world is at peace, society is stable, education has been restored, and the number of academic talents has already formed a surge after decades of accumulation. Under such circumstances, even for local government, there is no shortage of talents to serve as civil servants. In fact, officials have to rush to get them, and this has gradually developed into the highest threshold for an ordinary person to enter the official career. .
In the past, Emperor Liu's advocacy of emphasizing practice caused a lot of criticism. For many traditional scholars, such changes were almost unacceptable. However, as time went by, more and more people began to support and defend this article, and the reason was still based on Emperor Liu's practical theory.
Under this surface, the more important reason is that the vested interests have discovered that the practical examination is simply tailor-made for people like them. For the powerful, their children are definitely inferior in terms of knowledge and experience. The only way to defeat ordinary students is to take the practical test. The son of a bureaucrat is more likely to go on to become a bureaucrat.
It was precisely because Emperor Liu discovered this sign during subsequent observations that he gave ordinary officials the opportunity to be directly promoted to the official position in the subsequent promotion regulations. Every year, there is an indicator in the promotion list of the Ministry of Officials.
However, this also has a premise. You must be an official, and you must have outstanding abilities and excellent results, otherwise everything is still empty talk. And Kang Baozhen took the same path of being transferred from official to official. If they could be more delicate, more patient, and not too ugly, even the Imperial City and Wude would not be able to detect it easily.
Emperor Liu's "idealistic" consideration led to the birth of a new "nine-grade Zhongzheng system" in the Han Dynasty, and this system is much smarter than the theory of family background. After all, isn't it correct to "evaluate people based on their talents"? , isn’t it fair? This principle can be justified and justified wherever it is put.
Emperor Liu was not unaware of these, but on the one hand he was unwilling to slap himself in the face, and on the other hand he had no reason to correct them. Compared with the solidification of classes that had already occurred, he did not want the emergence of some nerds who would only follow the words of saints.
For the current Shilin, their life is to a certain extent even more difficult than the troubled times of the three generations. At that time, they could still look forward to the birth of the Holy Lord and bring order to the chaos. Now, as Emperor Liu has been in power longer and longer, they and others are facing The country's influence is also declining.
For the wealthy gentry, it is not that difficult to enter the imperial court than for ordinary people, but first they have to correct their thoughts and make compromises. This is also the final choice of many people. After the compromise, they will taste the sweetness. Deadly maintenance.
At the same time, Emperor Liu also had a mentality of breaking the pot and breaking it. If he wanted to solidify it, he should solidify it thoroughly. It was best to ensure that the throne of his Liu family could be passed on for a long time.
In this regard, Emperor Liu was sometimes confident. At least in his opinion, as long as the current system of the Han Dynasty could be maintained for a long time, the country of the Han Dynasty would be able to continue.
After all, after the awareness of "practice first" has been continuously strengthened and promoted, the bureaucrats of the Han Dynasty, whether they are aristocratic bureaucrats or common people bureaucrats, no matter how many deep-rooted problems they have, at least in terms of exploiting the common people, they will be smarter and more capable. The means are also longer lasting.
