It was early September when Lin Yue returned to the capital. In the next more than half a year, he did not go to court to manage politics. Apart from asking about military intelligence and focusing on improving people's livelihood in detail, he did not take care of economic matters. However, as for the liquidation and aftermath of the Eunuch Party, it was left to Han Kuang, Cao Huachun and others.
His daily job is to dance with a group of young eunuchs who have just entered the palace, dance with swords, perform martial arts, ride horses and shoot, turning the harem into a school ground.
From time to time, he would also take his eunuch guards and some Tiqi from civilians in the Jinyi Guard to hunt in Yanshan, Eastern Suburbs and other places. Sometimes they would stay for four or five days. Cao Huachun and the servants arranged by the cabinet were not allowed to enter the hunting area. .
Many ministers thought that the emperor suddenly changed his gender, stopped playing with women, and changed his mind to riding horses and fighting games, because after more than half a year of training, he actually wanted to use this force composed of eunuchs and some royal guards to fight with the four guards battalion guarding the capital. Teach superiors and inferiors.
Some officials thought he was joking. Jinyiwei's Tiqi might have some abilities, but those eunuchs... were capable of fighting.
Of course, if you want to criticize me, if you want to try your best to dissuade me... no one really does it. It's just a few people in the cabinet who pretend to be admonished a few times.
First, the emperor overthrew Wei Zhongxian and reversed the verdict of the Donglin Party. Many officials applauded this. After all, the Eunuch Party had only been in power for a few years, and the civil service group with the Donglin Party and other parties as its backbone could be said to be deeply rooted in the entire court. , ranging from the cabinet to local officials, and even the big landowners and businessmen in the economic field, are all part of them. With the cabinet and Cao Huachun in charge, the emperor can have fun if he wants.
Second, after the military police battalion built with eunuchs and royal guards as its backbone lost to the four-guard battalion, it could make the emperor realize his own shortcomings, give up on military training, and stop dictating the situation in Liaodong all day long.
Third, once the military police battalion lost and the emperor's authority was damaged, and Cui Chengxiu died, the newly appointed Minister of War could use this as an opportunity to erode the emperor's military power.
What surprised many people was that in the spring of the second year of Chongzhen, the 2,000 elites selected by the Fourth Guards Battalion were completely defeated in the Yanshan area. As a result, the Military Police Battalion became famous. Han Kuang and others praised it on the surface, but felt very unhappy in their hearts. As for officials who did not know the inside story, they thought The main reason why the military police battalion with the weird name won was because the military attachés of the Fourth Guard Battalion let go. After all, once they defeated the emperor, they might be resented and life in the future would definitely be difficult.
In addition to building a nondescript gendarmerie camp, the emperor also had two major hobbies. The first was to be a teacher.
After recruiting hundreds of young martial arts eunuchs, he gathered the eunuchs who had entered the palace in the past two years and played the role of teacher to teach them how to read and write.
You say he plays role-playing, just role-playing, but what he teaches is not the Four Books and Five Classics. What is he teaching? Mathematics, geography, biology, science...
The key is that he wrote this kind of unheard of and unseen books himself, and ordered the imperial eunuch to print them into books and send them to the young eunuchs in the school. He also took exams. Those who excelled in the small exams were given bonuses, silver and silk, and those who excelled in the major exams were given. For official positions, in the later period, the 24 yamen officials were even ordered to accept the assessment together with the secretaries, directors, writers, supervisors and other managers. If there is a big gap between them and the newcomers, I'm sorry, please step down and make way for the next one.
This made the inner court a mess, and the old eunuchs complained, but they couldn't afford to make trouble. Firstly, the affairs in the palace were the emperor's family affairs. Secondly, there were hundreds of young eunuchs who wielded swords and guns every day. Dare you say anything? Anyone who was illiterate was flogged to death by the Duhuanyi Bureau. Even Cao Huachun couldn't hold on. He was in fear every day, fearing that his subordinates would find trouble for him... After a boss of Shangshan Supervisor was reprimanded by Wang Chengen for refusing to study, he drank in private. He drank wine and threatened to add spices to the imperial meal, but he was found dead in the moat the next day with twenty-seven stab wounds. Then there was an earthquake in the Shangshan Prison, and the meals sent to the inner court would go through seven inspections.
"Zhu Youjian" was messing around in the palace, and it was difficult for the civil and military officials to say anything, because the eunuchs and maids were domestic slaves, and the emperor's affairs were all family matters. Outsiders could only criticize a few words or try to persuade the emperor tactfully, but the emperor would not listen. What's more, after eight years of chaos and chaos by the eunuchs, the court officials hated those eunuchs who came from humble origins, had incomplete bodies, and relied on their imperial power to dominate and oppress the literati.
Another hobby of "Zhu Youjian" is tool making. His brother is a senior carpenter. He shuts himself in the house every day and makes a bunch of works of art. The new emperor's true colors were revealed less than two years after he came to the throne. However, he was not interested in wood products, but was interested in firearms. One day, he sent a drawing to the eunuch of the Military War Bureau, with a blunderbuss drawn on it, but it was different from the previous one. Unlike other muskets, it has a trigger.
The emperor's order was to first make a sample according to the drawings and show it to him. If the effect was good, he would have a better idea.
The palm print eunuch could only follow the instructions and take the drawings to the Gunpowder Department to find a craftsman to turn the things on the drawings into cash.
Within two days, the emperor came again. He wanted to observe the power of the Fran cannon and the Tiger squat cannon. He left without saying anything. A few days later, he loaded the cannon with several things marked with scales, and then , according to the calibration method he said, the shooting accuracy has been visibly improved...
…
The emperor's fussing reached its climax in the summer, because he suddenly became diligent in his duties. He went to court every day from once every three to five days. The result of going to court every day was that he was no longer limited to tossing the harem, he began to torment the courtiers, or A cheese that moved many people.
First, significantly weakening the status of civilian officials to improve the treatment of generals--especially generals who have fought in wars--it is a national policy to annihilate the Liaodong Tatars and stabilize the Ming Dynasty.
Second, reform the current imperial examination system and set up the post of academic supervisor in each state capital, which will be held by the eunuch of the newly established 25th Yamen Boxue Supervisor in the palace. The purpose is to direct local academic affairs, increase education investment and school construction, and at the same time, The books he compiled on mathematics, physics, biology, etc. were widely promoted, reducing the proportion of eight-part essays in the imperial examinations, and gradually including mathematics, physics, and biology in the examination scope.
Third, increase investment in firearms research and the scale of Shenji Camp, and fully develop the foundry industry.
Fourth, abolish the rule that those with meritorious status pay no or less food, and impose gradient taxes, as well as those engaged in business. At the same time, a statistics department was established in the Ministry of Household Affairs to collect and summarize economic data from various regions.
…
There are many similar reforms.
Taking the first point as an example, the current situation of strong civil society and weak military forces is likely to be changed. The second article is even more serious. Reforming the imperial examination system and local academic affairs is equivalent to inserting a nail into the official system controlled by civil servants. Connected with what the master does in the harem, the old man in the officialdom may not have an easy life in the future.
As soon as the reform regulations came out, the government and the public were shocked and in an uproar.
Everyone was complaining and unhappy. Finally, the civil servant's dissatisfaction exploded because of one thing.
At the beginning of July, Lin Yue issued an order to summon Ding Baiying to the palace, and she was given the title of Imperial Concubine, with the honorific title of Concubine Wu.
At that time, rumors leaked out that the current saint had poor moral character. He often stayed overnight in the palaces of empress Yi'an, Concubine Duan Chun, Concubine Ren Rong and other late emperors' concubines, and even had an affair with Concubine Zhou Wen's sister, Mrs. Zhaoyi. Having a new concubine before the end of the year is really too much.
On this day, Lin Yue received two memorials in the morning. They were written by cabinet members Qian Longxi and Zhu Guozhen. They wrote hundreds of words eloquently, ranging from ancestral rules to etiquette for the emperor, and proving that Nadine Baiying was the imperial concubine. It was out of consideration, I hope he will think twice.
Lin Yue smiled after reading it, threw the two memorials on the ground, and got up from the throne.
"My concubine dares to make irresponsible remarks. Is there anything you dare not do?"
Zhu Guozhen and Qian Longxi quickly came out of the crowd and knelt on the ground, as if they were admitting their mistakes and asking for forgiveness.
Manchao Wenwu remained silent and just looked at him from the corner of his eyes.
Lin Yue snorted coldly: "Have you been dissatisfied with me for a long time?"
With these words, the expressions of all the ministers below changed drastically. They all knelt down and shouted "I don't dare" in unison.
Lin Yue ignored them: "I have some breaking news for you. There are rumors spreading outside the Forbidden City that I am an impostor wearing a human skin mask."
One sentence caused the following to explode.
But it's not a matter of outward appearance, it's a matter of heart. Some people are frightened, some are uneasy, some remain calm, and some are secretly gloating about the misfortune. No one thought that these words would reach his ears, and he even brought it up to the morning to tell him. What was he going to do?
Since the emperor's disfigurement, his behavior has been very different from before, which makes people suspicious.
"Do you know where the rumor came from?"
No one spoke, no one dared to speak.
Lin Yue looked at the group of old dogs in the audience and sneered: "Don't know? Well, I'll tell you where the rumors came from."
