Chapter 42: The desperate situation in the eyes of the prince
The grief and anger in the prince's heart continued to burst out, and he said: "The current reform has aroused the attention of the scholar-bureaucrats all over the world. And my father was not very kind to the uncles in Huaixi. How could the death of Duke Han be hidden? Lin'an told me that one day she discovered that after Li Qi got up in the morning, his entire pillow was wet."
"The person who did this last time was Guangwu of the Han Dynasty. The Duke of Wei was getting weaker and weaker and could no longer go into battle. And the other noble families were all related by marriage to the vassal king. Even if I gathered military power, I might not be able to suppress this situation. I originally It is to rely on the world's scholar-officials to check and balance the Huaixi uncles. Now the Jiangnan scholar-officials keep silent and follow the road. How can this situation last long? The father has hollowed out the world. Now it is just the father's prestige that scares the world. I am a young person. But how can I have the prestige of my father?"
"The day my father dies, the world will be in chaos."
The prince was already in tears. Said: "Mother, if the child is unfilial, the world's children will not be safe. I really tried many ways. Kill He Xi to thank the world, but it is useless. Not to mention the theory that it is easy to kill He Xi today and He Xi tomorrow. It will become a banned book in the Ming Dynasty. I am afraid that other countries will imitate He Xi’s teachings and attack me. I, the Ming Dynasty, will become the laughingstock of the ages. And without He Xi’s teachings, how can we strengthen the country to control the vassal states?"
"If I don't kill him, how can I make the scholar-bureaucrats everywhere surrender? If the scholar-bureaucrats refuse to obey, I'm afraid I won't be able to get them out of Nanjing. If overseas vassal countries come to attack, I'm afraid the land south of the Yangtze River will be defeated by the wind."
"Neither the left nor the right. Zhang Du is still in the Ministry of Punishment destroying the scholar-officials? Does he think that the scholar-officials in the world are not rebellious enough?"
"I think my father will not stop until he burns books and humiliates scholars."
"Mother, why don't you advise my father to let the fourth child be the crown prince. I am incompetent. I really can't do this. I can't let the foundation of the Ming Dynasty go to waste."
This is the reason why Taizi's disease has never been good.
In the prince's view, the Ming Dynasty's crisis was brewing.
The first crisis is the second-generation crisis of the emerging dynasty.
After all, it was Zhu Yuanzhang who defeated the Great Tomorrow. Zhu Yuanzhang passed away. What would the Ming Dynasty be like without Zhu Yuanzhang? This in itself is a crisis.
After all, the Ming Dynasty was only more than twenty years old, and many ministers grew up in troubled times. For them, the existence of the Ming Dynasty was not natural. Even some people's loyalty to the Ming Dynasty is only meager.
If there is an opportunity, they would not mind competing for the highest power.
Even the second-generation monarchs of major dynasties will encounter this problem. Qin II did not solve this problem. Qin died. It was Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty who really solved this problem. As for Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty, Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty stabilized the Ming Dynasty under such circumstances as the nobles were domineering, the princes were powerful, and so on, and only then did the Ming Dynasty come into being.
Originally, Zhu Biao had to face only this crisis.
Honorable veteran general, king of the clan and vassal. Zhu's original idea was to rely on scholar-bureaucrats to check and balance both sides.
After all, after the experience of the Tang and Song Dynasties, scholars have become the backbone of Chinese society, with the support of scholars. The prince is sure to survive this crisis.
The second crisis is reform. Zhu Biao knows the so-called reform all too well. He Xi was talking about industrialization and capital society, but in the prince's view, it was actually one thing, which was to eradicate the scholar-official class as a whole and kill the scholar-officials who controlled the world's public opinion and academia.
This suddenly made the prince's original idea of relying on the support of scholar-bureaucrats to check and balance the clan nobles come to naught.
More importantly, as a result, the Ming court was basically gone.
When he succeeds to the throne, the prince has only three powers to rely on. First, the direct descendants of the Zhu family. Such as Nanjing Jingying, Jinyiwei, etc. This is no small force. After all, Zhu Yuanzhang came here from the rank of commoner. Even though there were many hills in the imperial court, the biggest hill was Zhu Yuanzhang himself.
Is this force powerful?
It is very powerful, with an army of more than one million, most of which are elite, and controls the central court. In most key positions, there are people the prince can trust.
But compared with the world, is it powerful?
It can be said that when Yuan Ting withdrew from the Central Plains, its strength was no smaller than this. But what was the result?
The second force is what He Xi calls the reform faction.
It is still a small seedling at this moment. Although it has some strength, especially in military production, it is far behind in other aspects.
The third force is the centrists, people whom the prince seems to be able to win over, such as certain people among the vassal kings and nobles. But the prince felt pessimistically that among the noble people in the world, there would not be many people on their side.
Not that the prince is not confident. As the prince said, Zhu Yuanzhang's restrictions on nobles were too strict, and there would be backlash.
As the son-in-law of the royal family, Li Qi should have been of one mind with the court, but Li Qi and the Ming court already had deep grudges. At the beginning, when Han Guangwu and Liu Xiu were in the Green Forest Army, Emperor Gengshi fell in love with his elder brother. Liu Xiu didn't show off at all in front of outsiders, but his pillow was wet every night. Finally I got a chance to go to Hebei alone, and from then on the sky was high and the sea was bright.
If there is no chance, Li Qi can only endure it, but if there is a chance. Li Qi was determined not to let it go.
Some people may think that just killing Li Qi will be enough.
But are there few people like Li Qi?
Among the nobles, there are too many. Zhu Yuanzhang was too strict with them. Even if there is no case of Li Shanchang and Lan Yu, there are still many nobles who have been prosecuted, their families are not safe, and they are reprimanded, idle, etc. It is even more commonplace.
Can you kill it?
The prince felt that after he ascended the throne, he must be kind to the world and appease the world in order to slowly solve these problems.
But Zhu Yuanzhang wanted to change the law.
To eradicate the largest scholar-bureaucrat class in the world is to dig its own foundation.
There are not many people who oppose it today. On the one hand, many people don't understand what the imperial court's reform means. If only to show favor to the mud-legged man. They actually don't care. Because of the management structure of the Ming Dynasty, it meant that they could not directly contact the people. They had to go through subordinate officials and scholar-bureaucrats to reach the people. As long as this structure remains unchanged, no matter what laws the court has, they have the final say.
It's just a matter of gust of wind.
On the other hand, Zhu Yuanzhang was in charge.
They dare not take the lead.
But once Zhu Yuanzhang left.
What will this world be like?
The foundation of Ming Dynasty is shaken, which is definitely not an empty talk.
He Xi can feel the storm in the future. The prince is in the most critical position of the Ming Dynasty. It can be said that all the situations of the Ming Dynasty cannot be hidden from the prince. It is normal that he sees it more clearly than He Xi.
It's just that Empress Ma never expected that this would be the case in the eyes of the prince today.
Empress Ma frowned, thought for a while, and said, "That's not true. Although I don't understand, I also know that everything in the world is for profit, and everything in the world is for profit. He Xi's method can only bring benefits to everyone. . There won’t be too many people who oppose it.”
The prince coughed twice and said: "Mother, who are you benefiting from? Whose benefit? Mother, you don't know. The number of private salt dealers executed this year is several times that of before. Their salt is all sold from Liaodong. That's all. .”
"All the salt in the world belongs to the imperial court. At worst, the imperial court will close all the salt fields. But what about the others? Because of the few ironworks, many people no longer have blacksmiths. Now we have to produce cloth, and men farm and women weave. Cloth is their only living money. Once the people's cloth cannot be sold, what kind of turmoil will happen."
"Just thinking about it gives me a headache."
"Let the Fourth Brother do it."
"Stop it." Empress Ma shouted sharply: "Do you have to kill the fourth child before you give up?"
The prince opened his mouth but said nothing.
Although he did not have this subjective intention, he also knew that if his words spread, King Yan would be in an extremely difficult situation. After all, Zhu Yuanzhang cannot touch the crown prince's position lightly. As for this reserve, even if the prince is willing to give up, many of the prince's followers will not give up.
In order to ensure their status, they will put King Yan to death.
This is to be expected.
