Chapter 35 Qide’s transformation
Zhu Yunwen's judgment on Qide was correct.
Zied still had an alternative.
It's just that Zid didn't approve of his method very much, and even felt ashamed. He said: "I'm ashamed, but now there is only one way. That is to acquiesce to the current situation. Maintain peace with the Northern pirates at sea."
After Zhu Yunwen heard what Qi De said, he was furious and said: "This is the reason why the Fujian Navy has not launched an attack during this period. If I don't ask, you will never be prepared to say anything. I don't think the Fujian Navy is cowardly." Fight, but you are too timid to fight."
Zhu Yunwen had already made mental preparations, but he never expected that the people below would actually reach this point.
Yes, Zhu Yunwen understood it as soon as he thought about it.
Although this strategy was not told to him, it was already being implemented. After all, there have been no major battles at sea in the past two months.
Zhu Yunwen thought that the people below were gathering strength, after all, they had failed the first two times. He never expected that the people below were not prepared to fight. Another unexpected thing is that he may very well be the last to know about this matter. .
How could this not make Zhu Yunwen furious?
Zhu Yunwen originally thought that the world situation was passive enough. Now he realized something was wrong. In fact, the situation was even worse than he imagined.
Qi De said: "Your Majesty, I don't dare to deceive Your Majesty. In fact, I am planning to fight a third time. But there is a lot of resistance from all aspects. I am also considering some things. Even if Your Majesty does not ask, I still have to report them. It's just that I am considering some things. There are a lot of things going on now. Your Majesty has not seen the memorial from me yet."
Zhu Yunwen looked at Qi De and secretly let out a breath.
He just felt like there was a big net in the world. He seemed to be in control of this big net, but he didn't know if he was controlled by this big net.
Zhu Yunwen understands more and more that there are many things that he cannot control himself.
It's easy to lose his temper with Zide, it's easy to replace him, and it's not difficult to kill him, but will the one he replaced work? After all, Qi De was a minister who came up in the late Hongwu period. Even Zhu Yuanzhang had a good evaluation of Qi De.
He can be regarded as a minister who has made great achievements in military affairs among civil servants.
Such ministers are rare.
Zhu Yunwen thought to himself: "Don't be hasty and be patient. Be careful and be patient." He suppressed the anger in his heart. He didn't believe a word of Qi De's explanation. But he just had to use Zied.
Zhu Yunwen said: "I will give you a chance to tell you your reasons."
Zide said: "Many people came to persuade me not to do too much. There are many people here that I have to consider. These people are doing maritime business. If the war between the two sides escalates, the maritime trade route will be cut off. .”
Zhu Yunwen sneered and said, "That's it? Mr. Qi is also in cahoots with these people."
Zhu Yunwen knew that these people were a powerful force, but Zhu Yunwen did not think that this was a reason for Qi De to give in. After all, Qi De was not a weak person, nor was he someone who could be bribed.
If Zied was so weak, he wouldn't be in his current position.
Zide is essentially a member of the hard-line faction between civilian officials and military generals, but under the current situation, Zide does not dare to say something inappropriate. But he's doing it.
In Qi De's view, martial arts power must be under the management of the imperial court. The so-called imperial court is the civil service group. The Fifth Army Governor's Mansion does not seem to be a government office of the imperial court.
What kind of situation will this face? It is not surprising that one day Qi De will be killed all over the house. Qi De still did not change his original intention.
How could you give in so easily?
Qi De said: "Your Majesty, sir, does your Majesty know the importance of customs taxes among the expenditures of the Ministry of Household Affairs?"
Zhu Yunwen was stunned and said, "How important is it?"
Zide said: "The Household Department must have a customs bank account."
"I don't know the specific expenses of the Ministry of Revenue, but I know that the fierce war this year has been very difficult for the Ministry of Revenue, and the customs tax is nearly ten million taels, which is one of the pillars of the imperial court. Once the war breaks out, the customs tax will be much less, or even Almost none."
"Is this the imperial court?
Acceptable. "
"I can only put the overall situation first."
Zhu Yunwen was silent for a while and thought to himself: "Has the situation in Hube been so difficult?"
It's not that Zhu Yunwen didn't know that the household department was in difficulty.
But a war?
It's normal to be a little tougher.
Even looking at the Ming Dynasty taxation alone, the total amount has increased in the two years between the 28th year of Hongwu and the first year of Jianwen. Especially this year, Nanjing's taxation has even reached the amount of the Hongwu year. This is actually quite remarkable.
After all, compared with the Hongwu years, there are fewer taxes in Hebei, Liaodong and other places.
In Zhu Yunwen's view, it is already very impressive.
Isn’t that enough to fight?
However, Zhu Yunwen was not prepared to ask Qi De this question.
After all, Zied doesn't care about this.
He was going to ask Fang Xiaoru.
Zhu Yunwen asked: "Do we have to maintain the current situation?"
Qi De said: "Of course not. I plan to build a shipyard in Guangdong, build large ships and build an iron factory. In the future, when the ships are stronger and the guns are stronger, the situation will be restored. The current situation is not what He Xi learned, and it is not enough to restore the situation. Still. Your Majesty, please take a closer look at this."
Zide said something and thought about it for a long time.
As I said before, many civil servants are not so disgusted with He Xi's theory.
Zied is one of them.
Qi De's theory on He Xi is contradictory.
Qi De was an official and a Xunli. Although he was a Confucian scholar, he could not be considered a Confucian official. He is a typical pragmatist. At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, there were actually many such pragmatists. They don't talk about doctrines or scriptures, they just look at whether things can be done well.
A theoretical method that can get things done well is a good method and a good theory.
Of course, there are some attacks induced by heaven and humans in He Xi's theory. Cancel the preferential treatment for scholar-bureaucrats and so on. Zied was just uncomfortable. Zied didn't mind implementing it if it worked.
In essence, Zide's background was that of a bureaucrat, not a scholar-official.
He is not entirely on the side of the scholar-bureaucrats, but he just hates changes that are not within his control.
Now, Qide is directly facing the pressure from the Northern Navy. The only way he can think of is to copy some of Beijing's policies one-to-one. He based everything in Guangdong. It’s also thoughtful. On the one hand, it was placed on the southeast coast. He was worried about attacks by the Northern Army navy.
He understood very well that it was not that the Northern Army could not reach the coast, but that it did not want to fight.
It's just that the situation can change at any time.
On the other hand, Foshan, Guangdong itself has an iron smelting foundation. In his opinion, it can be used.
Importing iron ore and timber from Guangxi and smelting it in Foshan is only an advantage of Foshan. At the same time, large timber from Guangxi can also be transported by water. There is indeed a shortage of qualified timber along the southeastern coast, but this does not mean that only the Northeast in the world has large timber. .
The large trees in the southwest are also very famous, but they are difficult to transport.
The golden nanmu from the southwest is transported from the southwest with human lives. But Guangxi is different. Guangdong's water system has a pattern of three rivers flowing back to the sea. It is not difficult to transport Guangxi heavy wood from Guangxi to Guangdong.
In Qide's view, these favorable conditions are enough for him to establish a situation in Guangdong that is inferior to Liaodong.
It's a pity that Zide still doesn't understand the advantages of coal over wood. It is not impossible to use large amounts of wood instead of coal. It’s just that the cost will be too high. Officials, however, are not inherently cost-conscious.
However, the most important sentence in Qi De's words is his admiration for He Xi's theory.
Zied took a big risk with this statement.
Qi De's current ideological change is partly due to Qi De's discovery that it would be difficult to deal with Beijing without learning from He Xi's doctrine. The battlefield is the fairest arena. If you can do it, you can do it. If you can't, you can't. It is impossible to cheat.
On the other hand, Qi De silently agreed with the idea that public opinion replaced God's will.
After all, he was
In essence, I don’t really care too much about the connection between heaven and humans. It's just that this is tradition, used to check and balance the emperor and unite the people's hearts. Since He Xi has an alternative plan, it seems that we can look forward to it.
Qi De's words also had a great impact on Zhu Yunwen.
Like Qi De, Zhu Yunwen was not a believer in that theory. Even Qi De's words reminded Zhu Yunwen a lot. For example, Zhu Yuanzhang’s confession back then.
