Looking at his meaningful eyes, Wang Qiong was thoughtful.
If there is anyone in the current cabinet who is not of the same mind as Yang Tinghe, it is only Liang Chu who served as the chief minister during the periods of Yang Ting and Ding You.
Liang Chu, who had accompanied Emperor Zhengde in his expedition south to conquer King Ning, also had stains related to his ministers and ministers.
Wang Qiong also knew that in Guangzhou Prefecture, the hometown of Liang Chu, the Liang family had a lot of reputation and had committed many crimes.
The cabinet is about to expand, but it won't suddenly reach six or seven people, right?
Could it be that Liang Chu has received some news, and Yang Ting and others want to squeeze Liang Chu out first?
Unlike the ups and downs on the civil servants' side, the military generals' side was much calmer.
Anyway, the power of the court has nothing to do with them. Now they barely become a class, just because of the ancestral system.
The third drum sounded, and the civil and military officials finally began to line up quickly in order of position.
Before dawn, the left and right doors in front were slowly opened.
Passing through the deep doorway, the Fengtian Gate, which is difficult to see in its entirety, appears vaguely in front, with not a single glazed tile reflecting the light of the rising sun.
Everything is like a new dynasty with an unclear tone at this moment. How will the Holy Will decide some things? On whom will the holy favor fall?
At this time, Zhu Houcong had already stood up from the Huagai Hall.
He was not sitting on the chariot. Behind him, Zhang Zuo and Huang Jin each held a box in their hands. Behind him, there were several eunuchs from the clerk's room carrying trays with many memorials in them.
After coming out of Fengtian Hall and going down the steps, Zhu Houcong walked to the west corner door on the right front.
The etiquette and rules were like this, and Zhu Houcong looked helplessly at the not-so-wide area over there.
In fact, he can go to court under the "eaves".
It sounds very high-end to listen to the affairs of the imperial family, but it is just sitting in the "concierge" and discussing national affairs.
It's just that the eaves of this gatehouse are very wide, with a depth of four bays.
The east and west corner doors are much smaller, not on the cloud platform, and are much weaker in terms of momentum.
Once there, many people had to stand in the open air outside the "eaves".
When Zhu Houcong arrived and sat on the throne that had been set up there, the Honglu Temple officials began to sing, and Zhu Houcong's first court appearance finally began.
From his field of vision, first there were guards of honor and guards lined up on both sides of the door, and then there were hundreds of civil and military officials lined up on both sides.
At this moment, they all wore black belts with horns on their court uniforms to mark the mourning period.
Zhu Houcong was also not wearing a uniform. He quietly watched Yang Tinghe, Xu Guangzuo and others take the lead in walking in.
There were only thirty or forty people in total who could walk into the porch, and the rest were outside the door.
After they finished their obeisances, Zhu Houcong said quietly: "Get down. I just heard that the court officials, except for Cui Yuan, the prince-in-law, and several others were all here due to illness. You all saw it when you ascended the throne. We are no longer strangers. Mr. Yang Ge, are your eyes uncomfortable?"
Yang Tinghe's tone was a little excited and even choked with sobs when he said: "Your Majesty came to court to attend to the matter in great mourning. I was so excited that I lost my composure for a moment."
Zhu Houcong smiled and nodded.
It really came out of the blue, and I don’t know whether it was because I was really moved, or because I remembered Zhu Houzhao who often did not go to court, or because I had a premonition that today’s court meeting would be difficult, and I started to want to cry.
His eyes swept through the crowd one by one, staying for a moment on Yuan Zonggao in the distance, and then moved to Yan Song and Xia Yan.
One is an editor of the Hanlin Academy, and the other is a military officer.
Those around Yan Song were all nobles from the Hanlin Academy, including Liu Long, the son and daughter of Cui Yuan.
There are two very active people near Xia Yan: Zhang Jiuxu, who is responsible for the official affairs department, and Qi Zhiluan, who is responsible for the affairs of the military affairs department.
Qi Zhiluan wrote two very lethal memorials. The first is to ask Zhu Houchong to call Fei Hong back, and the second is to ask Zhu Houchong to open up his voice, let domestic and foreign civil and military ministers and those who have been honored for non-military merits write their own statements, and let the police investigate and impeach the treacherous villains.
Fei Hong and Zhu Houcong had already ordered the invitation, but the other memorial was still retained.
Zhang Jiuxu was even more ruthless: he impeached Liang Chu, four of the six ministers, and many bigwigs from the Metropolitan Procuratorate by name.
Zhu Houcong withdrew his gaze and said, "I have read all the memorials in the past month and the past few days. I have read them for four days."
Yang Tinghe took the lead and knelt down to praise: "Your Majesty's hard work is really a blessing to the Ming Dynasty."
Zhu Houcong smiled: "After looking at it and checking the accounts for four days, my feeling is: there is no good person in the court, and our Ming Dynasty will perish."
All the civil and military ministers who had been exchanging compliments just now were kneeling and unable to get up.
For some reason, Yang Tinghe felt relaxed for no reason: Sure enough.
He knew there would be something wrong. Wasn't this coming on time?
Yang Tinghe didn't find it scary to say that there was no good person in the court: he had seen a lot of alarmist things.
This was the first time the new monarch publicly discussed state affairs in front of the officials, and when it came to auditing the accounts, some people couldn't help but feel uneasy in their hearts.
After all, they are not like Yang Ting and others who have dealt with the emperor several times, and their impression of the emperor is still shallow.
Zhu Houcong gestured to Zhang Zuo: "I have made statistics. During this period of time, I have asked people to extract all the words you said a lot from your memorials. Zhang Zuo, read it to everyone."
"My servant obeys the decree." Zhang Zuo opened a piece of paper in his hand, stepped forward and said loudly: "In accordance with your Majesty's decree, I have excerpted the remarks of the ministers. The count is as follows:"
"...little man, count ninety-three times."
"Party attached, eighty-eight times counted."
"Assisting rebellion, count seventy-nine times."
"Deceived, seventy-four times."
"Jiang Bin, count sixty-eight times."
"Powerful traitor, counted sixty-one times..."
Zhang Zuo read out the high-frequency words in the memorials of the ministers in this crisp way. The listeners had never seen such an expression technique before, and they were a little confused for a moment.
These are just high-frequency words, but they all know the court. Judging from the frequency of occurrence of certain words, it naturally points to three important topics: battles between courtiers, chaos in Chenhao, and eunuch chaos.
Didn’t you hear that Wang Qiong and Liang Chu also appeared in the high-frequency vocabulary?
After Zhang Zuo finished reading, Zhu Houcong pointed to the many memorials on the side: "Four cabinet ministers, six ministers and court officials, chamberlain officials... almost all of them were impeached by their names. In your mouth, every one of them is included. The crime should be punished. The memorials I have read over the past four days are about eliminating traitors, party members and dissenters, and personnel disputes. The remaining 20% are about specific state affairs. Only a few people have come up with personal strategies for these state affairs. This is always the case in the court. ?"
No one answered.
Above the court, it is indeed always like this, most of the energy is spent fighting with each other.
This is the center of the empire. Different people in the same position will naturally play completely different roles.
Could it be said that letting others do what they want is not the greatest state matter?
As for other state affairs, it has not always been the case. It is only based on personal ability to make suggestions, set the direction and the person to supervise, and let the people below take care of it, right?
What's more, this is the time to put things right. The new king will experience such storms when he succeeds to the throne.
Now, everyone is wondering what the emperor's intention was when he said this.
"Let's all get up." Zhu Houcong looked at them who were standing up thanks to Xie En. "When I was a child, I heard the villagers talking in Anlu, saying that those who were officials should be pulled out and lined up in a row. Maybe it would be unfair to chop them all, so chop off every other one. Almost all of them deserve it. Mr. Yang Ge, what do you think of these remarks?"
Yang Tinghe was named and had to stand up to refute the emperor's sudden remarks: "Why should your majesty keep these ignorant remarks in mind?"
"Ignorant people? Ignorant?" Zhu Houcong sneered, "Then the courtiers have studied hard for many years, so they can't be considered stupid people and ignorant, right? In your memorials, it is true that most of the officials in the Ming Dynasty are guilty. Doesn't this just show that the people Is your opinion correct?"
"Your Majesty, if all officials are guilty or not, they should be investigated in accordance with the law." Of course Yang Tinghe knew the trap in Zhu Houcong's words, and he also replied, "You will understand after listening to it. I hope that your majesty will take state affairs as the top priority and handle it prudently."
Zhu Houcong nodded: "How to deal with it prudently?"
"As His Majesty said in the edict of ascending to the throne, we should first eliminate the traitors and abolish the treacherous ones; then stay away from the villains before the imperial decree. Encourage learning and open up subjects, appoint good ministers; broaden the scope of public opinion, clarify the administration of officials; reduce corvee and light taxes, implement benevolent government, and establish a relationship between monarch and ministers. Zuo, I’ll send you my best wishes again.”
No matter how Zhu Houcong once evaluated "Hongzhi ZTE", Yang Tinghe's thinking will not change.
What he is saying now also represents the interests of most civil servants.
All in all, don't bother and let these "virtuous ministers" pastor the world on your behalf. We must deal with the wise ministers in person, listen to their advice to govern the world, and do not be instigated by villains to engage in military warfare, large-scale construction projects, and waste people and money.
It's all an old routine. It was what the sages Yao and Shun did many years ago when they were in power. The goal of the emperors and ministers throughout their lives was just to return to the legendary era of the past.
Zhu Houcong sighed softly: "If we keep talking nonsense like this this morning, then we might as well not hold it again in the future."
Yang Tinghe was shocked, and the other important ministers were not much better, and they all knelt down immediately.
"Your Majesty! Why do you say this? In the past dynasties, if the kings diligently look after their dynasties, the world will be in good order. If not, traitors will run rampant and the people will suffer. What is wrong with the words of the minister, so that your majesty has such a fallacy?"
