I want to be emperor

Chapter 362 The trend of studying science

Sun Yousheng seemed very happy with Sun Qinian's arrival.

On the one hand, although Sun Qinian and his blood relationship are far away, they are still relatives anyway. There is no problem in calling him a nephew, and he is also happy to see Sun Qinian succeed in his career.

On the other hand, it is also for himself.

Sun Yousheng also hoped that this distant nephew of his family would be able to bring some help to him in the future after he became an official in the Great Chu Empire.

As a native of Suzhou in the south of the Yangtze River, Sun Yousheng is a veritable minority in the officialdom of the Great Chu Empire today.

Because the Great Chu Empire made its fortune in Henan and was stronger than Northern Chu, most of the civil and military officials of the Great Chu Empire were from Henan and Northern Chu, especially Ruzhou and Nanyang Prefecture. And many of them have reached high positions.

After all, when the Great Chu Empire rose in this area, recruiting talents were naturally recruited on the spot, and it was impossible to go to other places for off-site recruitment.

This has also led to the fact that in the officialdom of the Great Chu Empire, quite a few middle and high-level officials are from these two prefectures.

After the Chu army continued to move south to occupy northern Chu, they recruited a large number of talents from various prefectures in northern Chu.

During this process, although there were also foreigners recruited, they were relatively few in general, mainly officials, military generals, and soldiers who had surrendered from the Ming court.

Sun Yousheng belongs to such a person.

But overall, there are still relatively few foreigners.

And there are even fewer people from the Jiangnan area. Anyway, looking around, Sun Yousheng, even a fellow from Suzhou, didn't see it.

The relationship between fellow countrymen and classmates, especially the personal connections in traditional officialdom, is an important part.

So in the past year and a half as a lieutenant in the Great Chu Empire, Sun Yousheng deeply felt that he was alone and weak.

Therefore, he still values ​​Sun Qinian, his distant nephew, and looks forward to him being able to assist him in the officialdom of the Great Chu Empire in the future.

Not only his nephew from afar, he also paid more attention to several other candidates from Suzhou.

Through his nephew, he invited more than a dozen students from Suzhou to have a meal, made some connections, and exhorted them as a senior in the officialdom, asking them to work hard and strive for the middle test, thinking that the big The Chu Empire is an official.

Later, a batch of books were sent to these fellow students.

The names of these books are different from traditional books. They all have the names of "Elementary Mathematics", "Elementary Geometry", "Elementary Physics", "Elementary Chemistry", "Elementary Mechanics", "Elementary Astronomy and Geography" and other books.

The editors of these books are unified as: Education Department of the Ministry of Rites and Education.

"These books, take them back and read them later, they will help you in your career!"

After Sun Qinian took it, he flipped through it for a while, and then asked with doubts: "Could it be that these books are used by Gewuke?"

Sun Yousheng nodded and said: "That's right, the content in this basic book is all the content of the Gewu subject. If you learn it thoroughly, you must have great hope in the Gewu subject."

Sun Qinian said: "It's just that, in this case of physical science..."

Be it Sun Qinian, or his fellow villagers, they all showed doubts on their faces.

Gewuke, they all know about it, but they have never paid attention to it before.

Mainly influenced by tradition, they believed that the Jinshi department was the best background. As for the two subjects of law department and Gewu department, they both thought it was a small way, and they would not be taken seriously if they passed the exam.

Just listen to Sun Yousheng said: "You also know that our country's imperial examination has a Jinshi department, a legal department, and a Gewu department. You all know that the Jinshi department has always been the correct way of the imperial examination. Let's not talk about it; how much do you know about the legal department? You should also understand that this is the selection of talents who are proficient in the law, and then they can work in the inspectors, patrolmen, legal affairs and other yamen, and the censors in the inspectorate are extremely noble."

"As for this physical subject, do you know why it appeared in this imperial examination? And it is listed in the three subjects?"

Sun Qinian immediately said: "Please tell my cousin!"

Sun Yousheng stroked his beard, and then said: "The Son of Heaven has a saying that in addition to being proficient in writing and quick thinking, an official needs to know astronomy, geography, physics and chemistry. Only in this way can he know everything in the world and be able to shepherd thousands of people."

"Officials in our country, from the top to the department hall, down to the staff, all need to understand things and know everything."

"In this way, our country opened the Department of Gewu to select talents who are proficient in all things."

"Even in this Jinshi subject, in addition to stereotyped essays, policy theory, etc., there are also science subjects such as mathematics. Only when you are an official can you understand and write various articles and reports."
"So, even if you don't plan to report on this subject, you should think about these books more, and you will also have to take the Jinshi subject when you go back."

Sun Yousheng's words made Sun Qinian and everyone else fall into deep thought.

Soon, someone bowed and said, "Thank you, Mr. Sun, for your guidance."

Sun Yousheng said: "You don't have to thank me. These books are already on sale in the capital, and they will be distributed to candidates for free. I just sent them to you just in time for the meeting."

Writing and printing, and then promoting the five sides of books on mathematics, physics, chemistry, astronomy and geography, is what Luo Zhixue started a long time ago.

It's just that because he was also busy before, and there was no one to help him sort out the corresponding books, so he couldn't get them out.

After the capital was moved to Jinling City, all aspects of the war also paused a bit. In the winter, Luo Zhixue had some private time, and he was able to sort out books and materials of various disciplines with the teachers and students of the Royal Institute of Technology, and finally reviewed and compiled them. "Elementary Mathematics", "Elementary Geometry", "Elementary Physics", "Elementary Chemistry", "Elementary Mechanics", "Elementary Astronomy and Geography", "Elementary Agronomy" and "Elementary Medicine" have a total of more than 20 books, involving basic textbooks of various subjects.

These more than 20 books are not written from scratch, but are based on various books handed down from ancient times. For example, in mathematics, they refer to the ancient Nine Chapters of Arithmetic.

At the same time, it also greatly refers to various science books that have been handed down from the West in recent decades, including many books translated by Ming people or Westerners, such as "The Elements of Geometry" translated by Xu Guangqi.

Then there are some books that scholars discuss based on these translated books, such as Sun Yuanhua's "On Geometry", "Geometry Usage" and so on.

Finally, a large number of books such as "Tiangong Kaiwu" written by Song Yingxing, the director of the Teaching Materials Division of the Education Department of the Ministry of Ritual and Education of the Great Chu Empire, were also referred to in large quantities.

After the Great Chu Empire came to Jiangxi last year, there were not many Ming troops stationed in Yuanzhou Mansion at that time. He chose to lead the army and civilians to surrender to the Great Chu Empire, so as to avoid the loss of life.

Of course, the most important thing is that neither Fenyi County nor the entire Yuanzhou Mansion at that time could defend against the Chu army.

All the county magistrates above surrendered, and it was impossible for Song Yingxing and other small officials to really resist. Except for a few who ran away, most of them still chose to surrender.

Originally, according to the arrangements for defecting officials, county edicts like Song Yingxing would generally not be dealt with specially.

But, it didn't take long for a lot of Song Yingxing's unfinished works, and only a small number of works that had been handed down attracted the attention of many Chu officials.

Then some of the works were sent to the Royal Institute of Technology.

As a result, it caused a relatively big reaction. The teachers and students in the Royal Institute of Technology, suddenly, damn, there is still a person with a lot of money hidden in this ravine.

Then, after a paper transfer, Song Yingxing became a section chief under the Textbook Division of the Education Department of the Ministry of Ethics and Education.

And began to bring a vote of officials who knew some scientific knowledge from the Great Chu Empire from all over the country, and cooperated with the Royal Institute of Technology to compile various elementary textbooks.

At the same time, they also entrusted Fenghe Commercial Company to hire several missionaries who knew scientific knowledge from the coast with high salaries, and asked them to translate various western scientific books.

The above is simply sorting out and bringing together all kinds of scientific knowledge that already exists in the contemporary era.

In ordinary countries, it is estimated that we can only learn slowly, develop slowly and then study.

But the Great Chu Empire is different. The Great Chu Empire has Luo Zhixue, a traveler.

In Luo Zhixue's previous life, although he was not considered a top student, he was just an ordinary person. Although he had forgotten a lot of things he learned in school, he did not say that he had forgotten all of them. He still knew more or less. .

A lot of knowledge is actually not forgotten, but because there is no need for it on weekdays, and you don’t go out of your way to recall it, so you ignore it, but if you get in touch with these things again, you can recall some of them.

Luo Zhixue is based on the many science books compiled by the Royal Institute of Technology, and then recalls, and then writes down some scientific knowledge that is still remembered in his mind, and organizes it.

And in this process, many things are just common sense to Luo Zhixue, such as various chemical elements, iron, carbon, oxygen and so on.

For example, in the field of guns, steel is just an iron-carbon alloy, and the amount of carbon content directly leads to various properties of steel.

For Luo Zhixue, this point is just a common sense thing, but for the scientific community in the seventeenth century, it was an absolutely unknown field. In history, it was not until the first half of the eighteenth century that scientists proved ironclad After absorbing a certain substance, it can become steel, and this substance is carbon.

Then oxygen, which is known to most people in later generations, but historically, it was not until the late eighteenth century that scientists discovered oxygen and explained its role in combustion.

And further, the combustion phenomenon can be explained, and the combustion phenomenon can further establish the law of mass conservation.

For Luo Zhixue, many things are experiments, not even knowledge, but in modern times, they are serious advanced science.

Standing on the shoulders of giants, Luo Zhixue corrected and supplemented various science textbooks compiled by the Royal Institute of Technology.

In the end, more than 20 science textbooks were obtained and used as textbooks for the Royal Institute of Technology.

According to these textbooks, the Royal Institute of Technology has established seven departments in total, including the Department of Mathematics, the Department of Physics, the Department of Chemistry, the Department of Mechanics, the Department of Astronomy and Geography, the Department of Medicine, and the Department of Agriculture and Animal Science.

Some of the most basic books, such as elementary mathematics, elementary geometry, elementary physics, elementary chemistry, etc., were printed by the Ministry of Rites and Education, and then released to the public as textbooks for other ordinary scholars in the world.

These are the textbooks that Sun Qinian and the others got now.

After returning to the inn, Sun Qinian carefully read some of these books. To be honest, he has no interest in these science books.

There are some very boring and boring topics, disintegration ideas and various explanations.

It makes people want to sleep!

But my cousin has already said that even if it is the Jinshi course that I applied for, I will have to take part of the science subjects at that time, and I don’t require such advanced science attainments. I can't understand the data...

So even though these books are boring, Sun Qinian still bite the bullet and read and learn.

If it doesn't work, just memorize it by rote, and then do some of the questions repeatedly.

Not to mention, although Sun Qinian personally has no interest in these science subjects, as a person who can fight his way through the imperial examination room.

Especially in the Ming Dynasty, he was able to pass the examination for a scholar in Suzhou, where the atmosphere of reading was very strong and the competition was extremely high. He still has a talent for reading.

At least those are pretty good in memory.

Without sufficient memory ability, it is impossible for Sun Qinian to memorize numerous Four Books and Five Classics and a large number of various annotations, let alone recite a large number of various historical texts.

Rote memorization also requires talent. If you don’t have a good memory, if you memorize it today and forget it tomorrow, then why do you still need to take the imperial examination?

In addition to memorizing by rote, he often discusses with a few fellow countrymen. Special research, a group of scholars in robes, often think hard about a math problem, and then have various arguments, as if they are discussing the truth of heaven and earth.

Not only a few of them, but people from all provinces who arrived in Jinling City one after another, all of them immediately obtained these science textbooks printed by the Ministry of Rites and Education.

After all, everyone now knows that not only Gewu subjects, but also Jinshi subjects and legal affairs subjects need to assess basic science knowledge such as mathematics.

If you don't learn it, if others learn it, then the score will be lower than others. Wouldn't it be that you will lose your name?
Under such circumstances, more than 2000 people from various provinces in Jinling City actually began to concentrate on studying elementary mathematics and elementary physics, which set off a wave of learning science.

This situation made Luo Zhixue quite comforted!

Who said that traditional scholars are all elm-headed?
Who said that traditional scholars cannot be used for their own use?
From Luo Zhixue's point of view, these scholars are quite smart, and they can be used, even reused.

(End of this chapter)