Daming 1805

Chapter 398 "Scholar Officials"

Yingtianfu City Forbidden City.

Before the Renwu Dynasty, the level of conservation of the Forbidden City in Yingtianfu was always problematic.

The main reason is that there is no royal family living in the Forbidden City, and the royal family themselves do not have much money to maintain it.

The owner can't make enough money, and the supervision is not in place. In the end, there must be frequent problems.

After the Renwu Dynasty, the royal family had enough money, and the overall management level rose to a higher level.

Several Forbidden Cities have been built overseas, and the original Longxing Land, Yingtianfu Forbidden City must of course be well maintained.

Zhu Jingyuan brought his family to Yingtian Mansion, and of course lived directly in the Forbidden City.

On the day of entering the city, first go to visit the elders.

Grandpa, grandma, father, mother, and aunt all came.

Zhu Jingyuan also brought a large family, six concubines of the Prince of Ming and concubines of the King of Dashi, eight wives of the King of Dashi,
And five boys and four girls, a total of nine children.

Liu Muyun and Yu Muxue each have a son and a daughter.

Chunxiang has a son and a daughter, Dongmei and Xiahe each have a son, and Qiuyue has a daughter.

But this is only already being born.

Now Liu Muyun and Yu Muxue are both pregnant with their third child.

Zhu Jingyuan's prince's concubine in Xintianfu, Wang Ya, who is also the steward of Zhu Jingyuan's harem, finally turned 20 last year, after a period of hard work, she is now pregnant.

Qiuyue, who has only one daughter, is also specially taken care of by Zhu Jingyuan, and now she is pregnant again.

Several other prince concubines, as well as other wives, will also turn 20 years old in the next two years.

The point is, Zhu Jingyuan himself is 22 this year.

Even if the tradition is followed, children born after this year will have no flaws in their inheritance rights.

So from this year on, Zhu Jingyuan will completely let go of his hands and feet.

Zhu Jingyuan has to cast a wide net and have more children before he can choose a good enough heir.

So in another two years, Zhu Jingyuan's children may double again, and it may directly exceed twenty.

Zhu Zhongliang and Zhu Jingyuan have also been separated for two years, and their father Zhu Jianyan has been separated for seven years.

Finally seeing Zhu Jingyuan, the most important child again, I was a little excited.

Especially Zhu Jianyan, when Zhu Jingyuan separated from him, Zhu Jingyuan was only a 15-year-old boy.

Now he has become a 22-year-old tall young man, only a few shadows of the past remain in his eyebrows.

Zhu Jianyan stared at his most peculiar son for a long time.

However, Zhu Zhongliang and Zhu Jianyan, father and son, both became emperors after all. Although they were quite excited, the external performance was not very obvious.

He just patted Zhu Jingyuan's shoulder with a smile, and then cheerfully went to recognize Zhu Jingyuan's children.

Only Liang Yunying, as a mother, saw her son again after five years, and her whole body was full of tears.

Liang Yunying took Zhu Jingyuan's hand, chanted intermittently for a while, and compared Zhu Jingyuan's height several times.

Then let Zhu Jingyuan introduce the women and children around him.

Zhu Di and Zhu Di, who Liang Yunying hugged at the beginning, are both over five years old now, and they will start to receive the education of the royal family in the past two years, but they don't know this grandma at all.

After introducing Zhu Jingyuan's child, Liang Yunying took a child who could already run from a maid:

"This is your younger brother, Jing Qi, he is four years old this year, Qi'er is here to call you brother..."

Zhu Jingyuan had already seen this child, and felt very surprised and strange.

When your parents come to see you, what do you do with another person's child?
The point is, this is not introduced by my father, but by myself now.

After hearing what his mother said, Zhu Jingyuan looked at the kid in front of him called his brother, and his mind got stuck for a moment:

"Jingqi... is it my younger brother? Is it my mother's younger brother?"

Liang Yunying nodded lightly:
"Well... your own brother..."

Zhu Jingyuan was startled immediately, and said almost instinctively:

"You were so old at the time, how dare you have a second child... What if something happens..."

Liang Yunying was a little embarrassed and said:
"It was an accident, but since I'm pregnant, I can't let it go. After all, it's my own flesh and blood. Fortunately, everything went very smoothly in the end. Your mother's body is not bad..."

Zhu Jingyuan had nothing to say, this accident was absolutely an accident.

Calculating the age, this should be conceived by my mother not long after she went to the Great Food Kingdom and returned to the capital.

My father was 47 years old at the time, and my mother was 36 years old at the time, and in the end I gave myself a younger brother.

The point is that my father is the emperor, and when my mother was 36 years old, the two of them could still make accidents.

It can only be said that the relationship between the two of them is really okay, but I don't know if there is any reason for it.

Could it be that my parents are thinking about whether they can have another child with the same talent?

The noisy family affairs have been tossing for most of the day.

Until the evening, the family had dinner together, and then went to rest separately.

In the morning of the next day, Zhu Jingyuan was alone and had a private meeting with his grandfather and father.

In the Imperial Study Room of the Emperor in the Forbidden City, there is a small conference room isolated separately.

There was a small round table with three armchairs around it. There were no outsiders in the room, and there were no recorders at all.

Zhu Zhongliang sat in the middle, watched his son and grandson sit down, stared at Zhu Jingyuan and asked:

"You said that with the continuous development of industry and commerce, private manufacturers and capital forces will make peace with the bureaucracy.

"Isn't there a peace agreement between the two sides now? Which of the main officials in the court does not represent various interests?
"Just like before the Renwu Dynasty, the gentlemen who talked in the court hall were also representatives of the scholar-bureaucrats from all over the place?"

Zhu Jianyan and Dad have also discussed it, so I will directly add at this time

"The current situation is just that the scholar-bureaucrats have changed from controlling the land and tenants to controlling the factories and workers.

"The court... the bureaucratic system, or the civil service system, was not a completely independent system in the first place, and they were originally representatives of the scholar-bureaucrat group.

"The social resources and factories controlled by the imperial consortium will continue to check and balance these new scholar-bureaucrat groups just like the Huangzhuang used to check and balance the landlord group?"

After industry and commerce replaced agriculture and became the foundation and main body of society, the identities and roles of manufacturers’ owners and shopkeepers gradually replaced the scholar-official class in agricultural society and became the de facto lowest-level managers.

The most direct "law" that workers face is not the law formulated by the imperial court, but the company's management regulations.

Just like farmers and tenants in the agricultural era, most of the time they had no contact with the law and the officials and lords in the city, and most of the time they were managed and controlled by the gentry in their own villages.

Workers have to work in factories or commercial firms in order to earn income to survive. Of course, the interdependence between them will become closer and closer, and it will become more and more difficult for the imperial court to intervene directly.

Just like in the agricultural era, it was normal for imperial power not to go to the countryside, and it was the talent of scholar-bureaucrats to conceal population and output.

Can imperial power in the industrial age really "submit a company"?

The scholar-bureaucrat group in the agricultural era controlled a large number of people and land for production, used their status and various methods to evade taxes and corvee, sought and cultivated spokesmen within the bureaucratic system, and provided shelter for the family.

They are sages and gentlemen in the country, and they are great benevolent people.

The scholar-officials in the industrial era controlled a large number of people and factories for production, used various methods to avoid taxes reasonably, and sought and supported spokespersons within the bureaucratic system.

They are successful people, they are philanthropists.

Therefore, in the view of Zhu Zhongliang and Zhu Jianyan, the current situation has not changed substantially compared with the previous agricultural era.

The royal family had Huangzhuang in the agricultural age, and the royal consortium in the industrial age.

Emperor Shizu had already reserved his backup.

So the two emperors didn't think there was any major problem here.

Then Zhu Jingyuan asked a question that he had thought about for a long time:

"Emperor Shizu created Huangzhuang to check and balance the landlord class, and created the royal consortium to check and balance private capital groups.

"But the essence of checks and balances is to compromise with each other so that both parties can obtain an acceptable distribution of benefits.

"The platform for this compromise and negotiation is the Ming court and the bureaucratic system.

"This system and platform, it is best to be able to obey the emperor, because the emperor himself is a relatively neutral individual.

"Even if you disobey the emperor, you must at least remain relatively neutral.

"A certain bureaucrat represents the interests of certain groups, and a certain bureaucrat is the spokesperson of a certain group. The boundary between them may not be very clear, and they may be interchangeable.

"But the performance of these two situations is definitely two completely different states.

"It's about the priority between the bureaucrat and the group he represents, who is the decider and who is the dependent.

"If the bureaucrats are the main ones, and the status of the bureaucrats is determined by the emperor, then the bureaucrats are the emperor's subordinates.

"The group corresponding to the bureaucracy can only obey the will of the bureaucrat, and indirectly obey the will of the emperor.

"The bureaucracy can only fight for more legitimate interests of the group it represents without violating the will of the emperor.

"This was a logic of coordination and compromise that existed for a long time before the Renwu Dynasty and throughout the entire agricultural era.

"If the group represented by bureaucrats is the main group, then the situation is completely reversed.

"At that time, bureaucrats are no longer subordinates of the emperor.

"The honor and status of members of the bureaucratic group is no longer determined by the emperor, but by the capitalist group he represents.

"When the interests of the emperor are opposed to the capital he represents, the bureaucracy will become the enemy of the emperor.

"The bureaucratic system will distort and even oppose the emperor's will, and use all available means to obtain benefits for the represented group.

"It can even include abolishing the emperor or even direct rebellion.

"This is the bourgeois revolution.

"The most critical reason for the success of the bourgeois revolution is that the bureaucratic system did not cooperate with the emperor's suppression.

"Even cooperate with the capital to rebel, otherwise the bourgeoisie may not know how to rebel.

"The anti-kings in ancient times, even the most direct ones, say our Emperor Taizu, after the power in the south of the Yangtze River began to take shape, the original scholars began to come to join us.

"The bureaucracy, that is, the elite representation of entire countries and ethnic groups, is definitely a force to be reckoned with.

"With the development of technology and the popularization of education, the size of this group will continue to expand over time, and their influence will become more and more important.

"Which side of the opposing sides they are on, that side is likely to win in the end.

"The strength of the group of business owners in the industrial age far exceeds that of the landlord group in the traditional agricultural age.

"The key is that with the continuous innovation of technology and the continuous expansion of scale, it will continue to expand.

"The speed at which they eroded the bureaucracy of the new era was unmatched by the agricultural era.

“The process of the bureaucratic system being eroded by private capital and completely making peace is the process of the national elite group changing from the emperor’s supporters and officials to the complete spokesperson of the bourgeoisie.

"The obvious models are Britain and the former Netherlands.

"The original king of England was killed in the revolution, and the new king was invited by the bourgeoisie. While succeeding to the throne, he gave up a lot of authority and gradually degenerated into a nominal leader.

"In our Ming Dynasty, it is like the era of Chongzhen, the bureaucratic system refused to cooperate with Master Wei Temple (Chongzhen), and was unwilling to resist internal and external enemies according to Master Wei Temple's requirements.

"Even if we now have a royal consortium, the royal family itself has enough power to carry out suppression by itself.

"But what is the result of a complete break between the bureaucracy and the royal family?
"At least a civil war to keep the emperor.

"Just like when Emperor Shizu rebuilt Ming Dynasty, it was essentially a civil war to overcome and regain control of the bureaucracy.

"Now the royal family already controls a certain amount of power, it's not as difficult as it was when Emperor Shizu started from scratch.

"However, even if the royal family can win, the power of the royal family will expand to an even more terrifying level. At that time, there may not be other forces that can check and balance the royal family.

"The power controlled by the Ming court is also huge, and the entire war process will definitely cause incalculable losses, which will damage the common interests of the entire country and all Ming people.

"Whether the imperial family takes control of the situation again, or the bourgeois rebellion succeeds, the balance of power between our entire Ming Dynasty and the Taixi people will undergo a huge change.

"I think we should make preparations in advance to prevent the situation in Daming from slipping into this state."

Zhu Jingyuan contemplated it for several months, and said such a long paragraph in one breath. After finishing speaking, the two generations of emperors fell into deep thought.

After a long time, Zhu Zhongliang extracted the core meaning of Zhu Jingyuan, and further confirmed to Zhu Jingyuan:
"Jingyuan, what do you mean to say that the current bureaucratic system in Ming Dynasty will quickly transform into the spokesperson of private capital with the rapid and leapfrog development of industry and commerce?

"After the bureaucratic system lost its neutrality, the imperial court and the bureaucratic system lost their role as a coordination platform, which led to the emperor, the royal family and private capital groups shifting from compromise to confrontation?
"Just like during the Chongzhen Dynasty, the entire civil service system did not obey the demands of Master Wei Temple, nor did it maintain the healthy operation of the imperial court, and the imperial court became a platform for factional confrontation.

"The point is, do you think the reason for the loss of neutrality of the bureaucracy is that the bureaucracy itself is not strong enough? The speed and magnitude of the growth of various forces is far lower than the expansion speed of private capital and royal capital?

"So your idea is that we must now find a way to control this changing trend, and try to prevent the bureaucratic system from continuing to transform into the spokesperson of capital, so that they can continue to maintain a relatively neutral posture?
"The specific plan will not be to give the bureaucratic system greater privileges, higher status and the most direct salary and benefits?"

(End of this chapter)