Follow Zhu Yuanzhang to conquer the country

Chapter 13 Zhu Yuanzhang’s promise to Xu Da

Zhu Yuanzhang was right.

Among the scholars who are now surrendering to him, Feng Guoyong is not a voluntary surrender, but he had to come to surrender because his village was short of food and happened to encounter Zhu Yuanzhang going south to Chuzhou.

Not to mention Zhang Cheng, Zhu Yuanzhang took the initiative to recruit him into the team.

Therefore, strictly speaking, Li Shanchang was someone who took the initiative to pay homage to Zhu Yuanzhang and brought capital to invest.

You must know that Li Shanchang in history was not a so-called down-and-out scholar, but a powerful man from Dingyuan, otherwise he would not be able to read.

In "Records of Taizu of the Ming Dynasty", Zhu Yuanzhang said that Li Shanchang was a highly respected local person.

In this era and place, what kind of people are highly respected? Naturally, he is a wealthy person.

Therefore, Li Shanchang's decision to vote for Zhu Yuanzhang was not considered desperate. He had to rely on Zhu Yuanzhang to make a living, but it was purely a political choice. After all, Li Shanchang had been struggling in the examination room and the Yuan Dynasty now restricted the number of Han people who could serve as officials, leaving him no choice. The road to progress.

As for the financial aspect, spending three thousand shi of food and labor on the army is nothing to a local powerful like Li Shanchang.

Zhu Yuanzhang's army stayed for several days and consumed a lot of food, so it needed new food supplies.

Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang was very happy after hearing the news, whether it was because a Confucian scholar took the initiative to invest, or because of the three thousand shi of grain.

As for the surprise, it was naturally because he didn't expect that Zhang Chengzhen was right. There really were scholars who didn't care so much about the current ethical order and would take the initiative to vote for him, a rebel general who didn't have much strength yet and could only be regarded as a potential stock.

Zhang Cheng just smiled indifferently. When he saw Zhu Yuanzhang looking at him with a hint of admiration, he shook his cattail leaf fan and said, "But according to the current ethics, this Li Shanchang is against the ethics. At this time, he surrenders to the enemy." Yuan Ting designated him as a rebel of demon thieves and took the initiative to donate food. This is simply collaborating with the enemy and being disloyal! Therefore, if we follow the current etiquette, the superiors should despise this person in their hearts, and should not even accept this person."

Zhu Yuanzhang could not refute.

"But if we use the new etiquette that emphasizes the distinction between Chinese and barbarians, there is no problem. It can be said that he chose to join the rebels in order to expel the Tartars and restore China."

"In this case, Li Shanchang is not disloyal, he is just unfaithful. His loyalty is not to the barbarian king, but to the Chinese, which is the orthodox gift in the world."

After Zhang Cheng said this, Zhu Yuanzhang nodded as if he had some understanding, and his impression of Li Shanchang was indeed better, and he said: "In this way, the original ethics was indeed not that perfect, and it downplayed the differences between Huayi and Huayi. It confuses right and wrong.”

As Zhu Yuanzhang spoke, he said to Xu Da: "Let me reply in person. You can send someone to take it. By the way, send troops to protect Li's people and food from being invaded by bandits. At the same time, he warned the brothers who were sent that if anyone dares to attack If the Li family is disrespectful, they are disrespectful to us and will be killed immediately!"

Xu Da said yes.

After Zhu Yuanzhang replied to Li Shanchang's post, he said to Zhang Cheng: "Although Mr. Zhang said that he can't handle the conflicts between the generals and their advisers, I still ask Mr. Zhang to try his best to help us handle it. Thank you for your help!"

"In this case, why don't you give me a favor now and let Brother Huayun go?"

"I went to see him. He has reflected well. He knows how difficult it is for the common people to make shoes and how hateful the Tatars are. He must be more willing to abide by military law and not bully the people, but rather treat all Han people as equals. Seen as brothers and sisters.”

Zhang Cheng said with a smile.

Zhu Yuanzhang did not expect that Zhang Cheng had already done what he wanted, so he raised his eyebrows slightly and said, "Then let's spare him the punishment for the sake of Mr. Zhang!"

Seeing this, Zhang Cheng smiled and left Zhu Yuanzhang.

Not long after Zhang Cheng left, Xu Da came back to Zhu Yuanzhang and said: "I have already given the order."

Zhu Yuanzhang nodded.

Then, Zhu Yuanzhang took the initiative to ask Xu Da: "This Confucian scholar named Li Shanchang took the initiative to join us. What do you think?"

"It's very surprising! I thought that Confucian scholars would not like us idiots and would not join us unless absolutely necessary."

"Even if Brother Feng Guoyong joined us, saying that he felt the benevolence of the superior and believed that destiny was in the superior, it was actually because he had no choice."

Xu Da said.

Zhu Yuanzhang also laughed after hearing this, and said with his hands behind his back: "It's surprising, but in Mr. Zhang's opinion, it's not surprising!"

Xu Da looked astonished: "Really?" "In his view, Confucian scholars don't actually value ethics so much. They value their personal future more. This is true for Feng Guoyong, and even more so for Li Shanchang."

When Zhu Yuanzhang said this, he sighed: "Feng Guoyong didn't tell us the truth!"

"Why did the superior say that?"

Xu Da couldn't help asking at this time.

Zhu Yuanzhang sneered: "You still have to ask! What he Feng Guoyong told us is that there are many gentlemen among Confucian scholars in the world, who abide by the ethics and teachings, are loyal to the emperor and love the people. We only want to be courteous and virtuous, and these Confucian scholars and gentlemen will feel that destiny is with us, and they will come. To vote for us is as if he took the initiative to vote because he was impressed by our kindness."

"But in fact, Mr. Zhang just told us the truth."

"Our courtesy corporal is of no use at all! We can't recruit Confucian scholars at all, so no matter how polite we treat the few Confucian scholars we captured, they are of no use, and we have to kill them in the end! What is really useful is strength, strong soldiers and horses, Even if you only have some slight strength, there will still be Confucian scholars who dare to bet!"

"And it is true that those Confucian scholars do not regard us as thieves because of our rebellion, nor are they all self-righteous, nor do they all value ethics!"

"So, this Li Shanchang showed up and offered three thousand shi of food. He didn't choose to avoid trouble in another country or build a stronghold to protect himself. We didn't send any soldiers to pay him a courtesy."

"Mr. Zhang accurately anticipated this situation!"

"Although he didn't know that Li Shanchang would take the initiative to join us at this time, he was already sure that there would be Confucian scholars who dared to take the initiative to join us when we were not so strong, in order to gain fame and wealth, what? Etiquette is not that important.”

After Zhu Yuanzhang said this, he looked at Xu Da, and his admiration for Zhang Cheng could not be concealed in his words.

But in fact, it was because Zhang Cheng was familiar with history and knew that Li Shanchang would come from Dingyuan County to surrender to Zhu Yuanzhang soon, that he told Zhu Yuanzhang with certainty that there would be adventurous Confucian scholars who would take the initiative to surrender regardless of ethics and principles, but Zhu Yuanzhang didn't know Zhang Cheng is just familiar with it.

After Xu Da heard what Zhu Yuanzhang said, he also became more interested in Zhang Cheng and asked proactively: "Does the superior want to say that Mr. Zhang told the truth to us?"

"It's also possible that Feng Guoyong didn't understand this himself. He didn't have Mr. Zhang's insight into people's hearts, so he didn't tell us the truth."

Zhu Yuanzhang took the initiative to explain for Feng Guoyong.

He did not want to rashly deny Feng Guoyong, saying that he had selfish motives, which would intensify internal civil and military rifts.

Then, Zhu Yuanzhang said: "No matter what, Mr. Zhang is a more sincere and understanding person!"

Xu Da nodded and said nothing more.

Zhu Yuanzhang didn't say anything else. He just reflected on Zhang Cheng's words in his mind, just like a studious person who would carefully reflect on other people's good words.

He even began to feel in his heart that he might really have destiny, otherwise he would not have met someone like Zhuge Kongming like Zhang Cheng.

The key is that Zhang Cheng seems to really care about the life and death of the people. His words are not just to restore ethics and become a master, but he does not hesitate to tell the truth.

Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang knew that he had to pay attention to Zhang Cheng who dared or was willing to tell the truth.

So, when he thought of this, Zhu Yuanzhang was still a little worried, so he looked at Xu Da again and said:

"We are willing to tell you this because you are more stable than other brothers. We want you to know that Mr. Zhang is more worthy of your trust than Feng Guoyong. However, this person's words are inevitably too straightforward and can easily annoy the brothers. Once When this happened, you have to come to Mr. Zhang’s rescue. Sometimes it’s not appropriate for us to stand up and favor Mr. Zhang. It’s more appropriate for you to stop the brothers from doing whatever they want.”

Xu Da nodded: "Understood!"

Later, Xu Da couldn't help but ask Zhu Yuanzhang: "Your superiors, what if Feng Guoyong doesn't understand and has selfish motives?"

"Then you still need to ask?!"

Zhu Yuanzhang asked sternly and said: "We will not let our brothers bleed for these Confucian scholars to become the masters of the world, only to end up being inferior!"

"Yes!"

(End of this chapter)