Chapter 43: Chapter Forty-Three: The Sovereign Is Young, the State Is Uncertain—Imperial Authority

Zhu Yijun’s participation in the monthly examination is also a form of performance evaluation.

Zhang Juzheng’s Performance Evaluation System, even when piloted in the capital, faced considerable difficulties, with ministers voicing numerous objections and employing a variety of tactics to resist it.

In the original historical trajectory, Zhang Juzheng’s reforms often failed to achieve their full potential.

In summary, the reforms were half-hearted: they sought change while clinging to ancestral laws and conforming to Confucian rites; this “wanting this, wanting that, and wanting also this” mindset ensured the reforms changed little.

Was Zhang Juzheng incompetent? Not at all.

Gao Gong’s “Memorial on Five Matters” demanded the young emperor not issue direct imperial edicts on memorials, provoking the Empress Dowager to issue a decree deposing Gao Gong; Zhang Juzheng’s reforms never received the full backing of imperial authority from the outset.

Empress Dowager Li exercised imperial power, and Feng Bao protected it, yet neither could provide sufficient support for Zhang Juzheng’s reforms; both feared the emergence of another Gao Gong in the Ming court.

Within a system built on imperial rule, the absence of imperial support rendered Zhang Juzheng’s reforms illegitimate and unjustified; in utter desperation, Zhang Juzheng declared: “I am not a chancellor—I am a regent.”

When the sovereign is young and the state is uncertain, the greatest problem is the absence of imperial authority under the imperial system.

“Next time, make the questions slightly harder,” Zhu Yijun said, standing upright, hands clasped, surveying the court ministers; his smile transformed into a bright, open one as he spoke calmly: “Lately, while attending to state affairs and reviewing memorials, I have noticed that ministers harbor many doubts about the Grand Secretary’s Performance Evaluation System, submitting memorials to debate its merits and flaws.”

“Though my examination today was easy, it pales beside the exhausting paperwork faced by the heads of the Six Ministries; yet oversight, supervision, and inspection are matters of paramount state importance.”

“From now on, the scholars of the Lecture Hall need not send examination papers to the Grand Secretary for review.”

Zhu Yijun raised his own standards: having lecture scholars submit questions to Zhang Juzheng for review had tacitly allowed the emperor to cheat.

After all, Zhang Juzheng and Feng Bao had jointly driven Gao Gong into retirement; to the ministers, Zhang Juzheng and Feng Bao were inseparable; if Zhang Juzheng knew, Feng Bao knew, and thus the emperor knew the exam content.

But this exam tested memorization, interpretation, and summary; even if the emperor knew the answers, he still had to write them out—and being able to recite them, in Wang Xilie’s view, was already quite impressive!

After all, the emperor is only ten years old.

Zhu Yijun raised his own standards and broke this tacit rule of cheating precisely to use his imperial authority to endorse Zhang Juzheng’s Performance Evaluation System.

Without Zhu Yijun’s endorsement, Zhang Juzheng could still push forward the system—but with imperial endorsement, Zhang Juzheng gained imperial authorization; the difference lies in whether the reform is conducted openly and legitimately.

“Your servant thanks Your Majesty for this great grace,” Zhang Juzheng said, frowning, glancing at Feng Bao, then thinking of the two Empress Dowagers in the palace; the emperor had not done this for him the first time: when the emperor hoed the earth on Jingshan and spoke up to entangle Ge Shouli; the second time, when he intervened to halt factional strife, silencing all ministers with a single clan-based argument;

This is the third time: the implementation of the Performance Evaluation System has met strong opposition from many court officials, and Zhang Juzheng has forcibly suppressed it with his own authority.

Now the emperor has stepped forward again to endorse him.

Zhang Juzheng had never anticipated that the young emperor would use his own academic evaluation to publicly endorse the Performance Evaluation System; for a moment, Zhang Juzheng bowed deeply in sincere gratitude.

When the sovereign is young and the state is uncertain, the most terrifying problem is the institutional design of imperial rule—namely, the absence of imperial authority; this danger is lethally destructive to the Ming.

After the Ming Emperor Yingzong, Zhu Qizhen, ascended the throne at age nine, the state fell into the crisis of a young sovereign and uncertain rule; Empress Dowager Zhang and Empress Sun indulged the child excessively, while the Three Yangs governed; many praised them.

But in Zhu Yijun’s own view, the Three Yangs’ governance inflicted massive damage on Ming state affairs; in Zhu Yijun’s eyes, the Three Yangs were far inferior to Zhang Juzheng.

In the ninth year of Xuande, the sixth voyage to the Western Seas was permanently halted; the once-mighty fleet rotted silently at its moorings; Ming maritime power, like the stationary ships, decayed, sank into the river, and was washed away, never to return.

In the first year of Zhengtong, the King of Annan received formal investiture from the Ming emperor; Annan became legally independent; with this investiture, Ming influence in Luchuan (Southeast Asia) collapsed, triggering rebellion; the prolonged Three Campaigns against Luchuan drained the Ming’s strength.

In the third year of Zhengtong, the Duke of Ying, Zhang Fu, ceased attending court; the Ming military aristocracy was thoroughly marginalized; the era of promoting literature and suppressing martial affairs began; the capital garrisons grew weak.

In the ninth year of Zhengtong, Yang Shiqi retired; Emperor Yingzong assumed personal rule, leaving behind a corrupt court: rebellions flared along the southeast, southwest, and northwest frontiers, while the emperor himself was a disgraceful degenerate who shattered the lowest bounds of imperial conduct.

In the thirteenth year of Zhengtong, the Ye Zongliu–Deng Maoqi peasant uprising swept through Fujian, Huguang, Zhejiang, Guangdong, and Jiangxi, with nearly a million peasants rising in revolt.

In the fourteenth year of Zhengtong, the Tumu Crisis occurred.

Now, in the first year of Wanli, Zhu Yijun is ten years old—again, a young sovereign and uncertain state, with imperial authority absent; Zhang Juzheng governs, but Zhang Juzheng’s governance differs from that of the Three Yangs: Zhang Juzheng first turned his gun on the civil officials—or rather, he turned his gun on this rotten world, determined to change it.

As the empire’s chief minister, does Zhang Juzheng not know how dire the state of the realm is? Does he not know how grave the problems are? He knows clearly—he knows perfectly well.

To know the truth and not waver is a kind of lucid suffering: knowing something is impossible, yet doing it anyway.

The Performance Evaluation System, now shackled upon all officials, seems to foretell Zhang Juzheng’s inevitable fate.

Zhu Yijun holds Zhang Juzheng in the highest esteem; Yu Qian rescued the collapsing state, rebuilt the capital garrisons, and repelled the Oirats even after Emperor Yingzong was captured and became a hostage.

What became of Yu Qian?

After Emperor Yingzong’s restoration, he executed Yu Qian on the false charge of “intent to rebel”; Yu Qian sought glory and received disgrace.

Zhang Juzheng is a scholar—he knows full well what fate befell Yu Qian.

Zhang Juzheng could have chosen to follow the path of the Three Yangs, colluding with the Jin Party, or even accepted Yang Bo’s offer to merge Chu and Jin, becoming a powerful minister whose authority rivaled even the emperor’s—this was not impossible.

But Zhang Juzheng did not do so; he wished to accomplish something—to make the declining Ming dynasty a little better.

Zhu Yijun’s endorsement of Zhang Juzheng is the exercise of imperial authority, lending legitimacy to Zhang Juzheng’s reforms and easing his burdens.

After Zhang Juzheng’s death, he was posthumously attacked, his Performance Evaluation System and Single Whip Tax were abolished, and even his sons starved to death—will Zhu Yijun allow such a thing to happen?

As long as Zhang Juzheng does not turn his Zhang Faction into a clan faction, Zhu Yijun will never allow such a thing to occur.

“Let us hold a court deliberation,” Zhu Yijun said, taking up the “Direct Explanation of the Four Books,” preparing as usual to read and attend to state affairs on the terrace while ministers below quarreled.

Habits form after twenty-one repetitions; Zhu Yijun had grown accustomed to this strange atmosphere—strange it may be, but at least under the crisis of a young sovereign and uncertain state, the Ming could stumble forward.

“Your Majesty, today is the ninth day, a day of rest,” Zhang Juzheng said, glancing at the ministers and bowing.

The emperor’s schedule today did not include study; the ministers’ only task was to supervise the examination at Wenhua Hall.

Today is a holiday; the examination is over, and the emperor may rest for a day.

Previously, on the third, sixth, and ninth days of each month, the emperor could rest one day, totaling nine rest days per month; but since the “New Memorial on Five Matters” was submitted, the young emperor has attended court daily at Wenhua Hall; after consultation with Zhang Juzheng, Wang Xilie, Wang Xijue, and others, they decided that after the monthly examination, the emperor would be granted one day off.

Too much is as bad as too little; if the young emperor is overburdened and reverts to his old ways, what then?

Rest and labor must be balanced.

Zhu Yijun paused, putting down the “Direct Explanation of the Four Books”; the ministers had reported this, and Empress Dowager Li had specifically reminded him—he had simply forgotten.

His life is extremely full: mornings for court sessions and lectures, afternoons for martial training and farming, evenings for stamping documents, and nights for reading agricultural texts, summarizing, and excerpting.

“Why not visit my Baoqi Palace?” Zhu Yijun asked thoughtfully. “I have personally tended to agriculture and sericulture for over a month; Qingming is approaching—let us all go and take a look?” Since he had free time, he would show the ministers what he had actually done.

It would also spare the Minister of Rites, Lu Shusheng, and the censors from constantly accusing him of neglecting his duties; in the eyes of Confucian scholars, the emperor’s true duty is moral cultivation: benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, trustworthiness, kindness, humility, frugality, and modesty.

But Zhang Juzheng’s definition of virtue is the principle gained through practice—the principle of acting and thereby gaining insight, where theory guides practice and practice refines theory.

Zhu Yijun believes the Grand Secretary is right.

In half a month, Zhu Yijun’s glass greenhouse had completed seedling cultivation; in a few days, Qingming would arrive, and planting could begin.

This has been the thing Zhu Yijun has been most occupied with during this period.

The Grand Secretary, the Deputy Grand Secretary, the heads of the Six Ministries, the Censorate, Duke Zhu Xixiao, and others were all stunned; they had truly believed the emperor’s personal involvement in agriculture was merely performative—never expecting they would be invited to tour the Baoqi Palace.

⊙￠O

Is this content meant for ministers to see?

Since the assassination attempt on the emperor, rumors from the palace have been bizarre and implausible; no one knows what is true and what is false; the ministers have little idea what the young emperor does outside Wenhua Hall.

“Your servants humbly request to follow Your Majesty,” Zhang Juzheng quickly bowed.

Zhu Yijun stood up and smiled: “Let’s go.”

Zhu Yijun led the ministers to the Baoqi Palace on Jingshan; the palace was small, the former orchard transformed into farmland, covered with a layer of decomposed compost; the half-mu glass greenhouse still burned with heat; a young eunuch pulled back the thick straw mats, sunlight pouring into the greenhouse and onto Zhu Yijun’s person.

“This is my seedling chamber,” Zhu Yijun said, standing in the sunlight, left hand holding his sleeve, right hand behind his back, head slightly raised; he was deeply satisfied with his creation.