Chapter 807

Hence Hai Rui is getting older, and his worries about the empire are getting deeper and deeper. Sometimes, he will suddenly be distracted in the dead of night, and then a kind of fear will arise spontaneously.

Fear that there is no one behind him.

He is old. Even the sharpest imperial divine sword cannot withstand the erosion of time. He is not sure whether his appearance is a coincidence or an inevitability of the Great Ming Dynasty.

In this short and brilliant life, he lived a life of being high and lonely.

He is very noble. He never corrupts. He does not demand others, only himself. He can even betray his own philosophy for the sake of the Great Ming's reform, choose to act according to the situation, and turn a blind eye to some corruption cases. Some corrupt officials he handled were reused again, and he also turned a blind eye.

He knows very well that the Wanli Reform cannot succeed by relying on a few people. His Majesty needs officials, even if the morality of these officials is not so noble. He knows very well that he is a minority in this turbid world.

Over the years, the only person who is as famous as Hence Hai Rui is Shen Li, but this upright official is becoming more and more smooth, becoming more and more flattering, and even his morality has a certain decline.

The Luzon Governor's Office, the Old Port Governor's Office, and the Jinchi Governor's Office that is about to be established have a group of military merit classes centered on each governor. This group was enfeoffed as Earls, Battalion Commanders, and Company Commanders during the conquest. This title can be inherited, but there are obligations themselves.

These overseas Earls, Battalion Commanders, and Company Commanders are a kind of pioneering nobility. If they want to continue the glory of their family, they must constantly conquer, hand over enough barbarian heads or enough slaves to each Governor's Office to continue this glory.

The anchoring objects of these overseas Earls, Battalion Commanders, and Company Commanders' titles are barbarian heads or slaves. Their descendants owe countless barbarian heads to the government office as soon as they are born, and they have to pay them back for a lifetime. They can also offer rewards, letting slave-catching merchants hand over enough barbarian slaves to these nobles.

This system was suggested by Lin Fucheng, a scholar with an extremely vicious heart, who proposed this suggestion for the sake of permanent transformation.

In Lin Fucheng's view, Nanyang without Han people is not as good as no survivors. Instead of waiting for these wolf-faced and beast-hearted barbarians to bite the Great Ming back, it is better to eliminate them directly in the long river of history.

And when the Emperor knew about this system, he actually chose to write it down and hide this condition. In the Emperor's view, the Governor's Office is far overseas, and doing so has its own difficulties.

And when the Ministry of Rites knew about it, they didn't ask at all, and didn't even say a word about "Heaven has the virtue of loving life."

Shen Li, as the Minister of Rites, did not start from the perspective of morality to persuade the Emperor to implement benevolent government. Shen Li became flattering and no longer upright, which made Hence Hai Rui even more worried.

Hence Hai Rui is not worried about the problem of moral decline. The debate between China and barbarians is long and new, and it is still firm. Hence Hai Rui does not intend to speak for the barbarians.

He is worried that the scholars of the Great Ming, as the Emperor's authority increases, will all choose to be silent, unwilling to actively offer advice, unwilling to speak out in remonstrance, only knowing how to flatter, or even watch jokes. Then the Great Ming will become dangerous.

At this time, Hence Hai Rui saw Xu Chengchu, as if he saw himself in the year.

Hence Hai Rui thinks very highly of Xu Chengchu. Xu Chengchu grew up being ridiculed by others. He had a tumor on his neck, and no one proposed marriage even after he passed the Juren exam. After he passed the Jinshi exam, he was ridiculed by others. "Xu Tumor" was the nickname given to him by the same list.

But under such pressure, Xu Chengchu still grew up to be what he is now, with an upright spirit, and even dared to speak out in remonstrance, stating the mistakes of the monarch and father. The Dinghai school system is incomplete and problematic, and the ministers in the court all saw it, but dared not say it, and could not say it.

The Emperor is no longer a child. If the ministers speak out in remonstrance like in the past, it is to kill the Emperor's prestige and is easily feared by the Emperor.

The local area invested a lot of money in popular education, which is destined to be absorbed by talent, absorbed to the coastal metropolises. Then the talents cultivated in the hinterland all ran away, and they couldn't develop. How can this loss-making business be done for a long time?

But the decisions made by the Emperor, no one dared to question, or even put forward opinions. Then the Great Ming is very easy to go on a wrong path.

And Xu Chengchu's appearance made Hence Hai Rui very happy. The Han dynasty has loyal and good people in every generation. One Xu Chengchu is enough.

Xu Chengchu's character is no problem. He cares about the world and is firm enough, and he is also intelligent. This is a scholar. The future is bright, the road is tortuous, and it is full of thorns.

Xu Chengchu's first case in the Censorate was so difficult. The Song Shanyong corruption case was just a small matter. In the future, the bigger the official, the bigger the wind and waves, and the greater the test for Xu Chengchu.

The current Xu Chengchu is just a piece of unpolished jade that needs careful carving.

"Song Shanyong is guilty." Xu Chengchu turned his head and said very firmly: "This silver is not tuition, it is dirty money! 5,400 silver, it is true that it was all used on the Tianxiong Academy, this is not wrong, but he took it, so he must be punished. If not punished, where is the national law."

"I am not afraid of being pointed at, not afraid of being besieged, but I still want to say, I am not wrong."

"Song Shanyong is guilty, but not wrong." Hence Hai Rui said with a full face of smiles: "Xu Chengchu, this is your first lesson in officialdom. You must remember, many things are like this, violating the rules, but not doing wrong."

"You are not wrong. You are a censor, doing your duty; Song Shanyong is not wrong. He wants to keep the Tianxiong Academy running; Great Ming Prefecture is not wrong, because the government treasury is poor to the point of running mice; the students who besieged you are not wrong, because they want to plead for their teacher, otherwise they are ungrateful."

"The difficulty of world affairs lies here. Everyone is not wrong, but the matter is guilty. Then I ask you, Xu Chengchu, then..."

"... who do you say is wrong?"

Xu Chengchu thought for a long time, his brows were twisted into a knot, and he asked blankly: "The world is wrong?"

"The world is not wrong either." Hence Hai Rui shook his head and said: "The Great Ming is still not strong enough. This case tells you that sometimes, you can choose to turn a blind eye."

Xu Chengchu looked at Hence Hai Rui, opened his eyes in disbelief, and asked blankly: "Does the Chief Censor mean that my first lesson in entering the Censorate, being a Plain-Robed Censor, is to learn to be flexible?"

"Indeed." Hence Hai Rui's face was very ugly. He shook his sleeves and threw out a book. His face was full of mixed feelings. This thing is the "Self-Cultivation of the Five-Step Snake" written by the traitor, treacherous official, number one rebel, and unloyal and unfilial person in the court, Wang Chonggu. This book is also known as "Being an Official."

This is Wang Chonggu's learning of being an official. There are many, many contents in it. Hence Hai Rui dislikes Wang Chonggu, this treacherous official, very much, and then dislikes his learning, but Wang Chonggu's learning of being an official is truly extraordinary.

Xu Chengchu saw the cover of the book, frowned and said: "Wang the Second Minister is a treacherous official, I don't want to learn from him!"

"You must first know what a treacherous official looks like, then you know what kind of people you want to deal with. Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will win every battle. If you want to do things, first learn to be an official." Hence Hai Rui stuffed the book into Xu Chengchu's hand, patted it, and sighed for a long time before saying: "Take it, study it carefully."

"Yes." Xu Chengchu's face turned red, but he still held the book in his hand.

Xu Chengchu, who returned to the All-Chu Guild Hall, was a bit confused. He clearly did nothing wrong, but he handled the matter very badly. Xu Chengchu read Wang Chonggu's "Being an Official" with a critical attitude, and then studied it again with a serious attitude, and finally, with the attitude of seriously studying and understanding, he read the book thoroughly.

At this moment, Xu Chengchu suddenly realized. He caused trouble. He actually put His Majesty in a very awkward state, a state of dilemma whether to punish or not. Finally, the Emperor used a private pardon to let Song Shanyong enter the capital to be an official, which took care of everyone's face.

Xu Chengchu only then knew that he had consumed the precious political resources, imperial favor.

From the Emperor to Hence Hai Rui, they all gave Xu Chengchu enough time and space to grow.

And Xu Chengchu also learned things from this thin book "Being an Official." When encountering such a dilemma, one must learn to shirk, learn to kick the ball, learn to be flexible, and let these officials do things, rather than holding national laws and binding the upper and lower officials to the point of being unable to move. That is pedantic.

"Wang the Second Minister doesn't look like a treacherous official, so how did he become a treacherous official?" Xu Chengchu was no longer resistant to the book "Being an Official." He found that Wang Chonggu lived very clearly, but how did such a clear person walk into the list of recognized treacherous officials?

Actually, Wang Chonggu wrote very clearly in the book. He just didn't accept it.

Zhang Juzheng, a hairy boy, a young man came to the Grand Secretariat, and wanted to shout and kill these old people who had made contributions in the wind and rain of the empire. Gao Gong, Yang Bo, Wang Chonggu, they didn't accept it, feeling that their Jin Party was big and deep, why did Zhang Juzheng always win?

Now the Jin Party is gone, Wang Chonggu is convinced, convinced, and has learned to persuade himself. Isn't it just losing to Zhang Juzheng? This guy is a monster who has never lost.

Wang Chonggu explained the method of flexibility in the book.

The Luzon Governor's Office established in the second year of Wanli. After the Luzon Governor's Office took Manila that year, they carried out severe interrogation of Spanish shipbuilders, coerced and lured, cheated, and even let Deng Zilong marry Luo Lian to appease the shipbuilders.

Finally, all these shipbuilders were absorbed as Great Ming craftsmen. After the Great Ming opened the sea, the shipbuilding industry started from imitating Western large sailing ships and three-masted sandwich ships.

The Great Ming banned the sea for 170 years, and the shipbuilders, industrial chain, and system were all ruined. Everything was waiting to be done. Official factory construction, these red-haired barbarian shipbuilders, were the first batch of shipbuilders in the Great Ming shipyard of the Wanli Reform.

At that time, if the Great Ming held the attitude of a Heavenly Dynasty, feeling that the barbarian technology was all trivial, then the Great Ming's opening of the sea would not be so smooth.

Flexibility is for better development, for the Great Ming to be great again.

"Holding the jade and walking on the muddy road, the jade must be broken; wrapping the leather shoes and wading through the rapids, the body will eventually drown; state affairs are like weaving, the warp and weft are intertwined. If you force to break the thread, the silk will be destroyed."

"A gentleman in the world should imitate the rivers and seas to accept all rivers without losing their taste; a true pillar of the country should show the softness of reeds on the outside and the firmness of pines and cypresses on the inside; therefore, a gentleman should be like unpolished jade and sharp sword, hiding in the sheath is warm as jade, and out of the sheath is cold light." Xu Chengchu made annotations. This was the realization he got after reading the book "Being an Official."

Xu Chengchu reflected on himself. The reason why he was annoying was not only the tumor on his neck, but also the aggressiveness he showed because of that tumor. Attacking was a way for him not to be humiliated and ridiculed, just like a bristling rooster.

This kind of thorny uprightness is indeed annoying, but this does not mean that Xu Chengchu was wrong in the past. He thought that after passing the Jinshi exam, no one would discriminate against him. After all, in his mind, Jinshi at least had virtue.

But he was wrong. After passing the Jinshi exam, he welcomed more widespread and vulgar ridicule, so he chose to use a sharper appearance to protect his fragile self.

Now, he is reborn and does not need a sharp shell to protect himself. He can learn from Hence Hai Rui. Hence Hai Rui is upright, and under the waving of the divine sword, demons and ghosts cannot escape. Officials fear him, but also respect him.

When not taking action, be warm as jade; when taking action, be merciless.

What surprised Xu Chengchu most was that Hence Hai Rui and Wang Qian had a very good relationship, and even Wang Qian himself was a Plain-Robed Censor. This was the fact that Xu Chengchu was most stunned by!

(Note: This line is a continuation of the previous segment.)

The only son of the second richest person in the world, Wang, the big dandy of the capital, was actually a Plain-Robed Censor, and actually promised to be incorruptible for life to achieve his life goals. This made Xu Chengchu too surprised.

Hence Hai Rui handed this "Being an Official" annotated by Hence Hai Rui himself to Xu Chengchu. He told Xu Chengchu the source of his clues.

It is truly, people cannot be judged by their appearance, and the sea cannot be measured. Under the appearance of this dandy Wang Qian, there was such an ambition.

And at this time, Wang Qian, under the name of seeing his son, looked at his father. After all, he was old, and he couldn't expect Wang Chonggu to bow his head first, so Wang Qian returned to the old house to visit his father.

Wang Chonggu was iron-faced and selfless on the surface, but actually ordered the servants to prepare good wine and food.

"You, you, you are too impulsive in doing things. Last time, your 'Nine Don'ts' caused such a big mess. It wasn't that you stepped on your father's face and relied on His Majesty's grace that you couldn't do it." Wang Chonggu didn't drink, the Great Physician didn't allow it, but Wang Chonggu still taught his son, hoping that his son would restrain himself in the matter of the Yanxing Tower Trading House.

That is a public business. Not encroaching on public interests to fatten private interests is already worthy of the imperial grace. Life is one's own.

Wang Chonggu didn't have any lofty awareness. For the sake of the country, he had already sacrificed his brother Wang Chongyi. He didn't want to send a white-haired person to a black-haired person before he died, and hold a funeral for Wang Qian.

Wang Qian leaned sideways and said in a low voice: "Dad, I came back this time because there is one thing I am not sure about."

"So that's it, you are willing to come back because your father is useful, so you come back, right." Wang Chonggu was almost angered to heart attack by Wang Qian's sneaky look!

This attitude of Wang Qian is just one: useful is the old father, useless is the old bastard!

"Tell me, what is it, I will give you some advice." Wang Chonggu was also curious. Wang Qian, who was not afraid of heaven or earth and had an idea with a turn of his eyes, actually had doubts.

Wang Qian drank a full cup before saying: "The Yanxing Tower Trading House has a way of playing, which is to borrow a large batch of valuable tickets with a smaller price, constantly sell them, lower the price, cause market panic and shock, and then buy them at a low position, and then return the valuable tickets."

"After buying enough chips at a low price, start to pull up, and then ship. When trading is not very frequent and trading volume shrinks, you can pull up the price with very little silver."

"I heard you say it, isn't it already there?" Wang Chonggu was a bit puzzled. Wang Qian called this kind of trading phenomenon "short," viewed volume-releasing decline as a short-selling signal, and called volume-shrinking rise as a shipping signal.

Of course, in actual trading, because of multi-party games, the signals of short-selling and shipping are not so obvious.

Only then did Wang Qian explain: "Recently, all families have suffered heavy losses, so they banned this method of borrowing shares to smash the market."

"What is your idea?"

(Note: This line is a continuation of the previous segment.)

"Don't ban it." Wang Qian said very affirmatively: "Admittedly, borrowing shares to smash the market, small households with weaker risk-bearing capacity, small households will always sell chips because of panic, and like to chase the rise. Which family rises, they will swarm to it, the crowd is noisy, and after a while, no one will ask again."

"Tossing and turning like this, the ones who suffer are the small households, but I still don't intend to ban borrowing shares to smash the market."

"The reason?" Wang Chonggu sat up straight and asked seriously.

Wang Qian hesitated and said: "Although there are 'Nine Don'ts,' there will always be fish that slip through the net. The Workers' Party is weak, and that Wang Jiaping is almost in the capital. I am afraid that my 'Nine Don'ts' can block most of them, but there will still be fish that slip through the net entering the market."

"After all, there is worldly wisdom outside the law, and there is a need for harmony above uprightness. The way of power change is the way of being an official."

"At this time, allowing borrowing shares to smash the market will smash the price to a reasonable position, where it should be."

"Oh, I understand, you read the Struggle Volume." Wang Chonggu raised his brows and understood Wang Qian's meaning.

A folk workshop enters the market, not allowing borrowing shares to smash the market, and the price can be pushed to the sky in a few days. On the first day of entering the market, they earned the money of several generations. Who is willing to work down-to-earth?

On the contrary, allowing borrowing shares to smash the market can close these owners, let the shopkeepers manage the folk workshops well, use the market to force owners and shopkeepers to make good decisions, instead of messing around. Today the seaweed was washed away, tomorrow the seaweed floated back. This kind of thing will not happen.

Fooling the market, someone in the market will borrow a bunch of chips and smash you to death.

This is the game, the game between the market and the folk workshops.

"Doing this, the ones who suffer are still the small households." Wang Chonggu thought for a long time and said affirmatively: "Follow your idea, don't ban borrowing shares to smash the market. In the long run, it is beneficial to the market's price correction of official factories and folk workshops."

"It won't be that good valuable tickets have no market, no one can afford them, and it won't be that these rubbish, on the first day of entering the market, earned the money of several generations."

The long-term stability of Yanxing Tower must be constant metabolism, clearing out those rubbish, leaving folk workshops and official factories with achievements and abilities, which is beneficial to everyone.

Excellent ones will stay, inferior ones will be eliminated.

Allowing borrowing shares to smash the market means: rubbish should be piled in the garbage dump, let the damn guys enter the downward cycle faster and die faster, accelerating metabolism.

"What about official factories? If official factories are short of money and come to this market for financing, they will be smashed dizzy on the first day of entry. Then who should I talk to?" Wang Qian immediately said the first difficulty. Official factories with government backgrounds entered the market and were smashed dizzy. If they ran to Wang Chonggu or Wang Jiaping to cry, things would be troublesome.

Wang Chonggu immediately said: "Then official factories rely on the inclination of the government office, and this business still can't be done, and there is no need to exist. Who said official factories can't close down? Just allow folk workshops to close down?"

"If I have to say, official factories can also close down, and they must also do a good job of metabolism. If they don't do well, the official factories will sooner or later become bloated and unable to be cleaned up."

"If the operation is unfavorable and there is no money, and they can't afford the craftsmen in the factory, do they have to rely on the court's taxes to support them? Where can the court's taxes afford so many craftsmen."

No one can live forever, and no system can move for ten thousand generations.

Even His Majesty is prepared to lose the Great Ming's country and the Great Ming must perish. Why should the official factories that occupy greater power, in the market competition with folk workshops, even find it difficult to support their families, and the court still allows them to rot arbitrarily without making any clearing disposal?

If borrowing shares to smash the market is banned, the Yanxing Tower Trading House will lose the mechanism of error correction through games.

But it is obvious that doing so will kill small households and lose all their money, escape quickly, and gather around those private trading meetings with high thresholds, becoming the wings of these trading meetings, letting these trading meetings take their silver and act recklessly in the trading house.

The benefits of doing so are also obvious, that is, the Yanxing Tower market follows the "Heaven Selection Theory" and "Human Selection Theory," survival of the fittest, not leaving a pit full of rubbish entered by nepotism, letting the whole market rot.

Decay will spread. Once the number of decay increases, the whole market will rot, the gold story will go bankrupt, and the Great Ming Treasure Note will lose its first anchor and turn into a credit currency.

There is no perfect method in the world. Any government decree has good and bad, and choices must be made.

Wang Chonggu knows this officialdom too well. How many clerks are there in the Yanxing Tower Trading House? Even if these trading houses are all selfless, dedicated to the public, and morally noble, with the scale of clerks, it is impossible to supervise the huge market completely. This is beyond the scope of manpower.

And the participants in the whole market are the majority. Only games can form a consensus.

Doing so is to expel small households and form a multi-dealer market, but small households deeply participating in this kind of game is itself a behavior of speculation greater than investment.

"Take the lighter of the two evils." Wang Chonggu made a decision for Wang Qian. Sometimes Wang Qian will also be confused, and will also look ahead and behind.

"Wang Jiaping asks to see you." The doorman stood in front of the study and handed a visiting card to Wang Qian.

Wang Jiaping entered the capital, and the first one to visit was Wang Chonggu's pier.

Wang Qian looked at the visiting card in his hand and said with great emotion: "Speak of Cao Cao, and Wang Jiaping arrives."

The Workers' Party is about to be handed over to Wang Jiaping. Although everyone is from the Jin Party, they don't deal with each other very well. They stumbled...

... and walked to today, and walked together again.

Wang Jiaping stood in front of the Wang family's mansion, stood with his hands behind his back, looked at the door, a bit trance-like. Last time, for the sake of the Assembly Hall in Guangzhou Prefecture, he begged Wang Chonggu here, hoping that Wang Chonggu would help for the sake of everyone being in the Jin Party.

Wang Chonggu didn't say anything, and handled the matter. This is a friendship. In the future, Wang Jiaping's counter-attack and liquidation would fall into a moral crisis.

Wang Chonggu, Wang Qian, and even the Emperor all felt that Wang Jiaping would do something for the Jin people, take the opportunity to suppress dissidents, insert his own people, and consolidate his authority, so the Emperor directly dismantled the All-Jin Guild Hall and turned it into a Workers' Hall, so that Wang Jiaping didn't have that ability.

But Wang Jiaping knew very well that there would be no counter-attack and liquidation, mainly because he didn't have that ability.

The Emperor and Wang Chonggu have no count in their hearts.

What Jin Party? Where are there still people in the Jin Party?! The past Jin Party was scattered. Either they turned to the Workers' Party or they turned to the Emperor's Party.

Fan Yingqi stayed in the Dissection Institute and couldn't come out. Zhou Liangyin simply became an Emperor's Party like Marquis of Yuzhao. Others were dismissed or convicted in the cruel political squeeze, and some unlucky ones were used by Wang Chonggu to brush imperial favor.

The Jin Party is really gone. A party with no one is destined to sink.

Power has no vacuum. As long as there is any gap, someone will fill it and fulfill power for you.

"Seen the Second Minister Wang." Wang Jiaping performed a disciple's ceremony. He returned to the capital with a very clear purpose: first worship the pier, and must not make the mistake of Zhang Siwei back then.

Back then, Zhang Siwei climbed on Yang Bo's head, feeling that his position as party leader was tenable, and even treated the All-Jin Guild Hall as his own, corrupting the current Ying Tian Governor Li Le, and didn't treat Yang Bo as the party leader. Later, Yang Bo handed the party leader's position to Ge Shouli.

"Sit, sit, sit." Wang Chonggu was very happy about Wang Jiaping's visit. At the very least, Wang Jiaping didn't rely on being young to bully the old man, which was already very moral.

Wang Chonggu and Wang Jiaping talked a lot, such as the salt law formulated by Yin Zhengmao back then, the operation of the Guangzhou Maritime Trade Office, Foshan's iron factories, shipyards, the situation in Annam, etc.

"I have a conservative attitude toward the situation in Annam. The Annam people haven't fought fiercely enough. Just right, I am old, so I called you back. Don't think that I blocked your building of merits. The plan to annex Annam, I weighed it left and right, but this Workers' Party is more important to the Great Ming." Wang Chonggu talked about his attitude toward Annam.

Wang Jiaping said very directly: "This is not the right time. Myanmar, Laos, Siam, Annam, Champa, these places are all barbarians. Without enough lessons, they will not listen."

Wang Jiaping also expressed his attitude. Annexing Annam again looks like a great merit, very tempting, but very hot. At the same time, the internal squeeze of Annam is not...

... fierce enough, and it hasn't reached the time when the melon is ripe and falls.

Wang Jiaping said that when he left, he would increase the import of foreign grain and Champa grain to accelerate the internal squeeze of Annam.

"The Second Minister Wang has always been worried about the union. I have an immature idea, hoping that the Second Minister Wang will help me correct it." Wang Jiaping took out a memorial. This was his practical experience in Guangzhou.

The two iron smelting institutes in Foshan can drive out bad currency with good currency, which is traceable.

Everything in the world has no reason. Wang Chonggu wanted to hand over the Workers' Party to Wang Jiaping. Then Wang Jiaping had to take out something to let Wang Chonggu do what he had always wanted to do, and the union was what Wang Chonggu was most worried about now.

After Wang Chonggu finished reading the memorial, he asked with some doubt: "Does the Vice Minister Wang mean that the current official factories are too closed, so they cannot form a union?"

"Flowing water does not rot." Wang Jiaping answered very affirmatively.