Chapter 836: A Method That Theoretically Could Keep the Great Ming Unchanged for Wan Shi—Issuing Money

Zhu Yijun looked at the title in front of the Taibai Tower. The content of today's gathering at the Taibai Tower was: How about issuing twelve guan of treasure notes to Great Ming commoners every year?

"Feng, my attendant, I have been too kind and gentle on weekdays. Look at these scholar-officials, they have set their sights on my gold treasury!" Zhu Yijun was somewhat emotional. He never expected that the Great Ming scholar-officials would be so bold! The Wanli treasure notes were Zhu Yijun's gold bonds. This twelve guan a year had to be paid by Zhu Yijun, the father of the monarch.

Feng Bao counted on his fingers for a long time and whispered: "Your Majesty, it is unaffordable, completely unaffordable."

The Great Ming now had 130 million people. Issuing twelve guan of treasure notes to every person per year would be 1.56 billion guan of treasure notes per year, which was 1.56 billion taels of silver, more than 300 million taels of gold, or 11,600 tons of gold.

These scholar-officials really didn't learn any mathematics at all. But if they learned a little mathematics, they would know that the Emperor couldn't get 11,600 tons of gold in a year. Let alone 11,600 tons, even 600 tons, Zhu Yijun couldn't get.

"They think highly of me. Where can I get hundreds of millions of taels of gold in a year?" Zhu Yijun flicked his sleeves and walked into the Taibai Tower, waiting for the gathering to begin.

Zhu Yijun met an unexpected person in the Taibai Tower: Ningyuan Marquis Li Chengliang. He had also come, and the Emperor directly summoned him to the "Heaven" grade private room.

"Does the Ningyuan Marquis also like to listen to gatherings?" The Great Ming Emperor signaled that Li Chengliang didn't need to be overly polite and let him sit down and speak.

Li Chengliang smiled and said: "Reporting to Your Majesty, I'm just joining in the fun. Listening to the gathering is fake. I'm just looking to see which pedantic Confucian has no eyes and is talking nonsense, so I can beat him up."

Li Chengliang felt that his retirement days were really too good!

Every day he ate and drank well, and when he woke up, he looked for pedantic Confucians everywhere. He had suffered the anger of scholars for so many years! Finally, he had a chance to vent.

For the Ningyuan Hou Fu, the more pedantic Confucians Li Chengliang beat, the safer the Ningyuan Hou Fu would be. Doing so was a cut between the military and the civil officials, especially for the two generations of military officials, Li Chengliang and Li Rusong, who were very capable of fighting; they had to be extra careful.

However, according to the observations of the Eastern Depot, Li Chengliang beating pedantic Confucians was not to keep the Ningyuan Hou Fu safe, but more to vent his anger. Li Rusong had made great military achievements, and the Emperor was in the prime of his life. The Emperor had no reason to "kill the donkey when the mill is done."

So it was purely a personal grievance.

"So that's how it is." Zhu Yijun talked with Li Chengliang about the war situation in Japan, especially General Qi Jiguang Jiguang's conquest of the three countries of Nagato, Iwami, and Izumo.

As the Ningyuan Marquis, Li Chengliang should have gone to the Zhao Wenhua Hall for court discussions every day, but he used the excuse of being old and sick to refuse to go to the Zhao Wenhua Hall for court discussions, just like when Wang Chonggu became the auxiliary minister but never sat in the Wenyuan Pavilion.

Li Chengliang's purpose for not going to the Zhao Wenhua Hall for court discussions was also quite simple: to stay away from the rights and wrongs in the court and pass down the Ningyuan Marquis title he had earned. Moreover, he didn't go to the Zhao Wenhua Hall also for Li Rusong's

future.

If he went today, Li Rusong wouldn't be able to go to the Zhao Wenhua Hall in the future. The old affairs of Yan Song and Yan Shifan had to be guarded against.

Li Chengliang didn't know about General Qi Jiguang Jiguang's plan. After hearing the Emperor's statement, he added his own point of view from both military and political angles.

Militarily, such a long and narrow territory along the coast was easily cut off at the waist and defeated one by one. Therefore, it needed the navy to sit in town. If the navy rescued properly, it could greatly change this predicament;

Politically, Li Chengliang felt that the Great Ming troops stationed there should strictly abide by the prohibitions and leave the evil deeds to the Japanese brokers, agents, and daimyo. The Great Ming should not intervene too deeply in these dirty deeds. First, it would not let the Great Ming army's morality decline, and second, it would reduce the Japanese's resistance to the Great Ming army's stationing.

"Let the Japanese hate the Japanese, let the Japanese fight the Japanese. Only in this way can it last long. I still feel that the Great Ming should not come forward to levy taxes and urge them too urgently, to prevent the old affairs of Annam back then." Li Chengliang summarized his views.

Zhu Yijun was silent for a moment, then smiled and asked: "Let the Japanese hate the Japanese—is the Ningyuan Marquis doing the same in Liaodong?"

"I only have this little trick that can't be brought to the table." Li Chengliang admitted that he was using this method in Liaodong to deal with the Haixi, Wild, Jianzhou Jurchens, and the seven tribes of Outer Khalkha, letting them kill each other. This was a relatively cheap way of ruling.

The only downside to doing this is that it is like raising a venomous insect; if one raises a "venomous insect king" that Great Ming cannot control, it will be very difficult to clean up the mess. But the Great Ming military has already entered the age of total firearms.

The tactics of line infantry, artillery formations, and light cavalry formations cooperating with each other—the "line up and shoot" tactics—were already very proficient. There was no "gu king" that artillery couldn't handle. If there was, it was because there wasn't enough artillery.

"These Confucian scholars haven't been arrested. The Great Ming is still too free." Li Chengliang looked at the Confucian scholars entering the venue. He was extremely dissatisfied with many of the remarks of these pedantic Confucians. Mainly, some pedantic Confucians still hadn't learned the theory of contradictions, and as soon as they opened their mouths, it was castles in the air.

These people sat in the warm pavilions of the capital, pointing fingers at the affairs outside the Great Wall, pointing and gesturing. They would talk about the total commander of the border region being harsh on the barbarians, wanting to cultivate literary virtue and soften the distant people. They clearly hadn't seen a few barbarians, but they were full of fantasies about barbarians.

Only when they really arrived in Liaodong would they know how rampant these barbarians were. Soften the distant people? Planting these barbarians in the soil to make fertilizer was the greatest kindness and mercy.

"Thanks to everyone for giving me face. The gathering today will be lectured by me. My name is Cai Xianchen, from Tong'an County, Fujian. It's a remote place, and my official language is not very fluent. I hope everyone will forgive me." Cai Xianchen arched his hands in all directions. He was from Fujian, and his speech carried a bit of an accent, often being ridiculed because of his accent.

But this official language and elegant words could not be so proficient in a short while, and the accent was indeed a bit difficult to change.

The Eastern Depot's secret agents had already investigated Cai Xianchen's ancestors for eighteen generations and summarized them into a

memorial, which was placed at the Emperor's side.

Cai Xianchen passed the provincial examination in the thirteenth year of Wanli and entered the capital to take the jinshi examination in the fourteenth year of Wanli, but he didn't pass. In the capital, he took Wang Yuanmei as his teacher and was actively preparing to take the jinshi examination in the seventeenth year of Wanli. This gathering was also Wang Yuanmei asking Cai Xianchen to come to the Taibai Tower to talk about his views on treasure notes.

Wang Yuanmei felt that just reading books was not the way, so he let Cai Xianchen come out for a walk. "Reading ten thousand books is not as good as traveling ten thousand miles."

"The greatest evil of the world is nothing more than annexation. In the sixteen years of the Wanli Reform, the output of land can no longer satisfy the appetites of the powerful gentry. Therefore, annexation is monopoly." Cai Xianchen began his gathering.

Zhu Yijun found it interesting. Cai Xianchen had at least read the theory of contradictions and the theory of classes, because the second volume of the theory of classes was the distribution volume.

Under the circumstances of small-scale peasant economy, the world was trapped by annexation. Land was concentrated and abandoned, grain production was insufficient, and with a slight natural or man-made disaster, there would be an uproar, and the common people would have no way out but to rise up.

After the small-scale peasant economy transformed into a commodity economy, the two words "annexation" transformed into a complex distribution problem, which eventually evolved into monopoly through the distribution problem.

The specific manifestations of annexation in the commodity economy are: monopoly of means of production and production tools; transformation from physical land deeds to equity certificates; making people slaves through debt, just like the servants and tenants who were strongly attached to people in the past; high concentration of market share, technology, capital, industry, etc.; transferring one's own risks to the majority to bear, etc.

To solve the problem of monopoly, one must solve the problem of distribution. At least Cai Xianchen's discussion was not empty pedantic Confucian talk.

Cai Xianchen continued: "Annexation is monopoly. How to solve monopoly? Naturally, by working hard on distribution. Let's look at this sentence: 'How about issuing twelve guan of treasure notes to Great Ming commoners every year?' This sentence contains several premises."

"First is the regular period, every year; the target, individuals, everyone in the Great Ming; the quantity is twelve guan, which is the basic living guarantee; finally, there are no prerequisites, regardless of old or young, as long as they are Great Ming people, they are all issued."

Twelve guan is twelve silver, which is the median income of a strong laborer in the Great Ming for a year of hard work.

In other words, Cai Xianchen wanted the Great Ming imperial court to issue basic living guarantees to every specific individual unconditionally every year.

What Cai Xianchen wanted to talk about was a universal, basic, regular, unconditional, individual social bottom-line mechanism.

Cai Xianchen continued: "Admittedly, this looks like a fantasy. Even if it is printing money, 1.5 billion guan of notes, 300 million taels of gold a year, no matter what, it cannot be realized."

"But we must notice that the anchoring of treasure notes is now gold, but not just gold, but also Great Ming goods. Under the premise of continuous improvement in productivity, the treasure notes that the Great Ming can issue are definitely not 6 million guan a year, but 600 million, 6 billion guan."

The problem that could be seen at a glance, Cai Xianchen had long noticed. The productivity at the moment could not do it at all. The anchoring object of Wanli treasure notes was only gold, but in the future, it could be goods. It was hard to find 300 million taels of gold, but it was still possible to think about producing goods worth 300 million taels of gold.

The purpose of him throwing out this topic was only to discuss the future of credit currency. Under the premise of high enough productivity and rich enough materials in the future, could it maintain basic social fairness by issuing money to everyone?

This was the problem Cai Xianchen was discussing.

"If we stand from the perspective of the imperial court, providing basic economic guarantees can effectively reduce dissatisfaction, so there won't be any uprisings, and the Great Ming can naturally remain unchanged for ten thousand generations." Cai Xianchen said with a full face of smiles: "Gentlemen, we seem to have found a method that can remain unchanged for ten thousand generations, at least theoretically it is feasible."

"It is worth noting that this way of issuing money is a distribution method, and it is very effective, because it does not require cumbersome and extremely troublesome reviews, and can significantly reduce administrative waste, especially when the common people have money, they will buy various commodities, thereby promoting commercial prosperity."

A method that theoretically could keep the Great Ming unchanged for ten thousand generations—issuing money.

Zhu Yijun leaned lazily on the back of the chair, looking at Cai Xianchen without any movement. This kind of rhetoric looked very beautiful and had great attraction to the Emperor, but Zhu Yijun knew very clearly that issuing money could not keep it unchanged for ten thousand generations at all.

A Confucian scholar reached out and stood up, asking with a puzzled face: "What you said is very good, but doesn't issuing money to everyone equal to not issuing it to anyone? Because everyone is issued money, the total amount of currency increases, and the Sun Shangli index will continue to rise. The more you issue, the more it increases."

The Sun Shangli index mentioned by this Confucian scholar was proposed by Yao Guangming, the magistrate of Shanghai County. It was divided into two types: one was the price increase of cheap necessary commodities, and the other was the price increase of more expensive non-necessary commodities.

The increase in the total amount of currency would inevitably cause the soaring of the Sun Shangli index. The more you issue, the more it will rise.

"You asked very well." Cai Xianchen nodded and said: "If it is purely issuing money, it will definitely lead to the soaring of the Sun Shangli index, because the commodities that can be provided in the market have not increased accordingly. Therefore, we cannot simply issue money. This is the problem I have been emphasizing. What we want to do is distribution."

"This money must never be generated out of thin air. Once it is generated out of thin air, this is not a basic guarantee, but a debt."

"Xu Heng said in the 'Paper Currency Memorial': 'Using the cost of a few coins of paper and ink to exchange for the goods of the people of the world; printing is easy, life is endless, and the source is inexhaustible. What the world calls the immortal's art of turning rubble into gold, how can it surpass this?'"

"Paper notes are debt. As long as it is debt, it must be repaid. If the Great Ming ignores the anchoring and issues a large amount of treasure notes, the Wanli treasure notes will be the same fate as the Hongwu treasure notes, which also means that this Wanli currency method has failed again."

Zhu Yijun highly identified with this remark by Cai Xianchen. Issuing money at will without anchoring would eventually harm the Great Ming itself.

Xu Heng had already discussed the relationship between currency and debt in detail in the "Paper Currency Memorial." Paper notes were debt, and debt was paper notes. The essence was the same, which was also the basic principle of the Great Ming's currency issuance. The imperial court wrote down an IOU and borrowed gold from the palace, but what was borrowed was treasure notes.

As long as it did not deviate from this basic relationship, the Great Ming could maintain that the quantity of treasure notes would not be excessively abused.

Such institutional design was to cap the lower limit of the empire.

Cai Xianchen was the main lecturer of the gathering. If he didn't understand anything, he would be a laughingstock on stage. He was really very cultured, and his understanding of paper notes was also very in place.

This Confucian scholar frowned and asked: "You also said that issuing twelve guan of treasure notes a year requires at least 300 million taels of gold. Even if Wanli treasure notes use goods as anchoring objects, can they support such a scale?"

"What should we do to ensure that treasure notes are not generated out of thin air? To ask more simply: where does the money come from?"

Cai Xianchen said very firmly: "There are many sources. We can increase taxes on powerful gentry, levy taxes on inheritances, increase income taxes; take out a portion of the profits handed over by official workshops; we can also invest this huge sum of money in trading houses or overseas plantations and distribute the profits to the people."

"In any case, this money cannot be generated out of thin air. Otherwise, it is better not to issue it, as the harm is greater."

Cai Xianchen highly identified with the Ministry of Rites' statement. As long as it is debt, it must be repaid. If the powerful gentry don't repay it, then the poor and laborers will repay it. Reality is often like this: the gentry's money is returned in full, while the common people's money is split three-seven.

Treasure notes generated out of thin air are like a boomerang, hitting everyone right in the center of the forehead.

"Naive." Li Chengliang pondered for a while, sneered, and leaned back on the back of the chair. This Cai Xianchen couldn't be considered a pedantic Confucian, but he was somewhat ignorant of the world, and his ideas were somewhat simple.

Zhu Yijun asked curiously: "Oh? Does the Ningyuan Marquis have any other high opinions?"

Li Chengliang shook his head and said: "I can't talk about high opinions. The biggest problem with this Confucian scholar is that he thinks the imperial court is too omnipotent. If the imperial court were so powerful, how could there be any change of dynasty?"

"And money, no matter when, is something that gets oily as soon as it passes through one's hands. If Your Majesty gives 1.5 billion guan here, it might disappear before it even reaches the people."

"Money is like water, always flowing to places where it is not lacking."

The imperial court is not omnipotent. Treating the imperial court as an omnipotent god is a fallacy. The imperial court is also composed of individual individuals, not an impartial god who disposes of everything without bias.

Moreover, issuing money is something that, as long as the imperial court issues it, will breed corruption. In the end, whether the money can reach the people is unknown, but those who are not short of money will definitely be even richer, leading to the poor becoming poorer and the rich becoming richer.

So Li Chengliang thought Cai Xianchen was naive. This kind of naive disease is easy to cure. As long as you actually do one thing, you will know how difficult it is to realize this unrealistic fantasy.

Zhu Yijun sighed and said: "I introduced some *Artemisia annua* from the Russian state. The flowers of *Artemisia annua* can be used as medicine. Whenever the flowers bloom, all kinds of thieves will rush into the fields."

"Most of these thieves are elderly people and children. They rush into the fields like crazy, grabbing the flowers of *Artemisia annua*."

"These thieves are all wandering and idle people found by medicine peddlers. The purpose is also simple: destroy the fields so that the medicine peddlers can continue to sell their arsenic instead of Pagoda Sugar."

"You say, what can the Agricultural College do?"

"When the Grand Minister of Agriculture told me, he was heartbroken, because these wandering and idle people have no method of picking, and often mess up the grass fields. *Artemisia annua* is expanding production, and this destructive picking brings a lot of trouble."

"They are all old people and children. You can't hit them, you can't scold them, you can't punish them. The local government offices can only advise them. They are like locusts. As soon as they are driven away, they come back."

"The key is that these medicine peddlers are intentional, letting these thieves, mainly old people and children, trample and destroy the fields, so that the scale of *Artemisia annua* cannot increase."

Li Chengliang asked curiously: "How did Your Majesty solve it?"

"I had no choice, so I caught a batch of people, found the medicine peddlers, and didn't stop there. I also caught the masters behind them and hung the masters in the grass fields. After that, no one trampled the grass fields anymore."

Zhu Yijun said helplessly: "I didn't want to either, but I had no better way. If I don't punish them with thunderous power, these masters will still let these medicine peddlers go around and deceive the wandering and idle people to destroy the fields."

Zhu Yijun used these masters, meaning to kill them as a sacrifice, just like the Shang King used the Qiang people.

The reason Zhu Yijun killed people was also because these masters deserved to die. The pharmacies of these masters sold fake medicine, and their bottoms were full of rotten things. They even dared to provoke imperial power in the agricultural affairs that the Emperor personally led. This was seeking death.

These masters held a fluke mentality, thinking that they wouldn't be found out if they incited the wandering and idle people, but they seriously underestimated the ability of the Embroidered Uniform Guards to handle cases.

The investigation process was very tortuous, but these secret agents who came from the "Duntai" Marquis were best at finding the culprit from the clues.

This is reality. Everyone has their own interests, and even some couples are in the same bed but have different dreams. Even in the same quilt, they can sleep with different hearts.

"Isn't this kind of absolute fairness unfair to the diligent?" A Confucian scholar stood up and asked loudly. He quickly noticed the big problem behind this seemingly reasonable system, which was: this imaginary system was actually raising idlers.

Absolute fairness is often unfair. This is oppression of the diligent and capable. The more you do, the more you earn, and the more grievances you suffer. Because these diligent and capable people have become the providers for idlers, and if this continues, no one will be willing to be diligent, and the entire Great Ming will lose its vitality.

Cai Xianchen smiled and said: "You are right. So, twelve guan is still too much. So we have to cut this value in half, and then in half again. It can only barely keep them alive, and they will be in great pain with a little bit of wind and grass."

Twelve guan is the median of a strong laborer's hard work for a year. Half of a half is a quarter, three guan of notes, which is just barely enough to eat a mouthful and not starve to death. In this way, the scale of idlers is reduced.

This Confucian scholar said with great disapproval: "This is not a question of quantity, but a question of raising idlers. What if you cut it in half again? These wandering and idle people will probably go around doing evil, forcing and robbing these treasure notes that have just been issued."

"Breeding wandering and idle people, let's not mention it for now. You still haven't solved the problem of 'not worrying about scarcity but worrying about inequality.' Why should I raise this lazy person?"

After the Confucian scholar finished speaking, he stood up and chose to leave. Cai Xianchen's prepared rhetoric could not convince him. Subsequently, more than ten Confucian scholars chose to leave the venue. This was to express their disapproval of the gathering content.

Those who have different paths do not conspire together. There was no excessive quarreling, just leaving directly. Making a fuss was a disgrace to the literati.

"If you issue twelve guan, why not issue ten thousand guan directly? In this way, everyone will have ten thousand guan of family wealth, and there will be no poor people." A Confucian scholar stood up, spread his hands, and asked everyone.

He raised a sharper question. Issuing ten thousand guan directly could better realize so-called fairness. Everyone had money, so there would be no poor people.

"This is of course not okay. Issuing ten thousand guan, then what level will the price of rice, flour, grain, oil, and coal rise to? No, no." Cai Xianchen waved his hands repeatedly.

This Confucian scholar looked at Cai Xianchen seriously and said: "Therefore, I do not agree with your statement. Issuing money cannot solve injustice, but is creating greater injustice. This is the reason I oppose it."

After this Confucian scholar calmly stated his reasons, he left the Taibai Tower. Following him were dozens of people. There were less than fifty people left under the stage of the Taibai Tower.

Another Confucian scholar stood up, frowned, and asked: "I have a question. When you are starving and cold, can you survive by eating your own meat?"

"That is naturally impossible. You will only die faster." Cai Xianchen did not drag things out, but answered this question directly.

This Confucian scholar shook his head and said: "Your Majesty's annotation on the 'Theory of Contradictions' says: 'The so-called one yin and one yang is the Dao. The principle of all things is infinite; one body and two forms. If you gain it in the east, you must compensate for it in the west; if you take that jasper, you must give up that jade. The sun and moon replace each other in brightness, and the dark and light alternate. Cold and heat push and move, and prosperity and withering grow from each other.'"

"You want to issue money to everyone, so what is the price? This is what we must consider. History tells me that those who bear the price are often the poor and laborers, not the powerful gentry."

"Therefore, I do not recognize your statement. Your idea is very good, but the final result may be the opposite of what you envisioned."

After this Confucian scholar finished speaking, he left the Taibai Tower, and several people followed him and left.

"Have I annotated this sentence?" Zhu Yijun looked at the departing Confucian scholars and asked Feng Bao. The time for the theory of contradictions was a bit long, and he didn't remember that he had said such a thing.

Feng Bao didn't flip through the memo either, but bowed and said: "Your Majesty, of course you have. I can also recite this passage. The following is: 'The wise observe changes, the accomplished guard the middle. Excess and insufficiency are both useless. Hold both ends and use the middle.'"

The wise are good at discovering and perceiving the changes in all things; the accomplished will hold fast to the middle path. Excess and insufficiency are both useless, and one must grasp the two extremes and take the middle path.

"Hold both ends and use the middle" comes from the "Book of Rites: The Doctrine of the Mean." It is Confucius's praise for Shun, and it is also the core thought of the Doctrine of the Mean.

"The teacher's theory of contradictions is too obscure and difficult to understand. Everyone learns the theory of contradictions by referring to Your Majesty's annotated version." Feng Bao explained why he could recite this passage. It wasn't to flatter the Emperor, but mainly to understand the theory of contradictions.

Zhang Juzheng was a great Confucian. When he wrote the theory of contradictions, he was too sparing with words, and some logical changes made people confused. But the Emperor's annotation was annotated from the perspective of a child student, which was very easy to understand.

"So that's how it is. The Master said: 'Review the old and learn the new.' I should still open the old books and read them when I have nothing to do, so as not to forget." Zhu Yijun was somewhat emotional. Some scholar-officials' understanding of the theory of contradictions was almost surpassing him, the Emperor.

"Review the old and learn the new" is indeed an excellent way of learning.

"Your Majesty has said: 'If the plan does not revitalize the industry, the people will definitely be disturbed; if the policy does not change the labor system, the success will eventually be a fantasy.'" A Confucian scholar stood up and shook his head: "Any plan that cannot promote the change of production relations and the increase of productivity is a fantasy, and in the end, it is all tossing the common people. The ones who suffer are definitely the common people."

"I do not recognize your idea. Farewell."

After this Confucian scholar left, the number of people under the stage of the Taibai Tower was already sparse.

"I actually think Cai Xianchen's lecture was still very good. Although I really can't afford to support the people, I can give some treasure notes to the widowed, lonely, and solitary, so that they won't be so difficult." Zhu Yijun looked at the stage. Cai Xianchen was full of anxiety and confusion. His point of view didn't seem to be recognized by most people.

Zhu Changzhi had a sparring partner named Qian San, who only had one eye and was bullied in the nursing home. Zhu Yijun arranged him by Zhu Changzhi's side, and Zhu Yijun gave him the big name Qian Zhizhong.

Feng Bao whispered: "Your Majesty, the widowed, lonely, and solitary are after all a minority, and these treasure notes are very likely to be 'swapped'."

"What you said makes sense. The Great Ming is still not strong enough." Zhu Yijun said very approvingly. The five-room big tile houses of the Wanli years of the Great Ming hadn't even dug the foundation yet. It was not the time to slack off.

Li Chengliang glanced at the Emperor. In fact, the Emperor didn't realize one thing at all. Issuing money was not particularly important to the empire. What Li Chengliang found most terrifying was that the Emperor used the theory of contradictions to kill a large group of Confucian scholars who should have become pedantic Confucians.

Because the imperial examination required it, these scholars had to read the theory of contradictions. But once a person learned to look at a problem from two perspectives—positive and negative—they couldn't be a pedantic Confucian anymore.

The theory of contradictions and the theory of classes were completely different. The theory of contradictions was a way of thinking about problems.

Li Chengliang had watched for so long, and he knew very well that now when these scholar-officials were gathering, they must discuss the theory of contradictions. This kept the entire gathering from deviating from reality, at least it was talking about something.

This was a very terrifying phenomenon, because these scholar-officials were the ruling class of the Great Ming Dynasty in the future, the official-selecting-official class.

At least for the next twenty or thirty years, the imperial examination system would still be the most effective means and method for the Great Ming imperial court to select talents. These young scholar-officials, who were still slightly green and immature, would decide the fate of the empire in the future.

At least they were much stronger than those pedantic Confucians who talked about "heart and nature" with their hands in their sleeves. ===== CHAPTER 837 =====

"What you say makes sense; Great Ming is still not strong enough," Zhu Yijun said with great approval. The "five-room tile house" of the Great Ming Wanli era hasn't even had its foundation dug yet; this is no time for slackness.

Li Chengliang glanced at His Majesty. In truth, His Majesty had not realized one thing: issuing money is not particularly important for the imperial dynasty. To Li Chengliang, the most terrifying thing was that His Majesty had used the "Theory of Contradictions" to kill off a large batch of Confucian scholars who would otherwise have become "base Confucians."

Because the imperial examinations require it, these Confucian scholars have no choice but to study the "Theory of Contradictions." But once a person learns to view a problem from both positive and negative perspectives, they can no longer be a "base Confucian."

The "Theory of Contradictions" and the "Theory of Classes" are completely different; the "Theory of Contradictions" is a way of thinking about problems.

Li Chengliang had been watching for a long time, and he was very clear that now, when these scholar-officials gathered to talk, they must discuss the "Theory of Contradictions." This kept the entire discussion from straying from reality, ensuring that, at the very least, there was substance to their words.

This is a very terrifying phenomenon, because these scholar-officials are the future ruling class of the Great Ming Dynasty—the class of officials selecting officials.

At the very least, for the next twenty or thirty years, the imperial examination system will remain the most effective means and method for the Great Ming court to select talent. These young scholar-officials, who are still slightly green and immature, will later become the officials who select officials, deciding the fate of the empire.

At the very least, they are much stronger than those "base Confucians" who stand idly by and talk about "innate nature."