Chapter 1536: This Is the Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn

"Imperial Father, look at these matters — your daughter-in-law won't even speak of the rites of the imperial clan or the bonds between the various fiefs. But how is it that these United States, the Jiaqing Kingdom, the Western Chu Kingdom, and the Dzungar Kingdom are all states of the Huaxia? They're already scheming against one another now — in the future won't they tear off all pretense and go to war?"

Crown Princess Ding Yuying, dressed in a red embroidered juyi robe of the latest style with narrow sleeves and a fitted waist, sat within the Hall of Imperial Supremacy, reading the memorials sent by the envoys of the King of the United States and the King of Jiaqing from across the Pacific, and offering her observations with some feeling.

It was now late summer of the twenty-seventh year of Hongxing of the Great Ming, but because a vast Pacific Ocean lay between them, news traveled with great difficulty, so what Ding Yuying was reading were still the memorials sent from Qingzhou, Jinmen, the Gulf of America, and other places at the turn of spring and summer.

The news that the Princes of Huai and De had discovered the "City of Gold" and the "River of Gold" had not yet arrived — their memorials still had to cross half of North America!

What had arrived now were the memorials in which the King of the United States and the King of Jiaqing were bickering with and sabotaging each other!

In them, the King of the United States was unwilling to hand over the two provinces of Ha and Ke to the King of Jiaqing, and furthermore slandered the King of Jiaqing, saying that his changing the state's name to "Qing" revealed ambitions to become emperor and rule as sovereign.

And Zhu Cihuan, in his memorial, had likewise brought charges against Zhu Hehao!

He said his ambitions were too great — that he wanted to swallow up the silver mines and gold mountains of New Spain! That he wanted to monopolize all the gold and silver under heaven!

Truly a fine uncle and nephew of the Great Ming — neither one was a lamp that saved oil!

For now Zhu Cilang was still here, and might still be able to keep the two of them in check, but in the future, once he truly became the late emperor, it was estimated that neither the United States nor the Qing Kingdom would be easy to deal with.

But when Ding Yuying offered her observations, her words were light and breezy, and her face showed no expression of righteous indignation — she knew the Zhu Emperor's mind all too well. He had no intention of letting his son and daughter-in-law live a comfortable life! In the future they would all have to exhaust their minds and energies being emperor, being empress, being empress dowager.

Zhu Cilang merely chuckled, and turned his gaze toward the Lucky Crown Prince Zhu Hexing. This Lucky Crown Prince had now grown up as well. He had served as county magistrate, prefect, and governor-general, and had commanded the military operations that "settled without battle" in Heilongjiang and Andong, and had also overseen military intelligence at the Grand Marshal's Office for a period of time. Beginning in the twenty-seventh year of Hongxing, he had finally begun formally studying the governance of the realm under the Zhu Emperor.

And before he had begun his studies, his wife had already been studying the way of governing under the Zhu Emperor for five or six years — anyone who didn't know better would think his wife was the "Crown Princess Regnant," and that he was a son-in-law brought in from outside to marry into the family.

But after six or seven years of scrambling about in the outside world, the Lucky Crown Prince had come to understand something of his father's painstaking intentions — the world was very complex, and even though the Lucky Crown Prince was not the sort of "deep-palace crown prince" who stayed shut up in the palace the whole time, his experience and knowledge were still far too shallow. He had to go down to the grassroots and temper himself thoroughly, broaden his understanding, and only then could he begin studying governance.

Now, seeing Zhu Cilang's ill-intentioned gaze, Zhu Hexing only smiled bitterly: "Imperial Father, this is probably what is meant by the Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn!"

He really had made progress! He even knew about the Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn — but what great righteousness did the Spring and Autumn period have? According to past understanding, the Spring and Autumn was an age when rites collapsed and music fell into ruin, when rites, music, punitive expeditions, and warfare all issued from the feudal lords — what great righteousness could one speak of? Even if there was great righteousness, such as honoring the king and expelling the barbarians, there wasn't much of it. War among the Huaxia states — that was the main theme of the Spring and Autumn!

But Zhu Hexing had nonetheless put forward this concept of the "Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn" — that is to say, the wars among the Huaxia states of the Spring and Autumn also had a rather positive side!

Without the competition among the Huaxia states of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, how could there have been the mighty Qin and the glorious Han that later dominated the East? How could there have been the core territory of Huaxia civilization? How could there have been the various fundamental elements of Huaxia civilization?

The progress the Huaxia people achieved over those five hundred-plus years probably surpassed that of the next one or two thousand years!

Zhu Cilang smiled and nodded. "Good! You've finally understood the Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn. This Great Righteousness of the Spring and Autumn lies in the competition among the Huaxia states, each striving and exerting itself. Competition is of course cruel — whichever house is foolish and weak will have its state destroyed! But the Huaxia states are after all one family, and no matter who can dominate and take the lead, they are all elder brothers of the Huaxia. Lucky boy, do you understand your father's painstaking intentions?"

"Your son understands," Zhu Hexing said with a smile. "No matter what, the Great Ming is the elder of the Huaxia, and must have the bearing of an elder — it must lead along its younger brothers below."

Zhu Cilang smiled, neither confirming nor denying, and then put the question to Ding Yuying: "Yuying, you tell us — if one day in the future you hold great power, how will you discipline those disobedient Huaxia brothers?"

What kind of talk was this?

The Lucky Crown Prince felt extremely awkward inside! Yuying was the Crown Princess, and in the future would be Empress. If she held great power, then she would be Empress Dowager — then what about me? Would I be the late emperor? I'm only in my twenties this year!

Ding Yuying glanced at her husband with a touch of sympathy — he was quite sturdy, and looked as though he ought to live a long life, right?

After withdrawing her gaze, the Crown Princess began to answer the question.

She thought for a moment, then said: "The failure of the ancestral Zhou did not lie in enfeoffment itself, but in a weak trunk and strong branches. Of course, the weakness of the ancestral Zhou's trunk was not what had been envisioned at the time of the original enfeoffment, but rather that the land where the ancestral Zhou was situated was either hemmed in by vassal states or beset by troublesome Rong and Di barbarians, making expansion truly difficult.

Moreover, the ancestral Zhou then carried out further enfeoffment on its own already small territory, causing the trunk and branches of the ancestral Zhou to suffer loss without gain, weakening day by day. This was 'the more one enfeoffs, the weaker one becomes' — something absolutely impermissible."

"If 'the more one enfeoffs, the weaker one becomes' is impermissible, then can one perhaps 'the more one enfeoffs, the stronger one becomes'?" Zhu Cilang asked with a smile.

"Of course one can enfeoff more and grow stronger," Ding Yuying said with a smile. "When Imperial Father enfeoffed the Princes of Huai and De, did that not strengthen control over the United States? Your daughter-in-law thinks this method is quite good. If your daughter-in-law were to hold great power, she would also enfeoff a few ten-thousand-household princes to the United States, the Southern Continent, the Western Chu Kingdom, and Dzungar. Oh, and that Qing Kingdom too — it's about to become a state without propriety, so a ten-thousand-household prince could also be enfeoffed there."

Zhu Cilang's move of "enfeoffing people but not land" was, for these sparsely populated Huaxia states — the United States, the Southern Continent, the Western Chu Kingdom, the Qing Kingdom, Dzungar — a "tonic" that they truly had no way to refuse!

These countries did not lack land — they did not even lack fertile and rich land, land with gold, silver, and copper buried beneath it!

But without exception, they all lacked people! They especially lacked Huaxia subjects. For the United States, the Western Chu Kingdom, the Qing Kingdom, and the Southern Continent, one more ten-thousand-household prince could enormously enhance national strength!

Therefore, in the foreseeable years, it would be impossible for them to refuse such a tonic.

And the ten-thousand-household princes enfeoffed there were without question sons or brothers of the Great Ming Emperor — all relatively reliable. At least while these ten-thousand-household princes were still alive, they would most likely be members of a "pro-Ming faction."

"Haha," Zhu Cilang laughed heartily. "Our little calculations can't be hidden from you! Lucky boy, to have such a wife — you truly are lucky!"

Zhu Hexing said with a smile: "That is all thanks to Imperial Father's blessing."

Zhu Cilang nodded, seeming to agree very much with this opinion, and then asked: "But you can't rely entirely on your wife, you know. That tycoon brother of yours is not easy to deal with! Tell me — in the future, how do you plan to deal with him and the United States?"

"Imperial Father," Zhu Hexing said, "your son's thinking is to support the Qing Kingdom. The United States cannot be weakened — without the United States, the desperate and fierce men of the Great Ming would lose an outlet, and the country would not be easily kept stable. But the United States also cannot monopolize the gold mountains and silver mines of North New Continent, otherwise the United States will sooner or later replace our Great Ming as the elder of the Huaxia. So your son's idea is still to support the Qing Kingdom! We can follow the precedent of the Princes of Huai and De, and also enfeoff two ten-thousand-household princes to the provinces of Ha and Ke. At the same time, assign these two provinces to the Qing Kingdom — in this way, though the Qing Kingdom will be strong, the King of Qing will be weakened."

Zhu Cilang said with a smile: "Who would be better to enfeoff there?"

"The Tenth Brother and the Thirteenth Brother could be enfeoffed as the King of Ha and the King of Ke." Zhu Hexing said, "The provinces of Ha and Ke are close to the silver mines and gold mountains of New Spain, so it should be easy to recruit military households there. Ten thousand might be difficult, but five thousand households should be no problem. Moreover, the mothers of the Tenth and Thirteenth Brothers come from the Wang family of Kyushu, so they can also recruit some warriors from Japan."

Zhu Cilang nodded, thinking to himself: Good — so you've learned to swindle your own little brothers too. Not bad, quite an improvement!

(End of Chapter)