Chapter 2: The Imperial Examination That Must Be Taken

"Young Master, why not rest for a while?

It won't be too late to review your lessons tomorrow."

Pan Jinlian looked at Zhang Jie, whose face was still pale even after taking the medicinal soup,

and felt heartache in her heart, so she spoke to persuade him.

"No.

It is already June, and there are only two months left until the Autumn Examination in August, so time is quite tight,

and I must seize the time to review poetry and classics."

Zhang Jie shook his head and refused Pan Jinlian's suggestion.

In the Song Dynasty, where all things are inferior, only reading is noble, even if Zhang Jie is a transmigrator,

if he wants to get ahead, he must join the track of the imperial examination.

As for learning martial arts, fighting for a career in the army, or getting a seat on Liang Shan,

and then coming to "want to be an official, kill and set fire to receive amnesty,"

and joining the imperial court with Song Heizi to be a small official?

Stop joking, transmigrators are also human,

at least he, this transmigrator, is still a mortal, bleeding when cut by a knife and shedding tears when punched.

If he really went to the battlefield, swords and arrows have no eyes, and a stray arrow could take his little life.

Not to mention that he brought a debuff after transmigrating, being sickly since childhood,

let alone getting on a horse to cut people, even marching for a hundred miles would probably cost him half his life.

Then, using the few memories in his mind, learning from other transmigrator predecessors,

inventing soap, burning glass to be a big businessman, and living a carefree life, is that okay?

After Zhang Jie carefully searched for information and thought about it, he found that the answer was, of course, no!

Although it is said that the commodity economy of our Great Song ranks among the best among all feudal dynasties.

Such prosperity is recorded in the "Along the River During the Qingming Festival," which has been famous for ages;

When the nobles in Paris in the West were still worried about the excrement flowing on the streets,

and had to wear high heels to cross the sewage-filled streets,

and had to wear hats to avoid flying objects from the sky,

Bianliang of the Great Song was already a big city with a population of one million, and it had also eliminated the curfew,

which can be said to be the most prosperous metropolis in history since before the Great Song.

But for one thing, the prosperity of Bianliang does not represent the prosperity of the Great Song,

or rather, it was the exploitation of the entire Great Song that brought about the prosperity of Bianliang.

The Emperor of the Great Song is known as the King of Bianliang.

Zhang Jie is a Shandong person in this life, so should he proudly puff out his chest whenever he thinks of the prosperity of Bianliang?

If he enters Bianliang as a businessman or a wage earner, the people of Bianliang will only say one thing:

"Yo! Another stinky outsider has come to our Bianliang to beg for food!"

If you want to have a place in Bianliang, the best and most convenient way is to have an official position.

And for an official position, besides the family members of the important ministers of the imperial court who can be admitted to office by shadow, only through the imperial examination.

Buying an official position?

Without the fame of a scholar or a provincial graduate, you still want to buy an official position?

Do you think the Great Song is the Manchu Qing?

Well, if you really calculate it, these two are also big brothers don't talk about second brothers, both are about the same.

Secondly, big business, or profitable business, is it something you can do just because you want to?

Doing some small business, like selling some steamed buns to support the family like Wu Dalang, is naturally not impossible,

but if you want to do big business, especially involving several provinces or even the whole country,

and several countries like Liao and Western Xia, you must have "capital"!

This capital is not sufficient principal or unique technology, but you must have someone above you!

To give a simple and direct example, why did red-topped merchants like Hu Xueyan and

Sheng Xuanhuai, who were as rich as a country and reached the second rank, appear in the late Qing Dynasty?

Is it because they were really the top scholars among businessmen, and business geniuses rarely seen in a thousand years?

This is certainly inseparable from their talent,

but the most important thing is the people standing behind them:

The person standing behind Hu Xueyan was one of the four great ministers of the late Qing Dynasty,

Zuo Zongtang, the creator and leader of the Hunan Army, who carried a coffin into Xinjiang and recovered Tibet, ensuring territorial integrity.

After the death of Mr. Zuo, Hu Xueyan was immediately raided, and overnight he fell from being as rich as a country to being destitute.

And behind Sheng Xuanhuai was Li Zhongtang, of whom it was said, "In youth, one does not know Li Hongzhang,

in old age, one knows he was a real scoundrel," and "The Prime Minister of Hefei makes the world thin."

Like this, in our Great Song, big businessmen are all supported by big officials, and they are the white gloves for them to make money.

In "Wisely Taking the Birthday Gift," the birthday gift sent by Liang Zhongshu, the guardian of Great Ming Prefecture,

to celebrate the birthday of his father-in-law Cai Jing,

raised gold, silver, and jewelry worth 100,000 strings of copper coins.

You know, the famous "waist wrapped with 100,000 strings, riding a crane to Yangzhou" is only 100,000 strings.

This poem first appeared in "Fiction" by Yin Yun of the Liang Dynasty in the Southern Dynasties.

The book records that guests gathered to discuss their respective ambitions:

Someone wanted to be the Yangzhou Inspector (official position),

someone wanted to possess a large amount of wealth (100,000 strings of money), and someone wanted to ride a crane to become an immortal.

One of them proposed "waist wrapped with 100,000 strings, riding a crane to Yangzhou," trying to achieve all three at once.

And our Liang Zhongshu, Lord Liang, just for his father-in-law Cai Jing's birthday,

sent out the biggest dream of an ordinary person's life.

Of course, this money could not all come from Lord Liang's salary:

Lord Liang's annual salary was only a few hundred strings,

and even if he didn't eat or drink for a lifetime, relying on his salary, he probably couldn't save 100,000 strings.

This money included both public funds he embezzled and filial piety from the wealthy merchants under his command.

Zhang Jie has no backing, wants to do business,

either find a "Yang Jinshui" in the Great Song imperial court to be a godfather like Shen Yishi in "Ming Dynasty 1566,"

or be eaten clean by bureaucrats like Liang Zhongshu,

"Zheng Bichang," and "He Maocai" who want to be whores and set up archways, there is no third choice.

Zhang Jie: My knees, I don't know why, have become a bit stiff.

They, they can't bend down!

And there is another point, even if Zhang Jie's knees are very flexible,

and can switch back and forth freely between stiff and soft,

then where should he find a godfather?

Although Zhang Jie was born in a family known as Zhang Dahu in this life,

this Zhang Dahu was only a wealthy family in the eyes of ordinary people, and was nothing in the eyes of bureaucrats and gentry.

Those who possess a large amount of wealth and have a greater say in a county are called county tycoons.

Families that have prominent reputation and influence in a certain county,

Families that have generally served as officials for generations or enjoy a lofty status in the local area are known as "Commandery Gentry."

Only those that have lasted for hundreds of years, with high officials such as the Three Dukes and Nine Ministers emerging one after another, are aristocratic families.

In "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," the sentence that Yuan Shao and Yuan Shu were most proud of was naturally "Four Generations and Three Dukes."

This term does not mean that his Yuan family had three dukes in four generations,

but that his Yuan family had had high officials ranked as the Three Dukes for four consecutive generations!

The power contained in such an aristocratic family is simply enviable, no, it is creepy.

The Yuan family, with students and old officials all over the world, made Yuan Shao call for response in Hebei, becoming one of the biggest warlords in the Three Kingdoms.

Yuan Shu, located in Runan, even declared himself emperor, calling himself "Zhongshi Emperor"!

Of course, we all know that his emperor was just a skeleton king.

And what position was Zhang Jie, who Zhang Jie was born into?

The answer is that the Zhang family is not a noble family, nor a Commandery Gentry, nor even a county-level wealthy family.

If you don't control the economic, political, and military lifeline of a county, you still want to be a county tycoon?

You see if the county magistrate doesn't clean you up, you're finished.

County Magistrate: I can't deal with the county tycoon, can't I deal with you?

Zhang Jie, who has no way, can't even find a dog hole if he wants to be a dog...

There is no way, Zhang Jie thought about it, and still felt that the path of the imperial examination is safe and reliable.

Han Qi, a famous minister of the Northern Song Dynasty, once said to the general Di Qing:

"Those who are sung out as top scholars outside the Donghua Gate are good men, how can this be a good man!"

It means that only scholars who become top scholars through the imperial examination outside the Donghua Gate are true "good men,"

and generals, even if they have great military achievements, are not valued.

Since then, the sentence "Only those who are sung names outside the Donghua Gate are heroes" has spread throughout the world.

Song Zhenzong Zhao Heng once wrote "Poem on Encouraging Learning":

Rich families don't need to buy good fields, there are thousands of bushels of grain in books.

Settling down doesn't need to build high halls, there are golden houses in books.

Don't hate that no one follows when going out, there are as many carriages and horses in books as clusters.

Don't hate that there is no good matchmaker when marrying a wife, there are beauties like jade in books.

If a man fulfills his life's ambition, he should diligently read the Six Classics in front of the window.

Zhang Jie, who had no other way, had to follow the trend,

and join the narrow path of the imperial examination that can reach the sky.

"Young Master, you took the scholar exam once a few months ago, and you will definitely be able to pass the provincial graduate exam in this year's Autumn Examination!"

Pan Jinlian cheered for Zhang Jie with full confidence.

In her eyes, her young master was a prodigy who never forgot what he saw,

could speak in chapters, and knew many truths between heaven and earth.

If it weren't for his weak body, and the death of his parents, which delayed him for a few years,

he would have already been on the golden list and passed the imperial examination.

It is not even known if he would have been named the top scholar by the emperor and famous for ages!

"Thank you for your auspicious words."

Zhang Jie heard this and could not help but show a bitter smile on his face.

He did not expect Pan Jinlian's confidence in him to be greater than his own confidence in himself.

Although he might be because of another reincarnation, the souls of the two lives were superimposed,

making his spirit exceptionally powerful, and he could be energetic even if he didn't sleep for several days,

and he almost never forgot what he read, only needing to recite it a few more times to be able to recite it backward,

plus the many insights from his previous life, making him have a little talent in poetry (borrowing),

but he also did not have the confidence to pass the provincial graduate exam at once.

Being able to pass the scholar exam at once this year made him feel that he had already exhausted his accumulation over the past few years.

Although Zhang Jie also did not know why in the Great Song Dynasty, where there should only be the provincial examination (to pass the provincial graduate),

the meeting examination (to pass the tribute scholar), and the palace examination (to pass the imperial scholar),

there would be the courtyard examination to pass the scholar, which should only appear after the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

In the imperial examination of the Song Dynasty, the scholar should have been just one of the subjects,

and later it was gradually replaced by other subjects, and the term scholar became a general term for scholars.

The scholars of the Song Dynasty were not equivalent to the scholars who became students through the courtyard examination in the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Scholars in the Ming and Qing Dynasties needed to pass strict examinations and have the status of fame,

while scholars in the Song Dynasty were more of a general term, referring to scholars participating in the imperial examination.

Perhaps it was because the author of "Water Margin," Mr. Shi Nai'an, was a person from the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty?

After all, the first-generation leader of Liang Shan was a failed scholar who failed the exam repeatedly

(that is, failed to pass the provincial graduate exam repeatedly),

Wang Lun, known in the Jianghu as "Scholar in White."

Of course, it is also possible that Zhang Jie's memory and understanding of Water Margin and the Song Dynasty before transmigrating were wrong.

Who made him, who had ordinary memory and understanding ability at the time, most concerned with Wu Song,

Lu Zhishen, and other heroes acting for heaven and seeking revenge,

and the jokes of the two silly emperors, Song Huizong and Song Qinzong?

But Zhang Jie only thought about these things for a while and then stopped struggling, anyway, existence is reasonable.

In Zhang Jie's plan, he would be thankful if he could pass the imperial examination within ten years.

After all, the difficulty of the imperial examination was far beyond Zhang Jie's imagination.

If viewed according to the difficulty of modern times, passing the scholar exam is no less than being admitted to Tsinghua or Peking University.

Tsinghua and Peking University recruit nearly 10,000 students a year, and the Great Song does not have 10,000 scholars a year.

Although modern students have to compete with millions or tens of millions of people for these thousands of spots,

which is almost one in ten thousand, and all scholars in the Great Song only have hundreds of thousands.

But the Great Song does not limit the age of the examination, from the prodigies with yellow hair and drooping hair to the old people with white hair,

as long as they are not scholars, they all come to take the exam, and the accumulation of numbers is also extremely terrifying.

The most terrifying thing is to compete with veterans who have studied for decades,

and have taken the exam ten or twenty times, as a teenager, just thinking about it makes Zhang Jie's scalp numb.

Zhang Jie has a clear understanding of himself:

If it weren't for the benign changes in his spirit after transmigrating, and the great improvement in his memory and understanding,

he felt that passing the scholar exam in this life would be his limit.

Even so, he still needs to show the perseverance of Fan Jin, studying hard, as long as he doesn't die in the exam, he will die in the exam, only then is it possible.

As for the provincial graduate, tribute scholar, imperial scholar, or even top scholar, second place, third place, etc.,

it is better to wash up and sleep early, after all, everything is in the dream...

The current Zhang Jie suddenly understood Fan Jin, and he could not help but sigh in his heart:

"In the torrent of the secular world, being able to stand firm is already extremely difficult,

wanting to get ahead is probably harder than ascending to heaven!" ===== CHAPTER 3 =====