Harry Potter’s Morning Light

Chapter 2373: truebelievers (on)

Chapter 2373 True Believers (Part 1)

In Joseph II's reforms, in addition to closing down "useless" monasteries that did not operate schools or hospitals, they also forced large and small societies to merge into a single "Charity Society", under the name of Mechelen's Charity Society. The castle, named Hof van Buesleden, was built during the Renaissance in the 16th century and is one of the most beautiful buildings in Mechelen.

It has always been used as a kind of heritage warehouse, involving all donations from the period of the Duchy of Burgundy to the period of the Austrian Netherlands, including a craft called "enclosed garden".

It looks a bit like a big cupboard. When the door is opened, it is a very complicated miniature scene. There are peacocks made of precious stones and figures of people made of gold. This is taken from the "Song of Solomon" in the Old Testament. This poem tells about In the season of birds and flowers, a couple confessed themselves. It is said that Solomon himself wrote it in Jerusalem. The male protagonist is a grape farmer, and the female protagonist is the rose of Sharon, which blooms like a lily in the Stranglethorn Vale, and the "closed garden" It tells the scene of the heroine in the valley.

In addition to being unfree, everything in the garden is like paradise, and there is no male protagonist in the scene. Therefore, this "closed garden" was later used as a symbol of chastity. It was very popular in the Middle Ages where Margaret of Austria lived. , the nuns of Bianju, as well as the female governor herself, have such a "closed garden".

It is used to honor women who "really" have pure and noble moral values. The cost of making it is not low, and the nuns can't afford it. Most of the believers donated money to make it for them.

Morally speaking, chastity is people's yearning for love. However, wars, natural disasters, and plagues continue, and there are also situations like Andromack who want to be a widow, but can't help it. Very few are truly widowed.

All in all, the new Mechelen Museum is in that castle, and the charitable organization would have to pay for it to maintain it. After breakfast, they went there to visit. It really looks like a warehouse, full of various Such a beautiful but dusty treasure, there are many murals on the wall. It is said that Erasmus once came to this castle to chat with the owner, and the murals recorded the scene at that time.

These murals have faded over the years. They were painted with vegetable dyes. One of the biggest advantages of ore color is that it is not easy to change color, but it is expensive. Quincy immediately said that he could repair these murals.

They used to paint with plant colors when they lived in the forest, and the barren flood area in the eyes of ordinary people was an inexhaustible palette for him and Emily.

Most artists are anonymous in their lives, unless acknowledged in life, as Leonardo da Vinci and Rubens did, and Johannes Vermeer, the author of "Girl with a Pearl Earring," waited until two years after his death. After a hundred years, it was excavated by the French, and he painted genre paintings.

Genre paintings are based on everyday life and do not have fixed buyers like portrait paintings. Even if the painters are talented, they will inevitably die like Van Gogh, and the paintings will not sell for high prices until after their death.

Maybe Emily is not as beautiful as "Girl with a Pearl Earring", a bit like Rembrandt's wife, not a recognized beauty, but Georgiana still bought a portrait that Quincy painted for her.

The 2000 francs for that painting plus Quincy's work income should be enough to start a home. Originally, Emily would also spin yarn and sell it on market days in exchange for some necessary living materials. Emily's painting is still a lot worse than Quincy's, which may be why she thinks Quincy is so talented, like a girl obsessed with the lead singer of a band who runs away from home without her parents' consent.

Others in the "village" (as they were called) were in different situations, most living their lives behind closed doors without disturbing each other. There is no church there, people don't gather for mass on Sundays, and they don't move around on weekdays. Joseph II lumped all market days in the Austrian Netherlands into one day, a practice that created a kind of wagon-driven merchants who would buy and sell goods that people didn't have time to buy on market day, It was a day when the few crowds in the village would be concentrated.

The French were initially welcomed as liberators, as they were in 1635, drawing swords against the Protestant Dutch in the name of protecting the nuns. Later, they disagreed and began to loot the city. To avoid them, the farmers fled into the forest of Soigne with their families and livestock.

Compared to that side, the forest northwest of Mechelen is much more peaceful. In order to hide as much as possible and not be noticed, they even cook at night, so that the smoke from the cooking will not be noticed by the people around.

Sometimes people leave, and new people come in shortly after they leave, and Emily and Quincy don't know what's going on with the new family, they think it's a businessman who wants to settle down and is going to open a new one. Grocery store etc. No one here will take the initiative to talk about their past, and you don't even know if they are using their real names.

That's all the information the young couple can provide, they live in their own two-person world.

For a person who is used to a poor or simple life, the people around him are similar. At this time, if you tell him to change his destiny, it will frighten him, because he is satisfied with his state. They seldom "get bored".

People who are still in ignorance suffer more from their bodies, lack of food and clothing. Slaves in the United States live much better than "free laborers" in Europe. Indeed, in the material conditions of life, food, clothing, shelter and In terms of working hours, those slaves in the south are much better than other laborers on the earth. They even have meat to eat. Although they usually eat bread made of cornmeal, they can also eat white bread during festivals. Fruits are also eaten when they are ripe. These are the pro-slavery factions that guide public opinion, emphasizing that slavery is a "good deed" that does not contradict freedom.

Slave owners will use such small favors to cultivate the loyalty of their slaves. Large slave owners may have compassion and care for the "house slaves" who serve their masters in the family, and their loyalty to their masters will also be exchanged for the master's favor and care, The children of slaves will also become playmates of the "little master". However, these are very few people. The "field slaves" hate the "house slaves", and they will be punished for their inactivity.

If a factory owner beats a worker with a whip in a factory, he faces charges and fines. Beat the slaves and tell them that as long as they obey the discipline, they can live a much more comfortable life than free laborers. Slaves not only have shelter but also food, and they can also give out $5 pocket money during Chinese New Year and festivals. Slaves exchange their freedom for life. Guarantee, why pursue the indulgent free instinct of primitive people?

A shameful thing, if it becomes a habit, no one will interfere.

South Carolina planters claim that this state, called the state of nature, has not actually existed since Adam and Eve were created, and that human beings are connected by a bond that binds them together.

Man is born to be controlled by others, he is not only dependent in infancy and controlled by others, in all ages the strong and the wise control the weak and the ignorant.

In other words, in order to maintain the legality and morality of slavery, the pro-slavery faction has denied the natural rights of the Declaration of Independence, saying that people are born free, and nothing is more unrealistic than this.

During the American Revolution, since he chose to hold high the banner of human freedom to defend his own interests, he also denied the morality of slavery in theory. There was a time when Washington planned to use slave soldiers because of the problem of soldiers, which would liberate them, while the southern states were mainly responsible for the debts incurred by the war. So slavery became a "necessary sin" and became the tone of the slave owners' justification at that time.

Jefferson also opposed slavery, but the key vote in 1801 was in the southern states, and his approach was to abolish primogeniture, a remnant of this feudal system, where all children could inherit the father's estate, while promoting small farmers, which made Building plantations became a frantic speculation, and easy bank credit and the fertile land in the west stimulated eastern farmers to emigrate to the southwest, most of them with the desire to expand their families. They don't necessarily take everyone away from slaves, it depends on how the property is divided.

But now they have to face a problem, if the former debt has not been repaid, how will the latter debt be repaid?

The British bank has not yet formed the kind of credit investment of the Dutch bank. It may have been there before. It was lent to the North American colonies and was required to repay in the form of peace, but the Americans did not repay, only Spain, France, and the Netherlands.

The public debt needs to be borne by the people. In order to increase fiscal revenue, Hamilton increased the whisky tax, which resulted in riots. Washington pardoned the rioters after negotiation, but the collection of alcohol tax was not smooth. Jefferson canceled the excise tax after taking office.

They need to expand, to expand to lend, to attract capital inflows, and to improve fiscal problems. Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations that the cost of colonial defense has always fallen on the mother country, the civil ceremonies of the colonies are very simple and never extravagant, and the missionaries are also very frugal. But Jefferson had no plans to form a navy, and argued that regular deposits were paid to pirates, contrary to Adams' belief that it would cost money to form a navy.

Continuing to fight over the expansion problem will make the financial problems worse. This country is overgrown with trees, half uninhabited and half uncultivated, and there is nothing valuable except food.

In ancient Roman times, the provinces of Egypt and Syria used grain to deduct taxes, and low-priced foreign grains benefited Roman citizens. Judging from the excavations of Pompeii ruins, even ordinary people ate well, but it made farmers suffer. Bankruptcy, the peasants were the main source of soldiers of the Roman Republic, they were either reduced to slaves or sold their land to the nobles.

After the reform of the military system, in the period of Anthony, soldiers had become a profession, with a fixed salary, and it was precisely because soldiers became a profession.

In ancient Rome, from the monarchy to the republic, the command was granted by the Senate and returned to the Senate after the war. By the time of Caesar, the soldiers had surrendered their honor and their lives to the commander-in-chief of the legion.

Britain's military system is to recruit troops from the people, and the parliament must protect their interests. William Pitt the younger tried to "buy" Prussian soldiers, which the German princes did, but the result was the establishment of the League of Armed Neutrality.

Scotland and Ireland are also carrying out enclosure movements. Many immigrants from the New World are from these areas, but they have not yet reached the point of fleeing the famine in the United States.

The output of Irish potatoes is similar to that of rice, but not as valuable as wheat. The wheat was rented to British landlords. Many Irish people starved to death because of this, until potatoes solved the problem of food and clothing, but it was only food and clothing. They had nothing but food and clothing. Even the place to live is the mud house where the Celts lived.

That kind of house looks a lot like the "magic world", who still lives in that kind of house if there is magic.

But it is undeniable that the enclosure movement made British agriculture develop rapidly. Georgiana really wanted to follow the mechanized production of farms like the United States when she implemented draught horse farming, and could feed so many people with a small agricultural population. Arthur Young of the Enclosure Commission thought the same, but was nearly hanged by a French peasant when he went to the country to see it in the field.

Brennus, the leader of the Gauls who once attacked Rome, said that the laws of Gaul are based on the point of the sword. Therefore, although the Gauls are tall and sturdy, they are difficult to tame.

Elizabeth I implemented the enclosure movement and also implemented the Poor Law. At that time, the number of robbers, hooligans, and beggars in England increased. This was to solve social unrest.

But she also built the British navy, attacked the Hanseatic League merchants, and safeguarded the interests of their own merchants. The purpose of Georgina’s establishment of agricultural loans is to reduce conflicts and replace usury with relatively low-interest loans, so that Alsace will not be so chaotic, but she may also backfire and make the enclosure movement possible in France.

The last time she swam by the lake, Georgiana met a man named Rutger, who was a member of the Dutch Land Commission and the director of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, who promised the mayor of Mechelen to donate a few paintings Painting for this new museum.

If the Louvre uses "counterfeit goods" to recharge, it is better not to send it.

Apart from the Bonaparte factor, Chiara is very suitable for Georgiana's appetite. She is an excellent painter. Although the original painting lacks the style, it can be seen that she has solid basic skills. She should not copy the painting less.

She just hoped that Chiara would not make the same stupid decision as herself. She liked the "closed garden" very much, although she had nothing to do with chastity and nobility in her life, even if she couldn't have it, it wouldn't hinder her appreciation.

Through these things, she understands that she is not suitable to be a professional woman, and her home is gone.

Just close the cabinet door and no one knows about this secret garden, just like she didn't open the door of the Hogwarts office that night, or the cabinet in the Louvre.

"Mrs."

Georgina turned around and found Borsky, the rich widow.

"Do you mind if I enjoy it with you?"

"of course not."

Borski walked over to her and took a deep breath, it seemed...she seemed to have something to say.

Georgianna used Legilimency on her.

Borski is sorting out the speech, she has requests from her...

Georgianna finally understood why Bolski invested in the Industrial Promotion Bank.

"I……"

"There is no potion like you said." Georgiana interrupted the old widow "Aging is irreversible."

She looked at Georgiana in shock.

"Are you surprised? Didn't you approach me because I'm a witch?"