Imperial Master of the Ming Dynasty

Jiang Xinghuo was very concerned about tax collection.

Needless to say, land tax, even the trade roads started with Zhejiang as a pilot project, also need tax guards to maintain. At the same time, the imperial power going to the countryside will inevitably face many problems, and because the domestic business network has just begun to be built. , taxation must be started from scratch, so we need to pay more attention to it.

Maritime trade is slightly better.

Nowadays, the taxation of maritime trade, because Shenfa Temple has revised the provisions of the Tianxian on sea bans, the era of strict sea bans in the Hongwu era is gone forever, and tariffs are gradually recovering and increasing.

Based on the existing three municipal shipping departments of Ningbo, Quanzhou and Guangzhou, the Municipal Shipping Department under Zhao Feng began to gradually reorganize and train officials and establish a complete anti-smuggling fleet, which all required a large number of manpower.

The existing manpower is definitely not enough.

The most important source of talent in Jiang Xinghuo's hands is the graduates from the "Shuixingtang", the senior school of the Imperial College. These people have studied since childhood, and some of them have been observing politics (similar to internships) before graduation. Accumulated experience and abilities.

However, these people cannot completely replenish the large number of vacant positions, because these supervisors are all rushing to become officials, especially officials in the capital. Such talents are not too few but very important. If there are no suitable opportunity, it is not easy to use it in other places.

To this end, Jiang Xinghuo put forward drastic reform suggestions.

Well, I still use the name of Lao Zhu.

At this point, I want to briefly talk about Lao Zhu's attitude towards the imperial examination, highlighting one capriciousness.

During the reign of King Wu, Lao Zhu issued an edict to prepare for the opening of the imperial examination, and made harsh words, "Let all Chinese and foreign civil servants advance through the imperial examination, and those who are not in the imperial examination will not be able to become officials." Look, no one will be an official without taking the imperial examination. .

But the slap in the face came soon. In the sixth year of Hongwu, Lao Zhu discovered that the people recruited by the imperial examination were good at writing, but not really good at doing things. So he said, "Since the more you take, the younger will be born. There are only a few people who can take action based on what they have learned, so they can only appoint officials and inspectors to promote talented people, but they do not need to stop the imperial examination." He also temporarily dismissed the imperial examination.

But what’s the point of not taking the imperial examination? Relying on the Imperial College alone would definitely not work. The Ming Dynasty’s territory was too large, so there had to be a way out for other scholars far away from the capital area.

Moreover, the Hu Weiyong case and the Kongyin case happened one after another, and the official vacancy was really serious.

Therefore, Lao Zhu ordered the restoration of the imperial examination system in the fifteenth year of Hongwu. The capital and various administrative envoys held provincial examinations every three years. You can become an official.

This situation continues until now.

But as the saying goes, thousands of troops and horses crowd a single-plank bridge. Jinshi is a smooth road, but it is much more difficult to raise people to become officials.

It is obvious that this kind of personnel system that determines the future by examination, although fair in form, has low actual efficiency, which is not conducive to discovering the potential of talents and mobilizing the enthusiasm of talents who have failed. Many talents with high rankings in the imperial examination have failed to climb the career path. Very high, but extremely lacking in the ability to govern the country.

This lack of ability may be partially compensated through rotation training and targeted training at the Daming Administrative School, but the institutional shortcomings obviously cannot be completely compensated.

And right now, there is indeed a shortage of local grassroots official positions that neither Jinshi nor Imperial College students are willing to take, so what should we do?

Don't even think about promoting a junior official to an official. Now the resistance is not as big as usual, so you can only leave it empty?

But even though it's empty, you can't learn to lead the Qing Dynasty, right?

The method Jiang Xinghuo gave was to increase the chances of promoting people to official positions and open up new channels for advancement.

"The servants of the country all want to sharpen their reputation and establish their achievements, so as to achieve a prosperous age together. They do not just use the short and long days of a day to set a lifelong pattern, so they are stagnant in it. Today, it is arranged at home and abroad, since The officials of the prefectures and counties go up to the top, and most of them are people who are subject. As for the scores of subjects, Jinshi ranks third, and the people who are promoted rank seventh. The so-called Jinshi and people who are promoted are just using this as a tool to see how it will be in other days. It does not mean that one person must be more virtuous than the other. But in today's officialdom, those who are related to the family background are very thin.

Not all Jinshi are virtuous, and not all Jinshi are unworthy. As for promotion, the Jinshi with the lowest performance is better than the Jinshi with the highest performance. Even if one or two are lucky enough to be promoted with the Jinshi, it will be difficult in the future. The salary of Jinshi is small but the promotion is high, and the salary of Jinshi is large but the promotion is poor. If the husband is selected by the imperial hall, only Jinshi will get it, and the promotion will no longer exist. Because of this, the morale of advancing is always high, and the morale of raising people is often timid. Those who are rich will become arrogant, and every time they take something, they will get little; those who are timid will become discouraged, and they will fall and sweat.

I believe that if we want to develop the way of governance, we should break away from the restrictive theory and open up the road to fame and success. When selecting people, we will only appoint them based on their qualifications at first. After they are appointed, we will only test their political achievements without asking about their origins. Those who are advanced scholars will be given priority. In other words, if a person is not necessarily superior, then there is no harm in promoting others; if a person is inferior, then he will be promoted later, and if a person is not necessarily inferior, then there is no harm in promoting a scholar first.

The officials will visit the officials on their own, but if they are talented people, they will be promoted one by one, and they will not be humbled again. If Jinshi are used together with Jinshi, then Jinshi will not dare to be arrogant and good governance will be many; Jinshi will not dare to be arrogant alone, then the people will be promoted to their own benefit, and good governance will be more; if there are many good governance, the people will be safe, and if the people are safe, the country will be rich, and Education is possible.

The prosperous age of Yongle can be hoped for by common people. "

Jiang Xinghuo's memorial was written quite well. He first stated the current situation of the problem, then stated his reasons for reforming the system, then explained the specific methods, and finally looked forward to the future.

Especially the penultimate paragraph, to put it bluntly, is the catfish effect.

Zhu Di was very happy to see it. Any solution that can solve real problems is a good solution. Zhu Di's mind is not so rigid. In his opinion, there is nothing wrong with appointing people as officials. It does not necessarily have to be a Jinshi. In the north, people with high academic qualifications are already very high. Okay.

Therefore, with a stroke of his pen, Zhu Di gave instructions: "The ancestors used to employ people without qualifications, but the recent employment system of the dynasty has made the people useless and the achievements unproductive. The great economic achievements made by the imperial masters are of great benefit to the talents of the people. It will be held in accordance with the agreement."

Jiang Xinghuo also put a lot of effort into the local personnel system.

The status quo is still maintained at the prefecture and prefecture levels, but for grassroots officials at the county level, in order to cooperate with the imperial power's move to the countryside, the appointment of junior officials such as experience, care, bookkeepers, and history officials has been opened, but they must ensure that they are not in the same place. The employer, that is, the place of residence and the place of appointment of the person to be promoted must be at least one administrative envoy, which means that the official position is still maintained, but the qualification requirements are lowered, which saves the long queue time for appointment. At the same time, this is to prevent This policy has become a measure used by local powerful powers to strengthen local control.

At the same time, certain reforms have been made to the avoidance system, that is, flexible avoidance. For official positions that are not popular and basically only have responsibilities but no salary, such as academic officers, division instructors, post officers, gate officers, etc., when there is no position, they are allowed to It is no longer mandatory to be assigned to other chief ministers if they serve in 2-3 governments in this chief minister's office.

Of course, if there are areas where the system is relaxed, there must be areas where it is tightened. Changes made in order to expand the scope of employment and efficiency must be supported by supervision.

The scope of inspections of the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Ministry of Civil Affairs was also expanded accordingly.

In the past, general inspections were usually carried out only at the grassroots level, such as the county magistrate. But now, since other grassroots chief officials and assistant officials have enjoyed the policy relaxation, they have to bear corresponding obligations, and these grassroots officials are At the local level, since they are directly responsible for civil affairs, even if they are not "local emperors", they are still "local kings". There are many people who show off their power in the local area and there are many who do evil, so the personnel inspection system must be expanded to this level.

According to the opinions on the revision of this system, the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Metropolitan Procuratorate also revised the corresponding system and announced it to the world in "Di Bao".

"The imperial procuratorate's participation in the impeachment story is limited to state and county officials, not to assistants and teachers. Even if there are unscrupulous people among them, they will be deposed in three years if they are far away, and they will be promoted to full officials in the near future. This is all leniency. It is not enough to show punishment. Today, the Procuratorate and the Ministry of Personnel are conducting supervision. Those who have committed obvious crimes below the rank of Zuo Er will be arrested and questioned according to the order. Those who are not good enough will be dismissed from their posts and live in leisure. Questions will be written every quarter to prepare for repeated reports. "

According to Jiang Xinghuo's "technique of picking out stupid people and detecting traitors", since the results of the Beijing inspection are good, then the reform of officialdom, with the end of the Taixue Meeting, the change in the direction of the entire government and opposition public opinion has also begun to unstoppable Advance.

One is to reduce criticism, the other is to uphold discipline, the third is to emphasize edicts, and the fourth is to verify names and facts, one by one, they are gradually implemented.

Among them, Article 4, which stipulates eliminating redundant staff in various government offices, restricting the power of "hidden officials" and severely punishing theft and selling of national supplies, has caused chaos in the capital.

But just like a house has a new owner, it must be cleaned. Even if there is some temporary dust, it is inevitable.

Many petty officials who came in through connections were dismissed from their posts, and officials who had previously stolen and sold supplies from the national warehouse were uprooted by the Jinyiwei. Although it was not comparable to the scale of the major cases in the Hongwu Dynasty, it was still involved and was free. Don't worry about your position, someone will naturally fill it.

In the Ming Dynasty, the most indispensable thing was people who wanted to be officials.

So many scholars have studied hard for countless years in order to become officials.

In fact, for them, no matter how many positions there are in the court, they can all be filled. There is no phenomenon of officials and no one doing it, unless it is the terrible Lianxing case during the Hongwu Dynasty, which scared people. .

After passing the imperial examination and Beijing inspection, I had a prickly carrot in one hand and a bloody stick in the other. I first focused on beating the officials in the middle of the capital, then rectified the atmosphere of the eunuchs, eliminated redundant staff, and replenished the grassroots officials. The rest is to deal with the serious officials in the capital. supplied.

This naturally relies on this year's A-Shenko meeting.

In the history of Jiang Xinghuo's previous life, the Jiashen Keqi Examination was a famous mystery. The examiners at that time were Xie Jin and Huang Huai, and the examiners were Hu Guang, Hu Yan, Yang Shiqi, and Jin Youzi. However, this time the imperial examination, There is great controversy over the selection of the top pick and overall admissions.

Everyone believed that Liu Ziqin should have been the number one scholar, but because the examiner Xie Jin didn't like Liu Ziqin and thought he was arrogant and arrogant (homophobic?), he secretly leaked the exam questions to Zeng Qi. As a result, Zeng Qi was the number one scholar in high school and Liu Ziqin was only the second. A is the twelfth place, and Zeng Qi is from Yongfeng and has an old relationship with Xie Jin. Zhou Shu and Tanhua Zhou Yujian are ranked second. They are both Zeng Qi's disciples and Jishui people from the same hometown of Xie Jin. This ranking is generally regarded by the government and the public as Xie Jin's. Jin cultivated cronies to win over party members, which laid a huge foundation for Xie Jin's later life and career.

At the same time, candidates from Jiangxi still maintained their strong position, occupying the top seven places in this subject, including three first-class Jinshi: Zeng Ji (from Yongfeng), Zhou Shu (from Jishui), Zhou Mengjian (from Jishui), and The top four Jinshi in the second grade: Yang Xiang (from Taihe), Song Zihuan (from Luling), Wang Xun (from Ji'an), and Wang Zhi (from Taihe).

In terms of the overall enrollment ratio, Jiangxi people also account for 30%.

In this time and space, both Xie Jin and Huang Huai were released. At this time, Xie Jin was helping his teacher Dong Lun return to his hometown, so it was not his turn to step on Jiashenko's thunder.

According to the system of the Ming Dynasty, candidates who took the Chinese-style provincial examination went to Beijing in February to participate in the joint examination hosted by the Ministry of Rites. Those who failed in previous joint examinations could also take the examination together.

Therefore, the three months that the eldest prince had been thinking behind closed doors were not over yet. As expected, the examiners were appointed to Yao Guangxiao and Song Li, while the examiners were San Yang from the cabinet.

Well, Jiang Xinghuo really didn't do anything to Yang Shiqi.

There is a saying here that the rules of the imperial examination in the early Ming Dynasty were completely different from those after the middle Ming Dynasty.

For example, the number of examiners has not changed, but in the late Ming Dynasty, they must have been used by cabinet ministers to cultivate party members.

During the Xuande and Zhengtong periods, it was required that the third-rank official should also be a bachelor of the Hanlin Academy. After Hongli, there was usually one bachelor of the university and one of the bachelor of the Hanlin Academy, or "the university scholar was the prime minister, or two ministers."

But in the early Ming Dynasty, the co-examiners were not limited to rank or origin. They were initially selected by the Ministry of Rites, and all Hanlin Academy officials, Beijing officials, and instructors could take the exam.

Well, let’s focus on “recommendation by the Ministry of Rites”.

The examination is one of the key tasks of the Ministry of Rites. The Ministry of Rites is now in the hands of the reformists, so as long as the emperor does not interfere, Jiang Xinghuo has the final say.

The imperial master has the final say whether the examination will be chaotic or not.

But the Imperial Master was too embarrassed to do it in person, so he appointed a highly qualified prime minister in black, coupled with a Minister of Rites, so no one could find fault.

The Taixue Meeting ended on the 26th day of the first lunar month of the second year of Yongle's reign within a few days.

On the eighth day of February, Emperor Yongle ordered Zhuo Jing, the Minister of Rites, to go to the Confucius Temple to worship the great sage and sage Confucius. After the sacrifice, the examination hosted by the Ministry of Rites officially began.

On the ninth day of February, Yao Guangxiao, Song Li, San Yang and others followed the candidates into the examination room.

The system of the A-Shenke Examination is no different from the past. The main difference lies in the test questions.

The procedures for sealing, transcribing, proofreading, grading, and filling out the exam are the same as those for the provincial examination. The venue is Nanjing Confucius Temple Gongyuan. Candidates take the exam in a single room. They are searched before entering. Each person is given three candles. After entering, the door is opened. It was immediately sealed off, and candidates answered questions there and rested there at night.

There are two boards in the single room. You can sit on a chair, unfold it to become a bed, and there is a toilet underneath. You can eat, drink, and poop inside. You have to prepare your own food because it lasts for many days, so you usually bring non-perishable food. It's usually flatbread and rice, with bacon and pickles on the side. Otherwise, if the food goes rancid and your stomach becomes loose, you'll have to eat, poop, and take exams at the same time, and you'll have to sleep on the toilet at night.

In short, since the examination started on the ninth day of February, the Gongyuan of Confucius Temple has been locked up, surrounded by soldiers outside. Even if the capital is about to be breached at this time, no one inside can come out.

Anyway, Yao Guangxiao, Song Li, and San Yang from the cabinet all had to stay in the marking room of the examination room at this time, and no one could get out. Hu Guang was the only one working in the cabinet.

It's harder there, so it's hard to judge.

Although the general examination starts on the ninth day of the lunar month, you usually have to start filling in the results on the 25th or 26th, and the results must be released on the 29th (not a leap month). The time is very tight.

The elimination actually started on the ninth day of the lunar month.

In the first test, the five books (newly added "Xunzi") have three meanings (limited to 300 words), and the five classics have four meanings (limited to 500 words).

Although there is no stipulation on how long it takes to finish writing the first session of Sutras and Meanings, theoretically it only needs to be submitted before the second session. But the earlier it is submitted, the greater the probability of passing the exam in theory, because of the ranking and screening. Generally, people arrive early rather than late.

Of course, the examiners cannot see the collected test papers for the time being. After the scholars hand in the papers, there are still several hurdles.

The first test is the Mi Feng Guan. The collector classifies the scriptures according to the classification, and then sends them to the Mi Feng Guan for sealing. The dog-eared corner where the name is written on the test paper is stamped with the Guan Fang seal.

The second level is the official recorder, where the clerk will copy the test paper with a red pen without missing a single word. The examiner will only read the copied copy, and the original will be sealed and kept separately. This is to prevent the marking officer from identifying the handwriting and to prevent off-site collusion. possible.

At the same time, the records officer needs to take away the non-compliant papers that did not pay attention to avoid the emperor's taboos, self-reported personal information such as family status, made special marks on the paper, did not meet the prescribed number of words, included draft paper, etc. All are screened out. This is the exam regulation and has nothing to do with the content. It doesn’t matter whether you write well or not. As long as you violate the rules, you must be screened out.

The third level is the anti-reading officer, which means that the recorded copy will be read by a special anti-reading officer. One person will read the red scroll, and the other will read the ink scroll. Two people work in pairs, and they must read every word. Read it carefully to make sure nothing goes wrong.

In this way, after passing through the three levels of sealing, recording, and reading, the unnamed, unmarked, and flawless copy of the test paper will be handed over to the examiner.

In order to ensure the fairness and impartiality of the examination, the same answer sheet often needs to be marked separately by several examiners. In fact, the workload is very, very heavy. In addition, after working for a long time, you will definitely become dizzy and make mistakes, which will cause dissatisfaction to the candidates who will mark the examination papers later. It's fair, so not all the test papers were graded by Yao Guangxiao, Song Li and San Yang. There were many "fellow examiners" among them.

These "fellow examiners" were basically members of the Hanlin Academy pulled from the editing team of "Yongle Dadian".

The evaluation of the general examination paper was carried out after the first exam. The two examiners, three marking officers and dozens of fellow examiners used the same method to face the same examination paper during the evaluation process. The main comparison was Review method, word and sentence review method, evidence review review method, scripture meaning measurement review method, etc.

And it’s not just the examiners who can’t leave the courtyard. In order to prevent contact with each other, the system stipulates that examiners who are judging different questions in each room cannot interact with each other, and they have to eat, drink, and have sex in their own rooms.

It can only be said that the candidates are in pain, and the examiners are also in pain. Starting from the evening of the ninth day of the Lunar New Year, they have to work all night to mark the test papers. The workload is too heavy, so basically it is day and night.

The first exam was about the Five Books and the Five Classics, so the examiners were divided into two groups, one was the Five Study Rooms and the other was the Five Classics Room. The number of examiners in these different groups was based on their areas of expertise. Assigned, but also related to the topic.

Uh. There is another point that usually no one mentions openly, but it does exist, and that is the influence of the popular trend of the imperial examination.

Scholars' choice of the He Jing in the Five Classics as their main classic is often related to their family background, teachers, and the county schools where they studied. However, from the perspective of big data analysis, the number of people who study "Poems", "Yi" and "Books" is far greater than "Book of Rites" and "Spring and Autumn" (there is a digression here. It was supposed to be a test of the Six Classics, but the "Book of Music" has been lost). The number of words and difficulty level of the first three are simpler than those of the latter two. Many of them are also related, especially the subtle words and great meanings in "Spring and Autumn", which often make scholars who specialize in the field retreat in the face of difficulties.

It is precisely because of this phenomenon that when questions are generally asked in the imperial examination, the "Book of Rites" and "Spring and Autumn" will be biased or not biased.

In other words, since the imperial court knew what subjects the scholars studied most, it could actually artificially control the "big and small years", which was a bit of a gamble.

As for this kind of "big and small years", scholars often judge by the court's needs for employment.

This year, Jiashenke, because the imperial court has a huge demand for personnel, scholars generally believe that the probability of taking the first test of "Poetry", "Yi" and "Book" is much higher than that of "Book of Rites" and "Spring and Autumn", because this will This resulted in a "big year" for the imperial examination.

Unfortunately, Jiang Xinghuo is not a person who likes to play by the rules.

Therefore, this year the Five Classics will focus on "Spring and Autumn", and the Five Books will focus on "Xunzi".

Because the "fellow examiners" are mainly responsible for marking the test papers, while the chief examiner and marking officer are responsible for the subsequent review, so the "fellow examiners" are actually the ones who really control the fate of the candidates. They usually use " "Green pen" is used to write reviews. Generally, the better the reviews, the higher the probability of winning. Usually the average number of words is about thirty. If you write a lot of good reviews, it means that the "same examiner" is betting on yourself. Recommend this candidate's paper to the marking officer. Generally, the marking officer will focus on it.

However, because the number of places is limited, generally more than 300 people are admitted to the top three Jinshi. Therefore, the marking officers and the final examiner are very cautious and will screen out the papers recommended by dozens of "fellow examiners". Then the best ones will be selected from the remaining papers for ranking in the first exam.

On February 12, the second year of Yongle, the second exam was held. There was an examination essay (limited to 600 words), five judgments, and one answer from the imperial edict, imperial edict, and table. The essay meant an argumentative essay, and the questions were also drawn from the five books. It comes from the Five Classics, but it is different from the first one. You don’t need to use eight-part essay to answer. You can answer whatever you want, including prose and parallel prose. The focus is on the quality of the argumentative essay itself; the judgment is an administrative document, that is, the yamen in Beijing. Regarding the comments on the documents submitted by the subordinate units, Jiang Xinghuo and the old monk discussed the documents from the two president's reform affairs yamen, two from the six departments, and one from the temple. It can be regarded as selecting practical talents for the country; Biao and Biao are official documents written by the emperor, requiring scholars to imitate the words and deeds of the superiors and write corresponding edicts, imperial edicts, and Biao, usually Han imperial edicts, Tang imperial edicts, and Song imperial edicts. The purpose of writing the emperor's official documents is to avoid anyone offending the current emperor. This year's three topics are "Imulating the Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty and the Imperial Edicts of the Dayue clan in the Western Regions", "Imulating the imperial edicts of the Tang Dynasty with Zhang Jiuling as the Zhongshu", and "Imulating the ministers of the Song Dynasty" He Xiaozong made a chart of worshiping heaven."

February 15th, the third exam.

The third session was much simpler, with just one question, policy question, which tested current policy (more than 1,000 words). The policy question requires the text to be stated in a straight and clear manner, without being verbose.

Cewen means starting with "ask", giving a piece of material, and after reading the material, write down your own understanding.

Generally speaking, policy questions are additional questions. In terms of order of importance, the test will focus on the eight-legged essay on the meaning of the classics in the first session, then the trial judgments and optional edicts, edicts, and tables in the second session, and finally Shi Ce asked.

But this year is different. Before the exam this year, it was clearly stated that the three games were of the same importance, which meant that the proportion of the score of Cewen increased.

As expected, the title of this year's policy question is "On the national policy of the Song Dynasty to build a foundation for all people and open up the sea and prosper the country."

It is talking about the Song Dynasty, but all the candidates who participated in the examination know that it is talking about today's Ming Dynasty.

And since the Jia Shenke General Examination, from the organizer to the examiner, are all reformists, then naturally there is no need to say more about the "standard answer" to this question or the examiner's preference.

Of course, it is also possible that the "fellow examiner" who graded your paper was a conservative and secretly dismissed papers that favored reform, but this probability is always slim.

Are there any stubborn people out there? Yes, but this is something you can't live with yourself.

Therefore, the vast majority of scholars, whether they were really leaning towards reform or for their own future, chose to write about the benefits of these Song Dynasty national policies.

And this is one of the purposes of mastering the imperial examination. Regardless of whether you are unwilling to do so, as long as you write it, you will be labeled as a "reformer" in the future, and if the imperial examination will always be this standard , then the scholars of the Ming Dynasty will definitely focus on studying these things about the reform in the future, and their thoughts and actions will naturally be inclined to the reform. If this continues, after passing the imperial examinations one after another, will they still worry about the failure of the reform? In addition, the Imperial College has now undergone a comprehensive ideological transformation, and the Ming Dynasty Administrative School is completely controlled by Jiang Xinghuo. All three employment channels are under control, so the future will belong to the reform.

On February 16th, after handing in the papers, for the candidates of Jiashenko, this imperial examination is temporarily over, and the next events are completely out of their control.

On February 25th, all the examiners gathered together, filled in the arranged test paper numbers into the draft list, then locked the door, and numbered the ink scroll and the ink scroll one by one. The ink scrolls were bundled and sealed and stored in the hall until the official list was filled out on the 26th.

On February 26, Yao Guangxiao and others gathered together again and began to fill in the second list.

On February 27th, fill in the first list, also known as the main list, starting from the sixth place. The decision-making power of the sixth to eighteenth place is mainly in the hands of the examiner, and the rest will be reported directly Give it to Zhu Di and Jiang Xinghuo, who are already waiting in the palace.