Qin Official

Bamboo slips two feet and four inches long were neatly placed on the table. The early morning sunlight came in through the windows, and the smooth bamboo slices after being baked reflected the shimmering light.

The CRRC ordered Zhao Gao to kneel down in front of the case, take a deep breath, dip the pen in his hand full of ink, steady his mind, and begin to write small seal characters on the bamboo slips one by one...

The three great calligraphers of the Qin Dynasty all had different handwritings. Li Si was a native of Chu and had traveled to study among the princes for a long time. His calligraphy drew on the strengths of others and combined the characteristics of Chu characters. His calligraphy is vigorous, unique and bold.

Hu Wujing was born as a typical Qin Guoxue disciple. His calligraphy is calm, natural and extremely steady.

Zhao Gao is different again. He was illiterate when he was young and studied hard by himself when he was more than ten years old. Therefore, he has some eccentric swordsmanship. His calligraphy is delicate but powerful, and his style is lean and beautiful. This is the characteristic of Zhao Gao's calligraphy.

Soon, as his wrist moved, three more beautiful seal characters appeared on the first bamboo slip.

""Yuan Li Chapter"!"

This is the literacy textbook that Zhao Gao wrote under the emperor's order. He wrote very slowly. Firstly, it was because the matter was so important that he strived to make every word perfect. Secondly, it was difficult to sketch quickly because of the bamboo slips and brush: Press the slips with your left hand and write with your right hand, one slip per line. After writing, push the slips one by one to the right and arrange them.

If you want to take shorthand, you don't need a bamboo book, but a wooden tablet.

The Qin State has always had regulations on the carrier for writing official documents: counties, counties, and officials used willow wood or other soft wood that can be written on as slips. Official documents were cut into two feet and four inches, while private letters were one foot long. It's called a ruler. These wooden tablets are all sealed with sedge, cattail grass, orchid grass and hemp.

Bamboo albums are a higher level than ruler slips because they are more complicated to make. They can be made into bamboo slips through cutting, cutting, and finalizing. You can write on them. After writing a chapter, you can drill holes in them and use "Wei", which means cutting them into strips. It is made of cooked cowhide in a similar shape, and accordingly, the price is several times more expensive than wooden tablets!

Therefore, reading is really an expensive thing. Except for the wealthy officials with a fortune of hundreds of thousands, they cannot prepare all the written and ink slips. In the classroom, a book is usually passed around and read by everyone until the handwriting is blurred and the strong cowhide webbing is broken.

These days, it is the sign of a "scribe" to have several volumes of books of his own. He is reluctant to lend them to others for viewing. He has to first become a disciple and call himself a disciple. If you can pull the collection of books onto several carts when moving, you will be praised as "the richest scholar in five carts" and be compared with the learned Wei Xiang Huishi.

The bamboo slips were hard to come by, but they were consumed quickly. Zhao Gao only wrote five or six hundred words, and the first chapter was finished. He asked his servants to come over and gently blow dry the words on the bamboo slips, then take them out and compile them into a volume. It can't be finished in a quarter of an hour.

He also happened to take the soup from his younger brother Zhao Cheng and drink it to rest.

Zhao Cheng was dressed in military uniform. He was a five-hundred-year-old master, subordinate to General Wai Lang, and was ordered to guard Linguang Palace. At this moment, he came over to give soup to Zhao Gao, while whispering:

"Brother, have you heard about the advice given to Your Majesty by Heifu, the Commander-in-Chief of Hu Ling, yesterday?"

Zhao Gao naturally knew that Heifu presented the official script for Cheng Miao, thinking that it could be used together with Xiaozhuan and the emperor approved it.

He also said that bamboo slips were bulky and silk was expensive, so he volunteered to make a writing material for the emperor that combined the advantages of both...

Zhao Cheng knew his brother very well. Although Zhao Gao was usually very polite to Hei Fu, he secretly regarded him as a competitor, so he came closer and said:

"Brother once warned me that there is a saying in Qin's law that the ministers of the Ming Dynasty should not overstep their official position and make meritorious service, nor should they make improper statements. If they exceed their official position, they will die, and if they do not do so, they will be punished!"

"Now that Mr. Hei is the household minister of Zhonglang, his duty is to stay in the guard and confinement, but he talks about the work of a craftsman for examination. This is considered as overstepping his official position. Do you want me to instruct the censors I know well to criticize him?"

"My brother, you have spent so many years in the officialdom in vain."

Zhao Gao put down his cup, glanced at his younger brother with his slender eyes, and sneered: "According to your statement, as the magistrate of the CRRC, I am responsible for being in charge of Chengdu, but I often write edicts and compile texts. Is this also true? Have you overtaken your official position?"

"This..." Zhao Cheng raised his head: "This is different. Brother has your Majesty's permission..."

"Finally got it right."

Zhao Gao stood up, put his hands behind his back and said, "Just like Han Zhaohou's hat officer, he did it on his own without informing the monarch. That is called overstepping his authority."

"But if you report it to His Majesty before doing it, or if you are assigned by His Majesty, it is not exceeding your authority, but you are obeying orders."

Zhao Gao was not only proficient in writing, but also proficient in laws and regulations. The more he thought about it, the more he discovered that at the grassroots level of the empire, the laws and regulations were harsh and inhumane.

In the county, if a person does not work hard at farming and wants to be a merchant or craftsman, then he is not doing his job properly and will be reprimanded by Qin officials.

In the county, if a petty official does not do his official duties well but does irrelevant things all day long, he is also breaking the law and will be blamed by the censor.

However, when a person's official position reaches above the court and is at the side of the king, his authority will become blurred. The Taiwei has been vacant for a long time, and the Prime Minister on the right is just a decoration. Li Si, the Tingwei, is always doing the work of the Prime Minister. Zhongche The order of the government, Zhao Gao, also served as a visitor.

Strictly speaking, these things are not in compliance with the laws and regulations. The reason why they are done openly is just because of the emperor's words.

Zhao Gao asked: "Do you know who lived in the cell where Cheng Miao lived in Yunyang Prison before?"

Zhao Cheng shook his head and didn't know.

"Han Fei, Han Fei was also imprisoned in Yunyang back then, but his fate was not as good as Cheng Miao's."

Zhao Gao said calmly: "Han Fei's crime is not worthy of death, but your Majesty found that this man was obsessed with Han and could not be used for himself, so he still decided to kill him. Cheng Miao's crime should be punished according to law, but your Majesty missed him. The revised text might come in handy one day, which saved his life."

There is also his own example. Zhao Gao committed a crime and deserved death, but the emperor still dismissed Meng Yi's sentence with just one sentence, and Zhao Gao was reinstated.

Is it legal? Obviously illegal, but it is a manifestation of the monarch's power, and no one dares to say otherwise.

In Da Qin, the emperor can kill whoever he wants!

In Da Qin, the emperor can use whomever he wants!

The emperor is in the law! Therefore, His Majesty has the final say as to whether officials have exceeded their authority, and the laws and regulations have to stand aside.

"You don't understand His Majesty's intentions, and you actually want to blame Hei Fu for the crime of overstepping his official position. What's the use except to frighten the snake? Besides, such a trivial matter can be solved as long as Your Majesty transfers Hei Fu Ping to a post in the Imperial Household or Sikong. ”

After Zhao Gao taught his incompetent brother a lesson, he asked him to lay out the new bamboo slips on the desk and continue writing the next chapter.

Before putting pen to paper, he nodded to Zhao Chengdao:

"You remember it, so that those who obey the law will have no reward or lack thereof, and those who break the law and disobey the order will have no escape from punishment. This is called law. Distinguishing between loyal and traitors, with unpredictable rewards and punishments, is called skill. The power and position are respected, and the handle of killing is in your hand. The ability to win over others is called momentum!"

"Your Majesty is an Ming Lord who is based on Shang Yang's method, combined with the art of Shen Han, and handles the situation! The matters decided by the Ming Lord must not be questioned, just watch carefully."

But he was secretly happy in his heart: "That Mr. Hei is eager to achieve great results, but he doesn't know that after losing the position of Zhonglang Huling, he will stay away from His Majesty. Even if he succeeds by luck and gets promoted and gets a title, so what? It's really not worth the loss."

Han Fei said it well: flying dragons ride on clouds, soaring snakes swim in the mist, and clouds rest in the mist. However, dragons and snakes are the same as insects and ants, so they lose their ride. If a wise man submits to an unworthy one, his power will be underestimated and his position will be low; if he is unworthy but he can submit to a wise man, his power and position will be respected.

And where did the power of the courtiers come from?

It's just the leftovers of the king's power. The emperor is so high that he doesn't even need to shout "Come and eat!" The people of the world will crawl at his feet hungry and thirsty.

Zhao Gao has seen through the power structure of the Qin Dynasty. No matter how meticulous his laws are, no matter how strict his title is, no matter who he is, the prime minister must be from the state department, and the fierce generals must be sent to the army.

In the end, the only thing that determines a person's power is the emperor's trust. This is the cloud and mist position that these flying dragons and snakes rely on!

Bai Qi and Wang Jian seem to have made great achievements in slaughtering the country, but in fact they are castles in the air, like floating shadows on the wall. Once the birds are gone and the cunning rabbit dies, everything will be lost.

And once you cling to the imperial power, even if you are as short as Youzhan, with power in hand, you can still cast a huge shadow like the Twelve Golden People!

"Let's go, let's go. Li Xin, Meng Tian, ​​Li You, Hei Fu, these officials who are keen on fame are all flowing away like water. Only I, Zhao Gao, firmly occupy the position of close ministers."

As a close minister, if you have no great achievements, occasionally make small achievements, shoulder hard work, and have not been promoted for ten or twenty years, it is safest to follow His Majesty closely!

He smiled, continued the previous chapter, and wrote on the bamboo slips, "When people give up their thrones and give up their country, there will be Yu Tao and Tang Dynasty."

But what Zhao Gao was thinking was:

"Yao was an ordinary man who could not rule three people, but Jie, the emperor, could bring chaos to the world. From this I know that I can rely on my power and position, but I cannot admire the virtues of wisdom and merit!"

…

At the end of June in the twenty-sixth year of Qin Shihuang's reign, while Zhao Gao was writing calligraphy in Linguang Palace and pondering the source of his ministers' power, Hei Fu returned to Xianyang in a light carriage.

As soon as he got off the bus, he went to the Internal History Office and found Zhang Han, who was transferred back to Xianyang last month and served as Zuo Sikong in the Internal History.

After Fusu's persuasion failed, Guanzhong had begun to carry out large-scale construction. Zhang Han, as internal historian Zuo Sikong, was responsible for supervising the construction of the palace. He had just returned to the official office from the construction site. He was exhausted on a hot day and was resting indoors.

Hei Fu came in a hurry. When he pushed the door open and entered, he saw Zhang Han being served by two concubines. His hand had already reached into the lapel of one of them...

Heifu coughed lightly and said "Excuse me", then asked the concubine to leave and told Zhang Han the reason for coming here.

After hearing this, Zhang Shaorong almost jumped up. He wiped his feet and cursed: "What? Three months! In three months, I will make what you said! Otherwise, I will be punished? Why don't you stop me?" Kill me? Mr. Hei...Zhong Lang Hu Ling, I finally returned to Xianyang as an official after exhausting my efforts, and I was very busy just supervising the construction of the palace, why did you want to harm me?"

Heifu shook his head: "What a great Zhang Shaorong. I give you credit for your achievements, but you blame me for harming you?"

After saying this, he became serious and said with his hands behind his back: "I have been promoted to Shaofu Cheng by His Majesty, with a rank higher than Qian Shi. In the next three months, you will serve as my deputy, command the craftsmen of my subordinates, and help me complete the papermaking process." ! This is His Majesty’s edict and cannot be shied away from!”

After putting on a bad face, Hei Fu smiled and fooled Zhang Han again: "Shaorong, what you and I are going to do is no less than Cang Jie's eternal achievements in creating Chinese characters!"