The rise of the prince

Chapter 350
Li Xingzhou laughed, and then bowed his hands to the emperor: "Reporting to the emperor, I have two things to say about this matter. First, the battle report is written without exaggeration; second, I do oppose severe punishment of Suzhou businessmen."

"Then you admit to accepting the benefits!" The prince's eyes lit up, thinking he had caught his lifeline.

The emperor above ignored the prince's words, but said: "Then tell me why you object."

The prince was dumbfounded, Li Xingzhou was amused, the prince thought that the emperor would care whether he received benefits or not, it is really short-sighted
Li Xingzhou cupped his hands: "Because copying businessmen seems to be rich for the people, but in fact they are harming the people of Jiangsu. If there are not many people copied, and the money is used to provide disaster relief, it seems to solve the problem in a short period of time, but after a long time, there will be endless disasters."

As soon as he said this, several people immediately looked over with surprise on their faces.

Even Degong and He Zhao frowned in confusion, Yu Chengan even laughed to himself, muttering in a low voice, "Heretician theory."

Li Xingzhou ignored the crowd, but stepped forward and cupped his hands, then picked up the writing brush in front of the case, dipped it in the ink, and spread out the paper, "Let me explain in detail how the people in Suzhou have had enough to eat and how their lives are better than those in Jingguo. Good place."

When he said this, although they didn't know what he wanted to do, they all came together out of curiosity, the emperor also frowned, and came down from above.

Li Xingzhou drew a table with four horizontal and vertical lines, and then wrote "cloth" and "grain" in the vertical columns on the left, and "Suzhou" and "Jingxi" on the top.

Everyone was puzzled, Li Xingzhou went on to explain: "The fertile land in the west of Beijing is thousands of miles away. It is the place with the most domestically produced grain in Jingyuan. It is close to Kaiyuan, so Kaiyuan Mansion has never been short of food.

Suzhou is rich in cloth, and most of the national brocade cloth comes from Suzhou. "

"That is to say, Suzhou has beautiful mountains and rivers, and the climate is suitable, but it is not flat enough, so the weaving industry is developed.

If we collectively refer to the time, material resources, and manpower consumed to produce something as resources, and count them.So it can be seen that in Suzhou, it takes ten resources to make a piece of cloth, but it is difficult to make cloth in Jingxi, which requires twenty resources.

Suzhou produces a lot of cloth, but can't it produce grain itself?Of course it can, and the climate in Suzhou is suitable for rice, but the terrain is uneven, so it is regarded as one share of grain, and only four resources are needed, which is simpler than producing cloth.

In the west of Beijing, because the land is fertile and vast, farming is convenient, and only one resource is needed to produce one grain. "Li Xingzhou wrote it down in the form while talking.

"So, should Suzhou produce grain?" Li Xingzhou asked.

"Naturally, producing grain in Suzhou is easier than producing cloth. This is what the prince himself said. Besides, if there is no grain production, he will starve to death with dissatisfaction!" Yu Chengan said.

Li Xingzhou smiled, and then picked up a pen to calculate, "If Master Yu said, if all the manpower and material resources in Suzhou this year are counted as 25 resources, they can produce [-] grains, but what if they change this way?"

He said and calculated again: "If all the cloth produced in Suzhou can produce ten parts of cloth with these one hundred resources, and then the cloth can be exchanged for grain in the west of Beijing, then Suzhou can get one hundred parts of grain, which is four times more than their own grain. Times!"

Speaking of this, several people onlookers were stunned for a moment.

"This is the source of Suzhou's prosperity!" After he made such a calculation, everyone was surprised, and the emperor frowned, seeing the clue.

The prince quickly jumped out to retort: ​​"No, it's not right, it's good for Suzhou, but Ke Ke harms Jingxi!"

"Hahahaha." Li Xingzhou smiled, then wrote and counted.

The crowd also came together again: "The people in the west of Beijing also need cloth to make clothes, after all, food, clothing, housing and transportation are indispensable.

But Jingxi is not conducive to weaving. If Jingxi also has [-] resources this year, all of which are used for weaving, it can produce [-] copies of cloth.

If they grow grain with all their strength, they can get [-] shares of grain, and with Suzhou Yibu, they can get [-] shares of cloth, which is still twice as much as weaving by themselves! "

Now, everyone stared wide-eyed, staring blankly at the paper on the table, and began to calculate repeatedly. The emperor also stared at the paper he wrote on, as if deducing it in his heart.

This is actually the absolute advantage theory in the classical economics "The Wealth of Nations".

Many people in ancient times believed that businessmen were harmful to the country. Once they got money without doing anything, they were lazy.Second, it is believed that interests cannot be created out of thin air. Since businessmen can make profits, it must be speculation and deception to extract the interests of ordinary people.

However, Adam Smith, a British classical economist, has clearly told the world after more than ten years of research that the profits of commercial trade are not generated out of thin air, but obtained by taking advantage of regional advantages. To put it bluntly, commercial trade magnifies regional advantages. Greatly promote social prosperity.

Several ministers and the crown prince were obviously shocked when they heard such a theory for the first time, and the emperor looked at him: "So you don't want me to kill those businessmen?"

"That's right, the circulation of goods needs to be completed by merchant trade. Their trade will bring huge benefits to the people in Suzhou and the west of Beijing. If there are no merchants, Suzhou can only produce its own grain, and the west of Beijing must also weave its own food. Not only will it affect Suzhou also affects the prosperity of the west of Beijing." He said seriously, and then said: "Furthermore, it's not that there is no punishment at all, the court can impose lighter punishments, such as confiscating some mansions and requiring handover of silver, etc., so I invite the emperor Consider this carefully."

The emperor did not speak after listening.

The Kunning Palace meeting, which was originally thought to be of unanimous opinion, unexpectedly ended with a disagreement.

Li Xingzhou's theory of cloth and grain made several ministers feel refreshed and amazed. When he left, the prince's expression was very bad.

He didn't care, the emperor must have made a decision in his heart, but he didn't say it out, and there was only so much he could do.Sending money to officials for disaster relief is only a temporary measure. To ensure the long-term interests of the people in Suzhou, trade must be ensured.

At noon the next day, the sun was scorching hot, and Zhu Rong swung his hammer against the concrete wall at the back of the palace. It took him a quarter of an hour to knock down the concrete wall.

Looking at Zhu Rong, who was dripping with sweat, everyone was stunned. The wall was only two fingers wide, and it was built with irregular stones!

Li Xingzhou laughed triumphantly, folded his arms and personally named the calcined powder cement.

At the same time, it ordered the construction of more calciners made of graphite refractory bricks, dedicated to the calcining of cement.

This project was approved by Li Xingzhou, funded by Yan Chun, and Zhu Rong was in charge of it. All the earthen kilns in the back mountain will be overturned, and the calcination of general brewing and perfume porcelain bottles will be outsourced to other companies.

Zhu Rong and his Zhu family have been in the palace for so long, and they have mastered more technologies, such as firing graphite refractory crucibles, firing graphite refractory bricks, building cement calciners, and calcining cement.

At this time, let them burn a few broken porcelain vases with their hard-earned talents, which is simply overkill.

The graphite in stock in the palace was shipped by sea from Liao businessman Xiao Hongqi.

Xiao Hongqi was afraid that the palace would regret not wanting those useless black stones in the future, so he shipped them all to the palace, while Yan Yan followed Li Xingzhou's instructions and accepted as much as he came, and he would not refuse anyone who came.The graphite mines in the back mountain are piled up into hills.

In late July, when the new round of palace construction was in full swing, the road to the north was finally unblocked after the emperor repeatedly urged and dismissed two county magistrates who were not doing well.

The Guanbei Meteor Express Horse immediately brought the news of victory to Beijing, and the Liao people suddenly retreated. The Guanbei defenders took the initiative to attack and defeated the rear army of the Liao Kingdom.

This also indirectly proves that Jurchen's words are true. If there were no accidents in the rear, the menacing Liao army would not retreat in such a hurry.

So, in late July, the Ministry of Rites sent officials east to Yingtian Mansion to personally meet the Jurchen Jin Kingdom envoy who had been waiting there for several days.

Everyone knows about this, the whole Kaiyuan is full of excitement, most people are eagerly waiting, wanting to watch the excitement, after all, since the last time the Xixia envoys came to seek peace, no envoys from other countries have entered the capital of Jingguo
(End of this chapter)