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Chapter 365 No one can stop good luck when it comes

The emperor won two games in a row, and then died down. He did not pursue the enemy when he was poor. He did not act arbitrarily in the selection of the next minister of the Ministry of Personnel. He fully listened to the opinions of the six ministers and nine ministers, and finally made the choice based on the principle of the minority obeying the majority. Zhou Daodeng, the right minister of the Ministry of Rites.

Why do so many people recommend him? Do you have any achievements or outstanding achievements? Or is it a representative of a hidden force? It sounds a bit fantasy and a bit sad. Zhou Daodeng has the lowest academic qualifications and the worst political performance among all the nominations. At the same time, he is the most popular. No faction has obvious hostility towards him.

Sometimes politics is so ridiculous. A lot of people with great power come together to discuss. The original intention is to elect an official with both ability and political integrity. However, due to their different interests, the person who is ultimately elected is someone who wants nothing. of waste. It's really better not to choose. The result of direct drawing may be better.

Zhou Daodeng, a native of Wujiang (now Suzhou, Jiangsu Province), was born in a famous family. His ancestor was Zhou Dunyi, the originator of Neo-Confucianism in the Song Dynasty. But he was not very smart since he was a child, and he didn't like studying very much. By the time he was 30 years old, he had not even been admitted to the imperial examination, let alone Jinshi.

This kind of situation is not uncommon in later generations. Two Ph.D.s from top universities have a child, and they educate it carefully. When they grow up, they may not be as promising as the child downstairs.

The son of the dragon and the phoenix, the mouse, can dig holes. It does not describe achievement or moral character, but class. Genes can pass on appearance and body shape, but they cannot pass on IQ. Family status can pass down property and status, but it cannot pass down moral character.

The reason is simple. IQ and moral character are not innate talents, but acquired traits. There are many factors that contribute to its formation. Although family, education, and environment are important, they are also inseparable from experience and experience.

Fortunately, in the Ming Dynasty, besides the imperial examination, there was another way to enter the official career, called Gongsheng. The general meaning is that if the academic administration departments of various states and counties fail to pass the examination, they will use the method of recommendation to select those with both ability and political integrity from the local scholars and recommend them to the Imperial College to continue their studies.

Since it was a recommendation, there was no shortage of people and sophistication. Zhou Daodeng's family was rich and famous, so it would not be difficult to find a few local celebrities to help recommend his children. So relying on the help of his ancestors, Zhou Daodeng finally got the ticket to enter the official career. Although it is a standing ticket, it is better than not being able to get on the train.

But with this standing ticket, Zhou Daodeng not only got on the bus, but also walked farther than many people who bought sleeper tickets. After using the quota from the Imperial College to become a Jinshi, he entered the Hanlin Academy as expected and lined up with a lot of Jinshi to wait for the opportunity.

At that time, the name of the sacrificial wine in the Imperial College was Li Tingji. Yes, he was the cabinet bachelor who participated in the rebellion and was executed by Hong Tao. Although after becoming a high-ranking official, Li Tingji loved power and rejected the New Deal, when he was young, he was a college bully who almost won three yuan in a row. He was full of arrogance and backbone.

But it was such a high-spirited university bully that Zhou Daodeng was deceived. No matter how he looked at it, he found him pleasing to the eye, so he took care of him as a matter of course, and he was promoted much faster than the Jinshi in the same subject.

When Li Tingji became the Minister of Rites, he did not forget to take care of Zhou Daodeng. Just in time for Hong Tao to rectify the officialdom and supplement the vacancies in the Wanli Dynasty, he directly recommended Zhou Daodeng. I don't know whether it was because the Supervisor of Rites didn't check or because Hong Tao was negligent. Anyway, by some strange combination of circumstances, he was admitted into the Ministry of Etiquette, where he was promoted from the rank of fifth-grade Yuanwailang.

Let's talk about this person. If he is unlucky, his teeth will be blocked even if he drinks cold water. If he is lucky, he can't stop him. At that time, the various political parties in the DPRK were busy fighting. Zhou Daodeng didn't know whether it was because he had a long-term vision or because he was just confused. He didn't join any of the factions. He didn't even pay attention to Li Tingji's advice, and just lived alone in the Ministry of Rites.

Normally, after offending Li Tingji, he would be unlucky, but the result was just the opposite. The successor, Guo Zhengyu, the Minister of Rites, was a student of Shen Li. He was a pure Donglin Party and was incompatible with Li Tingji's Zhejiang Party. The more Li Tingji dislikes someone, the more Guo Zhengyu likes him. Less than two years later, Zhou Daodeng, who had made no achievements, was actually promoted again. He was a fifth-grade doctor, and he stepped into the ranks of high-ranking officials.

But at this time, Zhou Daodeng committed an old habit again and ignored the olive branch offered by Guo Zhengyu and the Donglin Party. After refusing many times, he was immediately ostracized and became the stinking shit of the Ministry of Etiquette, and no one liked to talk to him.

Fortunately, he didn't intend to make any achievements. He ignored people who didn't want to talk to him. He smiled all day long when he saw people and didn't do anything more. In this way, there is nothing to grasp, and it will not be driven away for a while. We can only wait until the next Beijing inspection to find ways to rectify it.

If someone else had been treated like this, they would have figured out what to do next. Either hand in your resignation and get out, go home and wait in line for reassignment, or quickly ease the relationship and choose one of the two: move closer to the organization or use money to pave the way.

In the end, Zhou Daodeng didn't choose anything. He just went his own way and spent all day in the Ministry of Etiquette, being a stinky shit, and then he got a fucking promotion!

In the fifth year of Jingyang, Li Tingji and Guo Zhengyu suddenly became rebels. The Donglin Party and the Zhejiang Party also became street rats and were beaten up everywhere. Officials who had close relations with them in the past kept silent for fear of being implicated.

After careful investigation by Jin Yiwei and Dongchang, it was discovered that Zhou Daodeng was a special case. He was both ostracized by the Zhejiang Party and disliked by the Donglin Party. He actually fought alone and resolutely against the rebels for a long time in the hardest-hit area of ​​the Ministry of Rites without compromising.

In the general environment at that time, even though Hong Tao worked hard to reduce the impact of the rebellion and was unwilling to be too involved, most of the officials below did not fully understand it and still acted according to the old way of thinking.

To judge who is a rebel and who is a righteous one, the first step is to determine the position. Those who are squeezed out by the rebels must be righteous. They must pay attention to the emperor. There is hard work without merit. If you are promoted to one level, you will be promoted to the right minister of the Ministry of Rites!

Then why does Hong Tao think that he is a mediocre person who only relies on good luck to reach a high position? It's very simple. There are many records about Zhou Daodeng in later generations. His good luck is not only this, but will continue in the future, and he will always be a very popular minister and become a cabinet bachelor.

In addition to a smooth official career, Zhou Daodeng's love luck is also better than that of ordinary people. Have you heard of Liu Rushi? One of the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai, she often wore Confucian attire and men's clothing to gather with literati. She talked about the general situation of the world and sang many poems. Later, she married the talented daughter of Qian Qianyi, a great talent.

Whether she is a talented woman, beautiful, or gorgeous, it doesn’t really matter what other people say. The one who has the most say is Zhou Zhou Daodeng. The reason Liu Rushi was able to grow from a maid to a talented woman was mostly due to Zhou Daodeng's training.

She was sold into the Zhou family at a very young age and became a concubine to Zhou Daodeng. Many of her attainments in literature, calligraphy and painting were taught carefully by this great scholar who was a Gongsheng student.

(End of this chapter)