Ming Dynasty: A hundred-year-old immortal cultivator, Zhu Yuanzhang’s biological father

Chapter 4 The Ebb and Flow of the Empire!
"Then why is Dayun Dynasty's industrial and commercial tax so low?"

"The origin of the problem lies with Emperor Dayun. Emperor Dayun emphasized agriculture and suppressed business. Farmers who left their hometowns to do business instead of farming will be regarded as idle refugees. The government must capture them and continue farming."

"He also strictly prohibited overseas trade and changed the trade to a tribute system. This tribute system is a bit like Ryukyu. Poor relatives like Annan came to rich households to beg for food. If they brought a watermelon to the door, Dayun Dynasty would have to pay it back. They bought a cart of grapes at a loss."

"In order to prevent more people from doing business, Emperor Dayun also stipulated the social hierarchy: scholars, farmers, industry and merchants, merchants were the lowest level of normal society, and descendants were not allowed to take the imperial examination."

"In 1381, it was ordered that peasant families could wear silk yarn and silk cloth, and merchant families could only wear curly cloth. However, if one member of a peasant family was engaged in business, the whole family was not allowed to wear silk yarn."

"And the late Emperor Dayun did not blindly suppress businessmen. He also made strong commercial management measures. Overall, he focused on agriculture and suppressed business. This was because too many people died in the founding war, the country had too much land that needed to be reclaimed, and he did not have the energy to deal with it. Chaos along the coast.”

"Under the circumstances at that time, restoring production was above all else, and there was no problem in focusing on agriculture and suppressing business. Some historical data said that because the consciousness of merchants was suppressed too much, in order to compensate them, Emperor Dayun stopped collecting taxes from merchants."

"This sentence is wrong. Emperor Dayun collected business taxes, but he collected them very lightly. The reason why he collected them was not to compensate merchants, but because he was afraid that heavy taxes would lead to high commodity prices and increase the burden on the people. "

"In 1369, Dayun stipulated that taxes must be paid on commodity transactions. In 1364, a propaganda department was established, and a general education department was established in Fuzhou and counties to collect commercial taxes."

"In 1362, the commercial tax was 15 tax 1. Two years later, the late Emperor of the Dayun Dynasty believed that the tax was too high and affected the price of goods, and the people could not afford it, so it was changed to 30 tax 1. Some daily necessities were simply exempted from tax."

"All the measures taken by Emperor Dayun were in line with the productivity situation at that time. They were to [enlarge the farmer group and suppress the merchant group] and prevent merchants with excessive mobility from occupying a dominant position in society."

"The late Emperor Dayun was not wrong. What was wrong was that after things changed, Dayun's later subjects still abided by the ancestral system of the organization and actively refused to change."

"And this ancestral system appeared in almost the entire Dayun Dynasty at every ebb and flow. The ancestral system can be summed up in one sentence, that is, the rules set for the late Emperor Dayun."

"There are many rules, ranging from institutional laws and regulations to institutional settings, the emperor's words and deeds, officials' regulations, harem conduct, etc., there are all kinds of them, and whoever breaks the rules will be brutally punished."

"Severe cases will be punished by punishment, and the whole family will be executed. The specific contents include "Huang Yun's Ancestral Instructions", "Da Gao", "Hongwu Etiquette", "Rituals and Destinations", "Filial Piety and Compassion", "Dayun Law" and so on. "

"These ancestral systems established by the late Emperor Dayun were extremely ruthless in the early stage and were implemented at every turn, but most of the contents later gradually collapsed."

"Re-employing eunuchs, dressing in luxurious clothes, establishing a cabinet, drinking and beauties, etc. are all against the ancestral system."

"The emperors in the future can innovate their tricks one by one. This thing made by the ancestors later became a shield. Everyone selectively believed that they would use it if it was in their own interests, and use it if it was not in their own interests."

"The ancestral system established by Emperor Dayun was originally used to sort out the emperor's supreme authority and construct a network of power operations and checks and balances. However, it turned out that it was used by the civil servant group to check and balance the imperial power." "When Yongle and Wanli established the crown prince, The civil servants collectively cried and shouted to move out of the ancestral system to fight against the emperor's power. Queen Wanlili could not give birth to a child. When he went to pay his respects to his mother, he had an affair with his mother's maid on a whim. "

"The palace maid became pregnant with a son a few months later, but Wanli felt that it was embarrassing for him to sleep with a palace maid, and he wanted to cheat and deny it, so his mother took out the "Daily Notes" and said, "Son, don't even think about running away. I will hold this grandson in my arms." deal."

"So the palace maid straightened her up and sealed her, Wang Gongfei."

"Zhu Changluo was raised in the palace as the eldest son and trained as the heir to the throne. Wanli found his true love, Concubine Zheng, and had a son with him, Zhu Changxun. Because he liked Concubine Zheng so much, he planned to help Zhu Changxun become the crown prince."

"But if this is done, it is against the orthodoxy. I want to make Zheng Guifei the imperial concubine first, with a higher status in the palace than Zhu Changluo's mother, in order to test the reaction of the officials."

"The ministers all saw Wanli's little thoughts. The Ministry of Revenue informed Jiang Yinglin about the matter and said that this was not possible."

"Wanli hated him for meddling in his own family affairs, saying that he "suspected the emperor and betrayed his integrity", so he sent him to Datong to make a small history. Unexpectedly, this blow angered the officials, and they were not afraid of Wanli's punishment. They rushed to demand that Zhu Changluo be officially crowned prince. Tortured Wanli until he suffered a nervous breakdown."

"Wanli fought hard with his ministers until 1601. Zhu Changluo was already 20 years old, and Zhu Changxun was already 16 years old. They were too old to wait for anyone. Wanli was forced to make Zhu Changluo the prince, and they got married in February of the following year."

"In the end, Zhu Changluo became Emperor Taichang, but he was poisoned to death after one month of being emperor. Emperor Tianqi, a carpenter, took over, and Zhu Changxun, the precious son of Wanli and Concubine Zheng, was granted the title of King Fu."

"The civil service group actually doesn't have that deep a relationship with Zhu Changluo. The reason why they brought out the ancestral system to suppress Wanli is mainly to compete for the right to speak. The right to speak does not seem to have much meaning, but it is actually an oath of power."

"It is to show the other party that I have many ways to deal with you. This is a power confrontation between the imperial power and the civil servant group, and Wanli was defeated in the end."

"His final defeat also marked that the power of the civil servant group did, at least in some aspects, overshadow the imperial power."

"I'm afraid... Emperor Dayun never thought that the ancestral system he used to maintain imperial power would eventually become a tool used by civil servants to resist imperial power. Emperors who were unwilling to fail in the confrontation with political power were naturally willing to fatten them up. Eunuchs and Jin Yiwei, let them go out to suppress the civil servant group."

"Actually, whether it is the imperial power or the civil service group, if the power is too great, it is not necessarily a good thing. If the imperial power is too powerful, it only thinks about how to exploit the world and satisfy personal desires."

"The civil service group has grown too big, and they only think about how to exploit the world and satisfy their own selfish desires. The first emperor of Dayun and the third emperor were both people who were born and died on the battlefield. They had no preference for civil servants. At the beginning of Dayun, they still maintained their The imperial power plus the Wuxun Group suppress the civil servant group."

"The emperor directly controls the military commanders. The military commanders control the governor's office of the five armies. The emperor directly controls the violent institutions."

(End of this chapter)