Daming: I am the Crown Prince

Chapter 28 Looking at someone who is not like a king
Zhu Yunhuan went to the tomb of Kaiping King Chang Yuchun to pay homage. This was not a big deal and was reasonable.

But some things cannot be judged on the surface alone. Many people think that this matter has a profound meaning.

It is true that Zhu Yunhuan is Chang Yuchun's grandson, and it is also normal for him to go to the sacrifice ceremony. No one can find fault with this matter.

Moreover, as a minister of great merit, even though Chang Yuchun is no longer with us, the royal family should still remember his achievements and send royal family members to offer sacrifices at some important moments.

But it’s different now, the prince has not been buried yet.

Zhu Yunhuan went to offer sacrifices to Chang Yuchun with great fanfare, and brought many children of noble families with him. All this was to show his status as the legitimate son and the huge group of noble families behind him.

This makes many people in the civil service group feel uneasy and puts them under great pressure.

In the early stages of any dynasty, the noble group is generally stronger and more powerful than the civil servants.

The same was true of the Ming Dynasty, which can be clearly seen in the representation of official ranks.

The so-called Three Dukes are all of the first rank, and all of them are nobles.

The Three Dukes today are not just empty titles. They are responsible for assisting the emperor in handling important state affairs and government affairs. The importance of their positions attracts many people's attention.

But this is just a promotion or gift of official position, some people may not care much about it.

But since the Zhongshu Province was abolished, the left and right prime ministers were also abolished. This is a first-rank official position, which is also the dream of civil servants.

Their dreams are now shattered, and the highest rank among the six ministers is only the second rank.

In the Five Military Commandery, both the left and right commanders are of the first rank. If it is fully staffed, there will be at least ten of them!
Not to mention the first-rank governors and associate governors, there is no fixed number of them.

The deputy governor is a second-rank official, and many military commanders now hold this title. Even some sons of meritorious officials who have no merits can still become a second-rank official because of their fathers' merits.

Civil servants can only reach the second rank after their entire lives, and many of the children of noble families who have risen to prominence are at this rank.

Looking again, there are a lot of superiors and people of high ranks in the court, not to mention the super-ranking meritorious officials who have been conferred titles.

The Duke is a first-class noble, the Marquis is a second-class noble, and the Earl is also a third-class noble.

Even the imperial concubine's captain was of super rank, and even above the earl!

Civil servants, there is simply no way they can make it through!
Especially in the early years of the founding of the country, Zhu Yuanzhang was very dissatisfied with the second sage Mencius and once carried Mencius out of the Confucius Temple.

Scholars all over the world were in an uproar and were in a stalemate with Zhu. In the end, both sides made concessions, Mencius remained in the Confucius Temple and was still the second sage, but Zhu changed the "Mencius"!
Scholars are talented people. If you want to govern a country, you cannot just rely on fighting and killing. It is also very difficult to govern the country without the help of scholars.

Zhu Yuanzhang also once wanted to take direct action against Confucius. For example, in the early years of the Hongwu reign, he decreed that "Spring and Autumn Sacrifices to Confucius Temple should only be held in Qufu, and there is no need to hold sacrifices throughout the country."

The scholars were in an uproar, and Zhu Yuanzhang had no choice but to revoke his order, but he was still unwilling to give in.

So Zhu took action against the so-called Duke of Yansheng and granted the Kong family 2,000 hectares of land. "Provide them with salary but not with work", the Kong family only needed to be responsible for worshipping their ancestors, and they didn't need to think about being officials.

In the Song Dynasty and even the Yuan Dynasty, the Duke of Yansheng was at least promoted to a higher position and had a title. However, during the Hongwu Emperor's reign, the Duke of Yansheng was just a decoration.

It was necessary to do so. Confucius' influence was there, and Zhu Yuanzhang did not dare to risk the world's disapproval. As for Confucius' descendants, many people had complaints about Yanshenggong, but there was nothing they could do. After all, they had a good ancestor. This was also a manifestation and means of being lenient to scholars.

The people are the most precious, the society is second, and the monarch is the light.

Old Zhu got angry when he saw this.

Confucius believed that a ruler should treat his ministers with courtesy, and ministers should serve their ruler with loyalty.

The subjects must be loyal to the monarch, and the monarch must treat the subjects with courtesy. There is a certain degree of equality between the two sides.

As for Mencius, if the monarch treats his subjects as his own hands and feet, then the subjects will treat the monarch as their own heart and soul; if the monarch treats his subjects as dogs and horses, then the subjects will treat the monarch as their fellow countrymen; if the monarch treats his subjects as dirt, then the subjects will treat the monarch as their enemy.

This was a good thing, and how could Zhu Yuanzhang, with his violent temper, tolerate this? He abolished the prime minister system to strengthen the imperial power, so how could he allow someone to encourage ministers to regard the emperor as an enemy? So Zhu Yuanzhang issued an edict to expel Mencius from the Confucian Temple and not allow him to be worshipped.

As a result, the scholars disagreed and many of them died in protest.

It seems that Zhu Yuanzhang has given in, but the "Mencius", which is regarded as a classic by countless scholars, has been deleted and revised by Zhu Yuanzhang.

"Mencius", one of the Four Books, became "Mencius Jiewen", which established the imperial examination system. The authentic "Mencius" was no longer used as imperial examination questions, and all the upright teachings of sages were based on "Mencius Jiewen".

It is hard to say who wins and who loses.

Compromise and checks and balances are also an important part of politics.

Even a strong man like Lao Zhu can't make everything go according to his will. But it's enough to achieve some goals.

What is the dream of a scholar?
It is to spread the teachings of the saints and bring peace to the world, to leave a name in history, and to assist the monarch.
These may be too grand. To be more specific, they hope that the emperor can rule the world together with the literati.

What they like is that during the Song Dynasty, scholars had a very high status, and military officers were of low status in front of them. The power of life and death over military officers was controlled by scholars. Even if the emperor was furious, he could not kill scholars or civil officials.

They also liked the Mongols, although there was a saying that officials were second only to clerks, monks were third, Taoists were fourth, doctors were fifth, workers were sixth, hunters were seventh, prostitutes were eighth, scholars were ninth, and beggars were ten. Scholars were even just slightly better than beggars.

However, many scholars do not agree with this statement. They believe that it was written by Zheng Sixiao, a poet of the Southern Song Dynasty in the Yuan Dynasty, and that it was a smear work by the Southern Song loyalists.

What scholars saw was that during the Yuan Dynasty, the rulers expanded the "Pumai" of the Song Dynasty into a tax farming system.

Emperor Hongwu once believed that the Mongols lost their country because of "leniency". This was not leniency, but the laziness and inaction of the Mongols.

The Mongols did not require the Han Chinese to serve in the military. Many people felt that this was a favor, not that the Mongols did not trust them. The Semites were responsible for collecting taxes, and there were no officials in many places. It seemed that the people had great autonomy, but the landlords and gentry oppressed the people and could easily accumulate a lot of wealth.

Those people didn’t care about the so-called four-class system, and they didn’t care whether they were Han or southerners. It didn’t matter if there were Mongols or Semites above them, so much so that even now, there are still many survivors of the Yuan Dynasty.

For example, Zhang Sanfeng, who called himself a remnant of the Yuan Dynasty, repeatedly refused to respond to Zhu's summons.

Everyone in the early Ming Dynasty did not forget the Yuan court and had no intention of serving as an official.

This is not an isolated phenomenon. The poet, writer, calligrapher and painter Yang Weizhen was unwilling to work for Zhang Shicheng or Zhu Yuanzhang, and he said, "How can an old woman who is about to die remarry?" The Neo-Confucianist Zheng Yu refused to serve two masters, and he knelt down to the Northern Yuan Dynasty and then hanged himself.

It is said that "most of the martyrs at the end of the Yuan Dynasty were Jinshi scholars". These scholars are considered to be the vested interests and they don't care whether the lower-class people are in dire straits.

When it came to the Ming Dynasty, they also tried their best to change the current situation where military officials were valued and civil officials were looked down upon, and to get rid of the situation where civil officials could be killed by the emperor at any time.

Now some scholars are getting anxious and they are really starting to worry.

They knew what kind of person the late Crown Prince Zhu Biao was. Even though he was as ruthless and decisive as the emperor, he appeared to be kind and benevolent on the surface.

Now that the crown prince is gone, Zhu Yunwen is in a good situation. He received Confucian education since childhood and was determined to restore the past. He also came from a scholarly family and had close relations with the civil service group.

Originally everyone was expecting him to be named the crown prince, as the situation of scholars might have changed greatly in the future.

But now, Zhu Yunhuan, the third grandson of the emperor who was previously known as a playboy, has appeared. After causing a big commotion in the court, Huang Zicheng is still in prison, and Zhan Hui is in a state of anxiety.

Putting aside his reputation, just the one time he appeared in the court, many civil officials felt that he was not a "benevolent monarch" and was not in their interests.

Moreover, he is now so close to the nobles. Even the beatings of the civil servants by the nobles before were said to be instigated by this grandson of the emperor.

Originally, they had a chance to see the dawn and had many expectations for the future. But now, Zhu Yunhuan, the grandson of the emperor, has interfered, and many people feel uneasy.

If he became the emperor's grandson, he would most likely continue to use nobles and relatives by marriage to suppress civil officials.

While the civil officials were worried, Zhu Yuanzhang issued an imperial decree to summon the princes from outside the capital to return to the capital to attend the prince's funeral.

(End of this chapter)