Jinyi Night Walk

In the Huagai Palace, Zhu Di sat at the head, Lu Zhen, Minister of Rites, Leng Aoyu, Hanlin scholar, Chen Ying, the imperial official of Zuodu of the Metropolitan Procuratorate, and Chen Anzhi of the Guozijian, each led their own staff with outstanding talents and learning. The ten articles are the articles of the top ten candidates in the undergraduate course.

Lu Shangshu, Leng Xueshi, Chen Yuanyuan, and his staff members all offered seats, and the hall was so quiet that Musi and the others could even hear the friction of sleeves as people moved their hands and feet, and the screeching of paper when unfolding the test papers. The eunuch sent the test papers to the adults one by one. The first one was Lu Zhen, Minister of the Ministry of Rites. The second test paper continues to review.Zhu Di even stopped the morning court today, and summoned these people to start reading the papers early in the morning.

The scientific examination is divided into three sessions, each of three days. The first session tests the three principles of the "Four Books" and the four principles of the "Five Classics", testing the candidates' familiarity and understanding of the Confucian classics.In the second trial session, the examiners judged right from wrong.Administrative ability to write various official documents.In the third test, five subjects of classics, history, and policy, inspected the knowledge of the students in ancient and modern political affairs.

The general examination is the country's talent selection ceremony, and its importance cannot be overstated even if it mentions the country's rise and fall.However, in the actual marking, due to the large number of exam papers and the piles of test papers, the time for marking papers is tight, the tasks are heavy, and every word has to be carefully considered. They formed an unwritten rule: marking only the first seven stereotyped essays.

Why only stereotyped?Because this is a style with a very strict format, it is easier for the examiner to grasp the advantages and disadvantages of right and wrong, greatly improve the speed of marking papers, and make it easy to judge whether the test papers are suitable or not, so that all test papers can be reviewed as scheduled, and the subjective factors of the examiners Minimize it, so as to ensure the seriousness and fairness of the official selection examination.

Therefore, although its rigid procedures and restraints are criticized by others, it is true that candidates can only follow suit and dare not take half a step.But precisely because it has strict regulations on starting, inheriting, transferring, and combining, and even on the number of words and sentences, it can minimize the subjective factors of the examiner, so as to guarantee the rights and interests of the candidates to the greatest extent, and make Those who are really good get fame.

It is rare for a person with outstanding talent and learning to fail to do the most important stereotyped essay in this scientific examination. If you insist on how good his knowledge is in other aspects, it is actually limited.In the era of the official standard, if the examiner's marking standards were too free, there was a lot of room for cheating. Therefore, stereotyped examinations were considered to be a relatively standardized examination in that era, and it was the most objective and fair way to obtain talents at that time.

However, its degree of standardization is still limited after all. If it is not for the disparity between the articles, who is good and who is bad, the examiners are different, and the appreciation angles are different, so naturally different conclusions can be drawn. Lu Zhen just plays tricks in this respect.

When everyone had finished reading the test papers and needed their comments, the adults Lu Zhen, Leng Aoyu, and Chen Ying whispered with their colleagues to exchange opinions, and then made room for each other, and finally Lu Zhen did it first. Comment.

Lu Zhen said respectfully: "The emperor carefully read the test papers of the top one and the top two selected by the bachelor of the Jie University. From the four aspects of 'reason, law, speech, and spirit, it is indeed a masterpiece. Three The mastery of the scriptures and the understanding of Cheng Zhu's annotations are very good in interpreting the structure of the article and the students' writing ability and literary heart. But..."

Zhu Di opened his eyes and asked, "But what?"

Lu Zhendao: "However, Chenguan No. 7 You Tingguang's article is pure, elegant, full of emotion, vivid in writing, and stable in confrontation. Breaking through the topic, inheriting the topic, the turning point is natural, and its explanation of meaning is particularly excellent, although it is not as good as the bachelor's degree." The essays of the first, second, and third candidates are gorgeous in words, but they can convey the scriptures, and they are full of literature and science, which is highly appreciated by the minister. If the minister is the examiner, this person should be selected as the first.

Also, Chang Hui, the No.9 candidate, whose essay..."

Lu Zhen said it tactfully, but in the end he rejected all the first and second places that Xie Jin had taken, and ranked You Tingguang as the number one, Chang Hui as the second place, and only No.3 was unmoved.Zhu Di frowned, and said in a deep voice, "That is to say, it's not fair for Xie Jin to choose a scholar?"

Lu Zhen is such a slippery and experienced person, how could he directly come forward to fight Xie Jin, and hurriedly said: "This, I dare not judge. Examiners have different likes and dislikes, and it is normal for them to put more emphasis on grading papers."

Zhu Di snorted, and turned his gaze to Leng Aoyu, a Hanlin scholar. This Leng University scholar was humiliated in public by Xie Jin when he recited poems against him. The power of Jin, who was eloquent at the moment, criticized the articles selected by Xie Jin all over the place.He didn't say who's article was good, he only said that Xie Jinxuan's article was not good. If you want to find faults in that article, you can find it no matter what.

Zhu Di's face turned dark, and he asked Chen Ying's opinion again, but Chen Ying did not directly criticize Xie Jin, but instead spoke kind words for Xie Jin. All the marking and evaluation were done by the same examiner, and the examiner only commented on the selected articles in the end. Check, + decides a ranking; when the time is tight and the amount of examination papers is large, it is inevitable that some negligence; in the end, I just pointed out two small mistakes with a little regret, for example, the handwriting of the champion paper selected by Xie Jin was not beautiful enough. There was a small ink smear on the eye examination paper, which made Zhu Di even more troubled.

It was Chen Anzhi's turn at the Guozijian last. Mr. Chen was more idle than the senior scholar Leng of the Hanlin Academy, and he was not afraid of how Xie Jin would retaliate against him if he didn't fall. The article selected by the bachelor as the number one scholar has ambiguous topics, low sentiment, and lack of spirit. On the other hand, the article selected by the Zhejiang scholar Dongfang Mingyuan, which was selected as the bottom of the top ten list, is much better than the article selected by Xie Xueshi. .

Your Majesty, please see, this article is divided into stereotyped strands, like a chain of locks, with joints growing together.There is no need to transfer a single sentence, the game is the most advanced.After the middle part is picked up, there is a wonderful way to connect the roots.Each foot is swaying and swaying.The real meaning is interpreted in the stock, and every word is thorough and meticulous.At first glance, it looks unremarkable, but when you think about it carefully, it is amazing.The way to come is very precise, the way to go is very clear, you can speak for the sages!On the other hand, the articles taken by Bachelor of Science..."

Chen Anzhi curled his lips and said disdainfully: "Your Majesty, please take a look. I only took a cursory look at this strategy theory about the scholar's selection of the top scholar. I found two typos in the text and one sentence that didn't make sense. Let's take a closer look." Look, I have never read a sentence! I dare not say whether Xie Xueshi followed Si, but Xie Xueshi was sloppy and slack in selecting scholars for the imperial court, which can be seen!"

As I said before, at that time, there were too many exams and a large amount of test papers, and the time for revealing the list was too short, so there was no time to read all the candidates' papers, so the examiners only emphasized stereotyped essays, but according to the rules, all essays should be written carefully. , carefully reviewed.Others acted according to the unspoken rules, so it didn't matter if there were no accidents. If Xie Jin committed a crime at the moment, he would investigate all his faults.

In ancient my country, there were no punctuation marks, but in order to stop and break sentences for easy understanding and reading, scholars gradually invented symbols similar to modern breaks and periods. When marking papers, these symbols should be added to indicate that they have read word by word. But if you want to do this, you have to read the whole article carefully before you can make an accurate sentence sentence. This policy is not taken seriously, and the examiners will naturally be lazy.

Now that Chen Anzhi brought it up, it is an undeniable problem. Whether Xie Jin will do his best to recruit scholars for the court has naturally become a big problem.

Zhu Di said with a cold face: "Today, I only asked all the ministers to read the first ten volumes, and they came to all kinds of conclusions. How do you know that there are no virtuous and capable candidates among the candidates who are ranked at the bottom or even failed? The students grew up Little meng boy, studying hard in the cold window, weeding out layer by layer, it will take decades for those who can pass the Jinshi exam. Decades, a doll with a milky voice can only learn something when it is young, or even longer If it is successful, how can the imperial court not cherish it?"

He slapped the imperial case, and said in a deep voice: "Decree, the undergraduate list is invalid! All the test papers will be re-evaluated by the Ministry of Rites together with the Hanlin Academy and the Imperial College, and then the list will be announced!"

All the civil servants in the hall stood up one after another, bowed together and said: "Your minister receives the decree!"

Neishi Musi walked out of the Huagai Hall with her fly whisk, glanced left and right, beckoned to a little eunuch, and ordered in a low voice: "Go to Dongchang quickly, tell godfather, Xie Dashi... It's over!"

The emperor overturned the original list and ordered the examination papers to be reviewed again, which naturally proved that Xie Jin's selection of scholars was unfair. Since the selection of scholars was unfair, he would naturally be severely punished. How could Mu Si not understand such a simple truth?

In Wenyuan Pavilion, Xie Jin was restless. In Huagai Palace, the emperor was summoning officials from the Ministry of Rites, Hanlin Academy, Metropolitan Inspection Academy and Guozijian to discuss matters. No need to ask, the matters discussed must also be related to the matter that the disciples accused him of. , Xie Jin wanted to inquire about what was going on there, but it was really inappropriate for him to take any action right now.

His in-law Hu Guang urged him to compete for the chief examiner at the beginning, but now he has made a big fuss. Hu Guang feels ashamed, and he doesn't even face him. Several other cabinet scholars also have strange expressions when they see him, a bit avoiding the plague god Xie Jin didn't dare to take a walk in the corridor, for fear of bumping into his colleagues, and everyone felt uncomfortable.

He regretted it, really regretted it, thinking why he didn't listen to Duke Fu's advice at the beginning, lard dreamed like a heart, and went to fight for the chief examiner!Seeing that the compilation of the "Yongle Canon" is about to be completed, is it possible that he will not be able to regain his family with such great achievements?Now that a group of villains are making trouble, what should I do? "

The more Xie Jin thought about it, the more anxious he became. At this moment, a young eunuch came in holding a stack of memorials. Xie Luo glanced at them hurriedly, and found that they were the memorials that the emperor transferred to the East Palace for review.The handover of memorials between Donggong and him has always been in charge of Donggong Zuo Yude and Yang Shiqi, why is there a new eunuch now?

Xie Jin asked in surprise, and the little eunuch said: "The crown prince asked the servant to bring the memorial, and the servant just obeyed the order. The servant will not know what the old man asked."

Xie Jin's heart sank suddenly. ! .