I have to say that Guo Pu has a deep understanding of Zhang Juzheng, but it may be that he doesn't seem to have a good sense of Zhang Juzheng - Gao Pragmatic noticed that he called Zhang Juzheng "Zhang Baigui" a few times just now.

Bai Gui is Zhang Juzheng's nickname, or the original name - Juzheng was changed later. Guo Pu directly called Zhang Juzheng by his nickname, obviously a little dissatisfied with Zhang Juzheng's life.

Zhang Juzheng has always shown himself as a great reformer in later generations, and some people even say that he is the only great politician in the Ming Dynasty. Gao Pragmatic's attitude towards this has always been to roll his eyes - Zhang Juzheng is indeed a politician and a reformer, but the excessive exaltation of him by later generations has reached the point of completely ignoring the truth, which can not convince Gao Pragmatic at all.

Even for the Longwan reform, Zhang Juzheng, as a politician who continued the reform policy of Longqing and Gaogong, not only did not really further deepen the reform, but obviously made the mistake of "overexerting force" in some administrations, and Gao pragmatic even felt that the biggest tout of his achievements in later generations was "to continue the life of the Ming Dynasty for decades" It was a little difficult to live up to his name.

As mentioned above, from the perspective and level of national politics, forcibly rolling out a whip law across the country is a typical overexertion - what is the comparison between the rich Nanzhili Suzhou and Hangzhou areas, which are close to the level of the early stage of capitalism, and Shaanxi, which is barren and suffering disasters year after year, can actually carry out a whip law across the board?

Is this to prolong life, or to drink to quench thirst? Hard.

As for the examination method, the same is true - when there are still many problems in the lower-level administrative units that have not been solved, it is very difficult to improve administrative efficiency, and at this time, Zhang Juzheng forcibly ordered the improvement of administrative efficiency in the name of the center, which can only lead to the uneasiness of the entire administrative system, resulting in the division within the civil and official group, and some people can only increase the oppression of the common people in order to meet Zhang Juzheng, so as to meet the "test results", and the other part cannot complete the "test results" because they are unwilling to oppress the people excessively. So he was liquidated and suppressed by Zhang Juzheng, and then became the main force of Zhu Yijun's later counterattack.

Is this to prolong life, or to drink to quench thirst? Hard.

However, history has proved that Zhang Juzheng's style after he really took power: arbitrary, rigid and self-serving, those who follow me in employing people and administration prosper, and those who oppose me die.

In this way, some sycophants and treacherous villains are often reused, and those who disagree are ostracized. All the ministers of the imperial court who offended Zhang Juzheng were demoted, dismissed, and even tortured and imprisoned, which led to death.

This method of employing people based on one's own likes and dislikes and one's own rights and wrongs has not only caused difficulties in the implementation of reform, but also sowed a crisis in the failure of reform.

In fact, not all people who are good at currying favor with Zhang Juzheng really support reform, such as Zhang Siwei, who was promoted and reused by Zhang Juzheng, after succeeding to the first assistant of the cabinet, that is, following Wanli's footsteps, liquidating the reform - and in fact, Zhang Siwei was originally a faction of Gao Gong, if it were not for the fall of Gao Gong, he would inevitably enter the cabinet as an auxiliary minister.

But Zhang Siwei is also a person who has been polished by officialdom for a long time, so when Gao Gong fell, he endured it, hibernated under the Nine Shadows, and behaved "like a follower" in front of Zhang Juzheng, which was recognized by Zhang Juzheng, thinking that Zhang Siwei had softened, so he was reused.

In addition, the powerful Zhang Juzheng, although he was not actually a big greedy in the officialdom of the late Ming Dynasty - at least much stronger than his teacher Xu Jie - was not completely innocent. He used his status and influence to seek fame for his family, the eldest son was the champion, and the second son was originally ranked second in the examination, and Shenzong arbitrarily moved him to the first and second ranks, and Zhang Juzheng also accepted it calmly.

The upper beam is not correct and the lower beam is crooked, after Wanli, there is serious fraud in the field, and many sons of prominent officials and important officials have become Jinshi, which leads to unconvinced people's hearts, discussions, and even corruption, Zhang Ju is very responsible.

In addition, his family members in their hometown in Hubei are also rampant and accept bribes. Zhang Juzheng was actually very aware of this situation, and wrote a letter asking local officials to strictly control it, but he himself failed to take any effective measures, and even made it clear that as a son, he could not control the reckless father, so he would inevitably attract criticism from others.

In Gao Pragmatism's view, leading a large-scale reform movement is inherently full of thorns and difficulties. Zhang Juzheng himself is autocratic, rejects dissidents, uses people improperly, makes too many enemies, and can't be strict with himself and restrain his family, so the end can only be that people go to tea and cool, and people die in politics, not only the reputation behind him plummeted, but also ten years of business went down the drain.

The reason why Gao Pragmatic did everything possible to keep Gao Gong was because Gao Gong was his third uncle, as long as he could not fall, he could leave himself with strong political resources to a large extent, which would be conducive to his continued promotion of the Longwan reform in the future, and there would be no teachers and students like Zhang Juzheng and Wanli turning against each other and dying in government, but this is not the only purpose.

Although Gao Gong was also a bit arbitrary, at least he listened to persuasion, and although he usually seemed to be anxious, he was very careful in his administration—which can be seen from his step-by-step and zonal progress in opening up the sea and promoting a whip law.

In addition, the previous time Gao Pragmatic suggested to him that the conditions for the promotion of local officials should be linked to local economic development (in fact, Gao Pragmatic only mentions the amount of taxes collected, see the earlier part of this book), Gao Gong said that it may lead to the small people being exploited too much, which may have an impact on the stability of the country.

This is the overall situation and prudence that a great statesman should have.

National politics are not child's play, and they are not something that can be taken as a guideline and implemented by pondering at home and patting their heads. Any policy must be carefully considered, what is feasible in the south of the Yangtze River may not be feasible in the north of the Yangtze River; What is feasible in Yunnan may not be feasible in Liaodong.

Therefore, in the process of implementation, we must carefully and patiently discover, examine, and solve problems, and we must not ignore problems, ignore problems, or cover up problems, otherwise the problems will only become more and more and more irreparable.

Guo Pu may not use the "dichotomy" dialectical thinking that has been proven effective in later generations to examine Zhang Juzheng, but he is not ignorant of the dangers of people like Zhang Juzheng holding power, so he has such an attitude.

Gao Pragmatic suddenly realized from Guo Pu's two "Zhang Baigui": the reason why he was so cooperative and refused to delay for a moment to return to Beijing with him was that he had actually agreed to recover in his heart, and the purpose was to restrict Zhang Juzheng!

Gao Pragmatic suddenly breathed a sigh of relief, although Guo Pu agreed to return to Beijing for the sake of the overall situation of the country, but that is not important, for Gao Pragmatic, the focus of everything at the moment is only one: to protect the high arch and suppress the upright!