When people comment on a person, in addition to his appearance, they like to say whether the person is smart or not, of course, this statement is generally for children, for the elderly generally say how his character is, and for adults the most is how the person's ability is. Everyone likes to say that they are capable, and they like to be praised by others for being capable, but there is no accurate standard for people's assessment of ability. The powerful big fat man can bend his arm and wave his fist to show that he has the ability after easily lifting a stone lock, and the little thin man with the sharp mouth monkey cheeks will squint his eyes and think that he has the ability after successfully making the big fat man fall into the pit he has dug.

Soldiers will show their ability after a siege victory, blacksmiths will be proud of their abilities after building an unusually sharp weapon, and merchants will be confident in their abilities after making a fortune with a hard silver coin on their waists, and there are places to prove their abilities in all walks of life. Not to mention other industries, let's just say that in the Ming Dynasty, everyone's identification of ability is not the same, some people think that the crime rate is low in the land under their rule is their own ability, some people think that it is their ability to dare to ask for the people's lives, and of course, there are also people who think that it is their ability to make two small sums of money when they can get by up and down.

When King Xin saw Liu Zongzhou talking about ability, he asked, "May I ask how Lord Liu understands ability?" Is your understanding convincing? ”

Liu Zongzhou said: "I think the best way to reflect the ability of an official lies in two consistencies, one is the consistency of the upper and lower levels, that is, the emperor requires that the upper and lower levels can be satisfied, and the other is the consistency of words and deeds. ”

Qian Qianyi remembered the conversation with the apocalypse at this time, so he said: "At the beginning, the emperor also talked about the consistency of the upper and lower levels, thinking that the consistency of the upper and lower levels is a very high standard, and it can be said that there are very few officials in the Ming Dynasty who can do this. Lord Liu said that the unanimity of the upper and lower levels is a place that reflects the ability of an official, if you really want to be serious, does it mean that my officials in the Ming Dynasty are currently incapable people? The lower officials may not have paid attention to Lord Liu's essence, so please don't be surprised by Lord Liu and teach him more. ”

Liu Zongzhou said with a smile: "It's okay, in fact, it is said that few officials in the Ming Dynasty can be consistent at present, and if you still have a face, if you really want to be serious, it can be said that none of the current officials in the Ming Dynasty have reached this standard." I remembered that the reason why the emperor talked about the name of the Holy Academy after he established the Holy Academy was that he wanted all the officials in the Holy Academy to become saints in the end, but until now no one has said that he has reached the standard of a saint, and no one has done it just because he has not taken a penny of extra money. Does it mean that the standards set by the emperor are useless? I think it's useful, and many of the old ministers in the Holy Academy are strict with themselves, and that's where it works. ”

Qian Qianyi nodded slowly and said: "Xia Guan understands, it can be said that he has a great ability to be consistent from top to bottom, and as long as he goes in that direction, he has a small ability, I don't know if Xia Guan understands it correctly?" ”

Liu Zongzhou said: "It's generally good, but it's mainly the embodiment of specific affairs, and I think it should be divided into three realms in terms of consistency between the top and bottom." For example, if an official can fulfill all the requirements from above and all the needs from below, we can say that he has achieved the same level, of course, this situation is almost none. The second is that an official does a thorough job, if he can't complete the above requirements, he will try his best to convey to the lower to seek the understanding of the people below, under special circumstances, it is still necessary for individual interests to be subordinated to the overall interests, on the contrary, when he can't meet the following requirements, he will also try his best to respond to the superiors, that is, as the saying goes, ask for the people's lives. ”

Yang Lian frowned at this time and said: "The second type is already the minimum requirement for officials, and officials who can't meet this standard are still people?" ”

Yang Lian's words made other people, including Qian Qianyi, dare not agree, what is popular in the current Ming officialdom is to deceive the superiors and conceal the subordinates, and the officials who can really do it are not there but not many, even Qian Qianyi himself thinks that he can't do it many times. If someone else said so, Qian Qianyi would secretly despise this person's hypocrisy, but Yang Lian has always been very upright, so Qian Qianyi would only secretly admire.

Liu Zongzhou said at this time: "Of course, there is a third kind, this kind of person is an official who benefits from the middle, and if there is any benefit from it, such as what kind of disaster relief funds and other money, he will cut off some of it for his own use, and he will also collect more taxes paid by the people below to eat a bite." Even if there are two kinds of such people, one is to do something for the people while reaping benefits, if there are too many such people, they can only turn a blind eye and let it go, and the other type of people just make money and never do good deeds, this kind of person can be said to be the scum of the scum should be vigorously eliminated. ”

Gao Panlong is in charge of officials, Liu Zongzhou said that he has heard of these types of people, he used to be vicious as hateful, and when he saw the officials who made money, he couldn't wait to pull them out one by one and slaughter them all, and later had a comprehensive understanding of the officials of the Ming Dynasty, and he found that if he really wanted to slaughter, it was estimated that more than half of the officials of the Ming Dynasty would die immediately. He thought for a while and said: "What we all inspect is the conduct of officials, like the kind of officials who only make money and do not do good deeds, we are ruthless when we see one and catch the other." But for those who can still do something if they are not fierce, we can only warn slowly, and if we really want to get rid of them all, it will not be complete. ”

King Xin is not interested in knowing why he can't clean up the greedy officials, because he has heard many times that 'when the water is clear, there are no fish', the officialdom of the Ming Dynasty has had a lot of bad habits after hundreds of years of evolution, and it is not possible to do it overnight to change immediately, at least now people have to say that it is good to do things, and there is no spirit to do things without benefits.

Seeing that Liu Zongzhou only said that he was consistent, he asked: "Lord Liu began to say that there are two consistent requirements for ability, but now he only says that there is consistency between the top and bottom and the consistency of words and deeds, what do you say?" ”

Liu Zongzhou said: "The so-called consistency of words and deeds means that an official must not only be able to do but also be able to speak, of course, for those who only have two mouths, it is necessary to be able to not only say but also be able to do." Being able to say means that you have to tell people what you are going to do, and if you don't say it, who knows what you are here for? Not to mention that the people below can't figure it out, and the colleagues next to you don't know how to cooperate with you. If you can do it, you don't need to explain, it means that you can do what you can say, and you can do what you say and do. ”

Gao Panlong said at this time: "I agree with the two of them, Master Liu, and I can publicly publish this idea in the next issue of Donglin Monthly, so that officials all over the world can see what kind of people they belong to, and whether they can reform themselves." At the beginning, Master Liu said that it was because of the two prisoners of the Bo Academy, and they said that the Huang Chao of the Tang Dynasty was forced to rebel by the imperial examination system, which cannot be said much, otherwise it will be quoted by people with intentions. And the beginning of the incident was caused by Wen Tiren and Zhou Yanru's investigation, and this matter cannot be said much, otherwise it is easy to be thought that they deliberately sow discord. ”

At first, King Xin didn't believe that Wen Tiren and Zhou Yanru would deliberately sow discord, Liu Zongzhou also explained that the two were inadvertently seen in the transcript, and now Gao Panlong also thinks that Wen and Zhou are innocent and can't say more so so as not to misunderstand, but Qian Qianyi doesn't think so. From Zhou Yanru's last move, Qian Qianyi knew that these non-Donglin people had opinions about the Donglin Party, and this view was deep-rooted and could not be changed, it makes sense to say that they inadvertently provoked the incident, but to say that they were intentional and can be explained, why don't you go to investigate and put away the previous records?

Several people discussed for a while and decided to present the results to Apocalypse to take a look, although everyone knew that Apocalypse was not feeling well for a while, but after all, this was something that Apocalypse personally promoted and was very concerned about, and it was his business whether he saw it or not.

In fact, Qian Qianyi's idea is reasonable, Wen Tiren really deliberately revealed the phenomenon that non-Donglin people are not mixed well, it turned out that everyone only had a vague concept, but now according to the transcripts of Wen and Zhou, there is a digital concept, and the effect is different. For example, everyone says that a certain person is a corrupt official, and the family has collected countless people's wealth, and the most people who hear it are laughed at after thinking about it at the time, but when there is evidence to prove how many suites this person has embezzled in his name, how much land and land he has purchased with stolen money, and how many boxes of gold and silver have been placed in his home, people will be excited in the face of these conclusive evidence.

The reason why Wen Tiren did this was not to embarrass the Donglin Party, he just wanted one person to see it, and the person he hoped to see what he did was the Apocalypse. Although it seems that Tianqi has handed over all the power of the Ming Dynasty to the Donglin Party, from the Government Affairs Yuan to the Military Affairs Yuan and the Metropolitan Inspection Yuan, plus the Holy Academy that formulates the development direction of the Ming Dynasty and the Bo College that provides technical support, there are many Donglin Party members, but the sharp-eyed Wen Tiren still found that Tianqi was defensive against the Donglin Party. First of all, the Military Affairs Yuan was personally seized by the Apocalypse, and the Government Affairs Yuan was his own brother and a group of princes, and it was not easy for the Donglin Party to cover the sky with one hand.

Later, Tianqi agreed to add a few more people to the Government Council to help, including Wen Tiren and Zhou Yanru, who were not members of the Donglin Party. Wen Tiren did this to see the reaction of the Donglin Party and the reaction of the Apocalypse, and from his point of view, he really hoped that the two prisoners would make things bigger. If the matter really makes a big fuss and the Donglin Party people make a fuss, it can make the Apocalypse more wary of the Donglin Party, if the Apocalypse does not reprimand him after the trouble, it means that the Apocalypse approves of his behavior.

In fact, Liu Zongzhou, Gao Panlong and others are not blind to this, the reason why Gao Panlong called out to be silent is to avoid being used to talk about things, whether Wen and Zhou are intentional or unintentional, they should not make a big deal about it. King Xin did not fail to see that in order to broaden the hearts of Panlong and others, he especially added a little to Liu Zongzhou's ability theory. Liu Zongzhou said that the ability of officials should be measured by the consistency of words and deeds, and the king of letters added a sentence of loyalty is the greatest ability, and all the Jinshi who have ten years of hard study experience have their loyalty cannot be questioned, which made Gao Panlong and Liu Zongzhou and others very happy.