Following the direction of Zhu Mingzhong's finger, Huang Zongxi and his party saw that someone seemed to be pouring something on the road in front of them. When a gust of wind blew, I smelled a pungent odor, and when I got closer, I saw that they were pouring black and hot things.

"What are these people pouring on the stones?"

Huang Baijia asked curiously.

"Asphalt!"

He pointed to the craftsman who was sprinkling asphalt on the stones.

"You see, this is sprinkled with a layer of asphalt, and after the asphalt solidifies, it will naturally bond the stones together, and then pave a piece of crushed stone the size of a bean, and after rolling and pressing with the stones, the road surface will be smooth as a slate, not to mention, and the adhesion is one, not much worse than ordinary slates, and the price is extremely low."

When mentioning this primitive asphalt road, Zhu Mingzhong looked a little proud, originally built a new city with Qinghe Academy as the center, which is part of the "urban development", of course, it is also one of the measures of open source, after all, in the 21st century, he is no stranger to land finance.

Although he introduced the urban planning of later generations in the new town, he encountered problems when renovating the roads, such as the rammed earth pavement was not durable, and the stone roads were too expensive, even the European-style horse tooth road, which was paved with brick-shaped stone slabs, was relatively expensive. In the end, he even considered paving the road with wooden planks, as was the case with the historical Huaihai Road in Shanghai's French Concession, but in the end, a report from the coke factory made him change his mind.

There is a surplus of bitumen in coking plants, although the stock of coal tar in coking plants is only a few hundred tons, but for this era, there is obviously a surplus, and after obtaining wood preservative oil, bitumen and other chemical products through distillation, there is more and more bitumen in warehouses, which is of little use except for shipbuilding.

In this case, using them to pave the road is the best choice, and the pavement in this academy is a test road, and the original asphalt paving method that Zhu Mingzhong is experimenting with here will be popularized and used in the new city street in the new city if all goes well.

With the development of the coking industry driven by the ironmaking industry, the output of asphalt will be more and more in the future, and asphalt roads will definitely become more popular. It is even very possible to realize the hard face of the official road in Zhu Mingzhong's dream. Thus fundamentally changing the conditions of transportation.

Of course, all this is just an occasional thought.

"Like a slate?"

When they came to the paved section of the road, Huang Zongxi and his party looked at the road that swept away the floating gravel on the ground, not only was it very smooth, but also the bean-sized stone seemed to be glued and formed a neat one.

"After a while, the mountain chief has finished class, please come over."

Omitted?

Could it be that he is the Jianghuai Jing envoy?

Looking at this young man who looked not much different from ordinary scholars in astonishment, Huang Zongxi and his party never thought that he would be Zhu Mingzhong, the Jianghuai Economic Envoy.

"Are you General Zhu?"

Wan Sinian was surprised.

"Zhu Mingzhong, who is Mr. Unconsulted?"

Looking at Huang Zongxi, the oldest of the four, Zhu Mingzhong introduced himself.

"I've seen Jingluo in Xia Huang Zongxi!"

Huang Zongxi hurriedly bowed his head and said,

Huang Zongxi!

Looking at the middle-aged man in front of him in surprise, Zhu Mingzhong never thought that the person in front of him would be Huang Zongxi, the Huang Zongxi who wrote books such as "Mingyi to be Interviewed".

How did he get to Qinghe?

Then Zhu Mingzhong smiled.

"But Mr. Lizhou, originally Zhu heard the master say that he would invite Mr. Lizhou to teach in the academy, but he never thought that Mr. Lizhou would come so quickly, and he never greeted Mr. Lizhou in person, which is really rude for Zhu."

Of course, this is just a kind word, after all, now Zhu Mingzhong, as the Jianghuai Governor, presides over several prefectures in Jiangbei and governs millions of people. In contrast, although Huang Zongxi has a certain reputation in Shilin, he does not need Zhu Mingzhong to greet him personally.

However, although it was just a polite word, it still made Huang Zongxi feel flattered, not to mention in front of his son and students, such politeness was quite useful to him, and he immediately became a little close to Zhu Mingzhong, and when he arrived at Zhu Zhiyu's residence, the relationship between the two seemed much closer, and there was no strangeness at all.

In fact, for Zhu Mingzhong, he has always hoped to set off a "Confucian revolution" in Qinghe Academy, or the self-innovation of traditional Chinese culture with the improvement of Confucianism as the core. Of course, in addition to his personal thoughts in this regard, the overall environment is also conducive to his self-innovation.

In the middle of the 17th century, during the Ming and Qing dynasties, Chinese society was in a turbulent era of "heaven and earth disintegration" and "new and old Ding Revolution", with a nationwide peasant uprising caused by the fierce land annexation at the end of the Ming Dynasty, a series of anti-tax and supervision struggles set off by the emerging citizen class in the south of the Yangtze River, and the Ming and Qing national wars triggered by the entry of the Manchu people, and so on. The final result of all these contradictions was the irretrievable demise of the Zhu Ming Dynasty.

With the fall of the Ming Dynasty, many famous thinkers of the "remnants" of the Ming Dynasty were painfully reflecting on the central question of "why did the Ming Dynasty die". From the painful historical reflection, they realized that the Ming Dynasty was an important reason for the fall

Because at the end of science, especially at the end of Wang Xue, he talked about his mind. As a result, a trend of "silent and realistic thinking" was vigorously unfolded in the ideological circles at that time.

Among them, there are two famous representatives, namely Huang Zongxi and Zhu Shunshui, Liang Qichao once commented on these representatives: "They thought that the death of the Ming Dynasty was a great shame and great responsibility for the society of scholars, so they abandoned the empty talk of clear insight and focused on the practical application of the world." They don't do learning for the sake of learning, they do learning for politics...... Huang Lizhou, Gu Tinglin, Wang Chuanshan, and Zhu Shunshui are the representative figures at this time. ”

And they all continued to fight against the Qing Dynasty and the restoration of the Ming Dynasty. After the final fall of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Shunshui went into exile in Japan, while Huang Zongxi lived in his hometown. Since then, they have begun to theoretically summarize the lessons of the Ming Dynasty. They pointed to the shortcomings of the late Ming Dynasty's empty talk about the nature of the mind, believing that it was the main reason for the demise of the Ming Dynasty, and then called for correcting the deviation with practical learning that has been applied to the world. On the one hand, they fiercely criticized the Song and Ming Dynasty for "talking about the mysteries of the Tao, talking far and far, talking in vain, sitting and talking about the Tao, so that the decadence follows the customs, and the troubled times and ruin the country."

And now, Zhu Shunshui did not go east to Japan in exile, but became Zhu Mingzhong's teacher, and became the head of Qinghe Academy, teaching disciples in Qinghe, and the core of his academic thought is "practice theory", that is, emphasizing practice. To explain it in detail: First, it is believed that the "Tao" of Confucianism exists in actual life. Those who seek the "Tao" must rely on learning and understanding in practice. Moreover, any kind of "Tao" is more practically applicable. The second is that the formation of human character also comes from practical life actions, and the acquisition of lofty morality requires the diligent efforts of people.

“…… Not only requires the emperor to be diligent and love the people, but also pays more attention to "benefiting the people", and what is benefiting the people, as Chengren said before, to promote the prosperity of the commodity economy, and then enrich the country and strengthen the people. What Chengren implemented in Jiangbei is a policy that benefits the people. ”

In the study room of Zhu Zhiyu's home, he was full of interest and immediately talked about learning with Huang Zongxi. However, he did not forget to praise his proud protégé in front of Huang Zongxi.

"What Mr. Chu Yu said is extremely true!"

Huang Zongxi naturally agreed,

"Since Zongxi arrived in Yangzhou all the way north, the people of Jiangbei have said that the good of the laws of governance and the Qing River are better than in the past, and it is the work of the strategy!"

This is not a deliberate compliment, after arriving in Jiangbei, Huang Zongxi originally thought that after the salt merchants were all copied, Yangzhou must not be as prosperous as yesterday, but who would have thought that not only Yangzhou is far more prosperous than before, but even all parts of Jiangbei seem to be becoming more and more prosperous.

"Lizhou praise!"

Being praised so much in front of others, Zhu Mingzhong always has to show some modesty.

"Today's Jiangbei is initially determined, all industries are recovering, although there is a little bit of Ming Zhong, but it all depends on the help of the teacher and the people of the government office, I think that at the beginning, when the Jiangbei was initially determined, I asked the teacher how to care for the Jiangbei provinces, and the teacher only said two words at that time. One is "etiquette" and the other is "law", and "etiquette and law are equally important" natural governance! ”

For Zhu Mingzhong, who is from the 21st century, he naturally knows that in a mature country, moral education and legal constraints are two-legged walks, and the progress and implementation of the law must be based on the protection of morality. Such an assertion, even in the society hundreds of years later, is deafening. Not to mention this era?

In fact, what makes Zhu Mingzhong the most proud, I am afraid that after coming to the Ming Dynasty, the master he recognized, although as a latecomer, he will also be influenced by Zhu Zhiyu on the issue of governance, because many of his suggestions, in Zhu Mingzhong's view, are directly pointed to the shortcomings of ancient Chinese governance.

"Pay equal attention to etiquette and law", and the world will be governed by nature!"

Huang Zongxi nodded in agreement,

Most of the disciples of the Holy Gate say "rites", but they don't know the law, but they don't know that if there is no law, how can people in this world abide by the courtesy, and the rituals and laws can be held at the same time, and the world can be governed! ”

Zhu Mingzhong was not surprised that Huang Zongxi would praise Zhu Zhiyu's views, after all, there were special articles in later generations to analyze and compare the academic thoughts of the two, although there were certain differences in the thoughts of the two, but probably both of them advocated practical learning, although there were certain differences in the practical learning they advocated, but it was this difference that made Zhu Mingzhong believe that the arrival of Huang Zongxi could further strengthen the practical strength of Qinghe Academy, and then form the "Qinghe School" with Qinghe Academy as the center.

Even compared with recruiting his government as an official, Zhu Mingzhong attaches more importance to the "Qinghe School" that spreads "practical learning", which is the foundation of the future national governance.

Therefore, even for Gu Yanwu and others, Zhu Mingzhong would deliberately ask them to be part-time lecturers in the academy to spread practical learning. And then consolidate the academic foundation of Qinghe Academy, and now with the arrival of Huang Zongxi, with these three masters of practical learning in the late Ming Dynasty as a town in the academy, how can this practical learning not flourish again?