It was getting late, Li Zhang was walking in a carriage at the head of Tokyo at night, if it was at this time in the past, the curfew in Tokyo would have started a long time ago, but recently the court was discussing the complete lifting of the curfew in the capital, although it has not been completely decided, but it was agreed to move the curfew time back to the second watch, if feasible, and then completely lift the curfew, so when Li Zhang opened the car window, he also saw a very lively night market scene.

I saw that the streets of Tokyo are full of all kinds of small vendors, these vendors used to be able to set up stalls during the day, and they had to close their stalls before the curfew, but now they can set up for a few more hours, and the people who have been busy all day have time to go to the streets, and even many people come to buy things, after all, they are too busy during the day to have time.

The shops on both sides of the street are also lit with bright lanterns, the servants shouting loudly to solicit business, and even occasionally see women walking through the street, although the scene in front of you is not as lively as during the Shangyuan Festival, but it is much stronger than the usual daytime.

Looking at the lively scene on the streets of Tokyo, Li Zhang also smiled faintly, it is estimated that it will not be long before the curfew will be completely lifted in the capital. Then he slowly fell into contemplation, for the problem of the imperial examination, Fan Zhongyan and others could only come up with a way to treat the symptoms but not the root cause, and reducing the number of admissions may also offend the entire class of scholars, so Zhao Zhen also had reservations about Fan Zhongyan and others' proposals.

In this regard, Li Zhang gave his own idea, but this idea startled Zhao Zhen, because Li Zhang pointed out that the number of scholars will increase in the future, and even with the development of the economy, it is not completely impossible for the whole people to read, and the number of people participating in the imperial examination every year will be a huge number.

Li Zhang's words are not alarmist, but an inference on the existing basis, with the promotion of potatoes, the Great Song Dynasty has basically solved the food shortage, of course, there must be a lot of poor people, after all, inequality between the rich and the poor is a big problem in any era, but with Zhao Zhen's reform of the Great Song Dynasty, as long as there are no accidents, the Great Song Dynasty will definitely promote the popularization of education in the future, plus movable type printing has also appeared, so there will be more and more people who can afford to read books.

With such a strong educational foundation, if only one or two hundred people are admitted every few years as it is now, this is simply too few people compared to the huge class of scholars, so changes must be made, otherwise in the future, it will definitely cause some people to be dissatisfied because the upward channel is too small, and maybe it will cause a big mess.

In this case, Li Zhang's suggestion to Zhao Zhen is that the officials merge with each other, in short, the officials are also included in the official system of the imperial court, because in this era, the boundary between officials and officials is clear, officials have official status, and they have official status, and the identity of officials is still ordinary people, and the class has not risen, but they can exercise part of the power of the government.

In addition, it is worth mentioning that the recruitment of officials is also very chaotic, some of them are officially recruited by officials at all levels, some are brought by officials, and some are local big-connected households, and their local influence is intertwined, even if officials have to rely on these related officials to rule the locality.

It can be said that the center of the court gave up the personnel power of the officials, but delegated to the hands of officials and officials at all levels, and the officials have no official status, let alone a term of office, which is a bad thing and a good thing for the officials, because they do not have to worry about being transferred as soon as the term of office arrives, and they can operate in a place for a long time, which also makes it more convenient for the officials to control the power of a place, and even some officials will be hollowed out by the officials.

Li Zhang proposed the merger of officials, that is, he wanted to classify the officials into the officials, you must know that the number of officials can be countless times more than the officials, for example, in a county, generally only the county governor, the county lieutenant and the county Cheng are considered formal officials, and the rest are all officials, and if the officials are also included in the official system, you can assign the scholars in the middle to the officials to do things.

To put it simply, in fact, it is to let the scholars start from the grassroots level, if they perform well, they can naturally get the opportunity to be promoted, after all, there is no boundary between officials and officials, and it can also prevent officials from setting aside officials, and the personnel appointment and dismissal power of officials will also be returned to the imperial court, which can be described as killing multiple birds with one stone.

However, although the suggestion of the merger of officials is good, but the difficulty of implementation is extremely great, first, the vast majority of scholars look down on officials, after all, generally speaking, only scholars who fail in the imperial examination may choose to go to the small officials, and secondly, the status of the officials is low, some officials recruit officials, in fact, they are regarded as servants, with the arrogance of the scholars, if they pass the imperial examination and then become small officials, they will definitely be greatly resisted.

In addition, the class of officials is too huge, and many of them are the beneficiaries of the current system, if more scholars are involved, it will definitely move their interests, which is also a great resistance, and finally there are officials, in the past, part of the appointment and dismissal power of small officials was in their hands, but now the court wants to take away this power, and naturally their interests are also moved.

It can be said that although the confluence of officials looks good, it is simply thankless to touch the interests of too many people when it is actually implemented, at least at this stage, it is really not a wise choice to touch the interests of so many people while rectifying the officialdom.

Therefore, after listening to Li Zhang's proposal, Zhao Zhen did not agree immediately, but said that he wanted to think about it, and Li Zhang also knew that this matter was too difficult, so he also advised Zhao Zhen to be cautious, if it really didn't work, he could wait until the officialdom was rectified before considering, and when it came to the imperial examination, he could temporarily maintain the status quo, after all, such a big matter, if you want to reform, it is not a day or two to decide.

Thinking of the above, Li Zhang couldn't help but sigh secretly, in fact, his method of merging officials was mainly inspired by the civil service system of later generations, but the social situation of the Great Song Dynasty was very different from that of later generations, so it was extremely difficult to implement such a similar system.

Although Li Zhang knew that it was very difficult to get Zhao Zhen to agree to this matter when he proposed, and even he himself did not approve of the implementation at this time, but to be honest, he was still a little frustrated in his heart, but this was also a helpless thing, after all, no matter how good the system was, it must be in line with the national conditions at that time, otherwise it would only cause social turmoil.

Just as Li Zhang was pondering, the carriage was about to return to Li Zhang's home, but at this moment, he suddenly saw a black shadow rushing out from the street corner next to him and suddenly pounced on Li Zhang's carriage!