Zhao Yan's scripture is "Zhou Yi", so these four scriptures are from "Zhou Yi", Zhao Yan looked at the four questions, not too difficult, so he decided to answer the first and third four book questions first, then answer the four scripture questions, and finally answer the second four book questions.

After answering the two questions on the four books and the four scriptures on the scratch paper, Zhao Yan turned his attention to the second question of the four books, and he was reckless if he did not think about it.

The idea of solving this problem, Zhao Yan actually had it when he wrote the first four-book righteous question, and Zhu Xi of the Southern Song Dynasty recorded in the "Annotations to the Analects" that he did not seek the heart, so he was faint and did not get it. If you don't get used to it, you're in danger and uneasy. Cheng Zi said: 'Erudition, interrogation, prudence, discernment, and dedication to the five are abolished, and one of them is abolished, and it is not learning.

Cheng Zi, that is, Cheng Yi in the second Cheng, the word Uncle Zheng, was a great educator in the Northern Song Dynasty, known as Mr. Yichuan Ling.

Since he has the idea of solving the question, what Zhao Yan is left to do is to find a way to dress up this idea with words, make it fuller and more connotative, and make the marker look more pleasing to the eye without losing his original intention.

Time passed little by little, and Zhao Yan's neat and orderly words became more and more.

But if you learn without seeking your heart, you will be dizzy and will not gain for yourself. Cover learning is expensive. Otherwise, would you rather avoid the loss of your husband? The meaning of this by the sages of the past is: Husband and reason are scattered in things, there is no way to gather without learning, and there is no way to get without thinking......

With less than 300 words, Zhao Yan did it in one go, and after writing it, he examined it from beginning to end, and felt that this could be regarded as the best eight-strand essay he had written.

A few pieces of scratch paper were written all over the dense but square and orderly pavilion body, Zhao Yan looked at the sky outside, the golden crow was already drooping in the west, and it would be dark for more than half an hour, and the three candles in Zhao Yan's hand had not moved at all, so he was not worried about running out of time.

One stroke at a time, the work is neat, and there are more and more words on the main scroll.

From ancient times to the present, most people like to judge people by their appearance, whether it is the previous examination system or the current imperial examination system, they attach great importance to a person's appearance, and a person's appearance does not only include appearance and height, but also includes handwriting, the ancients believed that words are like their people, so in today's imperial examination era, whether the writing is good or not is also an important criterion.

Zhao Yan for the imperial examination, for the cabinet style of the imperial examination font has made a lot of hard work, hard work pays off, now only in the cabinet style, Zhao Yan's words can be ranked in the forefront of all candidates.

It was already dark, and when there was still half of the second candle left, Zhao Yan finally copied all the content of the exam to the main paper, and after a careful inspection, Zhao Yan put the paper into the wooden box that the receiver had prepared a long time ago.

After everything was in order, Zhao Yan's heart was relieved, and he suddenly remembered that he had not eaten water and rice for almost a whole day, and when he touched his lips, he was already peeled because of thirst.

After shaking his head and laughing, Zhao Yan lit the charcoal fire, ate a little, and then covered the felt blanket exhausted and fell asleep.

At midnight, Zhao Yan vaguely heard someone in the distance hissing and shouting, "Give the student another candle...... No, just give the student half a candle and the student will be almost done, please......"

Zhao Yan woke up suddenly, and listened carefully for a while to know that the three candles of the sergeant who shouted had been lit, but he had not finished writing the test papers, but the sergeants who collected the papers and supervised them didn't care about these, they had to do everything in accordance with the regulations of the examination room, so they insisted on taking away the test papers.

After a while, the scholar was blasted out of the examination room, according to Zhao Yan's estimate, I am afraid that this person's qualification for this examination has been invalidated, as for whether he will be banned from the examination in the future, it depends on the meaning of the chief and deputy examiners.

At noon on the 10th day of the first month of August, the filing of the names had been properly processed, the door of the Tribute Academy was finally opened, and the first wave of candidates who had been released walked out one after another under the supervision of the sergeants.

Zhao Yan looked left and right, but did not find Zhang Wenyuan, and thought that he might have been arranged to appear in the afternoon or evening.

The entrance of the Gongyuan was black, and most of the purpose was to pick up the candidates who came out of the field, Wang Lin, Li Er, and Zhang Shun waited at the gate of the Gongyuan early, and they were all crowded to the front of the crowd by virtue of their strong bodies.

Wang Lin saw Zhao Yan at a glance, he waved his hand at Zhao Yan excitedly, and then rushed forward to take Zhao Yan's backpack.

Zhao Yan and the three of them waited at the gate of the Gongyuan, and all the candidates who waited for the appearance did not see Zhang Wenyuan, it seems that he was really arranged to appear in the afternoon and evening. Zhao Yan was physically and mentally tired, so he arranged for Li Er to accompany Zhang Shun to wait for Zhang Wenyuan here, and he himself returned to the inn with Wang Lin.

After returning to the inn, the experienced shopkeeper had already arranged a lot of food, Zhao Yan ate some things at will, and fell asleep after returning to the room, because he ate something in advance, so Zhao Yan slept peacefully until the next morning, and was not woken up by hunger in the middle.

When he woke up, Zhao Yan only felt refreshed, and after washing, he pushed the door open, and Li Er was standing outside the door, he was afraid that someone would disturb Zhao Yan's rest, so he had been standing at Zhao Yan's door since last night to guard the door.

Standing outside the door all night, Li Er's spirit still seemed to be very strong, and when he saw Zhao Yan awake, he said, "Childe, you are awake, I will go outside to buy you some food." ”

Zhao Yan stopped Li Er, who was about to turn around, and asked, "Is Brother Zhang back?" ”

Li Er replied: "Zhang Gongzi came back yesterday afternoon, and it should be almost time to wake up at this time." ”

"Go ahead, and by the way, help Brother Zhang buy some food." Zhao Yan came to Wang Lin's room to take a look, but he didn't see his figure, Zhang Shun didn't seem to be there, Zhao Yan shook his head, walked to the door of Zhang Wenyuan's room and listened to the movement inside, and then walked to the lobby and found a table and sat down.

After a while, Zhang Wenyuan opened the door and stretched, Zhao Yan turned his head, and the two looked at each other and smiled.

"Brother Zhao, how did you do in the first test of this township?" The first thing Zhang Wenyuan said after approaching was to ask about the exam.

Zhao Yan saw that Zhang Wenyuan's face was relaxed, and knew that he must have done well in the exam, so he smiled and said, "Brother Zhang and I are just each other." ”

The two sat and talked for a while, Li Er bought the food back, and at the same time came back Wang Lin and Zhang Shun, the two of them went to the street and didn't know what to do, their faces, clothes, and shoes looked full of dust, and there was a smell of sweat when they got close.

Wang Lin and Zhang Wenyuan were also familiar with each other, he sat down at the table and said with a grin: "Senior brother, Brother Zhang, you can be regarded as awake, haven't you slept for several days in the Gongyuan?" The one who sleeps is called a death. ”

Zhao Yan frowned and asked rhetorically, "What are you doing, why are you so embarrassed?" ”

Wang Lin said mysteriously: "Senior brother, guess who I have seen?" Li Xun of the Mu family left the Li family, when I was a child, he often came to my house to find my eldest brother, but I didn't expect that now he has become a big official, it looks majestic, Zhang Shun and I just went out of the city with him to walk the horse back. ”

Li Xun? Since he and Yuan Bin, the captain of Jinyi, left Zhending Mansion before the government exam, Zhao Yan hadn't seen him for more than a year.

Zhang Wenyuan didn't know much about Li Xun's identity, but Zhao Yan knew a little, and he asked puzzledly: "What is Brother Li looking for you?" ”

Wang Lin glanced at Zhang Shun and laughed: "He originally came to find you and Brother Zhang, but when he saw that you were sleeping, he didn't let me wake you up, and asked me to go for a walk outside the city. ”

Li Xun's current identity should be Jinyiwei, Zhao Yan doesn't doubt that he can find a place for himself and Zhang Wenyuan, Jinyiwei's eyes and ears are all over the place, and it is easy to find two people, but Li Xun came to find himself and Zhang Wenyuan, is it really just to meet the old people and catch up with the past?

"That's right." Wang Lin said suddenly: "Brother Li said, you have been busy taking the township exam these days, I'm afraid you don't have the heart to think about other things, he said that he will come to you after you finish the township exam." ”

The second examination of the township examination is on August 12, and it is still August 11 and August 13. This second test is a test theory, more than 300 words, five judgments, and one internal medicine of the edict table.

The trial theory is actually a policy theory, mainly to test the candidates' views on the current politics, military, people's livelihood and other aspects, the judgment is to write a judgment, make their own judgments for some cases and write them into words, and the edict is mainly the ability of the examiners to write official documents, these Zhao Yan have been prepared, so it seems to be proficient, the only thing that is a little brain-consuming is the policy theory, this time the policy is to let the candidates make suggestions for the governance of the Yellow River.

The Yellow River is the most important birthplace of Chinese civilization, so there is nothing wrong with the Chinese people calling it the 'mother river', but the water can carry boats and overturn boats, and the Yellow River can bring hope to people, but it can also bring destruction.

In history, there have been more than 1,000 times of flooding of the Yellow River, more than 20 times of diversion, each time the overflow caused heavy losses to the imperial court and the people at that time, and the Yellow River has recently been unstable, so how to control the Yellow River has become the topic of discussion in most provinces of this year's township test.

Digging a river with an excavator? This era is simply impossible to achieve, and it is useless at all, but it would be too popular to write about some ways to build dams and strengthen the Yellow River embankments in the lower reaches of the Yellow River.

For most people, this policy is just a dispensable topic, but for Zhao Yan from later generations, he can use all kinds of knowledge that is hundreds of years ahead of the world to make this policy topic his own topic, provided that he can think of a suitable way to govern the Yellow River in this era.

After pondering for a long time, Zhao Yan wrote down the words 'Yellow River Control Policy' on scratch paper, and he thought of the method used by a water conservancy expert to control the Yellow River a hundred years later, called 'Binding Water and Flushing Sand Method'.