Chongzhen is anxious, since he ascended the throne, he can be said to have worked hard and exhausted, but the world is becoming more and more chaotic, and the country's situation is getting worse.

If it weren't for the sudden starting point city and the Tiance army, the Ming Dynasty would have become a vegetable garden of the Manchu Qing Dynasty.

But where is the cure for statecraft? Chongzhen was at a loss.

Wang Yue frowned and said, "The system of the starting point city may only be suitable for the starting point city, and it is difficult to apply it to the entire Ming Dynasty. ”

Chongzhen was a little disappointed, if the entire Ming Dynasty could be like the starting point city, how good would it be, would there be people who rebelled for the sake of not having enough to eat? The starting point city does not recognize the personal dependency relationship, and the lawsuits are finally fought to the court, and they are still resolved by themselves and the mud. Chongzhen knows very little about its institutional aspects.

Wang Yue continued: "The Ming Dynasty governed the world with Confucianism, dividing the subjects of the world into three, six, nine and so on, and the peasants, industrialists, industrialists, and merchants ranked at the lowest level of society. Facts have also proved that Confucianism looks down on all craftsmen and craftsmen, and all technological progress is called miraculous and skillful. In Daming, the craftsman is almost synonymous with lowliness. ”

"Daming is an agrarian society, and farming is the foundation of the country. The starting point city implements an industrial society, and in the future, it will be a commercial society, and industry and commerce will become the cornerstone of the starting point city. This is the biggest difference between the starting point city and the rest of Daming. ”

He knew that Chongzhen must be in the fog for the starting point city, so he analyzed the difference of the starting point city to Chongzhen.

Chongzhen was incomprehensible: "If you don't develop farming, where will the food come from?" Isn't that going to be full of starvation? ”

In fact, there is one thing Chongzhen understands in his heart, but he does not say it, that is, the small-scale peasant economy and society are tightly bound to the land, which is conducive to social stability.

Wang Yue said: "Your Majesty, first of all, this work is called a craftsman in Daming, and it should be expanded to be called industry in the starting point city. Agriculture is the foundation of industry, and industry can provide agriculture with more and more advanced production equipment, make agricultural production more convenient, and even increase production and income. ”

The relationship between industry and agriculture is a big topic, and if you really want to study it in detail, you can't finish talking about it for a while, so Wang Yue had to say it concisely.

"For example, in the past two years of drought, there has been a shortage of water everywhere, and the starting point city was able to have a bumper harvest last year, all of which is due to industry. First of all, there are tens of thousands of wells drilled in all the fields of the starting city, which is because of the well-drilling machine. Due to the delay in farming, the starting point city uses tractors to plough the land, and the efficiency of one tractor is at least more than 100 manpower. These well-drilling machines and tractors are the products of industry, and from the perspective of Confucian children, this is a miraculous skill. ”

"The starting point city can have a bumper agricultural harvest, and the yield per mu is several times that of the region, and one of the heroes is chemical fertilizer. Fertilizers are also produced in factories, which are also products of industry, so you can see how much work can contribute to agriculture. ”

Chongzhen has an intuitive understanding of this, and when he paid a huge amount of grain tax in the starting point city last year, he carefully inquired about the reason.

"That day, the military equipment was excellent, and it was also the work of industry?" Chongzhen asked meaningfully.

Wang Yue smiled and said, "Emperor Shengming, that's exactly the case!" ”

Of course, Chongzhen knew the role of the craftsman, he had been the king of letters, and he was not ignorant of the situation at the bottom of the society. The role played by craftsmen is most intuitively reflected in the starting point city, and the 100,000 army was easily defeated by less than 10,000 well-equipped Tiance troops, which is the best proof of this.

But it is undoubtedly impossible to elevate the status of craftsmen to the fundamental height of the country in the Ming Dynasty. Because this will disrupt and reorder the society of the Ming Dynasty, those Confucian children will definitely play with him.

Chongzhen has not experienced a hundred years of humiliation, nor is he Guangxu, nor has he experienced the feeling of being beaten by the powers at every turn, so he is not as urgent as Guangxu wants to change the law.

He just sighed and said to Wang Yue: "Then Wang Aiqing said, why do you want to focus on business?" ”

Wang Yue said: "The materials produced by industry and agriculture can be used as commodities, and an important role of commerce is to promote the circulation of commodities and play a bridge between production and consumption." If there were no merchants, how could the people of Jingshi be able to buy the oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea they needed for daily life? How can you buy silk and cotton cloth from Jiangnan? ”

"Another role of business is to absorb labor, create more jobs, and give more people something to do."

"Another huge role of business is to increase the enthusiasm of producers and improve production efficiency. People are profit-seeking, if the goods they produce can be exchanged for money, they don't need others to force them, they have to work hard to produce. ”

"So the position of business in the national economy is very important. The Song Dynasty was called the Fu Song Dynasty because of its emphasis on commerce. ”

Chongzhen also reads history, and of course he knows how rich the Song Dynasty was. The Ming Dynasty came to the end of the Ming Dynasty, in fact, commerce was still very active, and the status of merchants was not as low as in the early Ming Dynasty, otherwise there would not have been a group of big businessmen like Jin merchants.

However, the activity of commerce did not bring much financial revenue to the imperial court, because the Ming Dynasty did not collect commercial taxes.

Chongzhen asked, "Does Wang Aiqing mean to collect commercial taxes in the starting point city?" ”

Wang Yue nodded and said: "Of course, it must be collected, in order not to be ambiguous with other areas of the Ming Dynasty, the commercial tax of the starting point city is currently called the management fee." When looking at the situation of a country or region, the first thing to look at is finance. The affairs of the world are inseparable from the word interests, and the biggest and most urgent problem of the imperial court now is that there is no silver. Your Majesty, the minister thinks that the Southern Song Dynasty has been supported by half of the country for more than 100 years, and some financial practices are worth learning from. ”

Chongzhen's face darkened when he heard this, what do you mean? What is the method of the Southern Song Dynasty worth learning from?

He said with a gloomy face: "Could it be that you mean that the current Ming Dynasty has reached the end of the dynasty?"

Wang Yue's face did not change and said: "The minister did not lie about it, the current Ming Dynasty is worried about internal and external troubles, the displaced people are everywhere, and the finances are exhausted. If you are not careful, you can expect to lose the country. ”

Chongzhen stared at Wang Yue for a long time without speaking, Wang Yue's expression was always very calm, and he did not avoid Chongzhen's cold eyes at all. Maybe there are few people in the entire Ming Dynasty who understand, who would have thought that the huge country would die in a few years! As the emperor's Chongzhen, of course he doesn't believe it now.

Finally, Chongzhen calmed down the anger in his heart and slowly spoke: "The laws of industry and commerce in your starting city cannot be fully applied to the entire Ming Dynasty. However, your starting point city is indeed prosperous, and I just heard your analysis of industry and commerce, which makes some sense. It seems that Wang Aiqing also has unique insights on the way to govern the country. Tell me, what are the fundamental symptoms of Daming now? Is there a solution? ”