When Ji Qingwen heard this, he was so frightened that he was sweating - don't look at Emperor Chongzhen's young age, and things often seem very impatient and naïve in the middle of the period, but after all, the Jingshi City is his home field, and as soon as Ji Qingwen stepped into the nine gates of the capital, he was already overwhelmed by countless pairs of eyes loyal to Emperor Chongzhen.

And beside Ji Qingwen, isn't there an eyeliner planted by Emperor Chongzhen - Li Yuanyin? It is not surprising that this person is secretly listening to the corner by his side, and the emperor knows the details of his conversation with Xu Guangqi.

Thinking of this, Ji Qingwen was already shuddering, and he had an idea, and hurriedly lied: "Alas! The emperor, I don't know which ear it was, actually listened to the words between the minister and Xu Ge Lao. We are not talking about the 'Ji Party', but the 'Imperial Party'...... What we mean is that it is wrong for courtiers to form a party for personal gain, and only by closely uniting around the emperor and forming a single 'friend' is the correct political position. And isn't this 'friend party' the 'imperial party'? ”

"Ji Party" and "Imperial Party" are really one word apart, and the accents are very similar to each other, so it is not impossible for Ji Qingwen to explain it like this.

But Emperor Chongzhen was suspicious, and he was not very sure of Ji Qingwen's explanation, his eyes squinted, and he asked, "Oh? Can you be so faithful? Could it be that I blamed you? ”

Wen Tiren suffered a loss from Ji Qingwen just now, and immediately put on a serious expression like a black-faced Bao Gong, and said, "Your Majesty, Ji Qingwen is clearly clever words. The gentlemen are not the party, Ji Qingwen befriended the cabinet ministers and ran the private party, which was clearly the work of the villain, and did not take the emperor's teachings seriously. ”

Since Emperor Chongzhen ascended the throne and purged the eunuch party, the "Fushe" formed by the descendants of the Donglin Party and the first batch of Donglin party members has become the largest civilian force in the court, and although the leader of this force is Qian Qianyi, who is in the opposition, the spokesperson they selected in the court is Zhou Yanru, the first assistant of the cabinet.

Therefore, as the head of the largest partisan force, Lord Zhou Yanru, when he heard Wen Tiren's words, he only felt that Wen Tiren was not accusing Ji Qingwen, but scolding himself.

At this time, Zhou Yanru, as the first and auxiliary minister of the cabinet, could not show weakness at all, coughed lightly twice, and said: "Lord Wen, you are too alarmist, right?" I think that Lord Xu and Master Ji are just casual jokes, nothing to make a fuss about. If you are like you, Lord Wen, every word must be compared, wouldn't that make the people of the government and the opposition panic? ”

Wen Tiren didn't expect Zhou Yanru's counterattack to come so quickly and directly, but he was scolded speechless, stunned for a long time, and then said: "If there is, change it, and if there is none, it will be encouraged." I'm just giving a wake-up call to Lord Xu and Master Ji to let them take precautions, what's wrong with that? ”

"Humph!" Zhou Yanru immediately grabbed Wen Tiren's words and said, "Okay, it turns out that Lord Wen also knows that this matter has fallen on the word 'nothing', so isn't your accusation so loud and lustful, not making something out of nothing, framing Zhongliang, and disrupting the government?" ”

Zhou Yanru is worthy of being a member and champion of Lianzhong, and he is only one step away from the highest achievement of the civil officials of "Lianzhong Sanyuan". His words were like putting countless big hats on Wen Tiren's head, so that Wen Tiren, who was the second assistant of the cabinet, didn't know whether to take it or throw it off.

Or Emperor Chongzhen coughed lightly towards Wen Tiren, and said: "Zhou Aiqing, you just said that Wen Tiren was alarmist, but aren't your words?" Lord Wen and you are officials in the same dynasty and walking in the same cabinet, you can say something well, so why bother? ”

This is obviously pulling the shelf. is the same as knocking on his hat and talking nonsense, Chongzhen is obviously pulling Wen Tiren to suppress Zhou Yanru.

Zhou Yanru is a shrewd person, of course, he has already understood Emperor Chongzhen's intentions, but although he is not convinced, he can't do anything about the emperor, so he can only swallow his anger and say the word "yes".

Although Ji Qingwen didn't like Zhou Yanru, but in the matter of forming a party, he stood in the same trench as Zhou Yanru, so he hurriedly came over to make a round and said, "Your Majesty, calm your anger." Last night, the minister did talk with Lord Xu for a long time. However, the minister is also a little self-aware, and what he talked about with Xu Ge Lao was not a major matter of the court, but only some scientific and technological issues. If the emperor doesn't believe it, he can send someone to Xu Ge Lao's house to get two books, and the minister talked to Xu Ge Lao last night about the contents of these two books......

"Oh? Is it? Emperor Chongzhen asked with some suspicion.

If an ordinary emperor heard his courtiers say this, he would no longer pursue it. After all, Ji Qingwen has already said that there is evidence, as long as he takes those two books and takes a look, he will know whether he is deceiving the king and concealing it, such a lie that can be exposed at once, these people who can be extremely human ministers will not talk nonsense.

But Emperor Chongzhen Zhu Youzhen is not an ordinary emperor.

In the spirit of science to break the casserole and ask the truth, Emperor Chongzhen summoned the eunuch who was waiting on the side and said: "You, go to Xu Guangqi's mansion, and say that Xu Ge Lao wants to take the two books from last night, and he wants to bring them to me, and let them take them to the housekeeper." Don't say anything else. I'll give you a quarter of an hour to get these two books, and you'll see you when the time is over! ”

The eunuch was startled when he heard this, quickly kowtowed, and ran out with a roll.

Ji Qingwen didn't expect Emperor Chongzhen to be so serious, so he could only praise insincerely: "Your Majesty, the word 'serious' is the most afraid in this world. The emperor is so 'serious', which sets an example for our courtiers. If everyone in the court is as serious as the emperor, why worry that the government has not improved? Why worry that the people can't live and work in peace and contentment? ”

Xu Guangqi was down-to-earth, so he also echoed: "Lord Ji said what the old minister wanted to say. The emperor is so serious, not to mention anything else, at least there can be more than half of the unjust cases in the world, which is also the blessing of the community! ”

Zhou Yanru was on Ji Qingwen's side in this matter, and when he heard what Ji Qingwen and Xu Guangqi said, he was quite confident in his heart, smiling and standing silent.

Wen Tiren did not calm down, and his heart was beating wildly, as if someone had stuffed a restless frog in his chest.

In order to dispel such a nervous mood, Wen Tiren took out a style of worrying about the country and the people, and began to discuss national affairs with Emperor Chongzhen.

Ji Qingwen was in a corner of the south of the Yangtze River, and he hadn't been active in the center of the imperial court for a long time, so he had such an opportunity, so he also pricked up his ears and listened carefully.

It was originally from the end of last year after the Manchurian Emperor Taiji was ousted, the imperial court became more and more useful, and the government became more and more difficult to support.

First of all, after the trampling and ravaging of the Manchurian Tartars around the Jingshi, a large amount of silver taels was needed to restore the original bridges, roads, and fields.

Secondly, Sun Chengzong's side needs to restore the Guanning defense line and strengthen the defense of the Xifengkou line at the same time. This part requires a large supply of silver, although Ji Qingwen's Suzhou weaving yamen transports 800,000 taels of silver into Beijing every year, but it can only solve half of the budget investment, and the imperial court still needs to invest more than 800,000 taels of silver every year in this part.

The above can be regarded as a man-made disaster.

There were also many natural disasters in the Ming Dynasty.

It is now September, and the drought in Shaanxi and Shanxi has not improved at all, and it seems that there will be no harvest in the northwest this autumn, and the harvest in other places north of the Yellow River is not good. The Huaihe River valley was flooded, and the rice that had matured and was only waiting to be harvested was washed away by the flood. Therefore, in the Ming Dynasty, only Sichuan and Jiangnan were okay, and grain and grass must be requisitioned from these two places for disaster relief.

Transportation also requires costs, and the grain mobilized from the south is sent to the north, which is a large investment. Moreover, in the process of collecting grain, he is also very knowledgeable - if he collects less, he will not be able to effectively help the victims; If too much is levied, the people in the rich areas will not be able to survive, and the officials will force the people to rebel, destroying the production in these places, and on the contrary, the gains will outweigh the losses.

What a difficult problem is in front of Emperor Chongzhen.