On the ninth day of August, the first township test was officially opened, which means that the Daming township test officially kicked off.

Follow the process of the exam:

The first test is the "Four Books" and the "Five Classics", and the questions of the "Four Books" are commonly known as the Eight Strands;

the second examination of theories, judgments, edicts, edicts, chapters and tables, that is, official document writing;

The third test is to examine the political ability of scholars.

Each exam paper will be distributed on the same day of the exam.

Since the first of the three township examinations is Baguwen, Baguwen is also known as the stepping stone of the imperial examination, but this does not mean that scholars only learn Bagu, after all, there are two later in the township examination, and if the examination is too bad, it will also be brushed down.

Therefore, on weekdays, those who read more energy are spent on familiarizing themselves with various books to increase their knowledge, and making friends all over the world to improve their personal cultivation.

After all, Baguwen is just a format for the imperial examination, as long as one's own cultivation and talent can be enriched, then it will naturally be able to write a good article at that time.

Li Hongyu took the first exam paper and looked at it, which listed three questions selected from the Analects, the Mean and Mencius, and five questions selected from the Book of Songs, the Book of Songs, the Book of Rites, the Book of Rites, the Book of Changes, and the Spring and Autumn Period.

The reason why there are three questions in the "Four Books" is that not every subject is tested in the township examination, and usually three subjects are selected to produce the questions, which are generally a combination of the Analects, the Mean and Mencius, and the examiners do not like to ask questions from the "University" due to the small number of words.

Whether it is three "Four Books" questions or five "Five Classics" questions, candidates do not need to answer all of them, they only need to choose one of them to answer each.

Among them, the writing of the test papers of the "Four Books" questions should be in accordance with the strict eight-strand text program, and the content and format of the answers should not be violated.

It is worth mentioning that although the "Four Classics" were compulsory subjects in the Ming Dynasty, not all of the "Five Classics" were studied, and scholars only needed to choose one of the "Five Classics" as their own scripture to study.

Therefore, there are popular subjects and unpopular subjects in the "Five Classics", among which the "Book of Songs", "Book of Changes" and "Book of Changes" are popular subjects, and the number of students is relatively large, while the "Book of Rites" and "Spring and Autumn" are unpopular subjects, and the number of students is small.

Because the "Five Classics" is a specialized study, there were some imperial examination families in the Ming Dynasty who had family classics, that is, families of scriptures, and spread to the region.

For example, Changshu's "Book of Songs", Yuyao's "Book of Rites", Suzhou's "Book of Changes" and Huiji's "Spring and Autumn" were all very famous at that time.

Since the "Five Classics" is an optional subject, it is more free than the "Four Books", and people often change other subjects in the "Five Classics" as their own scriptures because they have not studied the selected scriptures well.

It is precisely because the candidates have different emphases on the "Five Classics" that the candidates' papers will be classified according to the "Five Classics" questions they choose to answer, so that the examination papers are divided into five categories, each category corresponds to one of the "Five Classics", and then the corresponding room examination, that is, the marking officer, will review it.

Considering the popular and unpopular in the "Five Classics", the number of examiners in each course is not the same.

Usually the "Book of Songs" has the most, and there are five room critics; "I Ching" and "Book of Changes" followed, each with four rooms of paper critics; "Spring and Autumn" and "The Book of Rites" are the least, and each has two rooms to approve the papers.

When ranking in the township examination, in order to take care of the candidates who study different "Five Classics" subjects, first of all, the person who answers the best essay in each of the "Five Classics" test questions is selected, and the Five Classics account for one of them, so that there are five people, known as the "Five Classics Kui", which is the origin of the "Five Classics" in the Daming Township Examination.

These five people will be the top five in the township test, and the best of them is Xie Yuan in the township test, because it is difficult to compare the different "Five Classics" articles, so at this time, it is necessary to look at the merits of the "Four Books" questions, that is, to test the candidates' ability to write eight strands.

As for the ranking of the five people, it is determined according to the comprehensive situation of the three exams, of which the results of the first exam, especially the Baguwen, account for the largest proportion.

According to the regulations of the township examination, the top six in the township examination can be exempted from the next selection examination by the person to take the examination, and directly obtain the qualification to go to the capital to take the examination, so the competition for the top six places in the township examination is extremely fierce.

For those candidates with excellent grades, they naturally go to the "Five Classics Kui", once they become the "Five Classics Kui" can not only be among the best in the township examination, but also go directly to the capital to catch the exam without having to participate in the selection examination, at the same time, this is also a great honor, and when introducing the identity to outsiders in the future, it can be called "Jingkui", which can be described as the best among the people.

However, if the competitor of the chosen scripture is too strong, then some people will settle for the second best scripture to take the test.

Taking Huguang candidates as an example, Fang Yun is good at "I Ching", Shen Bocheng is good at "Book of Songs", and Yang Renxiao is good at "Shangshu", and the three of them are all currently popular.

In fact, Hong, Fang Yun and Yang Renxiao all wisely avoided the most popular "Book of Songs", after all, there are the most people who choose "The Book of Songs" as the main scripture, and the competition is the most fierce, so it is better to retreat and choose other subjects, and focus on rushing into the "Five Classics".

Li Hongyu doesn't care, he didn't prioritize the study of the "Five Classics" in school, and in the past, "Little Li Hongyu" chose the "Book of Changes" as the scripture, and it stands to reason that he should answer the question of the "Book of Changes", but then he will have to compete with Fang Yun head-on.

Because Fang Yun, Shen Bocheng, and Yang Renxiao helped Li Hongyu when Hu Guangsheng was besieging Wuchangwei, Li Hongyu was not good at competing with the three of them, so he was ready to choose the unpopular "Spring and Autumn" question to answer.

And Zhao Xin and Li Hongyu encountered the same trouble, after all, the siege of Wuchangwei was initiated by her, and it was inconvenient for her to compete with Fang Yun, Shen Bocheng and Yang Renxiao, so after discussing with Li Hongyu, she chose another unpopular topic of "The Book of Rites" to answer.

In addition, whether it is the township examination or the general examination, there are requirements for the number of words in the answers to the Four Books and Five Classics.

According to the customization of the Ming Dynasty, among the three "four books" questions, each question has a minimum of 200 words and a maximum of 600 words; In the five "Five Classics", each has a minimum of 300 words and a maximum of 500 words, and once it does not meet the number of words, it will be invalidated.

Because the first game of the township examination is very important, to a certain extent, it can be said to be the decisive battle of the township examination, which is related to whether the candidates can win the title and get the opportunity to step into the official career.

Therefore, cheating in the township test is also mainly concentrated in this one.

For example, the flea-like "Complete Commentary on the Five Classics" and the more than 400,000 characters of yellow silk were prepared for the first exam, which can be described as painstaking.

Compared with this cheat sheet, some candidates use a more advanced way of cheating, memorizing several articles in advance, and then only need to choose one of the articles closest to the exam questions to answer, because this cheating method is very hidden, so it is usually difficult to find during the exam.

But this method also has a disadvantage, that is, if the selected essay is close to the exam question, if it is thousands of miles away, then the examiner will also eliminate this kind of exam paper, and sometimes the examinee will be held responsible, after all, in order to win fame, some people will know that the essay is not right, and they will answer with luck.

Therefore, it is very important to bet on the questions before the exam, and if you are lucky enough to bet on the exam questions, it will be much smoother to answer, otherwise you will only have to play on the spot, racking your brains to think about answering.

I have to say that although the imperial examination was a relatively fair and advanced way of selecting talents in ancient times, it enabled the children of the poor family to step into the official career, unlike the Korean Kingdom, where the government was controlled by two classes of nobles, so that the court was dull.

But it also has great drawbacks, in addition to imprisoning the reader's mind and affecting the development of natural science, luck also accounts for a large proportion in the examination, one is whether the question is correct, and the other is whether the answer is in line with the examiner's appetite.

According to the process of answering candidates, they usually answer the "Five Classics" questions first, and it is obvious that the eight-strand essay of the "Four Books" question is much more difficult than the "Five Classics" question.

Li Hongyu quickly answered the "Spring and Autumn" question in the "Five Classics", which was just a commentary on the sentences in the "Spring and Autumn", which did not bother him at all.

Subsequently, Li Hongyu's attention focused on the three "four books" topics.

According to the custom, the question of the craft, that is, the title of the Bagu Wen, is only taken from the "Four Books", and the examiner appoints a certain sentence or paragraph of the "Four Books" as the topic to test the candidate's understanding of the meaning of the scripture.

The examination question of the Analects is "the people are sufficient, and the king is insufficient";

The exam question of "The Mean" is "Pu Bo is like the sky; The abyss is like an abyss. Seeing and the people are not disrespectful; The people do not believe it; Do and the people don't say it";

The exam question of "Mencius" is "Be kind to others, and relieve the people from hanging upside down".

After staring at the three questions for a while, Li Hongyu's gaze fell on the examination question of the "Analects", "The people are sufficient, and the monarch is insufficient", and it is obvious that in terms of artistic conception, this question in the "Analects" is the best.

Liu Dongfu is undoubtedly lucky, Li Hongyu gave him the eight-strand essay close to the "Mencius" exam questions, if Liu Dongfu's other subjects are not too bad, then he has a great hope of winning this township exam, it depends on his luck.

Because the eight-strand text has a special customization, the first sentence of the text is "breaking the topic", the so-called breaking the topic, the popular understanding is to analyze the topic, that is to say, what this article is mainly about.

The eight-strand essay is only used in two sentences, and sometimes there is a phenomenon of a long sentence with a slight pause, so it looks like three sentences.

"Breaking the topic" is very important to the Bagu text, as the two sentences of "breaking the topic" should not only summarize the meaning of the topic and explain the meaning of the topic, but it cannot directly say the meaning of the topic, which is both thorough and generalized in popular terms.

For candidates, a good "problem-solving" often leaves a very good first impression on the marker, so that even if there are some flaws in the content behind, it is harmless, which can be said to be the soul of Baguwen.

After thinking about it for a while, Li Hongyu wrote on the examination paper, "The people are rich at the bottom, and the king is rich at the top", and used these two sentences as "breaking the question".

"Breaking the topic" is followed by "undertaking the topic", and "undertaking the topic" is to undertake the main points of "breaking the topic", and then supplement and explain them to make the argument more clear and complete.

Immediately afterwards, Li Hongyu did not hesitate at all, and wrote down with a stroke of the pen, "The wealth of the king is hidden from the people." If the people are rich, how can you be poor alone? If it is said that the monarch and the people are one, it has been mourned", as a "theme".

There are six parts behind the topic, including the beginning of the lecture, the topic, the starting stock, the middle share, the back share, and the bundle of shares, plus the problem and the topic are eight parts, which is the system of the eight-strand text.

It is worth mentioning that each part of the last four parts should be composed of two paragraphs of dual text, a total of eight dual words, each paragraph is commonly known as a share, so it is also called the eight-strand dual text, which is the origin of the name of the eight-strand text.

Baguwen should speak in the tone of a saint, and the four pairs of the last four parts should fight against each other, and you must not use allusions to the wind and snow to blaspheme the saint, otherwise the end will be miserable.

"In Lu Yan, it is a warehouse, and the so-called people who rely on things and accumulate are worry-free. Between the fields, there is no regret about the so-called health care to send the dead. ”

After writing the part of the beginning and the topic, Li Hongyu's starting stock was also quickly completed, with three sentences in the upper part and three sentences in the lower part of the battle.

With such a good beginning, the battle sentences of the middle stock, the back stock and the bundle part did not have much time for Li Hongyu, and he wrote down the content of these three parts on the exam paper with ease, and the battle was neat and far-reaching, and he was very satisfied with it.

"Phew! The establishment of the law was supposed to be for the people. And the sufficiency of the country is because of this, why bother to be rich by endowment! ”

After the two sentences of the battle, Li Hongyu ended with a stroke of his pen and a highly summarized sentence, and finally completed the article that he thought was nothing to be faulted with.

"I'm tired!" Then, Li Hongyu put down the brush in his hand and stretched lazily, and his nervous mind relaxed.

"Gurgling ......"

At this time, there was a hunger cry from Li Hongyu's lower abdomen, and after reaching out and touching his lower abdomen, he raised his head and looked out through the gap above the oilcloth, only to find that the sun was in the sky, and it turned out that it was afternoon unconsciously.

Li Hongyu didn't eat much last night and this morning, after all, who is still in the mood to eat when the exam is about to start, and now that he is relaxed, he will naturally feel hungry.

Without thinking much about it, Li Hongyu pushed the brazier out from under the oilcloth and prepared to cook a delicious Yangchun noodle to eat, although it was not as good as what was made outside, but it was very rare for the number room.

The two soldiers patrolling the corridor outside were stunned for a moment, never expecting that someone would use charcoal fire now, knowing that now is the critical period for answering questions.

After the initial stunned, the two immediately notified the relevant personnel, and after a while, someone brought charcoal in an iron bucket and put it in Li Hongyu's brazier.

Li Hongyu then pulled back the brazier, went out to scoop water from the water tank, and then methodically set up the iron pot and began to cook noodles, when he took water, the officials and soldiers outside all looked at him with strange expressions.

I'm afraid that Li Hongyu is the only one in the entire tribute courtyard who is in the mood to eat, and he is still cooking on a fire, which is a big surprise.

In fact, Li Hongyu was not the only one who made a fire to cook, Zhao Xin also finished answering the question half an hour later, and then cooked noodles there like Li Hongyu and ate them, making the officials and soldiers on patrol look at him like monsters.

"I'm hit, I'm lifted!" After Li Hongyu cooked the noodles, he didn't eat a few bites, and a man's excited shout suddenly came from the room on one side, which made him slightly stunned.