The brown-red-haired Westerner who was talking to Zhang Ruiyang saw Zhang Yuan stepping into the hall, and immediately stood up, looked at Zhang Yuan, and asked Zhang Ruiyang: "This is Linglang Zhang Jiezi Zhang Gongzi?" "This Westerner speaks Nanjing Mandarin, and his accent is quite blunt.

Zhang Ruiyang also stood up and replied, "It's the little dog." ”

This Westerner is nearly a head taller than Zhang Ruiyang, should be one meter nine miles away, the Ming Dynasty tailoring ruler is five feet six inches, it is rare to see such a big man in the south of the Yangtze River, Mu Zhenzhen's father Mu Jingyan is only five feet four inches, this Westerner wears a narrow and wide hat, wearing a straight jacket, the eyes are as green as a cat's eyes, and the eyes keep blinking, no wonder Xiao Shi is frightened and scared - Zhang Ruiyang introduced: "Zhang Yuan, this is the Jesuit Wang Fengsu Wang President of Nanjing. ”

Zhang Ruiyang had seen the Tessie missionaries in the Zhou Palace, so he was not surprised to see the red-haired and green-eyed Tessie people, this Tessie claimed to have come from Nanjing to visit Zhang Yuan, for the Western missionaries of the late Ming Dynasty, Zhang Yuan only knew more about Matteo Ricci and John Tang, Matteo Ricci died four years ago, and at this time John Tang should still be studying at the Roman seminary, who is this Wang Fengsu?

After some greetings, Zhang Yuan learned that Wang Fengsu was the person in charge of the Nanjing Jesuit Society, and after receiving Xu Guangqi's letter at the end of last month, he rushed all the way to Shanyin to visit him -- there were some things that Wang Fengsu did not tell Zhang Yuan, and Xu Guangqi praised Zhang Yuan in the letter as a genius of Su Hui, and he was by no means a thing in the pool, saying that Catholicism would spread in the Ming Dynasty, and Zhang Yuan would be a great help, so he tried his best to urge Wang Fengsu to meet Zhang Yuan as soon as possible, and he must work hard to make friends, and it was best to guide Zhang Yuan to join the Society of Jesus -- Xu Guangqi was an outstanding figure in the Ming Dynasty Catholicism and a close friend of Matteo Ricci. Wang Fengsu received Xu Guangqi's letter, did not dare to slack off, and set off overnight to rush to Shanyin, but at this time he saw that Zhang Yuan was only a seventeen or eighteen-year-old young talent, and he couldn't help but be a little disappointed, how can a young student who is not weak crown help them Jesuit, but since he came, Wang Fengsu still had to cheer up and talk to Zhang Yuan, and first asked the servant to present Zhang Yuan with the gift he brought from Nanjing, which was a prism, a stone rubbing, and a self-striking bell. At the beginning, Matteo Ricci entered Beijing to present the Wanli Emperor with two self-striking bells are the most valuable, the Jesuits generally only visit important people in the Ming Dynasty to seek the right to preach will send the self-striking bell, now the entire Ming Dynasty will not exceed ten, it is Xu Guangqi suggested that the Jesuits will send Zhang Yuan a self-striking bell - this more than three feet high, ebony gilt self-striking bell has an angel with wings on its back at each of the four corners, the whole shape is like a spired church, extremely exquisitely made, in Taixi, this self-striking bell can be much more expensive than a telescope, Zhang Yuan saw the chiming bell, he was overjoyed, he needed this very much, he could accurately grasp the time, he also wanted to let the Ming Dynasty's skilled craftsmen imitate, the strength of the Chinese cottage should be traced back four hundred years - the pendulum of the chiming bell was motionless, the red-haired and green-eyed Wang Fengsu remained silent, waiting for Zhang Yuan to ask, but Zhang Yuan did not ask, went to open the back cover of the chiming bell, and looked carefully, this is not a clockwork clock, it is a hammer drive clock, this bell hammer mechanical clock has a large error, it must be adjusted every day, and the hammer is immediately put down, Then he turned the eagle's beak-shaped minute hand and adjusted the time to 3:10 p.m., and the hand walked up - Zhang Yuan turned his head to Wang Fengsu and said, "This is about this time, and I will adjust it later." ”

Wang Fengsu was dumbfounded, and asked for a while: "Zhang Gongzi has seen this Babel Tower before?" ”

"Babel?"

Zhang Yuan was amazed, and immediately understood that these Tessie missionaries called the chiming bell the Tower of Babel in order to show their magic, and replied: "I have seen it in a dream, but now I see it, and it is indeed the same as what I saw in my dream." ”

Wang Fengsu opened his green eyes, speechless, and unfolded the "Map of Mountains and Seas" to Zhang Yuan, which was based on Matteo Ricci's hand-drawn map lithographs, and there were also color signs, Asia is earthy yellow, South and North America and Antarctica are pink, Europe and Africa are white, the ocean is dark green, and the map does not indicate Oceania. ”

Wang Fengsu was shocked, when Matteo Ricci drew this "map of mountains and seas", considering the arrogant and proud special surname of the Ming people, he placed the eastern part of Asia, that is, the territory of the Ming Dynasty, in the center of the map, in order to please the Ming people, it was really very effective, the Ming people who had seen the map proudly thought that the Ming Dynasty was the center of all countries, very cool, and the missionary had a good impression of it, but now this weak crown student pointed out the deviation of the map, Wang Fengsu was stunned - Zhang Yuan saw that he had such a little common sense and shocked the red-haired and green-eyed Wang Fengsu, and secretly screamed ashamed in his heart, "I've seen a map drawn by the Tessie people in my dreams, and it's a little different from this. ”

Entrusting things that are not easy to explain to dreams, this is Zhang Yuan's habitual skill, the late Ming people, the Taixi people all believe this, Wang Fengsu is now sure that his trip to Shanyin is worthwhile, this Zhang Yuan is a genius, and he has had a strange dream, isn't it the Holy Father, the Holy Son, and the Holy Spirit teaching this young man - Wang Fengsu was extremely excited, but asked cautiously: "Zhang Gongzi has seen any characters when he had that strange dream?" ”

Zhang Yuan knew Wang Fengsu's thoughts, shook his head and said, "No." ”

Wang Fengsu took out the cross necklace he hung: "Have you ever seen this thing?" ”

Zhang Yuan shook his head and said no, he didn't want to be entangled in the dream, so he changed the topic and asked, "Is President Wang from Italy, Portugal or German from Tessie?" ”

Wang Fengsu was surprised again, the vast majority of the Ming people regarded Taixi as a country, could not distinguish between Spain and Portugal, and were all called Franco, and the Jesuits who preached in the Ming Dynasty were mainly Portuguese and Italians, and there were no Spaniards, but in the 31st year of Wanli, the Spaniards massacred the Ming immigrants in Luzon, and the Ming people blamed them for these missionaries, making it difficult for them to preach - Wang Fengsu, the Jesuit who took the name of the Ming people, was in awe of Zhang Yuan and replied: "We are from Italy. After that, he took out two books from his bag and handed them to Zhang Yuan: "This is a clumsy work, please ask Zhang Gongzi for advice." ”

Zhang Yuan took it and looked at it, one was "Qi Family Western Studies", and the other was "The Saints of the Holy Religion of God Practice", and said: "I must read it in the next place." ”

Zhang Ruiyang didn't have the slightest interest in this missionary, so he got up and said, "Zhang Yuan, you accompany the guest, and the old father goes in to rest." "Zong Yishan's parents are still in the west building of the inner courtyard, Yiting and Zong Yishan's family affairs have been decided, Yiting as Zhang Ruiyang's daughter-in-law, Zong Yishan will be his Zhang family's son-in-law - Zhang Yuan invited Wang Fengsu to the back garden wooden building for a long talk, today the weather is cloudy, at this time the clouds are open, the winter sun shines on both sides of the Demo River, the ice and snow are crystal clear, it is very good-looking, Wang Fengsu took the opportunity to show the prism, the sunlight is decomposed into red, orange, yellow, green, green, blue, purple seven colors - self-striking bell, map of the world and prism are the three treasures of the Jesuits who came to the Ming Dynasty to preach, This is like when Buddhism was introduced to Middle-earth, those monks in the Western Regions often showed supernatural powers to obtain believers, and the Jesuits used some advanced technology to attract believers, but in front of Zhang Yuan, these three ** treasures obviously did not work, but Zhang Yuan had to pretend to be curious to ask the principle of the triangular prism to reproduce colored light, Wang Fengsu did not understand that the seven colors of light have a refractive index, and the answer was half right and half wrong, and Zhang Yuan did not correct it - Wang Fengsu lived in a small building on the bank of the Toumi River for three days, and every time he had a long talk with Zhang Yuan, Wang Fengsu was far less knowledgeable than Matteo Ricci, and he was interested in geometry, Astronomy and optics only understand the skin, although Zhang Yuan's knowledge in these aspects is only a little stronger than the high school level of later generations, but it is not comparable to Wang Fengsu, and Wang Fengsu has nothing to talk about, Wang Fengsu has no intention of talking about those, he wants to persuade Zhang Yuan to join the church, saying that Xu Guangqi, Li Zhizao, these Ming officials have joined the church, Wang Fengsu actively preaches the doctrine, earnestly hopes to save Zhang Yuan's soul - Zhang Yuan knows where he comes from and where he is going, he first wants to save himself, his family and the people of the Ming Dynasty from breaking in. Sacrifice and Jurchen ravage, as for the soul, can be slowly saved, not in a hurry, for these missionaries he has a good impression, this is the same as Dharma Moses to come, Jianzhen to the east, as long as it is not by force to force others to believe, what religion the people love to believe in that is the freedom of the people, and at this time the Catholic doctrine as close as possible to Confucianism, is beneficial to the enlightenment of the people's wisdom, the late Ming society needs a new religious thought injection, but in Zhang Yuan himself, of course, can not enter the Catholic Church, as soon as he enters the religion, he will be labeled, and the road to national salvation will not be easy to follow in the future- Zhang Yuan excused himself to be young, his mother was a devout Buddhist, and he would not be allowed to enter Catholicism, but Zhang Yuan didn't say anything to death, saying that he could consider it again in the future, this is to give Wang Fengsu hope, the Jesuits in the Ming Dynasty are also Zhang Yuan's befriending, unite all the forces that can be united, the biggest enemy in the late Ming Dynasty is the natural disaster and the Jianzhou Jurchen, and the vigorous development of Western science and technology must be borrowed - Zhang Yuan also saw the hidden worries of the Jesuits from Wang Fengsu's speech, and Matteo Ricci's caution was different, Wang Fengsu's preaching was too public, The year before the completion of the new church in Nanjing, Wang Fengsu organized a large number of believers to line up to swagger through the city, male and female believers often gather together, chant and pray, which made the people of Nandu a little dissatisfied, and the officials and Buddhists who were hostile to Catholicism were even more condemned in unison, but Wang Fengsu did not care, last year he was rewarded by the superior Jesuit because of his most successful missionary achievements in the Ming Dynasty, so he worked harder and tried his best to develop believers, otherwise he would not have chased Zhang Yuan from Nanjing to Shanyin in the cold winter - Zhang Yuan advised Wang Fengsu to follow the missionary strategy of Matteo Ricci, mainly to spread scientific knowledge, otherwise there may be [***], but Wang Fengsu obviously did not listen, but out of admiration and wooing of Zhang Yuan, Wang Fengsu promised to use his connections to ask someone to bring two latest Spanish Mush Kert arquebuses to Zhang Yuan, in Daming, the arquebus is called a bird gun - Zhang Yuan also invited Wang Fengsu to visit the Hanshe Mirror Workshop, Wang Fengsu was greatly surprised that the Hanshe Mirror Workshop could make telescopes.

On the sixteenth day of the lunar month, Wang Fengsu left Shanyin full of admiration, and saw that Zhang Yuan was worthy of this trip, Zhang Yuan also donated 200 taels of silver as the mission funds of the Jesuits in Nanjing, and once again reminded Wang Fengsu to be cautious in proselytizing and beware of the impeachment of those anti-Catholic officials, but looking at Wang Fengsu's demeanor, this advice was not listened to, Zhang Yuanxin said: "If you don't listen to me, Catholicism will suffer a big setback in the Ming Dynasty, but this is also good, not only to show my foresight, but also to make the Jesuits change the current missionary policy, and return to Matteo Ricci's technology-first strategy." ”

(To be continued)