Unlike the peasantry, the urban common people had a clearer understanding of the ruling class. 【Full Text Reading】《

In a feudal agrarian society, the peasants had a vague understanding of the rulers. For the vast majority of the peasants, they were faced with landlords who were very pure in class divisions, but vague in their official status.

But for the urban commoners, most of them can be very aware that the ruler of the dynasty is the imperial court. The imperial court is the existence of standing on the opposite side of these small people.

Whether in a feudal agrarian society or in a capitalist society, the contradictions between the ruling class and the ruled class are always manifested through the struggle for survival.

In the vast countryside of the feudal agrarian society, the people who held the means of subsistence and production were the landlords. So under normal circumstances, the peasant rebels would target the landlords. On the one hand, they have a vague understanding of the feudal dynasty, the general representative of the landlord class, and on the other hand, they lack a real understanding of the imperial court, which represents the orthodox status.

The urban commoners, on the other hand, were in an environment in which they were exploited and oppressed by the officials of the imperial court and the vassal forces of the bureaucratic aristocracy. In this case, they can very clearly point the spearhead of the contradiction at the feudal dynasty.

However, from a practical point of view, both peasants and urban commoners, although they themselves are clearly aware of the reactionary nature of the ruling class, under normal circumstances, when the existential crisis does not erupt, they are still willing to live a peaceful life under the rules and order set by the feudal ruling class.

If it were not for the real outbreak of an existential crisis, if it were not for the immediate existence of life, if it were not for the clear understanding that only by breaking the rules and order of the ruling class could the means of subsistence be obtained, whether it was for the peasants or the urban commoners, they would not be willing to use violent means to resist the ruling class.

However, just as the peasants, after soberly realizing that the landlords who possess the means of production and the means of subsistence have directly threatened their survival, they launch violent means against the landlords to obtain the means of subsistence. Urban civilians, because they live in the core of the ruling class, can feel the attitude of the ruling class towards them very clearly. And respond accordingly to this attitude.

After fully realizing that the ruling class did not care whether they lived or died, and fully realized that the means of subsistence could only be obtained by breaking the existing order by violent means, the urban commoners behaved more resolutely and thoroughly than the peasants.

Mencius's view that "the king regards his ministers as mustard, and the ministers regard the king as enemies" explains and analyzes the relations within the ruling class from the standpoint of the ruling class. But this dialectical relationship also applies to the relationship between urban commoners and the feudal court.

Because of the high development of the commodity economy and the continuous prosperity of the market economy, the relationship between the urban commoners and the ruling class in the Ming Dynasty was also in the process of being constantly simplified.

Taking Beijing City, the ruling center of the Ming Dynasty, as an example, the three battalions and twelve guards totaled nearly 250,000 Beijing soldiers, and by the end of the Ming Dynasty, all of them had been reduced from armed forces to urban civilians.

These people have neither land nor a regular income, and are among the most thoroughly wage-labourers in the city of Beijing. The existence of these people, in the last years of the Ming Dynasty, where the economic crisis was serious, was completely a huge time bomb for the Ming Dynasty.

By 1630, the growing Baath industrial group had an economic impact on the Ming Dynasty for about a decade. Large quantities of silver were absorbed into Baath banks from all regions of the country as a result of Baath dumping of industrial products. A large amount of grain was absorbed and stored by the Baath Party throughout the country.

At the same time, the silver imports from the West, which had lasted for hundreds of years, began to shrink significantly due to the depletion of silver ore resources in the Americas.

From Jiangnan to the Central Plains, on the one hand, it was due to the severe food crisis caused by the reduction in grain production and the food policy of the Baath Party, and on the other hand, it was due to the severe deflation caused by the large-scale dumping of industrial products by the Baath Party. The huge economic crisis that existed in the Ming Dynasty became more and more serious.

In the countryside, it is because of natural disasters and land annexation that result from a large number of bankrupt peasants. They formed a huge peasant rebel army and operated in Shaanxi, Shanxi, Henan, and western Shandong.

In the cities, there are large numbers of unemployed urban civilians as a result of the economic crisis caused by Baath's industrial competition. In the major cities of the Jiangnan region and the Central Plains, the civil uprisings and mutinies one after another became the main phenomenon in the major cities in the last years of the Ming Dynasty.

In this context, urban civilians lose their jobs and incomes on the one hand, and on the other hand, food prices continue to rise and the food supply shrinks across the board. A large number of urban civilians are facing a serious existential crisis as a result of the boom of the commodity economy and the development of the market economy.

It is precisely for this reason that a civilian leader like Song Gouzi has to lead those urban civilians in Beijing, who also have no source of livelihood, to take risks and rob the property of the emperor's relatives.

You must know that in the face of a serious existential crisis, the urban commoners who are comprehensively impoverished are absolutely not afraid to confront the feudal rulers.

It's just that whether it is Song Gouzi and Liu Changsheng and others who were in the incident, or the officials of the Nancheng Soldiers and Horses Division and the Jinyi Guard Nancheng Thousand Households who are trying to stay out of the matter, they do not have a clear understanding of what kind of reaction the huge number of Beijing urban civilians with a total number of more than 250,000 will make under the demonstration of Song Gouzi and others under the serious existential crisis.

The outbreak of all contradictions is the result of long-term accumulation.

A long-term accumulation of contradictions only requires a small or even inconspicuous incident as a fuse, and then a rapid and violent chain reaction will be generated.

Just like more than 1,400 years ago, when Chen Sheng and Wu Guang slashed wood to uncover the poles, most people at that time probably did not realize that the seemingly powerful Qin Dynasty would fall because of this. One day in May 1630, a group of bandits suspected of being soldiers of the Beijing camp robbed the grain cart of Zhou Guozhang's family, which did not attract much attention at the time.

The popular mutinies and mutinies that occurred for the purpose of looting food and materials because many people could not eat were countless in the last years of the Ming Dynasty. In most cases, small-scale urban riots, which lack a mass base and are entirely spontaneous, are quickly suppressed by the local government and army.

For the ruling class, whether it is the ruling class of feudalism or the ruling class of capitalism, their absolute power is very small compared to that of the ruled class.

Under normal circumstances, under the condition that the ruling class can maintain a certain sober understanding, and if the ruling class does not completely fall into a state of insensitivity and ignorance and only knows how to defend its own interests, as long as the ruling class proceeds from the stability of its own rule and takes into account the tolerance limit of the ruled class, the violent machine of the ruling class does not need to face all the governed.

Under normal circumstances, the masses of the people who are willing to accept the rule of the ruled class and are willing to endure the exploitation and oppression of the ruling class are the majority. In the absence of an existential crisis, the violent apparatus of the ruling class is only directed against a small number of awakened people. Compared with this part of the awakened people, the power of the ruling class is very large.

It is for this reason that, unlike the large peasant rebels, which were relatively small and lacked mobility and flexibility, and did not have widespread support for popular uprisings and mutinies led by urban civilians, would never have had a fundamental impact on the rule of the Ming Dynasty.

Even in large cities like Suzhou and Hangzhou, with populations of more than one million, the popular rebellions and mutinies of urban civilians have not received widespread response and support.

In Beijing, however, the situation is completely different.

Although Song Gouzi himself seems to be an ordinary civilian in Beijing City, in fact, whether it is Song Gouzi or Shen Linzi, these people are actually soldiers and military surpants in the Beijing camp system. Unlike the civilians of Jiangnan City, who lacked connections, Song Gouzi, as the leader of the citizens of Nancheng, had the same identity as the soldiers and military households of the three battalions and twelve guards of more than 250,000 people in the entire Beijing city.

In particular, because of the nickname of "Song Gongming in Timely Rain" and his many deeds of helping military households, Song Gouzi is not only famous among the thousands of military households in Nancheng. The soldiers and families of the Beijing camp in the entire city of Beijing, no matter whether they have errands or not, no matter what their actual work is now, they have heard of Song Gouzi's reputation.

Song Gouzi in Beijing is completely different from those weavers and traders in the big cities in the south of the Yangtze River, and his influence and appeal are very real, not touted by feudal scholars and doctors with ulterior motives.

When Jiading Bo Zhou Kui went to the palace to cry with Empress Zhou, he didn't realize what he was doing.

When Empress Zhou complained to Emperor Chongzhen, she didn't realize what she was doing.

When Emperor Chongzhen ordered Cao Huachun, the eunuch of Dongchang, to inquire about the matter, he also did not realize what he was doing.

When Cao Huachun ordered one of his eunuchs to mobilize a large group of fans and Jinyi guards to Nancheng to investigate the case, he naturally didn't realize what he was doing.

Only Hu Yuanhua, a thousand households in Jinyi Weinan City, secretly complained in his heart when he received the superiors of Dongchang and Zhenfu Division.

In fact, things are really much simpler, how simple they are. Everyone knows the people who robbed Zhou Guozhang's grain store. Although I don't know who those participants are, the person who is in the lead, whether it is the Five Cities Terracotta Division or the Jinyi Guard South City Thousand Households, all know who it is.

Except for Song Gouzi, who is known as "Timely Rain Song Gongming", a famous social figure in Nancheng who has hundreds of loyal younger brothers under his command, and Song Gouzi, the chief figure in the hooligan lamablation, there is no second person at all.

The five carts are said to be Huguang rice, which is now rare, but in the blue sky and daylight, everyone was dragged to the slums in Nancheng by nearly 100 people. Hu Yuanhua received a clear report from his subordinates, and this group of bold Beijing Guard households distributed the looted grain from house to house in full view of everyone.

Hu Yuanhua even has a very clear evidence in his hands.

The food of Zhou Guozhang's family is different from ordinary food. His family's grain is packed in very high-grade sacks. The fine linen sacks, which were almost as good as cloth, were stamped with large red seals with very vivid and clear handwriting. It clearly marks the place of origin of the grain "Zhijiang County" and the producer of the grain "Zhijiang Wangfu". This is also consistent with the rumors that Zhou Guozhang has a close relationship with the Zhijiang Royal Mansion in Huguang.

After all, how rare the food in Huguang is now, everyone knows it.

Hu Yuanhua originally thought that things would not develop to this point. When he assigned the errand to his subordinates, Liu Changsheng, who was the kindest and even weakest, he hoped that this matter could be handled softly through Liu Changsheng, a person who likes to deal with problems with compromises.

He knew that the relationship between Liu Changsheng and Song Gouzi was not ordinary, so he hoped that Song Gouzi, who was famous for his righteousness and fame by nature, and paid great attention to fame and morale, would be jealous of Liu Changsheng's future official position in Jinyiwei, and finally took the initiative to comply.

Hu Yuanhua also praised him very much for the master who gave him ideas to come up with such a proper idea.

But what Hu Yuanhua didn't expect was that Liu Changsheng, who had always been known for being weak and bullied, didn't know what was going on, and this time he actually hardened once. He clearly expressed his attitude in Hu Yuanhua's private summons. That is, not only did he not want to do this errand, but he would not do it. Even he clearly submitted his resignation to Hu Yuanhua.

This can make Hu Yuanhua angry.

Not to mention that Jinyi Wei is a hereditary position that has been passed down from generation to generation, there is no resignation at all. Even if Liu Changsheng doesn't want to do it, there is only a reason for Qianhu to expel him, and there is no reason for him to resign voluntarily.

The key is that now that Liu Changsheng has picked his pick, among the remaining slugs in the thousands of households in Nancheng who only know how to extort and bully the soft and afraid of the hard, they can't find a person who dares to stand up and speak straight in front of Song Gouzi, who has thousands or hundreds of younger brothers under his command and who has the name of "Song Gongming in Time for Rain" among the hundreds of thousands of Jingwei military households in the capital.

You must know that on weekdays, the group of Jinyi guards in the Qianhu Office in Nancheng saw Song Gouzi on the street, and they only nodded and called "Song Ye". had a hard time with his "old man", and before they could pull out the rusty waist knife, they were beaten to death by the little brother next to Song Gouzi.

But the problem is that before Hu Yuanhua appeased Liu Changsheng and asked him to come forward to deal with the matter, the superiors in the palace, Jinyiwei and the uncles of Dongchang had already arrived at their yamen.

Although Hu Yuanhua has nothing to do with the civilian bureaucrats, he is still proficient in the principles of deception. He didn't dare to say to the people above that there were such a big man as "Timely Rain Song Gongming" under his rule. Otherwise, Song Gouzi's identity will be leaked, and the first person to be held accountable is himself.

In this way, the Fanzi of Dongchang and the Jinyi Guards of the Zhenfu Division did not get any effective information from Hu Yuanhua. The only information they had was that Zhou Guozhang's grain was in the hands of the military households in the slums in Nancheng.

I don't know if it's because Wei Zhongxian is no longer in power, so the case-handling ability of Dongchang and Jinyiwei has declined. Anyway, dozens of fans and brocade guards ran like wolves to the slums in the south city to make waves.

Seeing the ghosts crying wolf howling in the slums of Nancheng, Hu Yuanhua, the thousand households of the Thousand Households of the Jinyi Guard Nancheng as a sitting cannon, was cold in his heart.

He clearly realized that according to the methods of these people, a big chaos was just around the corner