Early Spring in Gangnam (IX) (Part I)

This aunt and grandmother of the Chen family has been in the palace for decades, and the Chen family and related families have been walking on thin ice, not daring to slack off, let alone crossing any distance. Jiangnan officialdom is corrupt and has become the hardest hit area of the imperial court. The first sentence summoned by the Queen Mother was to investigate thoroughly, if it was anything related to the Chen family, she would never be soft-hearted, and she could not give outsiders any leverage to accuse her of conniving at the dictatorship of her relatives. The Chen Family Academy is extremely eye-catching in Jiangnan, and its disciples are also all over the Great Zhou, and many of them stay in Jiangnan. Although the Chen family is cautious in governing the family, but there is a large population of side branches and disciples, how can they all ensure that there is no problem. Involving the Queen Mother's family, no matter who the Ministry of Officials sends, if it is found out to be related to the Chen family, the person who does the work will not do it, so the Queen Mother will deliberately point him to investigate. Grant him carte blanche to protect the reputation of the Chen family's Qingliu family and dig out potential loopholes. There will soon be turmoil in the imperial court, and the old queen mother will take precautions, first build a fence in her backyard, and at the same time firmly enclose the Gong family in the scope of her loyalty.

The three generations of the Gong family are many followers in the government and the opposition. But the three generations of Taifu are all very cautious people and never favor any of the princes. And it is even more wise to protect oneself, although they are all called Taifu, but they are only the princes' childhood teachers, and when the princes grow up, they are all recommended to worship under the name of other masters, The reason is that Gong's teachings are only suitable for childhood enlightenment, and they are beyond their reach in other aspects. In this way, he skillfully avoided the party struggle after the prince became an adult, and his position in the court was stable. But this kind of behavior of not getting on the boat was disliked by the current emperor who was a prince at the time in his early years, so in Gong Zhiyun's generation, his grandfather decided to let him take the career of a capable official. Whoever sits in that position needs to be assisted. And this generation of princes, no matter who sits on the throne, is the descendant of the queen mother, but these princes are not the only ones who are eyeing the throne. Whether it is from the court or from the in-laws, the queen mother takes him as a matter of course as a subordinate minister, and does not give him a chance to clear up.

But according to his father, he was chained of his own free will. Because his grandfather often took him in and out of various poetry and literary clubs in the capital, Ting Wei often followed his father and grandfather to join in the fun, he and Ting Wei often met, and the children of the two families often made appointments to play together, so they had the family affection of childhood sweethearts. The men of the Gong family were sensible relatively early, and they were sophisticated about people, and they had a very thorough understanding of the world very early on. He came out early, saw too many pros and cons of backyard politics on his career, carefully observed that the men of the Chen family did not like to marry concubines, monogamy, and the quiet life in the backyard, and after thinking about it a few times, he decided that he wanted this kind of life that he felt very envious.

So when he was appointed as a foreign official at the age of thirteen, he took the scholar and the servant to the post alone, and did not want any maids to have sex with. At the age of fifteen, because of his outstanding political achievements, excellent evaluation of officials, and because of his young age, the emperor was curious about him, and specially recalled the Beijing saint to report on his work, and his family took the opportunity to ask him about his family affairs. He proposed that he wanted to marry Chen Tingwei, who he knew very well, and his grandfather was originally opposed to this family business, but instead valued some women from neutral and Qingliu families in the court. He sat down with his grandfather and father and had a long conversation beyond his years. Regardless of family background, Ting Wei is a reasonable and straightforward woman, rather than marrying a woman who doesn't know or understand, it is better to marry a playmate who has known each other since childhood.

When the fifteen-year-old stood in front of his grandfather and said that he did not stand in line as an old man, that is, he stood in line with the most hypocrisy, and his essence was not to be loyal to the king, but to be loyal to his own family interests, his grandfather's eyes were very complicated for a moment. As the saying goes, three years old looks eighty. As the prince's teacher, he knows the temperament of the princes even better than the emperor. My grandfather and father were respected as mentors and friends by two generations of kings, but they were silent when they knew that the prince was not the choice of the emperor, so that many unscrupulous forces made chaos in the government and the opposition under the banner of the prince, causing losses to the court and the people. Jiangnan Wenzhao Marquis Mansion is not only a family of doctors and scholars, a real clear stream, and the Queen Mother has been in power for decades, everyone has long understood the Queen Mother's mind and open-mindedness for the first place in the country. Standing on the Chen family's ship at this time is not only safe, but more importantly, you can rest assured that you have the opportunity to be a capable minister.

To govern the world, it is not only necessary to have a wise monarch, but also to be able to be pragmatic and powerful, cooperate from top to bottom, be able to control the court situation, be able to set the border and peace, and understand the people's livelihood and people's livelihood. The reason why he was able to do an excellent job in the position of the seventh-rank official of the county magistrate in two years was that he had a team formed voluntarily by local scholars under his persuasion. These people are not sitting in the county office and waiting for the people to come to the door and then deal with affairs. Instead, they went out of the yamen and brought craftsmen of all kinds of skills, as well as their chosen merchants, to create livelihoods for the local people in the poor and remote areas. And his team has the strength to run a county and support him as a seven-grade official, but it has no ability to do more. If the Great Zhou wants to stabilize the country and the people live and work in peace and contentment, it depends not only on those clear streams, nor on those powerful people who chase utilitarianism, but on burying their strength in the court, the people, the merchants and the people in the rivers and lakes. Looking at it, the most qualified are the Tang family and the Chen family, who are also the queen mother.

After his grandfather and father listened to his analysis, the two elders did not speak for a long time, and the two sat in the study all night, and when the candle was extinguished, the grandfather came out, holding the jade pendant red sandalwood box containing the Gong family heirloom in his hand, and personally boarded the car to the Chen family to propose marriage.

Later, the Queen Mother personally summoned him. At that time, there were no rumors of the engagement of the two families, and outsiders thought that this was the honor of the outstanding county order of the youngest two years of the Great Zhou Dynasty. It's just that when he arrived at the palace of the Queen Mother, the Queen Mother looked at him for a long time and didn't speak, and after drinking a cup of tea, the Queen Mother put down the teacup and called out his expression, and began the first sentence: "Ziqian, I have known you since you entered the palace when you were three years old, but I have never found that you are such a snobbish person." ”

If ordinary people hear the Queen Mother say the word power, they are afraid that their feet will be weak. On the contrary, Gong Zhiyun, after kowtowing unhurriedly, lowered his head and said: "Xiaguan is indeed very snobbish, but it is because the situation is advantageous, because the Queen Mother is too capable, in the past few decades, this has been operated very well from the inside out, from the court to the people, and the temptation is so that the lower officials want to borrow the power of Niangniang to be a capable minister through the ages, so that the various livelihoods of the people planned in the chest of the lower officials can be displayed." If there is no platform set up by the mother, the lower officials have empty ideas, but I am afraid that they will not be able to realize it for the rest of their lives. Therefore, the lower official implored the mother to be gracious and allowed the lower official to be a snobbish person, who could use his strength to improve the people's livelihood while reaping the fame of the government and enterprises. ”

After hearing this, the Queen Mother Chen mural nodded again and again, and said a few good: "What a snob." ”

After that, the Queen Mother specially ordered someone to sit down and talk about some of his ideas for the government and the people's livelihood. After understanding the general situation, the Queen Mother announced that Lord Qi Xianqi entered the palace and talked with him, and it was also that long talk, Gong Zhiyun was even more sure of his choice. The Great Zhou Dynasty lasted for a hundred years, because of the competition between the nobles of the great family, the mutual tilting of various forces, and the dilapidated official system. The Queen Mother is a strange woman, and only under her control can Da Zhou not be chaotic and have the opportunity to prosper. And Lord Qi Xian Qi is an important assistant for the Queen Mother to build the country. While he was glad that he had made the right bet, he also admired and yearned for Chen's doctrine even more. The Empress Dowager and Master Qi are both from the Chen family, and the influence of the Chen Family Academy on their life, strategy and handling of things has created the open-minded attitude of these two old people, who are both in their late prime, to govern the country and to accept and treat talents and new things reasonably.

It was also that time that Lord Qi's words touched him. Master Qi said that some of the ideas and new policies he put forward were not something that he and the Queen Mother did not think of or did not want to implement, but were restricted by many factors. And in the past few decades, the Queen Mother and Lord Qi were still racking their brains for their own survival, and years of struggle had to be controlled in the imperial court. Lord Qi felt that his ideas were good, but his own qualifications were not enough to convince the courtiers, and some ideas needed to be revised and improved in various aspects of practice before they could be promoted in the Great Zhou on a large scale. But he and the Queen Mother are no longer young, can give him another ten years, and strive to go up step by step from the bottom of the county, before they become ancient, they can give him the opportunity to show his strength, they will try to choose a monarch who can make a living for the people, hoping to prolong the time of the Great Zhou State and the people's prosperity as much as possible.

And this trip to Jiangnan, in addition to assessing officials, another intention is to let him find out the people from all sides and further improve the blueprint of his team. There are many people in Jiangnan, and Hangzhou produces talents, and the imperial court has always liked to select talents in Jiangnan. There is no shortage of celebrities and celebrities, but there are very few talents who can really do things well instead of staying on paper.

And the officials of these six governments and eight states, looking at it, there are really not many people he wants to be included in the team. He also has a list of talents compiled by the officials, and one of the youngest, Sun Yaoyang, is in Hangzhou. In the Jiangnan scribe circle, this person has a very high voice. But looking at Sun Dufu in front of him, and then thinking of receiving a wire report in the morning, can such a son educated by his father really be useful? He carefully looked at Sun Dufu further.

Sun Dufu was also very worried at the moment. I don't know if the matter of Zu'er will cause a storm in the city, and it will affect his evaluation in the ears of the patrol. He sat solemnly on the surface, but in his heart he was quickly thinking about how to calm the situation and not let the patrol know about it.

I had just finished reading "The Book of Being an Official" here, when I saw the governor of the government poking his brain outside and looking around. The Shangguan is here to teach, and no one should disturb him. However, the Ministry of Officials also stipulates that during the assessment period, emergency civil affairs shall not be delayed. The governor of the government has always been a sensible person, and at this moment, he looks anxious that something must have happened. The prefect of Hangzhou is a spirit, don't leak during the assessment. But if you ignore it, I am afraid that if the patrol press knows, it will be even more wrong, so I left the table and quietly walked out and asked.