The room is very small, less than a meter wide and about one meter eight meters long, and the walls on both sides of the room have been peeled off in large areas, revealing the green bricks inside, although it was cleaned a few days ago, there is still a faint musty smell.

Directly in front of it, about the height of the thigh, lay a wooden plank, the size of a small door, resting on two protruding bricks.

This plank can be used as a stool to sleep on or as a stool.

There was also a smaller wooden board on the door panel, Fanning understood after a little thought, this small wooden board should be a table, he picked up the small wooden board, put it on the two bricks in front of him, and sat down to meet his chest, this wooden board had a thick layer of oil, and the stains left by the ink could be seen everywhere.

Thinking of the ink, Fanning looked up and saw a very old basket hanging above his head, and he removed it from the hook.

There were many things in the basket, including an inkstone, a new pen, half a piece of residual ink, most of the candles, a flint, two slips of paper for pasting names, a bottle of paste, and a bamboo tube for water.

At this time, a soldier came over with a bucket and said coldly: "Put the bamboo tube on the table!" ”

Fanning hurriedly put the bamboo tube on the table, and the soldier scooped a scoop of water, filled it with the bamboo tube, and then said, "You can light the candle." ”

Fanning lit the candle, and the room suddenly became bright, and there was a hint of warmth in his heart.

Time passed little by little, the sky was already numb, and by this time, all the candidates had entered, and the soldiers slammed the door of the examination hall shut.

Each alley was run by two soldiers and an invigilator, and at the end of the alley there was a toilet with a dung bucket in it.

Two and three were always the most pitiful, sitting next to the dung bucket and having to endure the pungent stench.

However, the provincial test is much better, and the two test numbers near the dung bucket do not arrange candidates, but the test solution has not been considered so much, and there are always candidates who will unfortunately draw the dung number.

At this time, a bell rang in the distance, which was required to begin preparations.

Fanning then noticed that there was a thin rope on the wall, and it turned out that there was a bell hanging outside, and when the bell was runged, the invigilator would come.

Zhao Xiuwen told them that they could only pull the bell when they went to the toilet and handed in the papers, and tried not to pull the bell when there was nothing special for the rest.

Otherwise, being targeted by the invigilator and giving a bad comment will affect the examiner's evaluation of the paper.

There are many details in the solution test, and if you are not careful, you will be hit, and every candidate needs to be careful, and to this extent, the solution is more stressful than a war.

At this time, the invigilator begins to hand out the test papers, four sheets of paper each, two of which are official papers and the other two are scratch papers.

Today is the first day of the exam, the argumentative essay will be examined, the essay will be examined tomorrow, and the morals and poems will be examined the day after tomorrow.

The time is the same, four hours, in which the argumentative essay must not be less than 1,000 words, and the countermeasure essay must not be less than 1,500 words.

The candle had been extinguished and put in the basket, Fanning began to study the ink in a hurry, patiently waiting for the official opening bell to ring.

'Knock-knock-'

The low bell rang dullly, and the two-year test of Emperor You's Great Song Dynasty finally kicked off.

The scholars first took up a pen and wrote their names, places of origin and examination room numbers on the papers, and then wrote the volume numbers in the upper left corner.

At this time, there is a bell' dang! When! This voice made every scholar hold their breath, this is the sound of the question, the question only appears once, and if you can't see it clearly, you have to ring the bell, but that will inevitably cause the invigilator to be unhappy.

When the bell rang in front of Fanning, the soldier appeared, holding a sign on which was the topic of today's argument.

"Spring and Autumn Unrighteous War"

Sure enough, just like the memory in his mind, there was no deviation, Fan Ning breathed a sigh of relief, and took a pen to write today's argumentative essay title on the manuscript paper: "Spring and Autumn Unrighteous War".

This is the book Mencius. A sentence from "Dedication".

Mencius said: 'There is no righteous war in the Spring and Autumn Period. He is good at this, and he has it. Conquest, up and down, enemy countries do not compete with each other. ’

The general meaning of this passage is that there was no moral war in the Spring and Autumn Period. At most, this country may be a little better than that......

There have been various commentaries on how to understand this passage of Mencius.

Sun Tzu pointed out at the beginning of "The Art of War" that "the soldier is the major affairs of the country." The land of death and life, the way of survival, must not be overlooked. ”

Fanning thought of Zhu Xi's understanding of this passage in the "Notes on the Four Books".

In the "Spring and Autumn Period", every book on the war of the princes will be ridiculed, and there is no one who agrees to it for the crime of being reckless. But there are those who are good at this, such as the teacher who summons the tomb.

However, from Fanning's personal attitude, he did not agree with Mencius's words.

Without the melee of the Spring and Autumn Period, how could there be the Seven Heroes of the Warring States? Without the Seven Heroes of the Warring States, how could there be the unification of the Qin Dynasty? Without the foundation of great unification, how can there be another rise of China?

History has its own laws, if everyone abides by righteousness without fighting, and the vassal states maintain peace for 2,000 years, then China in the future will be a plate of scattered sand.

From the perspective of historical materialism, it is true that the Spring and Autumn Period did not fight a righteous war, but this kind of war was necessary.

Disapproval is disapproval, but Fanning still has to follow the general righteousness and write an argumentative essay that will give him a high score.

This essay Fanning has been preparing for a long time, and after a little hesitation, Fanning wrote his argumentative essay on manuscript paper.

Although the argumentative essays of the Song Dynasty were not as rigid as the Baguwen of the Ming and Qing dynasties, in the imperial examinations, they generally opened with a clear meaning and directly stated their own views.

There is no way to do this, the examiner has to face thousands of papers, and generally will not have too much patience to help you carefully scrutinize, and generally see half of it, the examinee is still rambling and does not know what to do, and this kind of file will be directly sentenced to death.

It is necessary to catch the eye of the inquisitor in the first two or three sentences.

Fan Ning had prepared at least three plans before, and he had never been able to make up his mind, and at this moment he finally decided to use Zhu Xi's annotation as his beginning.

"Spring and Autumn Unrighteous War"

In the "Spring and Autumn Period", every book on the war of the princes will be ridiculed, and there is no one who agrees to it for the crime of being reckless.

But there are those who are good at this, such as the teacher who summons the tomb.

The so-called righteous fighters must use the orders of the Son of Heaven, and if the enemy countries fight, there will be no king.

What is the meaning of being called a teacher?

This "Spring and Autumn" respects the meaning of the king, and Mencius states that it is the edict of the world.

Gai said, what is the husband "Spring and Autumn", the husband "Spring and Autumn" fake Lu history to allude to the king's law, to set aside the troubled times and the opposite, just like this.

．．．．．．．．．

Fan Ning wrote more than 1,500 words in one go, stopped writing, he estimated the time, and it only took half an hour, which made Fan Ning quite proud.

But it's just creativity in one go, and to write a good article, you must constantly revise, refine, and temper it to succeed.

Fanning sank down again, and began to scrutinize word by word.

．．．．．．．

'When! While! While! ’

The bell rang, the time for the lunch break came, and the soldiers began to distribute lunch to each room.

Lunch is very simple, two shredded radish steamed buns per person, and a bowl of vegetable soup.

This is also the most criticized part of the examination institute, this lunch is sold for a maximum of eight cents, even if it is three meals, it is only more than 20 cents, but the examination institute actually charges 100 cents per person for lunch.

Inevitably, the sacred imperial examination was also stained with a hint of copper.

Noon is also the time when the bell of the candidates is not restricted, and the bell of the exam number is constantly ringing, asking to go to the toilet.

The invigilator watched with a blank face as students entered and exited with each test number.

At this moment, the bell of the twenty-fourth rang, and a soldier ran over, and after a while, the soldier ran to the invigilator and whispered, "Please go and see the examiner!" ”

The invigilator frowned, what is the problem, the paper is not enough, or the pen and ink are insufficient?

He walked quickly to the door of the 24th exam, only to see that the candidates inside were carefully pasting their names one by one with a paste note.

"What are you going to do?" The invigilator asked, a little upset.

"Enlighten the examiner, the student requests to hand in the paper!"

"Submit the papers?"

The invigilator was stunned for a moment, "Is it too early to hand in the papers?" ”

Fan Ning said lightly: "The student has already finished it, and has been waiting for noon, and now it should be able to hand in the papers." ”

When the bell rings during the lunch break, it is noon, and according to the regulations, students can hand in their papers after noon.

In fact, by noon, three hours had passed since the exam, and there was still one hour to end, and the handing in of the papers had little impact at this time.

The invigilator nodded, "Wait a minute, I'll collect the papers after the lunch break!" ”

The lunch break was only a quarter of an hour, and soon the alley was quiet, and the students quickly finished their lunch and began to write hard, and less than an hour before they handed in their papers, everyone began to feel anxious.

Only then did the invigilator come to the No. 24 examination room with his hands behind his back, and slowly swallowed Fanning: "I'll give you another chance, you can withdraw your request to submit the paper!" ”

Fanning handed the paper to the examiner and said calmly: "The student has checked it and confirmed to hand in the paper!" ”

"Okay!"

The invigilator took the test paper and the manuscript and dodged a way, "You can leave, try to be quiet, and don't disturb others." ”

Fanning put the kettle on his back, took the floating ticket and the exam card, quickly walked out of the exam number, and walked briskly towards the gate.

The invigilator looked at the background of Fan Ning's departure, shook his head secretly, and looked at his roll number again, Ding Liuqisan, it turned out to be a candidate for the children's examination.

The invigilator was a little interested, and began to peruse Fanning's argumentative essay, and after only a few sentences, he was attracted and couldn't help but read it carefully......

Fanning was not the first scholar to finish the exam, he walked to the door of the examination hall and just saw two students walking out of the door.

He knew both of them, both of them were candidates for the Changzhou County Boys' Examination, one was Jiang Feng, and the other was Yao Xi, but he didn't expect them to submit their papers early.

Fan Ning walked out of the gate, and Zhao Xiuwen, who was waiting outside the gate, was stunned for a moment, he had just seen Jiang Feng and Yao Xi come out, and Guo Yun went up to question them with an angry face.

I didn't expect Fan Ning to come out too, you must know that Fan Ning is his most valued student, and he is also the only hope for Wu County this time.

The boy test is not the same as the ordinary adult imperial examination, the boy test is not only the glory of the scholars themselves, it also represents the young students of a county, is the county scholar recommended by the government, and is the direct embodiment of the officials in the follow-up talent training.

It can be said that Fan Ning influenced the county magistrate Gao Fei and the county magistrate Yang Han to a certain extent, but such a county magistrate who made Zhao Xiuwen look forward to it infinitely turned in the papers an hour ahead of schedule.

Rao is Zhao Xiuwen is cultivation is very good, but he finally couldn't help it, and hurriedly stepped forward and asked, "Fan Ning, what's the matter, why do you hand in the file now?" ”