"How's the sprouts growing?"

In the palace, Empress Xu was annoyed by Zhu Di's same question.

"Your Majesty, why have you been paying attention to those sprouts for the past two days?"

Zhu Di refused the service of the palace maid, and he was wearing Yanju regular clothes, and said to Queen Xu on the couch behind him while wearing them.

"Secret, I'll tell you when I succeed."

After a short time, the maid who had been sent out to see the sprouts growing, returned.

"Your Majesty, the two sides are almost the same, there are no visible changes."

Zhu Di sighed lightly when he heard this, but he didn't say anything.

"Is Your Majesty going to the Cabinet?" Empress Xu got up and asked in a disorganized manner.

"Don't go to the cabinet." Zhu Di put on his rhino belt and said, "I went to the Great Heavenly Realm Temple and heard that the old monk has recently stabilized his madness. ”

Queen Xu muttered: "At such a big age, they are almost seventy years old, and they are still thinking about new knowledge every day, and everyone will be crazy." ”

"Hmph, after more than 20 years of suffering, the old monk is not kind to me, can I still be unjust to him?" According to the usual practice, Zhu Di inserted a meat-cutting dagger in the leaves of his cowhide boots that had been used for many years, "I will treat him as a madman, and bring some vegetables and fruits to condole. If I don't go to see it today, I'll have to wait until I return to Nanjing. ”

Empress Xu was silent for a moment, but she didn't say anything, just tidied up her husband's clothes, just like before every expedition.

It's just that in the end, I couldn't help but ask.

"If you are in the mu, do you have to bring the troops to Your Majesty personally?"

Zhu Di lowered his head and said seriously: "You know my habits. ”

"Either you don't do it, or you don't do it."

Great Heavenly Realm Temple.

The smell of autumn is already wafting through this tranquil temple.

The small novices sweeping the autumn leaves that are beginning to fall with large brooms, the old monks' clothes that are tighter than usual, and the pious expressions of the nearby farmers who come to pray for the autumn harvest all show that autumn is really coming.

"Tuk~"

Zhu Di, who was wearing a black robe, walked slowly to the door and knocked on the door, and in the other hand he personally carried a basket of fresh fruits and vegetables, which was also decorated with a bunch of red and white wild chrysanthemums, which was obviously the handiwork of Empress Xu.

Several passing monks saluted respectfully to His Majesty the Emperor, and in the past few months since Zhu Di ascended the throne, the situation of Buddhism and Taoism being suppressed in the Jianwen Dynasty has improved significantly.

The most intuitive. It's that the incense money began to gradually increase.

No one opened the door, so Zhu Di pushed the door directly and entered.

See the Buddha statue in the room.

Zhu Di saluted the Buddha with a gentle smile on his face, and inserted the bright bouquet in his hand into the incense burner ash in front of him with a powerful knuckle.

"I'll just say, it's not good for a big man to bring this when he meets, and give it to the Buddha and his old man, and my heart will be at ease immediately." Zhu Di thought to himself.

Looking at the neat and unmanned Zen room, Zhu Di raised his voice to the study.

"Old monk, are you still alive?"

"Thanks to Your Majesty's concern, I am still alive."

Zhu Di pulled the inner sliding screen, and then walked in.

The study room is full of all kinds of books like a hill, Buddhist scriptures, Taoist collections, Confucius and Mencius doctrines. The whole nine yards.

But none of these seemed to be looked at by Dao Yan.

In Dao Yan's eyes, there was only a letter on the bookcase, pressed on both ends with a green jade paperweight.

"Why didn't you call the 'bloodsucker' today?"

Zhu Di put the basket of fruits and vegetables in his hand on the cabinet at the door of the study and walked towards Daoyan's position.

"Your Majesty is the true dragon emperor, how can he be a bloodsucker? Who said His Majesty is a bloodsucker? The old man immediately went to argue with him. ”

Dao Yan looked up and smiled, looking much more normal.

Zhu Di sneered and said: "I killed this throne from the battlefield with a knife and a gun, even if it is a bloodsucker, it is also a joke and thirsty old monk who drinks the blood of the enemy himself, what do you want to understand?" ”

Dao Yan did not directly answer Zhu Di's question, but talked about a few small things.

"Your Majesty should still remember that two months ago, Lao Gao returned to his hometown in Changzhou County (belonging to Suzhou Prefecture)."

Zhu Di bowed slightly, signaling him to remember.

"Alas"

Dao Yan sighed and said, "That old sister is over seventy years old. ”

"Is my husband still alive? But do you want to make a commandment? Zhu Di didn't care, "What kind of official position and edict do you want, just write it yourself and hand it over to me." ”

"That's not what it meant."

Dao Yan shook his head and said: "On the way home, Lao Qu heard the children in Suzhou Mansion on the side of the road, all singing nursery rhymes on the road - Yan Nanfei, the country is in chaos, the people are suffering, who is sad." ”

Zhu Di sneered.

"The old sister didn't let me enter the house, scolded me for being a rebel and thief, and scolded me back."

"The old man went to see his old friend Wang Bin, but he refused to see me, only saying that the monk was wrong, and the monk was wrong."

The new rosary in Dao Yan's hand kept turning: "Your Majesty knows, what does the old man mean by what he wants to say?" ”

"Jiangnan gentry, the hard ones can't play with me, and they start to play the soft ones."

Zhu Di's gaze became extremely gloomy and cold, as if he was about to condense ice flowers.

The gentry class in the south of the Yangtze River, who controlled the discourse in most cities and villages, obeyed Zhu Di on the surface, but behind the scenes, they used nursery rhymes, scripts and other literary obscure methods to slander and insult Zhu Di, so as to belittle the legitimacy of Zhu Di's rule.

This is Zhu Di's most helpless situation.

Because of his always invincible blade, it can't be solved.

This is a battle outside the battlefield without gunpowder.

This is

- The Battle After the War!

Zhu Di can kill the civil official agents launched by the Jiangnan gentry, and the people are rolling, and they can punish the ten clans of Fang Xiaoru to cut off the seeds of reading, and Zhu Di can kill whoever he wants.

However, can Zhu Di kill all the Jiangnan scholars?

As long as the Jiangnan scholars who cultivate and read the heirloom can't be killed, Zhu Di will always face this problem.

Literati don't use knives to kill people, and they can slander your reputation and your military exploits behind your back.

What will be written in the history books of later generations?

The battle of Jingyan is not that you Zhu Di is powerful.

is because after the famous general, Li Jinglong is a waste on paper.

It's because every time you fight, there is a gust of wind to help you.

It's because Lord Hongwu has already colluded.

In short, it's not that you're amazing.

Zhu Di looked up at his black-clothed prime minister.

"Old monk, what do you think should be done?"

Dao Yan didn't answer directly, but asked: "Your Majesty plans to personally lead the heavy troops to the Susongjiahu Prefecture this time to implement the apportionment into the mu, is it intended to suppress the opposition of the Jiangnan gentry by force?" ”

Zhu Di has no need to hide it, as an emperor in this world, he is the only person who can be called a "friend".

Zhu Di replied in the affirmative.

"Yes, whether it is cutting the feudal domain or apportioning the army into the mu, my ultimate goal is to clear the internal opposition forces, first sit on the throne, and then try to move the capital and conquer Mobei."

"My knife is going to kill people in Susongjia Lake, and the blood is flowing like a river!"

Dao Yan suddenly asked, "What if Su Songjiahu is extremely cooperative this time?" ”

"That's not more." Zhu Di suddenly came to his senses.

"Are you saying that the Jiangnan gentry will cooperate on the surface and avoid my edge, and what should they do when my soldiers are gone, and they will continue to slander me with soft knives?"

Dao Yan nodded and said, "Yes, what should Your Majesty do in this situation?" ”

"That's the question I just asked you." Zhu Di didn't hide his emotions too much, and said unhappily.

Dao Yan was not annoyed, smiled and pointed to the other end of the bookcase, on which a towel was placed, and there were many neat stacks of manuscripts in the towels.

Zhu Di picked up the manuscript from the towel and flipped through the first few pages.

"When Yu Xi was a monk, he was in turmoil. Nearly 30 years old, from the Yu'an and monks in Jingshan to learn Zen, in his spare time to read internal and external classics, to knowledge. The testament of Mr. Ercheng of Henan Province, and the quotations of Mr. Xin'an Huian (Zhu Xi). ”

"The three gentlemen were all born in Zhao Song, and they passed on the learning that the saints have not passed on for thousands of years, which can be described as the heroes of the world, and the true Confucianism of the world. Mr. Three because of the auxiliary teaching, but to rebuke the Buddha and the old as the heart. The Tao is different, not conspiring with each other, ancient and modern, ridiculous! ”

"Mr. San, who is the patriarch of Sven and the teacher of later learning, although he rebukes the Buddha and the old, he must be selfless and selfless, and the people are convinced. Mr. Three because he didn't explore much Buddhist books and didn't know the essence of Buddha, he made evil words with his private intentions, which was too vain, and the hearts of the people in the world were also uneven. ”

This is a manuscript called "Dao Yu Lu", Dao Yan believes that in the science system constructed by Ercheng (Cheng Hao, Cheng Yi) and Zhu Xi of the Southern Song Dynasty, he mostly reprimanded the Buddha with his own selfish intentions, so he listed 28 articles in Ercheng's suicide note and 21 articles in Zhu Xi's quotations to refute them one by one.

Zhu Di thought thoughtfully: "So you plan to use this way to fight against science ideologically?" ”

"I used to think so, but now I think this method is really unacceptable." Dao Yan said honestly.

Zhu Di smiled and said, "Debating with a dead person who can't talk back, it's really not on the table." ”

"But now there's this."

Following Dao Yan's gaze, Zhu Di looked at the letter that was pressed on the desk by Qingyu's paperweight.

"What is this?" Zhu Di asked curiously.

"It's something to argue with a living person who can talk back."

Dao Yan pushed away the Qingyu paperweight, shook the letter paper, and his eyes were extremely focused.

"Your Majesty knows that with this thing, Lao Wei will be able to dig up a corner of Cheng Zhu Lixue's sky-high building."

"What's written on this letter?"

Zhu Di asked in disbelief.

Dao Yan handed the letter to Zhu Di.

Zhu Di pinched the letter paper and read it carefully.

Later, it was returned to Daoyan.

"Your Majesty understands?"

"Do you think I seem to understand?" Zhu Di asked rhetorically with a calm face.

Dao Yan laughed and explained to Zhu Di in detail the meaning of this letter.

Zhu Di didn't pay too much attention to the specific content of Dao Yan's explanation, but he was keenly aware of the effect that this letter could have.

This is an excellent weapon to suppress the Jiangnan gentry!

"Who wrote this letter?" Zhu Di asked.

"Jiang Sheng."

Hearing this answer, Zhu Di's heart was not turbulent, and he was no longer shocked.

For Jiang Xinghuo, an all-rounder who knows everything about astronomy, geography, history, politics, and philosophy, you just treat him as an immortal, since he is not a mortal, it is naturally shocking for a mortal to behave like this, but if the other party is an immortal in your mind, then what is there to be shocked about?

Zhu Di turned his attention to the effect of the letter.

"Are you saying that as long as it can be proved that Cheng Zhu Lixue's insistence on the theory of human nature is wrong, then Cheng Zhu Lixue's set of 'preserving heavenly principles and destroying human desires' can be systematically overturned? So on the ideological level, completely overwhelm this set of things of the Jiangnan gentry? ”

"Exactly." Dao Yan twisted beads and smiled.

Then Dao Yan added: "Of course, the academic battle and even the battle of Taoism are certainly not a simple victory with a letter, and the development of Cheng Zhu Lixue for hundreds of years is by no means something that can be easily shaken overnight, but this is a beginning. As long as there is this beginning as an introduction to arouse people's ideological doubts, it can naturally serve the purpose of attacking Cheng Zhu Lixue. ”

"That's not right." Zhu Di frowned suddenly and said.

"What's wrong?"

Zhu Di pondered his thoughts and said, "Why did I attack Cheng Zhu Lixue? ”

"It's the Jiangnan gentry who believe in this, but now after all, I am the emperor, the king is the minister, the father is the son, and the husband is the wife. I am the monarch's father, and I am the biggest beneficiary of Cheng Zhu's science. ”

"Nope."

Dao Yan put down the letterhead, pressed it with the green jade paperweight again, and turned his head to say.

"Your Majesty, you misunderstood."

"The purpose of attacking Cheng Zhu Lixue has never been to suppress the Jiangnan gentry class, from a higher point of view, what are the Jiangnan gentry? At best, it's just a bed bug, and it really can't be completely killed, and it will dirty your hands, but if you don't fight, it will dangle in front of you and disgust you. ”

"The suppression of the Jiangnan gentry class is only incidental, and the fundamental purpose of attacking Cheng Zhu Lixue is to centralize power!"

Zhu Di frowned: "Centralization? ”

"Not bad." Dao Yan said loudly, "The Jiangnan gentry class in the Ming Dynasty is actually the Jiangnan Shidafu Group, which was formed after the establishment of Yannan Crossing and is located in a corner of the country. ”

"In fact, after the Jin Dynasty crossed to the south, the same thing was formed, and that is - the gate valve!"

"Whether it is a gate valve or a scholar, they hold a group to grasp the right to speak and grasp the cultural inheritance, the purpose is to divide power and divide power from the hands of the emperor!"

Zhu Di blurted out.

"The king and the horse, the world!"

"The Son of Heaven and the scholars rule the world together!"

Dao Yan nodded, and then said: "Then Your Majesty, imagine what kind of authority can you share the world with the emperor, whether it is a gate valve or a scholar?" ”

"Is it military?"

Zhu Di shook his head.

Since the Jingnan army was raised, those literati of the Jianwen Dynasty were busy except blindly commanding, or they were the captains of the transportation brigades according to the soldiers' calligraphy and drawings, and lined up the two supply lines of the Southern Army, the Jianghuai-Dezhou Battalion and the Henan-Zhending Battalion, into a long snake formation for him, without any military contributions.

"Is it backbone?"

How good the Jiangnan is, it has been proved from the Hou Jing Rebellion, excluding individual cases, on the whole, the Jiangnan literati have a fart backbone.

"Is that money?"

Zhu Di was too lazy to shake his head, the gentry in Jiangnan were rich, but compared with other places in the world, there was no absolute overwhelming advantage. Directly said: "It's culture!" ”

"That's exactly what it is, it's culture." Dao Yan said, "It is precisely because the gate lords, scholars, and gentry have mastered culture, which is far superior to military, backbone, and money in peacetime, that they have the right to speak, and they even dare to discredit the emperor, and the emperor has nothing to do with them." ”

Dao Yan stood up from behind the desk and paced in the study.

"Therefore, if you want to attack the discourse power of the Jiangnan gentry, you must defeat the theory that they have the right to speak - Cheng Zhu Lixue!"

"Of course, it is not necessarily a complete denial of the defeat of Cheng Zhu Lixue, but just that Cheng Zhu Lixue no longer occupies a completely overwhelming position."

"In this way, won't the Jiangnan gentry lose their most powerful weapon?"

"Without this foundation for controlling public opinion in the world and losing the absolute right to speak, they have no ability to threaten the imperial power."

"In this way, Your Majesty will be able to allow all kinds of ideas to play, confront and debate each other, so as to achieve the goal of centralizing power."

"This is the same reason as going to the sea with the vassals and nobles."

Zhu Di bowed his head, he already understood what Dao Yan meant.

"And when are you going to start acting?"

"Wait." Dao Yan lowered his eyes and said, "Relying on this letter alone, Lao Wei has no certainty, and Jiang Sheng still needs to answer more questions from Lao Gao, Lao Gao only needs to figure out a few key issues that affect the foundation of Cheng Zhu Lixue, and then he can launch the first attack on Cheng Zhu Lixue." ”

"Moreover, Lao Wei also needs His Majesty to use the heads of the Jiangnan gentry first to shock people's hearts."

"If you have a knife in your hand, you can use it when you need to, so why should you reason with them fairly?"

Zhu Di agreed with this statement, and immediately asked: "Zhang Tianshi of Longhu Mountain is now in Nanjing City, if you want to provoke public opinion at that time, do you need the help of Daomen?" ”

"Absolutely."

Dao Yan said seriously: "When the Jianwen Dynasty was built, Daomen was also seriously suppressed, and Zhang Yuchu was even forced by Qi Tai and Huang Zicheng to have a home and not be able to go back, so he could only settle down and live more than ten miles away from Longhu Mountain, Your Majesty thinks that Zhang Yuchu doesn't hate these Jiangnan gentry?" Or did he say that as the most knowledgeable celestial master in the history of the Daomen, he didn't want to elevate the status of the Daomen? ”

"Everyone hates anyone, as for whether he can elevate the status of the Daomen, it depends on his own ability." Zhu Di said undeniably.

"This is the new dispute between the three religions, I am afraid that it will set off a monstrous wave in the hearts of the world."

"The more chaotic, the better." Zhu Di couldn't wait to see it happen, "This is completely opposite to the threat of various forces to my throne, and they are in turmoil, which is beneficial to me." ”

"That's true." Dao Yan agreed.

"Then wait for the good news that Your Majesty has cleared up Jiangnan Buchen."

Zhu Di smiled, taking the opportunity of implementing the apportionment into the mu to clean up the forces in Jiangnan that refused to submit to him, it was indeed a good opportunity.

Moreover, if it is said that the service into the mu is the first axe.

Then after the end of Jiangnan's autumn harvest into the mu, the second axe will be swung by Dao Yan.

In this way, the Jiangnan gentry class, which is very hostile to itself and has been constantly slandering itself since the beginning of the Jingnan, will inevitably suffer a great blow.

This is equivalent to using Jiang Xinghuo's strategy of cutting the domain to the foreign first, taking back the military power of the three guards of the vassal king, and solving the threat to his throne within the clan.

Subsequently, on the one hand, he hit the gentry class in Jiangnan with the use of apportionment into the mu, and on the other hand, he won the hearts of the people.

As the gathering place of Jianwen's remnants and the largest territory of Jianwen's diehard loyalists, it was completely purged, and Zhu Di's rule was further consolidated.

The two then exchanged for a while, and Zhu Di got up to leave, after experiencing the rebellion of the king of the valley, he planned to leave Nanjing City after arranging all the affairs.

(End of chapter)