Liu Hong continued: "So I asked Cao Jie, how can I restrain the family? Cao Jie told me that what these families crave most is an official position, and what they are most afraid of losing is also an official position. He also said that the reason why Emperor Xiaohuan launched the party rebellion was because he saw the same truth as I saw. But Emperor Xiaohuan was not ruthless enough, so that Huangfu Gui and Chen Fan all opposed it. So I adopted Cao Jie's view and launched a larger-scale party rebellion. ”

Ma Chao asked again: "Then Your Majesty, how is the effect?" ”

Liu Hong sighed and said helplessly: "The effect can be said to be exciting, or it can be said to be disappointing." ”

Ma Chao was very surprised and asked, "What do you mean by this?" ”

Liu Hong showed a more helpless look on his face, he said: "After the party's resignation, the effect is really remarkable. Dou Wu and Chen Fan, who have been above me for a long time, died, and Du Mi and Li Ying, who had bewitched the public, also died. Nearly 1,000 people were imprisoned, and dozens of wealthy families were wiped out; The children of their families are also confined to their homes and are not allowed to be officials. The imprisoned wealthy clans have greatly reduced their power and are still weakened to this day; The other wealthy families who did not participate in the formation of the party trembled and were silent. I thought they would be relented by this, but it didn't take long for someone to jump out again. I simply extended the scope of the confinement to the five clans, and let them reap the consequences. Until now, they have not recovered. ”

In the end, Liu Hong had an extremely happy smile on his face, and he was even so happy that he crossed Erlang's legs and reclined on the seat.

Ma Chao was even more puzzled and asked: "If this is the case, then why do you say it is disappointing?" ”

As soon as Liu Hong heard this, Fu became lost again, he silently put down Erlang's legs, sat up straight again, and said: "Although it is true that the imprisonment has greatly reduced their control over the court and the locality, it cannot completely solve the problem of the family's power. At the time of imprisonment, it aroused their strong resistance, but prompted them to form a party more frequently and strongly. This is also the second. Later, Zhang Jiao rebelled, and I feared that these damned party members would also be involved, so I had to exempt people who were related to the party members and those who were not related to the party, which was tantamount to loosening the noose around their necks. This is also the third. ”

After listening to this, Ma Chao also had to sigh with emotion. It turned out that the disaster of the party was due to the fact that the two generations of emperors of Emperor Huan of Han and Emperor Ling of Han were soberly aware of the expansion of the power of the family and deliberately attacked them. Instead of the eunuchs he thought were pretending to be imperial power to attack the party members who opposed them. However, Ma Chao also quickly figured out that the reason why the eunuchs were able to pretend to exercise imperial power was precisely because of the emperor's instructions; The eunuch is an extension of the imperial power and the emperor's loyal thug, and the party members are against the eunuchs, in fact, they are against the imperial power; The eunuch was just a shield for the imperial power, and Emperor Huan of Han and Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty used the eunuchs to cover up the truth of the game between the imperial power and the wealthy clans, making everything look like a battle between the eunuchs and the party. Maybe the wealthy people also know this, but they will not be stupid enough to pierce this layer of window paper and directly offend the imperial power.

Liu Hong said again: "Later, I thought about it for a long time before I came up with more ways to suppress the family. I knew that Taixue had become a hotbed for cultivating the children of the family, so I set up the Hongdu Gate School, under the banner of studying calligraphy and painting, to recruit the children of the poor to enroll, and to provide me with talents who could replace the children of the family, and has maintained the scale of thousands of people. I used them to fill key official positions such as Shizhong, Shangshu, Assassin Shi, and Taishou, so as to dilute the number of children of the family in the court and in the prefectures and counties. ”

After Ma Chao heard this, he was shocked like five thunderbolts. He didn't expect that Liu Hong's strategy had reached such a deep level. Because Ma Chao knew that Liu Hong had clearly seen that the reason why the family was powerful was because of the monopoly of the official election system. Taixue, conquest, filial piety, all let the family control. And Liu Hong came up with Hongdu Sect Learning, which is to draw a salary from the bottom of the kettle for the family, and his strategy is very clever.

Ma Chaowu was shocked, and Liu Hong said again: "I am also suffering from the fact that I can't really exclude them from the imperial court and the state and county, and the state taxes are shrinking year by year, so I simply sell the official mantle here in the West Garden." Anyway, they are the ones who will be the officials in the end, so they will simply let them bleed. They wanted to be the third duke, so they handed over ten thousand stones. Even if he is promoted normally, he must hand over money and food to the imperial court. So I had enough money and food to support the great war of pacifying the Yellow Turbans and the Northern Expedition to Xianbei. Otherwise, the imperial court would have collapsed long ago due to the depletion of financial resources, how could it be today? ”

Saying that, Liu Hong was even more helpless, and Jian Shuo and Liu Man on the side were also sullen.

Liu Hong suddenly stood up, walked to the tree and stood, turned his back to Ma Chao, sighed, and said in an extremely desolate voice: "I know that if the action is big and deep, it will definitely provoke their rebellion. That is a heavy blow that cannot be borne by the weak and powerless Han family world and the people of the world. Hanzuo has been around for 400 years, and it is not easy to inherit it. I dare not be cautious.

And the power of the imperial court has weakened a lot, and even if many things are done, it is difficult to succeed; There are still many things that will be obstructed by them in every way, and they will not be able to do it. I can only judge the situation and try to weaken them in ways that are difficult for them to perceive, within the limits of my ability. But in the end, I weakened them as quickly as they swelled, so that they have today. ”

Ma Chao thought for a moment, he suddenly stood up under the surprised gaze of Jian Shuo and Liu Man, walked to Liu Hong's side and stopped, looking at the sky in the distance just like him. Liu Hong was waiting for Ma Chao to speak. Ma Chao did not disappoint him, he said: "The minister is confident that he can clean up those families for His Majesty." ”

Liu Hong had a satisfied smile on his face, he turned his face to look at Ma Chao sideways, and asked, "Really?" ”

Ma Chao turned his face sideways and smiled confidently: "The minister has already planned properly, otherwise he would not have entered Beijing." ”

Liu Hong turned around and sat back in his seat and said, "Tell me, what do you plan to do?" ”

Ma Chao also came back and sat down, and he said: "After getting rid of He Jin, Your Majesty must take the minister as the prime minister and entrust him with full powers, so as to start implementing the minister's plan." The first step is to take the opportunity of reforming the official system to establish a system of three provinces and six ministries, and this system will be presented to His Majesty in the future. In short, taking advantage of the reform of the official system, on the one hand, he took the opportunity to install cronies, strengthen the control of the imperial court and prefectures and counties, and at the same time squeeze out some people from various families, either explicitly or covertly. In order not to startle the snake, some candidates can only be excluded, and the rest of the people will find a way to put them in the cabinet or leave them for future settlement. ”