Chapter 333: Even more powerful than our ancestors
Amid the cheers of the soldiers along the road and the people in Songshan Fort, Zhang Cheng followed behind Hong Chengchou, the governor of Jiliao, and walked into Jianwu Gate in the south of Songshan.
Only Qiu Minyang, the governor of Liaodong, and Zhang Ruoqi, the commander-in-chief of the army, accompanied him and Wu Sangui into the city, while other officials such as Bingxian Zhang Dou, Inspector Yao Gong and others could only follow Zhang Cheng and others.
Not to mention Chen Jiugao, Wang Pu and other generals, regardless of which town's general you are, you are actually nothing in front of these civil servants.
Not to mention the governor, the governor and other serious court officials, even the military commander, procuratorate, and supervisory officials would not look directly at them. Let's talk about those officials such as general magistrates, grain supervisors, supervisors, and magistrates in front of them.
They all feel that they are superior to others.
Of course, there are some exceptions to this, such as Zhang Cheng, who would not be like this in front of them. This is of course because he has a strong army at his disposal, is famous for his military exploits, and has backing in both the palace and the court.
Furthermore, as a time traveler, Zhang Cheng has no fear of civil servants in his bones, because he is not a warrior born and raised in this world. He neither understands the horror of using civil servants to control military power, nor has he ever seen civil servants.
How terrifying.
The reason why Zhang Cheng still showed great respect for civil servants was, firstly, to do as the locals do, secondly, to hide his ambitions, and most importantly, thirdly, to win over those lower-level literati.
After all, as a time traveler, he knows the importance of talents to a military group, and he also understands the principle that knowledge is power.
Although we do not rule out the possibility that illiterate soldiers will not become good generals, even if they become talented in actual combat, their future achievements will be extremely limited.
What Zhang Cheng wants is a partner who can go hand in hand with him, rather than a pure general who knows how to kill. Of course, he is not disgusted with such a loyal general. It is precisely the existence of such a general that can ensure his foundation.
Stable as Mount Tai.
But in addition, Zhang Cheng needs someone to advise him, organize documents for him, manage local civil affairs for him, manage money, food, military resources and other miscellaneous matters for him.
Therefore, he vigorously promoted literacy classes in the army and under his rule. Especially in the army, it was stipulated that military officers above the rank of Jia commander must achieve a certain amount of literacy, in order to cultivate talents who are loyal to themselves and capable of literary and literary skills.
Wu's talents.
But even if they know a thousand words, or even thousands of words, there are still very few people who can truly enlighten themselves and master the secrets of how to govern the world.
But Zhang Cheng couldn't wait for them to grow up slowly, so he needed to try his best to win over the literati of this era, especially those lonely literati at the bottom.
They not only have real talents and knowledge, but also have nothing to do with the superstructure of this era, and all of them have the extravagant hope of changing their own destiny through knowledge.
Zhang Cheng wants to gradually strengthen his foundation and team by winning over them, and finally use them to replace those high-ranking officials who are in high positions but have no job.
He wanted to use this to complete social transformation, renew the atmosphere of the new empire, and use a group of vigorous new aristocrats to drive the empire to new glory.
Of course, for those die-hards with strong vested interests, Zhang Cheng does not want to knock them all down with one blow. He will win over a group of wise people, knock down a group of die-hards, and scare a group of those who are waiting and watching.
This will be enough to speed up your future steps and successfully fulfill your ambition!
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In fact, Zhang Cheng also knows in his heart that this method cannot completely complete the real social structural adjustment. Hundreds of years later, or even more than a hundred years later, new vested interest groups will be formed, and the social classes will also be reconfigured.
solidify.
Zhang Cheng is naturally very aware of all this, but looking at the history of various dynasties in ancient and modern times, apart from the corpses littering the fields and the displacement of the people, is there any time when the wealthy families did not benefit in the end?
After all, in this world where imperial power does not go to the countryside, ordinary people can only see local gentry. Therefore, many successful people in history were able to achieve their final glory precisely because they united the vast number of lower-class gentry.
Without exception, Zhang Cheng also chose this shortcut to success. The reason why he made this choice was not because he was afraid of the power of the gentry clan, but because he wanted to unite the lower gentry to defeat the upper gentry.
In this way, we can inject fresh blood into the empire, change the empire's already rigid political system, and give this sluggish empire a shot in the arm, turning it into a powerful empire with a spirit of adventure and expansion.
After all, the current era does not yet have the conditions to transform the entire social class, if the form of social transformation of later generations is forcibly copied.
Let’s not talk about whether this approach can be successful. Let’s just say that the social changes caused by this will definitely exceed any previous dynasty changes. It will also make ordinary people confused and cause great social unrest.
There is reason to believe that such social changes, under the resistance of the gentry who control the lower class's voice, will definitely cause great social panic, and will fail in the full counterattack of the gentry class.
As a latecomer who has seen the world, Zhang Cheng clearly knows what "taking advantage of the situation" and "step-by-step" mean. He will not mechanically copy the methods and methods of social transformation in later generations, because that is different from this social foundation that does not yet have the foundation for complete change.
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There is no distinction between high and low methods of social change. There is only a question of whether it is consistent with the current social process. As long as it is a change method that matches the current society, it is the most correct.
Zhang Cheng firmly believes that in this historical period, the influence of the gentry class on the people at the bottom has not been eradicated. After all, there are not many literate people, and the imperial decrees often rely on the gentry to help convey and lead them.
Local people completed it.
Over time, local "Tu emperors" were formed. They almost completely controlled all local resources, and even the county magistrates appointed by the imperial court did not dare to offend them easily.
In fact, in the early years of the Ming Dynasty, because the previous Yuan Dynasty's management of basic administration was very extensive, and there were various small interest groups in the local areas, it was difficult for the central government's orders to reach the local areas, and it was extremely difficult to implement the imperial decrees.
.
Therefore, he adjusted the organizational form below the county level. He used one hundred households as a statistical unit, called "li", and organized every ten households into an "A", and selected one household from among them to serve as a "li".
"Jiashou" serves as the manager of these ten households.
Then a "Li Chief" is selected from among them to be responsible for managing the ten "Heads" below. This Li Chief is directly responsible to the county government. His main tasks are to collect taxes and grains on behalf of the court, distribute labor, and
To adjudicate civil disputes and disputes.
The most critical part of the system designed by Zhu Yuanzhang is that both the "head of the first class" and the "chief of the district" are neither appointed by the imperial government nor directly selected from the grassroots level, but a rotation system is implemented.
Among these one hundred households, they were ranked in order according to the amount of grain they needed to pay to the court, and the top ten households among them took turns to serve as "liang chief". The term of each household was one year, and "managed".
Take a photo of something within a mile."
In each A, one person is elected as the "Head of A" based on the amount of grain that needs to be paid, and their term is also one year.
Previously, common tasks such as paying taxes were completed by local wealthy households and gentry. This made it easy for a certain family to become bigger and stronger in the local area, thus creating a local "local emperor".
But now the lijia system designed by Zhu Yuanzhang implements the method of "the emperor takes turns to sit and come to my house next year". Ten people with more dingliang will have the opportunity to control this power. A small li can be said to be "the rise of princes".
Naturally, this can prevent one company from becoming the dominant one and eventually being the last one.
This is like cutting a cake. It turns out that the "knife" is always in the hands of one person, and everyone has to obey him. He naturally has the greatest power. Over time, everyone becomes accustomed to it, and they will naturally obey him absolutely.
But the current situation is that several people have a knife in their hands, and everyone has the opportunity to go up and cut it, so the authority of the person who was specifically responsible for cutting the cake is naturally not as good as before.
Moreover, mutual competition will naturally lead to mutual supervision and mutual restriction, so this greatly avoids the situation of one company becoming dominant.
The essence of this system is that while transferring the power of the imperial court to the grassroots Lijia, it also makes further subdivisions to ensure that power will not always be concentrated in the hands of a few people.
This move seems to make grassroots governance more decentralized, but in fact it further weakens the power of the grassroots gentry over the central government due to the "leaderless" situation, and instead strengthens the authority of the central court.
In fact, the so-called "imperial power does not go to the countryside" does not mean that the imperial power cannot control the people at the lowest level, but that it is necessary for the imperial power to control the lowest level, or whether it is worth spending more manpower and material resources to do so.
Do this.
Why do you say that?
Because if the imperial power is completely extended to every corner of the bottom of society, it will inevitably incur extremely huge management costs. Taking a country of the size of the Ming Dynasty as an example, as a ruler, you must consider a "cost and benefit"
question.
Furthermore, officials who implemented the power of the imperial court on behalf of the emperor would inevitably have some kind of collusion with local forces, thus forming an interest group that opposed the central court.
Therefore, the issue of "imperial power not going to the countryside" cannot simply be discussed in terms of "going to the countryside" or "not going to the countryside."
It is actually not a question of "yes or no", but a question of degree. It explores how much autonomy the central government has transferred to local governments.
At this point, the degree of each dynasty is different. If there are few transfers, such as the Qin Dynasty, the central government will pay huge management costs, and the grassroots will be exhausted under the power of the imperial power; while if there are many transfers, such as the Han Dynasty, then
It is easy for local governments to become powerful and form interest groups that oppose imperial power.
According to the current institutional form of the Ming Dynasty, it is actually very adaptable to the current social development process. However, with the solidification of classes, vested interest groups gradually began to control local places. This situation was especially obvious at the end of the dynasty.
What Zhang Cheng wants is to get rid of the current interest groups and use the newly born noble groups to redistribute social resources so that the dynasty can continue.
And inject the spirit of adventure and expansion into this dynasty, so that it can maintain contact with the world, walk out of a different world in the torrent of history, and become a leader among the world's nations.
As for whether this dynasty will become the best in the world in the future, it is not something he can imagine now!
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People around started talking about which general walking behind Governor Hong Chengchou could actually be accompanied by Qiu Futai himself.
Naturally, they were familiar with Wu Sangui, and soon some of them recognized him and commented: "Look, it's General Wu from Ningyuan. He's the nephew of our ancestral commander and a student of Governor Hong..."
"Which general is that over there? He seems to be younger and more handsome than General Wu..."
"I heard that the Xuanfu army has repeatedly performed extraordinary feats. First, they killed the Tatar Prince Duduo of Henan, and then they defeated the Tatars and solved the siege of Jinzhou. Could that be the chief military officer of the Xuanfu army?"
"Yes, it must be General Zhang of the Xuanfu. I heard that this General Zhang killed Tatars a few years ago, and he is the two sons of Dabeile Daishan..."
"Yes...yes...even the two Tatars, Ma Zhan and Yue Tuo, were killed by Marshal Zhang of Xuanfu. It's amazing...it's really amazing..."
"So... isn't it even more powerful than our great ancestor... At such a young age... he has such great achievements... I'm a good boy..."
Listening to the comments coming from the crowd around him, Wu Sangui didn't take it seriously at first, but the more he listened, the more uncomfortable he felt. He couldn't help but secretly hate himself for meeting Zhang Cheng on the way here.
After everyone entered Jianwu Gate, they walked all the way, and soon came to the governor's quarters on the north side of Songshan Fort. The place was decorated with red festoons everywhere, creating a festive atmosphere.
The incense burner, desk and other items have been set up in the hall. The eunuch Wang Chengen, the eunuch Wang Chengen and the eunuch Wang Chengen, are sitting in the Taishi chair on the left side chatting and drinking tea.
Zhang Cheng followed Governor Hong Chengchou. He quietly raised his eyes and looked up. He saw that the Founder-in-law was as white and beardless as Wang Chengen. Maybe it was because he was well-maintained, but he couldn't tell how old he was?
However, he is estimated to be around forty years old. His square face is slightly rounded, with a flushed face, and his complexion is very good. Sitting there, he looks a bit elegant.
As the officials and generals entered the hall one after another, Wang Chengen said to Fang Zhenghua: "Everyone has arrived. Eunuch Fang can read out the imperial edict."
Fang Zhenghua seemed to have great respect for Wang Chengen. He smiled modestly and said: "With the prince here, how can it be our turn to read out the imperial edict? Why should we ask the prince to do so?"