During the Jiaqing period, the Ming Dynasty's Gonggun princes finally gradually realized a serious reality, that is - the court's expenditure on supporting the vassal king was too huge, and the national treasury was already overburdened - so the famous "Zongfan Regulations" were introduced
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There are a total of sixty-seven articles in the "Regulations of the Domain", with three core contents. The first is to strictly control the number of wives and concubines of the feudal princes; the second is to improve the standards for conferring titles to the princes and younger brothers of the feudal lord; the third is to regulate the feudal princes' concubines.
Conduct financial accounting of the king's expenses, cut large amounts of useless expenses, and reduce the original salary amount.
Since then, the vassal kings have been strictly supervised from acquiring titles, granting land, to daily expenses. This temporarily suppressed the extravagant spending of the vassals, and also alleviated the court's need to support the vassal princes to a certain extent.
burden, releasing a certain amount of people's power.
However, although the policy exists, implementation is another matter.
In fact, after Emperor Jiaqing promulgated the "Zong-Fan Rules", the effect only lasted for a short period of time. The succeeding Ming Dynasty emperors quickly put the "Zong-Fans Rules" behind them and regarded them as nothing.
His own children and grandchildren were still extra generous when bestowing titles and fiefs, for fear that their fat-minded, ignorant and unskilled children and grandchildren would be wronged.
Take Emperor Wanli's fourth brother, King Lu Zhu Yiliu, as an example. When he granted the vassal status, he was rewarded with an area of land as high as 10,000 yuan. Later, he expanded the land under his name to 40,000 yuan by "complaining about King Jing's legacy".
It was so huge that it almost occupied all the fertile farmland in Huguang;
When King Fu Zhu Changxun was granted the title of vassal, Emperor Wanli directly granted 40,000 acres of fertile land with a stroke of his pen. In the end, King Fu himself was afraid of being the target of public criticism, so he took the initiative to ask for an order to reduce the amount by half.
During the Tianqi period, Emperor Tianqi granted 30,000 hectares of land each to King Hui, King Rui, and King Gui in Huguang, Shaanxi and other places. However, the local officials could no longer carve out so much land, so Emperor Tianqi ordered it to be allocated to Sichuan.
, Shanxi, Henan and other places.
In addition, the lords' annual salary and salary are astronomical figures. Their land annexation, tax evasion and other behaviors have greatly damaged the overall interests of the court. It can be seen that in order to support these moths, the court
It was already overwhelmed.
This phenomenon was not improved to a certain extent until Emperor Chongzhen of this world came to power. The financial pressure on the court and the severe burden on the people were slightly relieved.
After the current Emperor Deqing inherited the throne, he spent a lot of effort to reduce the support expenses of the vassals, which has been very effective over the years.
Secretly, the court officials and nobles, including Zhao Junchen, resented Emperor Deqing's stinginess and selfishness, and were often disturbed by Emperor Deqing's meanness and unkindness.
But objectively speaking, in terms of governing the country, Emperor Deqing's stingy selfishness, meanness and unkindness certainly chilled the hearts of his loyal ministers, but overall the benefits outweighed the disadvantages.
For example, precisely because of Emperor Deqing's stinginess and ruthlessness, he never cared about the friendship of the clan bloodline. Whenever his brothers and nephews established vassals, Emperor Deqing always behaved extremely stingy.
Not to mention that emperors such as Wanli and Tianqi frequently rewarded thousands of fertile fields. Even if they only rewarded two or three thousand hectares of fields, it would make him feel heartbroken. This undoubtedly slowed down the imperial court's support for the clan to a great extent.
Pressure increases.
At the same time, it was precisely because of Emperor Deqing's harshness and unkindness that he often took action to defeat and weaken the power of vassals in various places. Since Emperor Deqing came to the throne, the number of clan children imprisoned in Fengyang, the central capital, has increased significantly. It has more than doubled. Almost every year, a member of the royal family is deposed and imprisoned for some seemingly trivial offenses, and all their property is confiscated. The number of clan children who are ennobled every year is reduced by more than 30%, and then a lot. To a great extent, the relevant burden on the court was reduced.
Emperor Deqing not only treated the clan and vassal kings in this way, but also used even tougher methods when dealing with corrupt officials in the temple. For example, Wen Guanliang, Huang Yourong, Shen Changmao, etc. were all prominent officials in the past. They were powerful ministers for a while, but when they lost power and fell, they all shed several layers of skin and donated most of their wealth to Emperor Deqing before they could retire and return to their hometowns in peace.
Of course, these actions of Emperor Deqing were not out of public motives, but just to enrich the internal funds and make money for himself, but objectively they did play a positive role.
It can be said that Emperor Deqing was indeed very meritorious, greedy and had various shortcomings, but his ruthlessness in treating the clan and powerful officials was enough to rank his achievements quite high among the emperors of the Ming Dynasty. .
From Zhao Junchen's point of view, Emperor Deqing's harshness, ungratefulness, and ruthlessness were certainly his top-hanging sword, but if he were to deal with an emperor like Wanli and Tianqi, even if Zhao Junchen had the means to reach heaven, he would only I am afraid that I will not be able to improve the government's finances, and my political achievements will not be as indispensable as they are today.
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Under such a background, it is no wonder that after Prince Zhu Heyu launched an investigation into the crimes of Prince Fu's Mansion, he immediately caused an uproar in the clan.
Before that, Emperor Deqing had always adopted the method of boiling frogs in warm water when dealing with vassals from various places. He always attacked a very small number and preserved the majority. He first picked the soft persimmons and then gnawed the hard bones, using the sausage-slicing tactic bit by bit. To weaken the power and influence of the feudal kings and clans, the feudal kings and clans everywhere were in awe, but there was nothing they could do.
But this time, the scope of the attack by Prince Zhu Heyu was too wide, and the targets he targeted were King Fu, King Zheng and other important vassal kings with huge influence and weather vane nature. After the vassals in various places were suppressed by Emperor Deqing for many years , seeing this scene, they just thought that Emperor Deqing wanted to kill them all, so they naturally resisted with all their strength, even joining forces to put pressure on Emperor Deqing.
Prince Fu's Mansion, which is at the cusp of the storm and at the center of the storm, has been in a state of panic all day long. Ever since Crown Prince Zhu Heyi ordered the Jinyi Guards to block Prince Fu's Mansion, everyone has been terrified, fearing that the next moment There will be Jin Yiwei rushing in, arresting them all and imprisoning them, and then depending on whether their surname is Zhu, they will be imprisoned in Fengyang, or demoted to a lowly status.
At a time when everyone was in danger, a big event happened in Prince Fu's Mansion in the early morning of that day - Prince Fu's eldest son, Zhu Hezeng, was found tragically dead in his dormitory!
Zhu Hezeng probably died in his sleep. When he died, his expression was ferocious, his orifices were bleeding, and his skin was purple. He was most likely poisoned to death.
But who was the murderer who poisoned Zhu Hezeng? And what was the reason for poisoning Zhu Hezeng? Now that there are Jinyi guards blocking the outside of Prince Fu's Mansion and maidservants patrolling inside, what method did the murderer use to poison him? Zhu Hezeng?
It's all a mystery.
There is no doubt that compared to the pampered Prince Fu Zhu Citong, or the ignorant and ignorant eldest son Zhu Hejun, the shrewd and capable eldest son Zhu Hezeng has been the pillar and backbone of Prince Fu's mansion during this period.
The death of Zhu Hezeng naturally further aroused the atmosphere of panic in Prince Fu's palace. Not only did Prince Fu Zhu Citong fall into a panic, he was confused for a long time before he remembered to report it to the official. Prince Fu's eldest son Zhu Hejun saw the death of his brother Zhu Hezeng.
After the incident, he was completely frightened. He hid in his room and did not dare to come out. To drink water or eat, he had to send someone to test the poison first. It can be said that everyone was in a mess.
When the news that Zhu Hezeng was poisoned was reported to the Luoyang government, the chaos in Prince Fu's Mansion quickly spread to the entire Luoyang city.
Now it is the **** where Prince Zhu Heyu is wrestling with the feudal forces represented by Prince Fu. Under such a sensitive situation, Zhu Hezeng, a key witness who holds a large amount of information, suddenly died mysteriously. This matter is inevitable.
It is intended to shock both the government and the public, and all parties involved cannot escape responsibility.
Zheng Yicheng, the prefect of Luoyang, immediately announced the sealing of the city gates and searched for any suspicious persons - regardless of whether this approach would be effective, Zheng Yicheng had to do something at this time to prove that he was not idle;
The factory guards immediately took control of all the personnel in Prince Fu's Mansion and interrogated them one by one. Because Prince Fu's Mansion was under their control when Zhu Hezeng was poisoned to death, and they might be blamed afterwards, so the Jinyi Guards were interrogating them.
No matter how hard you hold back, you can hear the screams of torture and confession from time to time in Prince Fu's palace;
At the same time, all the important figures in Luoyang City, including Crown Prince Zhu Heyu, Henan Governor Zhen Zhen, Luoyang Magistrate Zheng Yicheng, etc., rushed to Prince Fu's Mansion to personally investigate the case.
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"Your Majesty, what is going on with all this? How come the eldest son of Wang was poisoned and died? As far as the official knows, he has been staying in Prince Fu's Mansion during this period without going out. Who could have poisoned him? Do you have any idea in your mind?
Any clues?"
The governor of Henan, **Zhen, is a disciple of the first assistant Zhou Shangjing. Most of the people in the "Zhou Party" came from the Han Dynasty. They have good images and good conversation. **Zhen is no exception. Every move he makes is full of the elegance of a scholar.
, when he asked King Fu Zhu Citong at this time, his attitude was still humble and respectful, and he did not add insult to injury at all because of the precarious situation of King Fu's lineage.
But in fact, underneath her seemingly calm appearance, her heart is full of complaints and complaints.
After Prince Zhu Heyu arrived in Luoyang and started investigating King Fu, Prince Zhen saw a storm coming and immediately found an excuse to leave Luoyang City, saying that he was going to Nanyang to inspect the progress of the drought relief work half a year ago.
The on-site inspection lasted for more than a month! During the inspection, ** really brought ****'s good character to the extreme. He personally visited every disaster-stricken village, and some villages were visited more than once.
In this way, he stayed in Nanyang until the news came from the central court that an imperial envoy would be replaced by an imperial envoy to replace the prince Zhu Heyu. Then he reluctantly returned to Luoyang to prepare for the reception.
Who would have thought that he had just returned to Luoyang the day before, and the poisoning and murder of Prince Fu's eldest son occurred the next day. He only felt that God was unfair and that he was very unlucky.
On the other side, after hearing the real inquiry, Prince Fu Zhu Citong glanced at Crown Prince Zhu Heyi with a blank expression, gritted his teeth and said: "After preliminary investigation, Jin Yiwei believes that the time of Zeng'er's poisoning should be around midnight last night.
Around that time, no one came in or out of Zeng'er's room, and Jin Yiwei also found a bottle with crane crown red on Zeng'er's desk, so Zeng'er might have committed suicide by taking poison... Humph!
From this king’s point of view, Zeng’er was forced to death!”
When it came to the latter part, Zhu Citong was already gnashing his teeth. Coupled with Zhu Citong's wide and fat body, he really seemed to be showing some composure at this time.
Obviously, these words of King Fu Zhu Citong were implying that Prince Zhu Heyu forced Zhu Hezeng to death!
After all, before Zhu Hezeng's death, he was frequently interrogated and interrogated by Crown Prince Zhu Heyu. Under such circumstances, if Zhu Hezeng was overwhelmed, there was also the possibility of committing suicide by taking poison.
But in fact, Fu Wang Zhu Citong knew very well that Zhu Hezeng probably did not commit suicide by taking poison, but was most likely poisoned to death, because Zhu Citong had an affair with Fu Wang Zhu Citong the day before his death.
A detailed conversation was held. During that conversation, Zhu Hezeng had sworn that he would never betray King Fu's lineage. No matter how the Crown Prince Zhu Heyu forced him, he would remain tight-lipped. At that time, Zhu Hezeng's expression was full of determination and determination.
He was confident and showed no signs of committing suicide by taking poison.
However, it is now the time when Prince Zhu Heyu is wrestling with the feudal forces, and it is also a critical moment for the survival of Prince Fu's family. Under such circumstances, the death of Zhu Hezeng is used to gain sympathy from the government and the public, and to create public opinion among the government and the people.
Taking advantage of the situation to attack Prince Zhu and Yu, and allowing King Fu's family to successfully survive this crisis, is the top priority in King Fu's eyes.
As for investigating the real murderer, catching the murderer, and avenging his shrewd and capable eldest son, they are relatively unimportant and can be completely ignored.
Therefore, for King Fu, it is necessary to kill Zhu Hezeng. The cause of death is suicide by taking poison, and connect Zhu Hezeng's suicide by taking poison with the interrogation of Prince Zhu Heyu.
As Zhu Citong finished speaking, ** Zhen and Zheng Yicheng looked at each other secretly, and neither of them dared to answer. They just peeked at Zhu Heyu's reaction from the corner of their eyes.
Nowadays, the crimes of King Fu's lineage have not yet been concluded. If the world thinks that Prince Zhu Heyu forced King Fu's eldest son Zhu Hezeng to death, then Zhu Heyu's reputation will be ruined.
On the other side, Zhu Heyu had a serious expression, frowning in thought, with a bit of gloominess in his eyes.
Zhu Heyu also knew in his heart that it was absolutely impossible for Zhu Hezeng to commit suicide, because Zhu Hezeng, who seemed to be loyal to Prince Fu's palace, had actually secretly turned to Zhu Heyu long ago, promising to stand up at the critical moment to kill his relatives and expose Prince Fu to the court.
Zhu Heyu had promised Zhu Hezeng that he would succeed to the position of King Fu after the vassal's various crimes.
During this period of time, Zhu Heyu frequently met with Zhu Hezeng alone under the pretext of investigation and interrogation. It was never to force Zhu Hezeng to confess, but just to discuss future countermeasures with Zhu Hezeng.
How could Zhu Hezeng commit suicide under such circumstances?
After hearing the sinister intentions suggested by King Fu Zhu Citong, Zhu Heyu raised his head and stared at Zhu Citong expressionlessly, his eyes full of suspicion and scrutiny.
Yes, at this time Zhu Heyu actually suspected that Zhu Hezeng's sudden death was related to the King of Fortune Zhu Citong.
If King Fu Zhu Citong received information from somewhere and learned that Zhu Hezeng had betrayed him, then he would naturally have the motive to kill and silence him!
The most important thing is that Zhu Heyu impeached several vassal kings to the court this time because he had the key witness Zhu Hezeng in his hands. But now because of Zhu Hezeng's sudden death, Zhu Heyu impeached many vassal kings.
The most critical link was missing from the evidence of his crime, and he immediately fell into disgrace!
In this way, Zhu Heyu was undoubtedly forced into a corner.
If this situation continues, all his future plans will be destroyed, and there will be no possibility of turning around!
Therefore, Zhu Heyu must not sit back and wait for death at this time, he must take action!