A donkey cart stopped at the side door of Zhang's house, and a young man in his twenties went to vote for assassination.
The disciples were quite vigilant, because there were too many people visiting the Prime Minister, and Zhang Gen had already issued a death order not to receive messy guests.
"It turns out to be the Eighth Prince of the Fan family!"
When Menzi saw the famous assassin clearly, his attitude immediately became enthusiastic: "Come in and have tea."
The eighth son of the Fan family was named Fan Jun. When his grandfather Fan E passed away, he was a special official in Guanglu, Shangzhu Kingdom, and Duke of Changshe County.
His father, Fan Yun, is still alive today. When the old Song Dynasty collapsed, he was already a doctor of Jin Ziguanglu, Shangzhu Kingdom, Shaobao, Bachelor of Zizhengdian, and the founding son of Changshe County. (Historically, he was honored by Zhao Goujin.
The Duke of the state, Kaifu Yitong three divisions.)
He also has nine brothers, seven of whom have been admitted to Jinshi.
His third brother Fan Wei married Zhang Gen's fifth daughter, the fifth sister of Crown Princess Zhang Jinping.
His fifth brother Fan Hao married the fourth daughter of Wu Dian, and Wu Dian was Li Gang's teacher, and Li Gang was Zhang Gen's son-in-law.
These are just the tip of the iceberg of marriage relationships.
Fan Jun waited for a while in the living room. Zhang Gen's youngest son, Zhang Yan, hurried over to receive him: "When will my dear brother come to Beijing? Why didn't you let me know in advance?"
"Coming to Beijing today," Fan Jun stood up and bowed, "to meet my brother."
The two reminisced about old times, and Zhang Yan asked: "With your talents and learning, if you take the imperial examination, you will definitely go to high school, and I'm afraid I can still be among the first-class students. Why don't you take part in the imperial examination of the new dynasty?"
Fan Jun said: "I have never passed the Juren Examination, so according to the regulations, I cannot take the Rites Examination."
Zhang Yan said: "This year, the control over Zhejiang has been loose. Many people who did not take the imperial examination also came to Tokyo and won the Jinshi."
Fan Jun said: "A gentleman should be careful in his independence. The superior can deceive the sky, and the inferior can deceive the earth, but he cannot deceive the heart."
"My dear brother is indeed a true gentleman." Zhang Yan said with emotion.
Among the ten brothers of the Fan family, Fan Jun was the most talented, but he refused to take part in the imperial examination.
Fan Jun said: "My foolish brother came to Beijing this time to study. I heard that there is a complete set of "Tao Yongce" in Tokyo, and there are many great Confucian scholars who compiled classics."
"I have all these books at home. Dear brother, please go to the study room." Zhang Yan said with a smile.
The two went to the study together. Fan Jun got "Tao Yongce" and immediately opened the book and started reading.
Zhang Yan knew what kind of temper this gentleman was, so he shook his head and left silently with a bitter smile.
In history, Fan Jun was the forerunner of the Eastern Zhejiang School. Zhu Xi visited him twice to ask for advice, so he could only copy his works and go home to study on his own, quoting the ideas in the book and writing them into the "Collected Commentary on Mencius".
Just when Fan Jun was reading seriously, Zhang Gen finally came back from get off work.
"Father, the eighth son of the Fan family is here and is reading in the study." Zhang Yan said.
Zhang Gen nodded and said: "He has been a bookworm since he was a child, so let him be. Don't disturb him before eating."
Zhang Yan asked: "I heard that the number of cabinet ministers increased to seven?"
"well!"
Zhang Gen sighed: "It doesn't matter how many cabinet ministers there are, but the voting system limits the prime minister's power to refute. The officials are angry this time."
Zhang Yan asked curiously: "When I was still in Sichuan, the situation was so difficult, and the officials and my father could get along well with each other. Why did I go to Beijing and establish a new dynasty, but..."
Zhang Gen said: "Both the officials and the prince acted too radically. Take the establishment of the Ming Dynasty's moral destiny as an example. It has hundreds of benefits and no harm. I don't know why the officials insist on abolishing it."
Zhang Gen really couldn't understand that he actively promoted the establishment of Deyun in order to consolidate the Zhu family.
Now, this has angered the emperor and made him a bad person both inside and outside.
"Could it be..." Zhang Yan guessed, "Could it be that the officials are jealous of my Zhang family? Otherwise, Uncle Fan is so virtuous and respected, why is he not even a minister now?"
"Don't talk nonsense!" Zhang Gen scolded.
Uncle Fan here is Fan Jun's father Fan Yun, a bachelor of Zizhengdian in the old Song Dynasty.
After Zhu Guoxiang ascended the throne, as a son and daughter of Prime Minister Zhang Gen, Fan Yun was only appointed as the prefect. It was not until Li Bao captured Fujian that Fan Yun was appointed as the right governor of Fujian.
Right Chief, second in command.
At Fan Yun's current age, there is almost no possibility of becoming a minister, let alone joining the cabinet as a minister.
This appointment seemed very reasonable and seemed to be a precaution against Zhang Gen.
Zhang Gen was therefore very vigilant and deliberately suppressed his son.
The eldest son Zhang Tao was born as Tanhua Lang and was originally appointed as the magistrate by Ju Ming. However, Zhang Gen forced his son to be the county magistrate first because of his lack of qualifications.
The second son didn't even catch the county magistrate, and is currently collecting local liquor taxes.
The third, fourth and fifth sons have no official status and will not take part in the imperial examination for the time being.
A son can deliberately suppress someone, but Zhang Gen cannot suppress his own in-laws.
His father-in-law Huang Fu once served as prime minister.
Huang Fu originally did not want to get involved in party disputes, but when he was a local official, he believed that the new law had just been implemented and should not be changed overnight, so he supported Wang Anshi's local reforms. Later, he discovered problems in the new law and asked Shangshu to correct the market change law, but was defeated.
Go to the reformists to suppress them.
Back and forth, it offended both the old and new parties.
When the old party came to power, Huang Fu was suppressed again because he had good personal relationships with people in the new party.
Huang Fu was given a high position in the early days of the Huizong Dynasty, but he died of illness soon after, and his descendants were ostracized by Wang Fu. In terms of both talent and virtue, he should be given a high position, and Zhang Gen had no reason to suppress his brothers-in-law.
There are also the sons-in-law and the sons-in-law.
Fan Yun's ten sons alone have already produced seven Jinshi exams, and one or two more may pass the exam next.
My father-in-law's family members include a lot of officials.
There are a lot of officials in the children's in-laws' families.
These people also have their own disciples, former officials, relatives and friends.
Coupled with the officials promoted by Zhang Gen, Zhang Gen had unconsciously built a huge civil servant faction in the court and local areas.
Although he is only invisible and may not even listen to Zhang Gen's words, it is enough to make the emperor and the prince afraid.
Cai Jing, Wang Fu and other powerful ministers are not far away from Yin Jian. Now that Zhu Guoxiang has made adjustments to the cabinet, Zhang Gen is inevitably worried.
After all, he was facing two founding kings!
…
A boat came from the south, full of leaders of the Fujian Peasant Army who were recruiting for peace.
In addition to Fan Jizhong and Fan Ru as uncles and nephews, there are also Liu Shiju, Liao Gongzhao, Yu Sheng, Zhang Wanquan, Zhang Yi, Ye Tie and others.
Last winter, half of Fujian exploded!
Fujian is mountainous and the people are poor.
Peasants were originally exploited by temples and gentry, but Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty imposed exorbitant taxes there, forcing many farmers and small landowners to go bankrupt.
Li Bao went to kill him and quickly detonated the gunpowder barrel.
Even the Zhejiang soldiers stationed in northern Fujian were defeated by the peasant uprising army.
Moreover, the Fujian rebels were more "brutal" than the Zhejiang rebels. Not only did they kill officials to rebel, they also attacked gentry and temples in unison. To put it bluntly, they killed landlords to divide their land.
Li Baoti's troops went north. Due to their strong combat effectiveness, they only regained one county town. Fan's uncle and nephew went to the mountains to fight guerrillas.
There are more than 200,000 such rebel armies, and there are more than a dozen groups, large and small.
It would be too troublesome to rely solely on force to clear out, so the only option is to recruit people, and those who are really disobedient can only be beaten.
"Brother Fan, I always feel uneasy." Ye Tie looked at the Tokyo wall.
Fan Ruwei said: "You've already come, can you still kill us all?"
Liao Gongzhao said: "If we want to kill him, he will die in Fujian, and we will not be invited to the capital."
Liu Shiju said: "It is more dangerous to stay in Fujian. How many gentry have you and I killed? Those remnants will definitely take revenge."
"That's right." Fan Ruwei nodded.
Fan Ji had some expectations in the center. As the biggest rebel leader in Fujian, he actually just wanted to live a stable life at first.
Unfortunately, his family's land was sold out, so he had to turn to smuggling salt.
Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty re-ascended to the throne in Hangzhou and intensified his exploitation of the southeast. At the same time, he was also rectifying various ills. For example, the crackdown on illegal salt was very strict, and the smuggling business became increasingly difficult to do.
His nephew Fan Ruwei instigated rebellion many times, and Fan Jizhong was always hesitant.
Therefore, Fan Ruwei ordered his men to murder the officials, forcing Fan Jizhong to rebel.
Even at this time, Fan Jizhong still wanted to be ordered to peace, so he strictly restricted the behavior of the rebels. However, as the number of rebels increased, the situation quickly got out of control. The soldiers killed the gentry when they saw them and demolished the temples when they saw them.
.
As uncles and nephews, Fan Jizhong and Fan Ru did not dare to go against the collective will of the rebels, so they simply followed the trend and shouted the slogan of equalizing land.
They were very frightened, so Li Bao used both suppressive and pacifying methods. It took him half a year to finally bring them to safety.
Fan Jizhong used to be a small landowner. He didn't have much pursuit. He was satisfied with being the county registrar.
Ye Tie, on the other hand, is full of ambition. He is the most powerful general in the Fujian Peasant Army, and he is also a bankrupt small landowner and private salt dealer. He wants to be a general, and he can fulfill his ambitions with his martial arts!
These people were taken to the north of Tokyo and placed collectively next to the military camp.
Upon learning of their arrival in Beijing, Fujian officials in Beijing, as well as Fujian Jinshi who were observing the government, wrote to the public to request severe punishment for the murderers.
They killed too many gentry. Even if they have been ordered to be safe, they cannot easily forgive them, let alone let the officials do it casually.
Faced with the turbulent public sentiment, Zhang Gen suddenly sent an e-mail.
Zhu Guoxiang carefully read Zhang Gen's memorial and said with a joking smile: "My in-laws also engage in self-destruction."
Zhang Gen's memorial was written very uprightly. The new dynasty has just been established, and there are enemies on all sides. You cannot kill the traitors who are trying to recruit people, nor can you damage the reputation of the court by being untrustworthy. Since these rebel leaders have accepted the recruitment, they should be properly arranged.
.
This memorial offended most of the Fujian officials and Jinshi!
Even Jiangxi and Zhejiang officials were vaguely dissatisfied with Zhang Gen.
Especially for officials in northern Fujian, many of their clansmen were killed, which even made Zhang Gen hate him.
After returning home exhausted, Zhang Yan said impatiently: "Why did father intercede with those thieves?"
Zhang Gen glared at his son: "Since you have been recruited, how can you go back on your word? The way to govern a country is to uphold integrity. You can go back to your hometown to prepare for the exam. If you fail to pass the Jinshi exam in three years, let's see how I deal with you then!"
Zhang Yan asked: "Didn't my father not let his children take the exam? How could he suddenly take the exam?"
"This moment, that moment, you will know in the future." Zhang Gen was too lazy to explain so much.
