"All your beloved ministers actually want to resign?"
In the imperial study room, looking at the six ministers who were about to resign collectively, Zhang Yan stood up in shock.
"I am incompetent and have failed the emperor's favor. I am unworthy of Your Majesty and deserve death!"
The six ministers all knelt down and worshiped.
"The Ai family knows that Ma Aiqing and the six aiqings have been slandered by Jiangnan literati recently, and they have been under tremendous pressure on His Majesty and the court. Ma Aiqing even fell ill, but His Majesty is not unwilling to come forward, but... alas, the Ai family does not hide it either.
Dear Sirs, Your Majesty went back to Beijing half a month ago due to something else."
Zhang Yan had a helpless look on her face at the end, knowing that she might not be able to survive if she knew she was hiding it from them.
Because she knew that these six ministers did not really want to resign, but the scholars in Jiangnan collectively denounced and slandered the second minister and the six ministers who were responsible for presiding over the New Deal. The momentum was unprecedented, and it had been so long, and His Majesty still had not come forward.
This caused them to misunderstand and panic, thinking that His Majesty was going to abandon them.
After all, only Your Majesty can solve this situation now.
"What?"
Sure enough, when the six ministers heard that His Majesty had returned to Beijing half a month ago, they immediately looked at each other, breathed a sigh of relief, and were speechless at the same time.
For such a big matter as the Reform and New Deal, His Majesty has never come forward and just hides behind the scenes. However, during the critical period of the New Deal, he actually went back to Beijing.
"Your Majesty, I am so bold. I wonder what kind of emergency happened in the north, so that the Holy Emperor returned to Beijing urgently?"
The Minister of Civil Affairs gritted his teeth and asked, and the other five ministers also perked up their ears. They were all obviously curious about what kind of big thing happened in the north. This caused His Majesty to abandon the new policy in Jiangnan and hurried back to Beijing.
Zhang Yan's face was slightly embarrassed, because Xun'er hurried back to Beijing, not because there was any important matter to deal with, but to attend the graduation ceremony of the students of the Jiangwu Hall, and she was extremely helpless about this.
However, seeing that they were not asking for resignation, he was relieved, so he said: "Don't worry, my dear friends, it is actually not a big deal. Your Majesty said when he left that he would leave as soon as possible and will be back again at the end of June at the latest."
Nanjing.
After His Majesty returns, His Majesty will not sit idly by when Jiangnan literati slander all his beloved ministers. During this period, the Aijia hopes that the six beloved ministers can perform their duties and continue to promote the progress of the New Deal. Tomorrow, the Aijia will go to visit Ma Aiqing in person.
!”
The six of them were very happy when they heard that Zhang Yan was going to visit Ma Shiying in person tomorrow, because in this way, His Majesty would no longer be able to abandon them, and at the same time, a lot of stigma could be washed away for them.
Seeing that Zhang Yan had expressed his stance, the six of them regained their confidence again and expressed that they would serve His Majesty and the imperial court even if they were shattered into pieces and left in infamy for thousands of years.
"Six dear friends, the New Deal has now reached its most critical juncture and must not be affected by this matter."
"The Queen Mother said, since various places began to slander Mage Lao, all states and counties have been affected. After Mage Lao fell ill, the yamen in various places became even more passive and sabotaged their work. People are panicked. So far, half of the states and counties have not reported their land acres again.
data.
Even for many reported states and counties, the data has not changed much, and it has not achieved the results expected by the Ministry of Household Affairs at all!"
The Minister of Household Affairs explained slowly and sighed after speaking. Obviously, this incident had a huge impact on the newly established authority of the cabinet.
Zhang Yan frowned when she heard this, but she also knew this kind of thing. Even if she ordered various prefectures and counties in the name of the Queen Mother, it would probably not have much effect. The only thing she could do was to support Ma Shiying and Ma Shiying on behalf of the emperor.
cabinet.
On this day, early in the morning, Zhang Yan drove to Ma Mansion with great fanfare and visited Ma Shiying in person.
Ma Shiying, who was bedridden, was so moved that he burst into tears. Furthermore, he learned that His Majesty did not ignore him, but had returned to Beijing and was no longer in Nanjing.
The depression in my heart immediately dissipated, and my illness was cured by 70% in an instant. From the lifelessness of the past few days, I regained my previous vigor and vitality. Two days later, I dragged my still-unrecovered body to the cabinet to continue presiding over it.
The implementation of the New Deal.
Zhang Yan went to visit Ma Shiying in person, which undoubtedly gave a severe slap in the face to the Jiangnan literati, especially the Donglin Party members.
After all, Zhang Yan is a well-known virtuous empress among the Donglin party. Now Zhang Yan, who is praised as a virtuous empress by them, went to visit an ancient traitor who was scolded by them in person. What the hell is this?
Son?
How can this be called the Donglin Party’s human feelings?
But no matter how dissatisfied they were with Zhang Yan, they would not dare to slander Zhang Yan like they did the Red Lady and Ma Shiying.
Therefore, in the end, I could only choose to ignore the matter and continue to slander Ma Shiying and the officials of the Six Ministries. The momentum became louder and the methods became more obscene and radical. The literati and gentry in other southern provinces also began to respond.
Not to be outdone, officials from various provinces filed memorials one after another to impeach Ma Shiying and the six ministers. At that time, the memorials flew to Nanjing like snowflakes.
Obviously the literati and gentry in other provinces are not stupid. They all understand that once the New Deal is implemented in Southern Zhili, it will definitely be the turn of the provinces.
Similarly, almost all civil servants and scholars resisted from the bottom of their hearts His Majesty's desire to completely control the power of public opinion.
Faced with this situation, Ma Shiying also became ruthless. While sending inspection censors to various states and counties for inspection, he issued another order urging and warning states and counties to report the true data on land acres as soon as possible.
However, the effect was not great. Both the censors sent out for inspection and the officials in various states and counties chose to be passive and sabotage their work, silently resisting the New Deal and His Majesty's attempt to seize the right to public opinion.
Neither Ma Shiying nor Zhang Yan could do anything about this, because the power of the cabinet came from the emperor.
The authority of Ma Shiying, who now presides over the cabinet, has been severely damaged and cannot be restored by himself. The emperor must personally step forward to restore the authority of Ma Shiying and the cabinet again.
The reason why all the officials in the past were afraid of the Cabinet and the Six Ministries was because all officials knew that His Majesty absolutely supported Ma Shiying and the Six Ministries.
At this time, even if they are resisting the New Deal in their hearts, no matter how unwilling they are, they can only choose to implement the cabinet orders honestly. Since they cannot resist, they can only obey.
But now that Ma Shiying and the cabinet are being slandered, there is no movement from His Majesty. This makes all officials have to wonder if Ma Shiying has fallen out of favor?
Does Your Majesty want to kill the donkey?
Or maybe you feel that Ma Shiying's knife is not very comfortable and you are ready to get a new one?
If it weren't for Zhang Yan's personal visit to Ma Shiying, which restored a lot of confidence in the Eunuch Party, I am afraid that the entire Eunuch Party would have lost their hearts under this suspicion and eventually fell apart.
At this time, Zhu Cixiang did not know what was happening in Jiangnan.
He also didn't know that just because he had handed over the propaganda and supervision of the newspaper when he left, such a small thing in his opinion triggered an unprecedented resistance among the gentry and literati in Jiangnan, making it impossible for the New Deal to continue to be implemented.
Instead, they were awarding swords to the second batch of 3,000 students from the Lecture Hall in the Wuying Hall in the Forbidden City in Beijing.
Zhu Cixiang did come here specifically for these three thousand students this time, because he could let the Red Lady take over for other matters, but he would not let anyone take over for the graduation ceremony of the Military Academy.
(The mourning period has passed. Updates will resume today. The 5 chapters owed in the past three days will be made up.)