: Breaking superstitions in the extra chapter

With autumn approaching, according to the Western calendar, it should be time for "Scorpio".

According to the Eastern calendar, the "heart is in the sky" season has passed.

Perhaps there were some ministers in the court who were very interested in mathematics and physics, and they had to be of high level. They would remember that sixteen years ago, when Liu Bei defeated Chang'an in the Northern Expedition, Emperor Huai Liu Xie ruined the civil war rebellion of Li Jue and Guo Si, and lost Chang'an and fled to Hongnong to avoid the war.

It was in September of the year after Liu Xie fled to Hongnong, the celestial phenomena showed signs of "Ying Huo and Guarding the Heart". At that time, General Yuan Shu, the Guard, sent Yan Xiang to Beijing to condemn the emperor's morality and asked Liu Xie to adjust his attitude towards the princes of all parties according to his wishes.

However, the farce was finally resolved by Zhuge Liang. Zhuge Liang also took out the "Solar System Zodiac" and displayed it in front of the imperial court, proving that this is astronomy law and has nothing to do with disasters.

At that time, Zhuge Liang calculated that there were only two rules for the emergence of "Yinghuo Shuxin":

Under normal circumstances, one round will occur every sixteen years. However, after two or three consecutive rounds, there may be a jump of half a round or one or two years higher or lower than half a round as appropriate. After the jump, it can enter the pattern of once every sixteen years and maintain a period of time.

This statement was also recognized. At that time, Liu Xie ordered the complete liquidation of some of Dong Zhongshu's evil sayings, abolished the "Spring and Autumn Festival" and even pacified the Xiamaling in Chang'an City.

This incident had a great influence on the Scholars, and many people knew about it at that time.

Unfortunately, most of the court officials in high positions in the world are not interested in mathematics, so they have not studied the details in detail. After more than ten years, they have forgotten them a little.

Later, after Li Su asked Liu Bei to implement the imperial examination system, more and more candidates from "Mingsuan" subjects and "Maocai" officials who needed to take the comprehensive examination of the general subjects gradually entered the officialdom.

This group of people are more scientific and understand some common sense in mathematics and physics. But the problem is that these officials have only been in the career of officialdom for at most twelve or thirteen years, and have not yet reached the top leadership of the prime minister, so they cannot affect the mainstream public opinion of the court.

The group that climbed the fastest, that is, ten years after entering the officialdom, reached the level of orders/doctors in various departments, which is equivalent to the department level of later generations. Those who can become ministers or deputy ministers can count them with one hand across the country.

What's more, even if you are an imperial examination official, you have three other subjects to refer to the examination, so you don't need to learn mathematics at all.

So even if the imperial examination officials occupy the mainstream of the court in the future, at least two-thirds of the officials may not understand mathematics in terms of number.

This problem was not solved by a generation, and Li Su could only proceed step by step. Only when the proportion of talents in the North Korean and middle school who "winned the competitive advantage of officialdom by relying on their math grades" increased to a certain extent and formed a new joint force of interest groups, can we continue to strengthen the weight of mathematics in the imperial examination.

These questions are far from the question, so I will not report it for the time being.

Just talking about the late autumn of this year, the ninth month of the lunar calendar (corresponding to the end of the 10th month of the Gregorian calendar, Scorpio), just before the heart is about to sink into the ecliptic horizon, the fearful sign of "Yinghuo guards the heart" really appears again.

But Zhuge Liang had not yet rushed back to the Central Plains.

Because he was avoiding the typhoon season in late summer and early autumn, he had just set sail from Japan shortly after this time. It would take more than a month to return to Luoyang.

Officials of the Taishi Ling and Lingtai Ling system have learned more or less the theory of Zhuge Liang, and also know that "Yinghuo Shuxin" should have scientific rules.

But unfortunately, people are unhappy, and this situation has indeed happened for the first time in 16 years since the Chang'an chaos in 194. Many Taishi and Lingtai officials still dare not make random judgments.

More importantly, many of Liu Xie's decrees were only effective for a while and were forcibly implemented. Later, because of Liu Xie's subsequent two years of experience, he became more and more miserable. Many superstitious people, after they recalled the taste, had this idea in their minds:

Emperor Huai said that Ying Huo was not a huge evil, even if there were really "scientific laws", he did lose his moral character that year and lost Chang'an, which led to Chang'an being slaughtered by Li Guo.

The heaven was furious and the earthquake collapsed the Chang'an city wall, causing the Han River Dragon Vein to return to Guanzhong, helping the attack and killing the rebels.

Judging from the results, the experience that year was indeed a "giant" for Liu Xie.

Even if there is a scientific conclusion about the so-called "the true destiny emperor is not fierce", it is only not fierce to Liu Bei at that time, and not fierce to the true destiny emperor who is about to rise, it does not mean that it is not fierce to those who are about to lose their destiny who are about to lose their power.

Who made Liu Bei use some magical means when he first made the Northern Expedition to Chang'an, either earthquakes or prescient and cheating. These signs have shaken some people who should have believed in science.

Li Su's behavior that requires all the benefits is like a later generation forcing some Taoist priests to stand on the ground, saying, "You must believe in science, there is no light skills in this world." After that, he jumped three levels from the cliff.

If you don’t set an example, who will you blame?

Some of the officials in the Taishi and Lingtai system were quite loyal. After observing Ying Huo Shuxin, they directly reported to the emperor and asked the emperor to instruct whether to strictly keep it confidential to the outside world—

Because most ordinary people in the Han Dynasty were not good at their cultural level. Even if you let them watch the astrological signs at night, they would not understand them. Not to mention being illiterate, even officials and scholars, 90% of them would not understand the celestial phenomena.

So if the emperor strictly ordered the blockade of news and did not tell him, perhaps no one would know that the disaster would have happened.

But Liu Bei did not dare to gamble, so he did not make clear instructions for the time being and did not want to leave a handle. He planned to observe the movements among the people for a while to see if the people really didn't notice this.

Li Su also knew about this at the first time, but he only comforted Liu Bei from a scientific perspective and did not deny Liu Bei's cold treatment.

However, in this time difference, officials in Taishi and Lingtai systems were shaken and secretly disclosed the news about this to the outside bureaucrats anonymously.

As a result, the powerful families in the world were originally dissatisfied with the imperial court's plan to build large-scale construction, to strengthen military forces, and to issue excessive national debts.

After all, it can be seen by those with insight. The emperor proposed many new reforms before, but later chose to stop by "raising enough money for the time being" and no longer vigorously promoted it.

But this is clearly just a temporary compromise. After the emperor frees up his hands and establishes his authority on the outside world, he will still sharpen his knives and deepen the reforms sooner or later.

Therefore, if you can seize the opportunity to make things difficult for the emperor, how can you not speak out for justice?

For a time, there were dozens of Beijing officials in the court, as well as thousands of scholars from all walks of life, including Juren and Tai students, who wrote to write to talk about things and went to the palace to the public craft.

His words are concise, and they all point out that "disasters from heaven are strange, just like the 36th year of Qin Shihuang, when Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty died, when Wang Mang was promoted to the Grand Sima, and when Emperor Huai lost Chang'an, only Your Majesty is careful."

Inside and outside, Liu Bei was asked to reduce taxes and taxes, stop building large-scale construction, and not to attempt to use troops outside and reform politics.

Liu Bei, who was just about to celebrate his 50th birthday, was very upset.

Liu Bei was originally a guy who was not careful about minor matters and was a casual person in his private life. He was still very open-minded and listened to his opinions on governing the country, but he had long been greedy for pleasure in life.

Originally, for the fifty birthday, Liu Bei created many rare treasures from all states in the world, and enjoyable things for food and drink.

Li Su, Zhuge Liang, Gan Ning, Zhou Yu, and Bu Zhi also specially made tribute to many overseas animals and plants that were not found in the Central Plains in the early years. In recent years, they just got them in Sanhan, Fusang, Haoyi, Liugui, Linyi, Funan and other places, whether they are for viewing or edible, and all of them were presented to be displayed, kept in the Luoyang Palace, and served in captivity.

Now that the birthday is coming, Liu Bei is simply crazy and wants to catch people and kill those guys who are witches.

Li Su was quite calm, but he didn't intend to spend too much energy on this matter. The main reason is that his thoughts and soul are more modern after all, and he also hates feudal superstitions.

Even if some of the people who wrote to the books and went to the palace were clichés out of kindness and conservatism, but these guys did not believe in science, why did Li Su spend his favors to save them? He should always pay a price.

However, after all, this matter involves too many people, and there are many discussions around the world, so it is impossible for them to be severely punished.

Finally, it was Sikong Lusu, the Minister of the Civil Affairs Department Gu Yong and other steadfast factions to advise the emperor to be cautious in punishment and not to expand the crackdown. At most, only the main evil should be punished. For ordinary officials who were deceived, they should punish the past and prevent the future, and give them the opportunity to repent and reform themselves.

Then Liu Bei took advantage of the situation and let Fa Zheng thoroughly investigate the case. Finally, he unified the cross-trial, clamped and bitten, and isolated the matter to prevent collusion.

Within half a month, two or three Lingtai officials, minor officials, and several court officials who had initially spread the celestial phenomena to the outside world, as well as several court officials and aristocratic families who obviously organized public opinion maliciously.

At the instruction of Liu Bei, the Fa people were imprisoned first. Among them, the most obvious crime was to deal with the punishment of the Great Punishment, but they were temporarily imprisoned first and left for winter before reviewing and being executed.

There was no judgment in this era of "dead the first decision / kill the prison guard". It is generally agreed that after the autumn is a matter of being asked to be executed, that is, after the harvest is over in late autumn, you will find time to kill and finish it.

Liu Bei and Fa Zheng did not dare to kill each other immediately this time, because they were afraid of arousing more rumors from others and being unfavorable to the stability of the court. So they had a thought:

On the one hand, Liu Bei heard from Li Su that Zhuge Liang was good at breaking feudal superstitions. Zhuge Liang was the one who calculated the natural laws of the celestial phenomena at the beginning, so Liu Bei also wanted to wait for Zhuge Liang to arrive and understand the situation to better refute the opposition.

During this process, Liu Bei also rarely complained to Li Su helplessly:

Brother, why are you so unsatisfied as the master who taught A Liang? A Liang is better than you in mathematics and physics and astronomy! What he can do is to calculate, but you can only make a general concept and not make specific calculations? This is a bit serious for being out of the blue! If Brother has A Liang's computing power, why would I wait for A Liang to save the situation today!

Li Su was also helpless about this. He has been traveling for twenty-three years. It would be great to know some system concepts about mathematics, physics and chemistry. He still hoped that he would personally practice the details of scientific research? It is indeed impossible.

I can only bear this complaint.

On the other hand, Liu Bei considered that he was a little guilty and always felt that he was uneasy in his fiftieth birthday. So he wanted to be more low-key, accumulate some virtue, and get through this autumn and winter first.

Therefore, even if it is to be called for those deceptive sinners in the future, Liu Bei was actually thinking, "and delay it again, or even delay it for the first month of the next year, and the Lantern Festival, which proves that there is no major disaster this year, and the explanation of the disasters and distortions of this celestial phenomenon is indeed false." It is not too late to kill again.

By then, those superstitious people should completely repent, realize that the celestial phenomena have nothing to do with the good and bad of the world, and have been proven by facts.

Li Su can see Liu Bei's mentality, but he did not forcefully refute it.

He knew that the road to breaking superstition was long, and people in the world had to clearly see that "This year, there was indeed a disaster that was unfavorable to rule." Only then would everything be truly convincing.

Sixteen years ago, Liu Xie was not successful, but today Liu Bei had to come to compete for this tone and provide the first unquestionable factual argument.

Everything was lifted up high and let go temporarily. After the judgment was completed, it was not strictly enforced, so I dragged it with the mud first.

The officials and juren who were convicted of serious crimes, the children of aristocratic families, and even in prison were delicious food and drinks, and the emperor did not intend to abuse them in the last few months before the execution.

At first, those people were frightened and fantasized that the people outside were angrily supported by the offenders. Later, they found that the treatment was OK, and they were all wondering, "Is it possible that the emperor is guilty and will forgive them in the end?" Then they felt relieved and did not cause trouble in prison, but just wanted to wait and see what happened first.

Both sides are waiting.

It was soon November, and Zhuge Liang finally returned to Luoyang.

At this time, Liu Bei's fiftieth birthday was over, but it was not very grand.

Liu Bei was not in the mood to invite all officials to celebrate together. In the end, the banquet was reduced in size, and only gave all court officials five days off. At the same time, he invited his confidant officials to drink, watch singing and dancing, eat fresh and unseen overseas food, and then watch the rare birds and beasts transported overseas, and then it was over.

When Liu Bei learned that Zhuge Liang had returned, he took the time to meet him immediately. He asked Zhuge Liang about the principle of the celestial phenomena and disasters with great concern and the basis for refuting.

Of course, Zhuge Liang answered questions smoothly. Out of trust in Master Li and his persistence in the belief that "celestial phenomena have nothing to do with disasters" was even more firm than Li Su himself, so he helped Liu Bei resolve his worries in detail.

Liu Bei was very satisfied with the result, but he still didn't want to execute those sinners who were deliberately inciting the public before this year, and wanted to delay the first month of next year.

Zhuge Liang would not ask about these specific decisions. He stayed in Luoyang for less than half a month. After finishing his report, he submitted his subsequent political opinions on Pingzhou, and then took office as the Secretary of the Central Secretariat.

Zhuge Liang then handed over the daily work of the Secretariat, and was sent by Liu Bei to Yecheng to take charge. This time his term of office was only more than one year. After the canal was completely repaired next year, Zhuge Liang would no longer need to supervise the imperial infrastructure project locally and could return to the capital.

In the past year, Zhuge Liang did not have to stay in Yecheng throughout the whole journey, but ran to Luoyang in spring and autumn, and in Yecheng in winter and summer.

Anyway, the transportation between the two places is quite convenient, both are on the edge of the North China Plain, with a straight line distance of only 500 miles. Occasionally, it is a relaxing trip.
Chapter completed!