Zhou Chong was already sweating profusely. He did nothing else today except greet people and receive gifts.
Even Jin Lei's book boy was borrowed to help because Zhou Chong came back alone.
As for communicating with the guests who gave gifts, Wang Yuan was of course the one to do it himself. Anyway, Wang Yuan would treat everyone he knew or didn't know politely without offending them.
In the evening, things finally calmed down a bit, and Zhou Chong came to report: "Second brother, I received a total of 460 taels of silver, and some goods. Among them, the Xi family of Shanxi merchants was the most generous, sending someone to deliver 100 taels of silver.
There is also a fine inkstone. That Shouning Marquis Zhang Heling is really nothing. We killed the bandits and saved several carts of property for him, but he didn't even send anyone over to congratulate him."
Wang Yuan wrote furiously and asked, "Has everyone who gave gifts been recorded?"
"Remember it, don't dare to make a mistake." Zhou Chong said with a smile.
Wang Yuan wrote dozens of letters, put them all in envelopes and put them away. He handed them to Zhou Chong and said, "I would like you to make a few trips tomorrow and reply all the letters according to the gift list. In addition, all the belongings will be pawned at the pawn shop and used as tickets."
It must be stored away."
"What is the second brother doing?" Zhou Chong asked in confusion.
Wang Yuan was too lazy to explain: "You will know in a few days."
What does Wang Yuan want to do?
Of course, all the goods received were donated. Wasn't there a town in Liangxiang County that was burned down by thieves? Throw the money to the magistrate of Liangxiang County and let him properly use it for refugee resettlement work. The gift money for the new top scholar
The county magistrate would not dare to embezzle money, because this money will burn his hands if he is greedy.
Wang Yuan didn't dare to take it because it was hot to his hands. He knew that he had offended many people by being selected as the number one scholar. To be conservative, it was better not to leave any clues - although this kind of receiving gifts was normal, even officials
If you are too lazy to care, who among the officials will not accept gifts?
After explaining the matter, Wang Yuan picked up the gift list again and said curiously: "This Shanxi businessman named Xi must be too generous. He is not a relative and he actually gave me one hundred taels of silver."
"I don't know either. I heard he is a businessman from Puzhou." Zhou Chong said.
There are three wealthy merchants in Puzhou, Shanxi, one is the Wang family, the second is the Zhang family, and the third is the Xi family.
The Wang and Zhang families have a profound background and have produced many officials and are married to each other.
The Xi family has emerged in the past twenty years. In terms of wealth, it is even more than that of the Zhang and Wang families. However, the children of the Xi family have not had any high-ranking officials. Everything they do depends on money. They even have people in the capital specially assigned to each subject.
The first-level Jinshi gave gifts, and at the same time, they also gave gifts to the common people.
It’s not for anything else, it’s just to form a good relationship, maybe it will come in handy someday.
Not only did they give money to officials, the Xi family also built bridges and paved roads in Puzhou and helped the poor. Anyway, they had a very good social reputation.
As for the real situation, only the devil knows.
The history books record Xi Ming as follows: "At first, he failed in his studies and did not like farming, so he said: If my husband cannot make a name for himself in the world, how can he be a coward like a grain of sweat, and cannot establish a foundation in the family? So he traveled to Wuyue and traveled to Chu.
The Wei Dynasty spread across the rivers and lakes, relocated and accumulated wealth, and built a fortune worth tens of thousands of dollars, and the Pu family must be called Nan Xiyun."
"Dong dong dong!"
There was a sudden knock on the door.
Wang Yuan put down the gift list and asked, "Who is it?"
The person outside the door said: "I am here to express my congratulations to the king who is now the number one scholar at the master's command."
Wang Yuan winked, and Zhou Chong immediately went to open the door.
The visitor held a box and offered it to Wang Yuan with both hands: "It's just a small gift, it's not respectful, please accept it."
Wang Yuan took it casually, opened the lid of the box and saw that there were two layers of silver ingots lying on it, each layer containing twenty ingots of silver.
"Two hundred taels, what a big deal, who is your master?" Wang Yuan said with a joking smile.
The visitor clasped his fists and said, "Prince Ning."
Of course, it was King Ning who rebelled in history. From the sixth year of Zhengde to the ninth year of Zhengde, King Ning sent people to give gifts to the capital for a full three years. The important ministers of the cabinet, the bosses of the six ministries, key officials, and the first-level Jinshi in each subject, almost
They were all given away by Prince Ning, and it is said that the total amount of bribes amounted to tens of thousands of gold.
When Wang Yangming captured Prince Ning and found the gift list from Prince Ning's mansion, Yang Tinghe, the chief minister of the cabinet, was among them.
"I accept the gift," Wang Yuan said with a smile, "Wait a moment, I will reply a letter to Prince Ning."
The content of the letter is roughly as follows: "Prince Ning and I have been living together for a long time, and I was very frightened to receive such a great gift. The elder did not dare to refuse the gift, so I boldly accepted the gift. It happened that a village in Liangxiang County was burned down by bandits, and now I am doing it myself
I advocate that all the two hundred taels of silver sent by King Ning be donated to the people who suffered from the war to rebuild their homes."
Wang Yuan directly handed over the letter, and the visitor read the letter on the spot. He immediately couldn't laugh or cry, and clasped his fists towards Wang Yuan to say goodbye.
Wang Yuan wrote another letter to Liangxiang Magistrate Gao Di, praising Magistrate Gao. He also said that he had received a lot of gift money and did not know what to do with it, so he donated it to the refugees to rebuild their homes. After the town was rebuilt, please
Magistrate Gao wrote an article and engraved the names of the gift givers on the stone tablet.
By then, Prince Ning's name will definitely be ranked first in the inscription.
Simply perfect.
I can't accept Prince Ning's gift.
The old Yinbi mentioned before, namely Fei Hong, the Minister of Rites, was expected to rebel against King Ning, so he refused to accept the gift. As a result, King Ning was jealous and colluded with Qian Ning to dismiss him from office. After Fei Hong lost his official position and returned to his hometown
On the way, King Ning raised his troops and rebelled. Fei Hong ran to contact Wang Yangming and assisted Wang Yangming in catching King Ning.
Wang Yuan didn't care, he would accept gifts from anyone and donate them to the people, as long as they didn't go into his own pocket.
Just after sending Prince Ning's people away, Jin Lei knocked on the door again.
"Ruoxu, there are some rumors in the capital, and they are all about you." Jin Lei reminded.
Wang Yuan asked: "What did everyone say about me?"
Jin Lei said: "Fortunately, you were admitted to the top of the list. They said that you won the favor of the emperor because of your killing of thieves, but in fact you couldn't even get into the first grade."
"Hahaha!"
Wang Yuan laughed three times: "If this is all because of luck, then they also go to kill the thief? I won't stop you." After saying that, Wang Yuan asked again, "Didn't you use my imperial examination essay as an excuse?"
"What did you write in your imperial examination article?" Jin Lei asked back.
"It's nothing, I just wrote it blindly." Wang Yuan didn't talk about it.
That article seemed dangerous, but in fact it didn't matter at all. Who hasn't had a passionate fantasy of helping the people, who hasn't had a ridiculous article with youthful spirit? And in the examination papers at that time, as long as it didn't violate the taboos of the court, you could write whatever you wanted, and no one would
Care!
Except for the sharing of land, all other contents in Wang Yuan's article were proposed by the ministers of the DPRK and even put into practice.
The founder of Zhang Juzheng's whipping method is named Gui E. He and Wang Yuan became Jinshi this morning. During the Jiajing period, Gui E took the lead in implementing the whipping method despite the opposition of others. How could he still be a minister in the cabinet?
Don't think that civil servants are all useless. Even Yang Tinghe actually wants to reform the bad government, but he just doesn't dare to go too far.
There are three real reasons why the marking officers collectively opposed Wang Yuan being the number one scholar:
First, Wang Yuan’s examination policy article does not comply with the regulations. It should start from the aspects of morality, history, etiquette, righteousness, etc., and give an overall and comprehensive explanation, that is, the so-called looking at the present from the past, and building a high-level view. Instead of going one by one like Wang Yuan did
Discuss practical issues point by point. Scholars who have never been an official cannot explain this kind of issue clearly.
Second, Yang Shen's essay on examination planning was so well written that it would be unreasonable not to choose him as the number one scholar.
Third, Zhu Houzhao was too excited and insisted on opening the roll to find Wang Yuan's name. Combined with Zhu Houzhao's past misdeeds, the reviewers were afraid that Wang Yuan would be included in the first class and enter the Hanlin Academy, becoming a lucky minister beside the emperor.
The more Zhu Houzhao likes someone, the less they can allow that person to enter the Hanlin Academy. This is a taboo for disturbing official order!
The third reason may seem unbelievable, but it’s actually the most critical!
Zhu Houzhao is still only crazily promoting eunuchs and royal guards, and of course the civil servants have no control over them. If Wang Yuan enters the Hanlin Academy, he will be promoted crazily by Zhu Houzhao. This is the emperor's hand in the civil service system.
Once Wang Yuan succeeds, other civil servants will surely follow his example. Why don't ministers want to kill this trend as soon as possible?
With Zhu Houzhao's bad behavior, believe it or not, Wang Yuan may become a third-rank official in a few years. Anyway, the ministers are convinced of this. After all, Zhu Houzhao promoted thousands or hundreds of Jinyiwei households, and dozens or hundreds of people were engaged in wholesale
.
Therefore, as long as Wang Yuan is not allowed to enter the first grade and Wang Yuan is rejected during the selection process, then Zhu Houzhao can do whatever he wants. Even if Zhu Houzhao has a brain attack and is promoted to Wang Yuan as a third-rank official in one year, it doesn't matter. He must be a member of the Imperial Academy.
The cabinet will not pose a substantial threat to the order of the court.
The ministers are not guarding against Wang Yuan, they are guarding against the Emperor!
He is just a new scholar, not yet qualified to enter the attention of important ministers.
This truth was understood by all the marking officers present that day, and by Wang Yangming who knew the truth.
After the Qionglin Banquet, Wang Yuan will go to pay homage to his mentor. At that time, Wang Yangming will definitely give his disciples advice and advise Wang Yuan to look for various opportunities to ask for employment as a local official after entering the Hanlin Academy.
As long as Wang Yuan leaves the central government and Zhu Houzhao, the hostility of the ministers towards him will automatically disappear.