Chapter 34: The stubborn Zhu Houzhao of the Great Court
The death of Hongzhi did not stop the Ming Empire!
The three elders of the cabinet, headed by Liu Jian, Xie Qian, and Li Dongyang, read out Hongzhi's posthumous photo at the court meeting on the second day and respectfully invited Prince Zhu Houzhao to ascend the throne.
The prince doesn't want to!
Please invite all the officials again!
The prince refused again!
Three invitations to all officials!
The prince reluctantly accepted it, chose an auspicious day to ascend the throne, and then arranged for the burial of Emperor Daxing. After all this trouble, more than a month passed.
At this point, the prince Zhu Houzhao finally became the emperor from the prince, with the reign title Zhengde!
As the saying goes, one emperor and one courtier, when a new emperor takes the throne, some positions in both the court and the inner court will be changed.
The first changes were made to the two positions that the emperor relied heavily on, namely the ceremonial supervisor and the imperial horse supervisor.
Wang Yue, the former Chief Superintendent of Ceremonies, was arranged by Zhengde to be a guard eunuch in Nanjing in accordance with Emperor Hongzhi's will, which was regarded as a retirement.
The new Chief Supervisor of Ceremonies is Liu Jin, who has been with the prince since he was a child. He is also the head of the Dongchang Factory. He is so powerful that he can be said to be the number one person in the inner court.
The former Chief Royal Horse Supervisor was sent to Taiyuan for retirement by Zhu Houzhao. The new Chief Royal Horse Supervisor is also the young eunuch Gu Dayong who has been with the prince since he was a child. He is in charge of the four guard camps including Wuxiang, Tengxiang, Zuowei and Youwei.
After the changes in two important positions in the inner court, some changes also occurred in the court.
First of all, the cabinet elder Liu Jian took office. In the past, the division of cabinet positions such as chief assistant and second assistant was not clear. But this time, with Liu Jian taking office, Li Dongyang was officially designated as the chief assistant of the cabinet, responsible for leading the cabinet and sharing the emperor's worries.
Secondly, after the new emperor ascended the throne, he vigorously promoted a group of young officials into the court. For example, Lin Nuo's old friend Xu Wei was awarded the position of Minister of Civil Affairs. He was a fifth-rank official and was qualified to go to the court to discuss matters.
The last appointment was to formally appoint Lin Nuo as the Commander of the Imperial Guards at the court meeting.
Although Hongzhi had made the appointment before, he had never announced it in public in the court, and most of the spies from other forces in the Jinyi Guard had been cleared out by Lin Nuo. Therefore, none of the officials know much about this matter.
However, regarding Zhengde's appointment, the civil servants of the Manchu Dynasty were furious. They were not angry that the new emperor's appointment of Lin Nuo was too high, but that the new emperor Zhengde was too bullying!
Who is Lin Nuo?
In the fifteenth year of Hongzhi's imperial examination, a student from a poor family entered the officialdom of the Ming Dynasty without relying on any connections, relying solely on his own knowledge. It can be said that he became a role model for countless scholars in the Ming Dynasty.
But now, this role model set in the eyes of the civil servant group was actually given to the Imperial Guard by the emperor. Even if he was given the position of a first-class left governor, in the eyes of the civil servants of the Manchu Dynasty, it was still a humiliation for Lin Nuo, and with it,
This is also a humiliation to the entire civil service group.
Who doesn't know that the Left Commander of the Fifth Army is in name only, and can only be regarded as a false position. Emperor, if you take a military attache for a false position, you will get the first-class Tanhua into the military attache system. Aren't you disgusting?
I would rather have a seventh-grade civil servant than a first-grade military attache! Although no one said this clearly, this is what the literati in the Ming Dynasty thought today.
Who doesn't know that today's military attache group has long since declined. To put it harshly, today's military attache group is a sheep raised in a sheepfold by civilian officials. They can only stay in the sheepfold honestly and let the civilian group
Some public officials even started to criticize directly, which made Zhengde very disgraced and some could not get off the stage.
Even Xu Wei felt unhappy for Lin Nuo. He didn't say much. He just kept asking the new emperor, hoping to make some changes to Lin Nuo's position, even if he didn't like him anymore and let him go.
You can also work as a prefect somewhere.
Zhengde suppressed his anger and looked at this scene in the court meeting. He was still too young. Faced with this situation where the opinions of the officials in the court were contrary to his own, he didn't know what to do for a while.
During this period, he turned his attention to the military attache group many times, but those military attaches all stood aside with their hands tied, looking like, "You can make any noise, but we'll just take a look at it." He was very angry.
My teeth are itching, and my heart is calling me trash!
At this moment, Zhengde finally understood what his father once told him. In the court, we need loyal ministers and capable ministers, but we also need corrupt officials and sycophantic ministers!
Corrupt officials can be used to establish authority, and sycophants can side with the emperor and quarrel with other officials, so that all officials will not stand together against the emperor.
At this moment, Zhengde urgently needs a sycophant to stand up and share his worries. But unfortunately, the appointment of Lin Nuo as the commander of the Imperial Guard has violated the interests of the entire civil service group, even if some officials want to be
The sycophant flatters me, but I dare not stand up at this time.
Otherwise, if you commit public outrage, you may really be beaten to death in the court!
However, although the young emperor Zhu Houzhao was young, his temper was also very stubborn. From the beginning to the end, he never revealed that Lin Nuo's position as commander of the Jinyi Guards was appointed by the late emperor.
In fact, if he had spoken out, he could have forcibly settled the matter in the name of the late emperor's will, but in that case, the person who would bear the infamy in the future would probably be the recently deceased Emperor Hongzhi.
In fact, the reason why Hongzhi appointed Lin Nuo as a royal guard before his death, instead of waiting until the prince ascended the throne, was to protect the prince and was willing to bear the infamy for the prince, so as not to cause the prince to antagonize the officials in the future.
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It's just a pity that father and son have a deep love. When Zhu Houzhao thought that his father had just passed away, if he was scolded by civil servants because of this, then it would be extremely unfilial for him as a son.
"My father is a benevolent king and should not bear the infamy. This infamy should be shouldered by my son!"
Zhengde thought so in his heart and did so. He hardly drank any water all day long and just sat in the Jinluan Palace, confronting the ministers, unwilling to back down or change his orders.
From beginning to end, neither the emperor nor the minister had any intention of letting Lin Nuo make a choice face to face.
Zhengde did not want Master Lin to be in trouble, while Li Dongyang and other civil servants wanted to protect Lin Nuo.
In the eyes of all the civil servants, Lin Nuo was definitely unwilling to enter the military attache system, but if he was allowed to express his reluctance face to face in the court, wouldn't it be disrespectful and disrespectful? If he was disliked by the emperor for this, what would happen in the future?
The future is completely cut off.
It has to be said that when the civil servants group together for their own interests, even the emperor will have a feeling of powerlessness, and this is the feeling of Zhengde at this time.
At this moment, he felt unreasonably bored with this so-called Great Court Meeting, and he didn't even want to live in the Forbidden City any longer!