Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 434: The Great Changes Caused by the Jealousy
Mao Yujian was a Jinshi in the second year of the Tianqi reign. During the Tianqi reign, Mao Yujian served as the Censor of Yunnan Province, but lost his official position because he impeached Yang Weiyuan and Ruan Dacheng.

After Wei Zhongxian's downfall, some people said that Mao Yujian had spoken out for justice and offended the powerful, so he was persecuted by the eunuch party and lost his office. Emperor Chongzhen was trying to restore order at the time, and when he learned about this, he issued an order to reinstate Mao Yujian. From then on, Mao Yujian once again became an imperial censor from a criminal official.

After returning to the capital, Mao Yujian was in high spirits, and after being reinstated, he used this as a capital to publicize his loyalty and integrity, and his reputation among the literati became greater.

At that time, scholars, especially civil servants, all valued reputation and talent. Since Mao Yujian was able to pass the imperial examination, he must have some talent. Moreover, his previous dismissal from office was somewhat related to Wei Zhongxian's eunuch party. Now that he has been reinstated, he has naturally become a part of the Qingliu and has a great reputation.

It was for this reason that Mao Yujian returned to the capital and attended many banquets and activities hosted by his colleagues, and these activities naturally included singing, dancing, drinking and sex.

How can a scholar be a scholar if he is not romantic? Moreover, Mao Yujian was in the limelight, and some people were targeting him.

The idea was not anything else, just to please him. When he knew that Mao Yujian had returned to Beijing alone after his reinstatement, with his wife and children in his hometown and no one to accompany him, he secretly sent a beautiful woman to Mao Yujian's house, under the pretext of "adding fragrance to Mr. Mao's sleeves".

Mao Yujian was a sick man. He looked like a gentleman on the surface, but he was extremely lustful in his heart. He had no power to resist this gift. He just pretended to accept it. With a beautiful woman by his side, Mao Yujian suddenly became energetic and seemed to be much younger. He was very happy to be immersed in the gentle land every day.

But somehow, just when Mao Yujian was enjoying himself and hanging out with beautiful women in the backyard every day, not long after, his wife from his hometown suddenly came to the capital and caught Mao Yujian red-handed for "cheating".

Although Mao Yujian was lustful, he was also afraid of his wife. Mao's family was ordinary, and he was able to study and pass the imperial examination to become an official with a lot of help from his wife's family. Therefore, everyone in the family knew that Mao Yujian was afraid of his wife. When he was reinstated, he deliberately left his wife and children in his hometown and returned to Beijing alone, also with the idea of ​​being away from his wife to have a quiet time.

But he didn't expect that this Hedong lion suddenly fell from the sky and caught him off guard.

Mao Yujian, who was having fun with a beautiful woman in bed, was caught red-handed by his wife who had come over from his hometown. Mao Yujian was beaten with a feather duster by his wife and ran away from the house with his head in his hands, naked.

After that, Mao Yujian begged hard for his wife to let him go, but he had to kneel on a washboard for a few days as punishment. Even his delicate beauty was kicked out of the house by his wife, so she could never enjoy him again.

The news spread quickly, and when everyone in the capital learned about Mao Yujian's experience, they were first surprised and then laughed, and it became a topic of conversation after dinner. Mao Yujian was humiliated by this incident, and he was furious. Thinking of the beautiful woman who was kicked out of the house, he felt even more pained.

Afterwards, Mao Yujian behaved himself at home and never had any thoughts of having affairs again. But this incident also made him very angry and puzzled.

Logically, his wife should be in his hometown, which is in Hubei. The distance from his hometown to the capital is not short. Moreover, his wife is just an ordinary woman. The travel expenses alone for coming all the way to the capital are not a small amount. With his wife's usually frugal temperament, how could she spend so much money and come from her hometown so quickly?
Mao Yujian then asked someone about the situation, he wanted to find out what was going on. Soon the news reached his ears, and he learned that the reason why his wife could come to the capital so quickly and also solve the travel expenses problem was entirely because of a policy of the court.

According to the policy of the Ming Dynasty, the families of officials could use the post stations for free, which means that his wife did not spend any money on the journey from her hometown to the capital. Moreover, not only food and accommodation but also transportation were provided by the post stations.

The post stations in the Ming Dynasty were already very complete, and traveling to various places was extremely convenient. This was also the real reason why Mao Yujian's wife rushed to the capital immediately after learning the news in such a short time, catching him off guard.

After learning the truth, Mao Yujian was furious and started to curse. He didn't dare to curse his wife, for fear that she would beat him up again after she found out. But he had no problem cursing the post station. In his opinion, if the post station hadn't been so nosy and provided his wife with free food, lodging and transportation, how could his wife suddenly run to the capital? If his wife was still in her hometown, how could his beauty be driven away?

Originally, he could hug the beauty and enjoy himself every day, but now, the beauty is gone, and only his old wife is by his side. After more than ten years, both of them have lost their passion. Touching his old wife's hand is no different from touching his own hand. There is no way he can get the kind of mental and physical pleasure that the delicate beauty brought him!
Mao Yujian directly complained about the post station. In his opinion, the post station was not a good thing and there was no need for it to exist. If there was no post station, how could he end up like this? It was even more impossible for him to become a laughing stock among the officials in the capital. As time went by, especially the longer his wife came to the capital, the angrier Mao Yujian became, and his life became less fun. He was full of thoughts of revenge.

Today, Mao Yujian suddenly heard the rumor that Emperor Chongzhen was worried about the military expenses in Liaodong. His eyes suddenly lit up and he thought of a good way to please Emperor Chongzhen and take the opportunity to take revenge. He immediately wrote a memorial overnight and delivered it to Emperor Chongzhen the next day.

That’s not all. Mao Yujian also went to find his good friend Liu Mao and asked him to help write the book.

Liu Mao was also a fool, a guy who had read too much and was out of touch with the world. After Mao Yujian found him and told him about this matter, and after another trick, Liu Mao patted his chest and said to Mao Yujian that he would leave the matter to him. He had no problem sticking up for a friend, let alone writing a memorial. What's more, he felt that Mao Yujian's idea was not wrong. If he could really do as Mao Yujian said, it would be a good thing for the country.

Just like that, after Mao Yujian submitted his memorial, Liu Mao soon also wrote a memorial and submitted it. The memorial discussed the same issue and proposed to Emperor Chongzhen to abolish the post stations.

Mao Yujian wrote a lot in his memorial, in which he specifically mentioned the benefits of doing so. He told Emperor Chongzhen that the post stations cost a lot of national expenses every year. Not to mention the expenses of maintaining the operation of the post stations, the wages of the post station officials and postmen alone were not a small amount.

Since the country is short of money, we must increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

Although Mao Yujian had no ability to increase revenue, he had a good idea of ​​how to cut costs. If we could close down all the post stations across the country, send the postmasters and postmen home and let them find their own way, wouldn't that save money?
According to the current situation, once the post station is abolished and all the staff are laid off, the country can save at least hundreds of thousands of taels of money a year. In this way, wouldn't the Liaodong military expenses that the emperor is currently troubled by be saved? If we think of ways to raise some money from other places, at least the initial 800,000 Liao military pay will be available. Isn't this a good thing to have the best of both worlds?

When Emperor Chongzhen saw the two memorials, he did not take them seriously at first, but as he read more he became more and more excited.

After reading the memorial, he immediately asked someone to inquire about the situation and check the detailed expenditure of the court on post stations in various places in a year. When he got the data and compared it, he found that it was indeed the same as what Mao Yujian said. Emperor Chongzhen was instantly happy. Without thinking too much, he directly notified the cabinet to immediately arrange for the closure of the post stations.

The cabinet was confused by Emperor Chongzhen's decree. Why did they suddenly close down the post stations?

Immediately, some cabinet ministers expressed their opposition, reminding Emperor Chongzhen that the post stations were state institutions with many functions, and if they were directly abolished, there might be problems, so the emperor should think twice before acting. But then Chongzhen asked a question that made those who raised objections speechless. Chongzhen directly asked, if the post stations were not abolished, then where would the court save money from? How to solve the military expenditure problem in Liaodong? If you can get the money, then fine, this matter will be left to you, and the post stations do not need to be abolished, as long as you get the money.

This rhetorical question left the other party speechless. If he objected, he would have to help solve the silver problem. How could this problem be so easy to solve? Even the Minister of Revenue Bi Ziyan couldn't do it, let alone him, a cabinet minister with a lower ranking?
After careful consideration, it was not a dismissal of court officials, so it was none of their business. The members of the post station were all low-ranking clerks, in other words, they were not regular civil servants at all, at best they were ordinary members of the public institution system.

As the saying goes, it is better to let a friend die than to let me die. Since the emperor has made up his mind to abolish the post stations, and he has no way to solve the financial problem, why should he risk offending the emperor to oppose it? It is not necessary to do this, and the cabinet soon approved the matter of abolishing the post stations, and then the court began to carry out this matter with great fanfare.

After the matter was settled, Emperor Chongzhen specially issued an edict to commend Mao Yujian and promoted him. So far, Mao Yujian finally "got his revenge", removed the thorn in his side with the help of the emperor, and was commended and promoted by the emperor. It was really killing two birds with one stone, which made Mao Yujian very proud for a while.

But neither Mao Yujian nor Emperor Chongzhen, including cabinet members and other civil servants, expected that it was this one move that made the subsequent situation uncontrollable.

It was originally thought to be just a simple layoff to save costs, but who would have thought that this layoff would accidentally cut a major artery. In order to save a few hundred thousand taels of silver, the Ming Empire, a time-honored company that had been in business for more than 200 years, ended up in danger and even closed down.

(End of this chapter)