Emperor Zhengde

Chapter 18 The people of Daming are very cute

At this time, Xu Jin, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, did not know that he had been promoted to Minister of War by Zhu Houzhao.

At this moment, Xu Jin was frantically taking a bookshelf of books out of the courtyard. These books were all classic Confucian textbooks such as "The Complete Four Books", "The Complete Five Classics", and "Collected Annotations to the Four Books".

“No wonder I have devoted myself to study for decades and have been diligent in my official duties, but I still see more and more refugees and more and more corruption in the officialdom. I have been misled by these so-called sage books!

These books that make people stupid are about how to govern a country, how to rule the world, how to destroy the Tartars, how to bring peace to the people!

In the end, our country and our family were misled by him!

You have no real plan for governing the country. You don't mention land annexation, production relations, or interests. You may teach people to be slaves, but you are using the wrong method to govern the country. I will burn you today. If I don't burn you, it will cause endless harm. The king will be deceived by you and will only know how to fool the people but not how to fear them. The officials will be misled by you and will only know how to get promoted and make money but not the safety of the world!"

Xu Jin was like a madman at this time. He piled all the books in the yard frantically, then asked the servants to pour kerosene on them and started a fire.

Just at this moment, Wang Yue, the eunuch in charge of the Imperial Household Department, came over and said, "There is an imperial decree!"

Xu Jin, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, had to hurriedly change into his official uniform to receive the order. However, Wang Yue, the seal holder of the Imperial Household Department, smelled fireworks and followed the smell directly over. He happened to see a pile of books being burned in the yard of Xu Jin, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, and one of the books was "The Doctrine of the Mean"!
Wang Yue, the eunuch in charge of the Imperial Household Department, was shocked and rushed to take out the book from the fire: "Master Xu, why are you burning this sage book? You are also a disciple of Confucius and Mencius, why are you behaving so rebelliously!"

Xu Jin couldn't help but laugh when he saw this: "The Four Books are really harmful. Even the eunuchs say they are sage books. Yes, they are sage books, but they don't have the true meaning of governing the world. I, Xu Jin, don't want to be a gentleman, and I'm not a gentleman. Why should I read these sage books? What's the harm in burning them?"

"Crazy, crazy! The previous Minister of War was just killed in a bombing, and the new Minister of War has gone crazy!"

Wang Yue, the eunuch in charge of the Imperial Household Department, said this speechlessly, but the imperial edict appointing Xu Jin as the Minister of War had already been issued, and he had no choice but to read it out, so he read it out anyway.

"We would like to congratulate Lord Xu on his promotion to Grand Marshal, but we still want to say that Lord Xu is now in charge of the military forces of the world. Please do not be so unorthodox. You must live up to the grace of heaven and live up to the people!"

Wang Yue, the eunuch in charge of the Imperial Household Department, sighed and walked away.

Xu Jin has calmed down now. He didn't expect that he would become the Minister of War before he became a member of the Zhongjun Society. But because of this, when he thought that he was still a reserve member of the Zhongjun Society, he was not as excited about being promoted to the Minister of War as others imagined.

Xu Jin had a desire to be recognized by the Zhongjun Society, and even wanted to become a member of the Zhongjun Society as soon as possible. At this time, Liu Jin found him again: "The organization is very relieved to know that you have become the Minister of War. The organization instructs you to change the decadent military equipment when Liu Daxia was the Minister of War during your tenure as the Minister of War, and select good future for the court! Also, when you meet the emperor to thank him tomorrow, you must seriously obey and learn from the emperor's guidance. We are members of the Zhongjun Society. The purpose of the Zhongjun Society is to unite under the collective with the emperor as the core to benefit the Ming Dynasty and the people. Do you understand?"

"Please rest assured, I will not disappoint you. I will do my best to be the Minister of War and will regard Your Majesty as my only core figure. I will never have any second thoughts!"

After Minister of War Xu Jin finished speaking, Liu Jin smiled and nodded.

Here, the chief minister Liu Jian, the second minister, the third minister Xie Qian and others also learned from the eunuch Wang Yue who held the seal of the Imperial Household Department that the Minister of War Xu Jin had burned the Four Books.

Liu Jian was so angry that his face turned red on the spot: "This Xu Jin, I saw that he does not form cliques or engage in private interests, and he is calm and low-key, so I chose him and Wang Hua. Why did he do such a treasonous thing! Can he burn the Four Books?"

"This kind of behavior is worthy of death! I didn't expect it, I really didn't expect it!" Li Dongyang said gritting his teeth.

"It's a pity that Lord Liu was killed in the explosion. If he hadn't been killed, a heretic like Xu Jin wouldn't have been the Minister of War! It's all because of people like Ma Wensheng and Liu Jin. They made the court a mess!"

Xie Qian sighed and said angrily. Liu Jian couldn't help but ask Wang Yue: "Eunuch Wang, does His Majesty know about this?"

"I have already told your Majesty. Your Majesty said that the books were bought by someone else, and they can burn them if they want. It does not violate the court laws, so there is no need to investigate further," Wang Yue replied.

Liu Jian sat down helplessly upon hearing this: "Your Majesty is confused! This is not as simple as burning books, this is against orthodoxy! Letting a traitor from the Confucian Academy be the Minister of War, just thinking about it makes me angry!"

After Liu Jian said this, Li Dongyang and Xie Qian also sighed helplessly.

But as Zhu Houzhao said, Xu Jin's burning of the Four Books was his freedom and there was no way to interfere. Moreover, Xu Jin's position as Minister of War was selected through a formal court recommendation procedure. No one had any reason to question it. Even the cabinet could not do anything about it, because Xu Jin was originally recommended by Liu Jian and others in the court, and then the cabinet voted on it, and it was approved by the Silijian and announced in an imperial edict.

Zhu Houzhao couldn't help but laugh after learning about the book burning by the Minister of War Xu Jin. In fact, he didn't expect Xu Jin to be so unorthodox. He suddenly discovered that the people of the Ming Dynasty might really be more lovely than he imagined.

According to convention, Xu Jincheng had to thank Emperor Zhu Houzhao when he became the Minister of War.

then.

Zhu Houzhao met with the Minister of War Xu Jin in the Leopard Room.

Unlike the previous times when the late emperor passed away and the emperor knelt down to worship the new emperor, and when Zhu Houzhao ascended the throne and held court meetings, Xu Jin was instinctively nervous when he met Zhu Houzhao this time.

This time, although he was the Minister of War in charge of the world's military forces and money, he had already regarded himself as a member of the organization. He did not dare to be disrespectful to Zhu Houzhao because he did not know who was from the organization around Zhu Houzhao and who was testing him. He did not want to go against the organization's ideals and show any disloyalty to His Majesty.

"Your humble servant greets His Majesty!"

Xu Jin bowed respectfully.

"Please stand up, my dear Xu. It is the popular wish that you can become the Minister of War. I also believe that you can manage the military affairs of my Ming Dynasty well. The safety of the world rests on your shoulders." Zhu Houzhao said a few words and let Xu Jin leave.

"I understand. I will definitely revitalize the military and live up to your majesty's trust!" Xu Jin said.

At this time, Zhu Houzhao suddenly remembered something: "Oh, Lord Xu, do you know where Zheng He's navigation atlas is?"

Xu Jin was stunned, wondering why His Majesty suddenly asked this, so he had to answer truthfully: "Liu Daxia also asked me to look for it before, but I haven't found it yet. I think it is still stored in a certain archive of the Ministry of War."

"Hand it over to me after you find it. Make sure it is kept properly and cannot be lost!" Zhu Houzhao breathed a sigh of relief.

After Xu Jin withdrew, Zhu Houzhao gathered Liu Jin and the other eight tigers together again: "Now that the Minister of War has been replaced by Xu Jin, this person has obviously become our believer. And the Minister of Personnel Ma Wensheng is also on our side. Now it's time to move on the eunuch Zhang Zhao who holds the seal of the Imperial Horse Administration. If we replace him, we can completely control the military power!"

Thanks to the book friend "偷生的蓮蚁" for the 100 Qidian coins reward

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(End of this chapter)