Uncle from a poor family

Chapter 351 Apply eye drops

Zhang Yu went to present gifts to Queen Dowager Zhou on behalf of the Eastern Palace.

This Buddhist scripture was stripped from the murals of the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang. It was obtained by Zhang Yanling's advance arrangement of sending people from Huizhou merchants to the Shazhou Buddhist Caves in the territory of Handong Zuowei in the Western Regions to copy them one by one. It can be said to be an absolute unique copy in this era. The richness of the content and the novelty of the perspective are like reading a book written in heaven for Zhang Yu. However, this did not prevent her from giving this item to Empress Dowager Zhou.

"Grandmother, this was something my father found by chance. My mother is also a Buddhist. My father originally prepared it for my mother. But knowing that Grandmother also likes to read Buddhist scriptures, he asked someone to send it to the palace. Now... I have sent it to you."

Zhang Yu presented the Buddhist scriptures respectfully.

Chen Gui, who heard the news, quickly took the Buddhist scriptures and brought them to Queen Dowager Zhou.

Queen Mother Zhou took the Buddhist scripture, and after just a few glances at it, she couldn't stop smiling, her joy was beyond words.

Queen Mother Zhou smiled and said, "This is good, this is good. I have only heard of many Buddhist scriptures, but now I can finally see them with my own eyes. The prince is thoughtful, and you are thoughtful too. You two are both filial, and you are truly of the same lineage."

Having obtained something good, one would naturally praise the younger generation. Compliments flowed out of Queen Mother Zhou's mouth as if they were free.

Zhang Yu, however, seemed very humble, and was not surprised by either praise or criticism.

"Hurry up and sit down... Why didn't the prince come? I haven't seen that kid in the past two days..."

Queen Mother Zhou suddenly thought of her precious grandson.

In the past, Zhang Yu always came to visit with Zhu Youtang, but this was the first time he came alone.

Zhang Yu said, "The Crown Prince has to attend classes today, so he can't come to pay respects to the Queen Mother. Besides, today is not the day for him to pay respects. The Buddhist scriptures should have been delivered by the Crown Prince himself, but the Crown Prince said that such a good thing should be delivered to the Empress Dowager as soon as possible... It just so happens that your granddaughter-in-law has nothing to do in the East Palace, so I am here to deliver it to the Empress Dowager on the order of the Crown Prince. I hope you won't mind."

“That’s thoughtful.”

Queen Mother Zhou smiled and waved her hand, "Come on, prepare lunch. I would like to invite the Crown Princess to dine here."

"No, no."

Zhang Yu hurriedly said, "I am only here to deliver something, and I dare not disturb the Royal Grandmother's meditation. Besides, reading Buddhist scriptures requires sincerity. I have been influenced by my mother, so I know a little bit. I will go back now."

Queen Mother Zhou asked curiously, "You're leaving right after delivering the gifts? This makes it seem like... I, an old lady, don't understand the younger generation."

Zhang Yu had a happy smile on her face: "Grandmother is so kind to the younger generation. Today, I am here to give you some Buddhist scriptures. We will see each other every day in the future. We will spend a long time together... Even if we need to have a meal, there is no need to rush today."

"Haha."

Queen Mother Zhou smiled and said, "Why not? Talking to you two makes me, an old man, feel comfortable. But granddaughter-in-law, are you really here for nothing else?"

"No."

Zhang Yu had an innocent look on his face.

This requires mentioning Zhang Yanling’s special instructions.

Although the prince spoke to Queen Mother Zhou about the Wanhe Temple incident in the name of filial piety, it was inevitable that Queen Mother Zhou felt that she was being used afterwards, and she felt somewhat unhappy.

What we want to do now is to make people feel that Zhu Youtang and Zhang Yu have no bad intentions at all, and that it is you, the Queen Mother, who is scheming to deal with Liang Fang, and it has nothing to do with us.

"Grandmother, my father is not in the palace recently. Logically, I shouldn't run around and disturb your practice. I'm really sorry... I'll go back first."

Zhang Yu stood up, bowed and left.

Queen Mother Zhou smiled and waved her hand: "Good boy, go back quickly... Someone come and see the reward."

"No, no, Grandmother, please don't be so polite. If you really give me a reward, my granddaughter-in-law won't dare to come here anymore, and I won't be able to explain to the Crown Prince when I go back!"

Zhang Yu quickly shook his head.

Queen Mother Zhou smiled and said, "Well, your Eastern Palace should have everything you need, so I don't need to worry too much. Chen Gui, please send the Crown Princess off for me... Go."

"Yes."

Chen Gui seemed very honored and personally escorted Zhang Yu out of the palace.

……

……

Zhang Yu came and went, appearing to be in a hurry.

When Chen Gui returned, he found that Queen Mother Zhou was studying the Buddhist scriptures carefully.

"Ancestor."

Chen Gui stood nearby, trying to make himself familiar to the crowd.

Queen Mother Zhou nodded and said, "This is really a good thing. It has unique insights. It can be said to be the original meaning of the sutra. It is full of Zen ideas... Later, I should invite a Zen master with profound practice to come and study it with me. I wonder if it contains any content about rebirth in paradise?"

Chen Gui smiled and said, "Queen Mother, where did this thing come from?"

Queen Mother Zhou turned her head, glanced at him, and asked, "Chen Gui, you have a very good nose. Why did you come here today just because you smelled something?"

"No, I just happened to come here to pay my respects to the old ancestor and bumped into him by chance."

Chen Gui said flatteringly.

Queen Mother Zhou asked, "Didn't someone ask you to come here specifically to say something for the Crown Prince and his wife?"

"Absolutely not."

Chen Gui firmly denied, "I haven't left the palace recently, and I won't be ordered by anyone. Besides, the Crown Princess... doesn't seem to have said anything, right?"

"hiss……"

When Queen Mother Zhou heard this, she could not help but close the Buddhist scripture.

Mainly because of her level of Taoism, she couldn't understand the complicated Buddhist scriptures, so she was just pretending to be a big shot when she held them in her hands.

"That hits the nail on the head... I originally thought that the girl came here alone for some reason, but in the end... she didn't say anything."

Queen Mother Zhou was puzzled, "If it were someone else, they would have to wear out their lips to ask for favors like this. People are really different."

Chen Gui smiled and said, "The prince is kind-hearted. As the saying goes, people from the same family stick together. How could the princess he favors be someone with such ulterior motives?"

"Ah."

Queen Mother Zhou nodded slightly. She seemed to agree with Chen Gui's words and nodded in approval. "What you said does make some sense. But that girl, is she really fine? Suddenly she mentioned that the emperor was not in the palace... What... What on earth is the emperor doing?"

Chen Gui replied cautiously, "He said he was practicing Taoism in a Taoist temple outside the palace in order to comprehend the Taoist principles and use them to cure diseases. Perhaps he could attain immortality."

Queen Mother Zhou cursed, "Who the hell is slandering my son? Li Zisheng? How can you believe such nonsense?"

"This matter really has nothing to do with Master Li."

Chen Gui explained, "I heard it was Immortal Master Deng. He took a miraculous elixir, and after taking it, Your Majesty felt that his condition had improved. Then Immortal Master Deng urged Your Majesty to go to Chuyun Monastery to practice Taoism. Your Majesty agreed, and he stayed there for half a month."

Queen Mother Zhou said with a gloomy face: "He didn't even tell me before he left. Could it be that he knew that I would definitely not let him go?"

Chen Gui asked, "Is this the purpose of the Crown Princess coming to give a gift?"

"Chen Gui, I thought you were in the same group as Li Zisheng, Zhang Luan and others. It seems that your motives are not pure."

Empress Dowager Zhou teased, "The emperor went to the Chuyun Monastery to practice Taoism. Do I need to learn this from the Crown Princess? Am I the kind of person who closes his eyes and ears?"

Chen Gui quickly apologized: "This servant did not mean to slander the Crown Princess."

Queen Mother Zhou said, "Besides, no matter how noble her status is, she is only the Crown Princess, a little girl. Even an old fox like me can't see any bad intentions from her, and you are still analyzing them for me?"

"I just feel that in terms of filial piety, this girl is no less than the prince. Hey, speaking of which, I want to meet my eldest nephew again and ask him how he raised such a good daughter."

Great nephew! ?

Chen Gui suddenly remembered that Queen Mother Zhou asked Zhang Luan to call her aunt.

Suddenly I felt ashamed.

"Compared to those guys who come to visit for no reason, the prince and his wife are much better." Queen Mother Zhou sighed, "As brothers, their filial piety is far from the same. It may be because they have a bad mother who did not educate her children well. The prince has no mother, so he treats me as his closest relative."

Chen Guixin said, you see, hasn’t the Crown Princess achieved her goal?

The most feared thing between people is comparison.

Perhaps the Crown Princess wanted to outdo Concubine Shao and her son, so she came here deliberately to offer Buddhist scriptures?
……

……

At noon, Zhu Youtang returned to Duanjing Hall. In the afternoon, he was going to Wenhua Hall to attend to affairs, so he came back at noon to make some preparations.

By the way, he asked Zhang Yu about the situation of delivering Buddhist scriptures to Queen Mother Zhou in the morning.

"Yu'er, you've worked so hard."

Zhu Youtang asked worriedly, "I should have gone with you. Did the Empress Dowager give you any trouble?"

Zhang Yu smiled and said, "Weren't you the most filial to the Imperial Grandmother before? Why, you are the most filial to her, but you are afraid that she will embarrass your wife?"

Zhu Youtang nodded solemnly and said, "The Empress Dowager has a bad temper and sometimes embarrasses people on purpose... In the past, if I made her unhappy, she would ignore me for a long time. Once, I knelt for a long time and begged her for forgiveness."

When Zhang Yu heard this, he couldn't help but put away his smile.

From her husband's story, she could intuitively feel how helpless the prince was at that time.

A helpless and pitiful child went to pay his respects to his grandmother, but was given a cold shoulder by his grandmother. In the end, he could only kneel there and beg the old lady for forgiveness... He was truly a motherless child, with no one to love and pity him, and even more so, lacking care.

"The Empress Dowager didn't make things difficult for me. She even praised you and me for our filial piety," said Zhang Yu.

"very nice."

Zhu Youtang clapped his hands and then asked in confusion, "Where did my father-in-law get the Buddhist scriptures from?"

"Who cares? He is willing to send her to the palace, which means there must be a deep meaning behind it. In fact, my father dotes on my mother very much. My mother likes to read Buddhist scriptures on weekdays."

Zhang Yu said with a smile.

Zhu Youtang was like a quiet listener, listening to his wife talking about the Zhang family, with a longing smile on his face.

……

……

in the afternoon.

Inside the Wenhua Hall.

On that day, Liu Jian and Xie Qian, the heads of the two groups of lecturers, were instructed by Wan'an to go to Wenhua Hall to accompany the prince to hear the case.

As for the reason, Wan An did not explain it to Liu Jian and Xie Qian, but the two of them still attended the meeting.

On that day, the two cabinet ministers Wan'an and Liu Ji, as well as Wei Tai, the new eunuch in charge of the Imperial Household Department, all arrived at the Wenhua Hall. Also arriving was Ni Yue, the Right Vice Minister of Rites and lecturer in the Eastern Palace.

Zhu Youtang was quite surprised to see so many people suddenly.

No one took the court sessions in Wenhua Palace seriously in the previous few times. Now that my old father has gone to Izumo Monastery to practice Taoism and is not in the palace, why are people suddenly taking him seriously again?

"Your Highness, something big has happened in the court recently."

Wan An immediately began to flatter the prince, "According to my investigation, there is a huge deficit in the granary in Tongzhou. The current Minister of Revenue Li Min and the Left Vice Minister Sun Ren have an unshirkable responsibility."

When Zhu Youtang heard this, he thought, doesn't this confirm the information I got from my father-in-law?
But I don’t understand anything. What’s the point of telling me?
Wanan continued to dig the hole.

He said, "The preliminary results of the investigation have been submitted by the Household Department, and detailed figures are listed on them. As for the exact deficit of the Tongzhou warehouse, we can only send someone to investigate. Your Highness... Here is a copy of the Guanbai, please read it."

As he spoke, Wan'an considerately had someone hand over a copy of the case details to Zhu Youtang.

Zhu Youtang was a serious and responsible person after all. He took it and read it carefully, but found that he couldn't understand it at all.

Because no one intended for him to understand.

Wan An said that this was the result of the initial investigation, but in fact it was just a summary of the income and expenditure of money and grain, which was nothing. There were too many and too complicated items involved, and it was definitely not something that could be figured out overnight by just two or three people. If you take this to the Three Judicial Departments, they would not be able to find anything useful.

Wan An bowed and said, "I ask Your Highness the Crown Prince to investigate this case strictly."

Zhu Youtang seemed to understand a little bit after hearing this, and immediately closed the Guanbai Book and asked: "Wan Gelao, shouldn't you ask my father for instructions on this matter? Why do you want me to make the decision?"

Wan An smiled and said, "This matter was all caused by the Crown Prince's careless words before. After the cabinet learned about this matter, they also paid close attention to it and even sent people to investigate, and only then did they discover the clues. Moreover, Your Majesty is not asking about court affairs now, so it is most appropriate for the Crown Prince to issue an order to investigate."

Xie Qian, who had been silent all this time, heard this and said half-jokingly, "Lord Wan, that's not right. His Majesty only asked the Crown Prince to hear the case in Wenhua Hall and didn't order him to handle government affairs. This case of the Ministry of Revenue involves a lot of people. How can we investigate it just because of the Crown Prince's order? Everything should be reported to His Majesty and handled by the court."

Traditional civil servants care very much about procedural justice.

To put it bluntly, what Xie Qian hoped was that the emperor and his ministers would sit down and discuss things together, rather than being as arbitrary and dictatorial as the current Emperor Chenghua.

The biggest problem faced by the Chenghua Dynasty was that the emperor basically did not discuss state affairs with his ministers, which led to the long-term neglect of the court discussion system and the gradual tendency of one-man rule in state affairs. This resulted in many cases like the deficit in the Tongzhou warehouse being left uninvestigated.

Or the emperor would order an investigation, and the result would be the arrest of a few top officials to take the blame, so as to deceive the public opinion.

The greatest significance of the court discussion is to analyze the matter rationally, find out all the responsible persons, and make amends afterwards to prevent problems from happening again.

Wan An, as if in a difficult situation, shook his head and said, "It's a pity that the court is basically in disarray now, and all matters are basically handled by the ministry."

Xie Qian reminded: "Then let's discuss it first."

Wan An smiled bitterly and asked, "Yu Qiao, don't you know the rules? Should we hand over the Ministry of Revenue case to the Ministry of Revenue and let them discuss it on their own? This is a major case involving officials at the level of Shangshu and Shilang. How can we leave such a case to them to handle on their own? Wouldn't it end up being a punishment of three cups of wine?"
"Autumn is about to arrive, and the Tatars love to harass the border of the Ming Dynasty at this time. If there is a problem with the allocation of money and grain, and if there is no grain and grass to be allocated from the Tongzhou warehouse... this will be troublesome."

Zhu Youtang saw that Wan'an was trying to embarrass Xie Qian, so he held out his hand to block the criticism for his teacher and took the initiative to speak: "Lord Wan, since there is such a thing, why doesn't the cabinet discuss it and come to me for instructions? In fact, I don't understand anything."

"Your Highness, you should understand."

Wan An said solemnly, "This case involves a lot of serious matters. The cabinet has indeed discussed it. Hasn't the Crown Prince even found out some details of the case? Doesn't the Crown Prince want to share the worries for Your Majesty?

“Although the affairs of the court are not the prince’s family affairs, Your Majesty asked the prince to hear the case in Wenhua Hall in order to find out the mistakes of the court, or to fill in the gaps.

“Now that the omissions have been discovered, no one is responsible because Your Majesty is away. Does the affairs inside and outside the court have to wait for Your Majesty to handle them alone?
"If you bother His Majesty with such trivial matters, I'm afraid that his illness will become even worse!"

Wan'an wanted to push Zhu Youtang to a high platform from which he could not get down.

You always play the emotional card of filial piety in front of others, but this time I will let you know that it is not easy to be a filial son.

Your father is now in seclusion recuperating from illness, but you don't help him share his worries and instead watch him continue to worry about state affairs, which eventually leads to his condition getting worse... Is this what you call being a filial son?
Humph, let me see how you get down from this staircase!
Zhu Youtang looked at Wei Tai and asked, "Wei Daban, how should this matter be handled?"

If Qin Chang were here, he would definitely tell Zhu Youtang that the matter could be put aside for the time being and wait for the emperor's order.

What seclusion or not? Your father has been recuperating for more than a day or two. Besides, he has known about this for a long time but just didn't do anything about it. Don't rush into it just because someone provokes you.

But Weitai...

He had just become the seal holder of the Imperial Household Department and had never even experienced a time when the emperor sat down with him to discuss state affairs. He was merely a temporary replacement for Tan Chang before the emperor went into seclusion.

After thinking it over again and again, Wei Tai just shook his head silently, indicating that he could do nothing about it.

Although Liu Jian and Xie Qian next to him were also the prince's teachers, as lecturers in the Eastern Palace, they had no say in the affairs of the court and could not help Zhu Youtang at this moment.

All the problems were placed before Zhu Youtang.

If he doesn't conduct a thorough investigation, he would be unfilial!

If he said he would investigate, that would be an act of usurpation and excessiveness, and he would probably be blamed by his old father for overreaching.

This made Qin Ji, who was listening at the side, very anxious.

Qin Ji mustered up the courage to suggest: "Your Highness, this matter...why don't you think about it first and then..."

"Eunuch Tan, what do you mean by this?"

Wan An stared at Qin Ji and said, "There are important matters in the court that need to be dealt with urgently. Now that His Majesty is in seclusion, the Crown Prince is equivalent to the regent of the Ming Dynasty. Is the Crown Prince afraid of things and dare not take the responsibility? It's not like he is going to do anything illegal... It's just a matter of investigating a deficit. Don't you even have the courage to do this?"

Beads of sweat appeared on Zhu Youtang's forehead.

It may be due to the heat, or it may be due to the tension in my heart.

Finally, Zhu Youtang asked, "Then... Elder Wan, can we let the cabinet investigate the matter and then ask the emperor to make the final decision?"

No matter what, Zhu Youtang still didn't have the courage to take that crucial step.

Because he knew that he had no ability to share the responsibility for his old father, he could only ask Wan'an in a pleading tone.

Wan An seemed very satisfied with this, and nodded, saying, "Since the Crown Prince cannot issue an order, then the Cabinet will be responsible for the investigation. I obey your order."

If you let us investigate, our goal will be achieved. We can then justifiably tell the outside world that you, the crown prince, are incompetent and even irresponsible.

No matter what you say, we have the final say. Aren't you, a little guy, easily under our control?

(End of this chapter)