Cross the Sea in the Red Chamber

Because he couldn't scare the snake away and arouse the suspicion of the powerful family, Jiang Yuan could only keep Lin Jun in Yangzhou, let him lead the spies to inquire about Song Chen's family, and he himself took Situ Ye to continue southward to Suzhou and Hangzhou. and go.

Along the way, Jiang Yuan made quite detailed investigations, whether it was the price of grain, or the output of the fields, the tax situation, how much the rent of the shops in the city was, how much was the rent of the tenants in the field, and how the government governed the people's livelihood. , What natural disasters*, he is not willing to let go of everything, every item will be carefully investigated.

Situ Ye didn't know what his teacher was doing, but he was also very interested in these things, and kept watching Jiang Yuan register the information on the form he made.I think this is the private visit of the micro-service mentioned in the teacher's story, asking for grievances.

What is Jiang Yuan doing?Lord Jiang Hou searched for the flaws and foundations of the aristocratic family and noble forces among thousands of clues.Although he hasn't fully figured out the reasons for their power formation, he is sure that there must be flaws to be found, no matter whether the family is noble or noble, and it is impossible to be seamless.

This flaw cannot be summed up in a simple sentence of official position or power.

You must know that in the Yan Dynasty, the court had already discovered that the aristocratic family was too big to lose momentum.The two generations of emperors in the Yan Dynasty were all trying their best to suppress the aristocratic family, and would rather promote a poor family with lower ability than the aristocratic family.The entire Jiangnan aristocratic family has not even had an official above the fifth rank in the Yan Dynasty for decades, and they are basically suppressed in the local area, and there is no way to enter the center.

But what about the Jing Dynasty?After decades of continuous suppression and the devastation of wars, the status of the aristocratic family remains unchanged, occupying most of the power in the south of the Yangtze River.Before Xungui appeared, he even became a real local emperor in the south of the Yangtze River, and almost separated Jiangdong and became king on his own.If the aristocratic family hadn't been deprived of military power during the Yan Dynasty, and suffered a real disadvantage in terms of force, and was defeated by Emperor Gao, and immediately surrendered, the aristocratic family might have established a single country!

Xungui's power is not far behind.Not to mention other families, but think about it, among the four major families in Jinling, there is only one Jia Zheng in the two families of the Jia family who holds a real official position. doom.Who gave them so much power, so much power?

The Jia family is still an official after all, so what about the Xue family in Jinling?The Xue family is nothing more than a businessman. They are called imperial merchants in name, but they are actually merchants who run errands for the royal family. Even if they are rich, they have no social status.So how can these unprofessional businessmen be able to shake the government's judgment, and even make a show of official talismans?

Official protection talisman, official protection talisman, how can a merchant's family where a dude lives can protect the official position of a state government official?And why let him be dismissed from office or even lose his life?This is well worth thinking about.

Some people say that the nobles are powerful because they collude with each other, so they can form such a huge force.It's not unreasonable to say this, but why should a high-ranking and powerful family collude with a weak and shabby household?

The four kings and eight males are almost juxtaposed.Jiang Yuan remembered that the four kings with different surnames in the original book gave the Jia family a lot of face, and they would attend the Jia family's activities every now and then, pulling a hand from time to time. Although they may not have any good intentions, there is still some collusion.

The king with a different surname has a great reputation and holds military power. The Jia family is just a shabby household. There is not even a person in power in the family, but there are only a few empty titles.But what about in reality?Among the four kings with different surnames, even the most old fox, the king of Beijing County, was willing to make friends with such shabby households as the Jia family and the Niu family.Why should a powerful king with a different surname be so polite to them?

An old man can never explain this question clearly, and this is definitely not something that the ancestors can explain clearly.Based on Jiang Yuan's understanding of Wang's family with different surnames, these families simply don't see rabbits and don't spread eagles, and they won't associate with families with empty titles if there is no benefit.Therefore, these aristocratic families and nobles definitely have some powerful backhands in their hands, and this backhand is the root cause of their standing for many years.

If he wanted to bypass the old emperor and take care of the family and nobles, he had to find out the root cause, so he was willing to investigate all the clues he could find, and dig out possible reasons from them.

Jiang Yuan had a rough life experience in his previous life, and he went to serve as a soldier when he became an adult. When he really had leisure time and could concentrate on reading and learning something, he fell seriously ill again.Therefore, although the knowledge he has mastered cannot be said to be small, most of it is seen on TV and the Internet. It is too complicated, but it is also too superficial and not deep enough.It can only be considered an amateur player, not a professional player.

Relying on the old fox's eyes cultivated in two lifetimes, Jiang Yuan can see through a lot of things, but he may not be able to tell accurately if he digs deeper.This requires him to study bit by bit, observe carefully, and perhaps rely on his insight to see something that others have not noticed.

When the official ship arrived in Hangzhou, Jiang Yuan secretly observed the Liu family.As an aristocratic family that has been passed down for hundreds of years, it can also be counted as a powerful local family. There are quite a lot of pigtails behind the Liu family. Not only one or two lives are forced to death, but the bullying of men and women is even more serious. happens sometimes.If they followed the Dajing Law, they should have been cleaned up long ago, but what about now?Officials, big and small, all over Hangzhou, dare not take care of them, for fear that their official titles will be lost after they take care of them, and even their heads will fall to the ground!

This kind of scene is too familiar, it is exactly the same as the official amulet in Jinling. Although Jiang Yuan has never read the book Red Chamber, he has heard those words, which can be described as impressive.

In the article, Jia Yucun, the governor of Yingtianfu, originally wanted to give Xue Pan a heavy sentence for beating someone to death, but the gourd monk next to him said to him: "Nowadays, all local officials have a private list, which says that the province The names and surnames of the most powerful, wealthy and noble gentry are the same in all provinces, if you don’t know, and offend such a family for a while, not only the official title, but also your life may not be saved!”

Jinling is like this, Hangzhou is also like this, if it weren't for the power of aristocratic families and nobles who can only control a few provinces in the south of the Yangtze River, wouldn't the whole of Dajing be so stupid? !Then what are these generals doing to expand their territories, and who are they using them for?Add power to these tyrants?

Situ Ye watched the whole journey, frowning all the way, bit his lips when he returned to the post station in Hangzhou, and said, "Teacher, don't people say that Jiangnan is a rich place in Dajing? Are there so many beggars begging? The civilians who come and go also look pale, and they look worse than those in the poor places in the north."

Jiang Yuan also frowned. In his opinion, the situation in Jiangnan has become quite bad. He has read history books, but he knows that these ordinary people seem easy to bully and offend, but in fact they are really urgent. They, they can also turn the world upside down and change dynasties.

Hair is cut like a leek and resurrected, and the head is cut like a chicken and crows again. Officials need not be feared, and ordinary people should never be taken lightly!The common people in the Central Plains have never been easy to offend. Behind the overthrow of all dynasties there is their power. When they are forced to die, do they still fear what the government calls death?If a person is not even afraid of death, would he still be afraid of risking his life to overthrow the corrupt court?

If the aristocratic nobles were allowed to destroy the people like this, then a rebellion in the south of the Yangtze River was possible. At that time, the whole country would probably be in flames of war. Let alone the Northern Expedition, it would be difficult to keep the Jing Dynasty.

The power of the aristocratic family and nobles must be resolved as soon as possible!But where is the problem? !

Jiang Yuan gritted his teeth and thought carefully about the information he had collected. The more he thought about it, the more divergent his thinking became. When he thought of aristocratic families and nobles, he would think of powerful landlords. When thinking of powerful landlords, he would think of local tyrants and evil gentry. I will think of fighting local tyrants to divide the fields...

Wait, beat local tyrants and divide the land? !

Fields, land, farmers, renters, taxes, bureaucrats... Jiang Yuan suddenly came to his senses, and he slowly raised his lips, revealing a smug smile.Well, it's no wonder that he didn't realize after so long that a person who was born and raised in the new era is too ignorant of the problems of the ancient economic system.He only thought about power and money, but he didn't think of a very important thing!

Jiang Yuan found out the reason why the honorable nobles of the family can be so firm/tight and tough, and that is - the land!

In ancient dynasties like the Jing Dynasty, the commerce and trade with the West was controlled by the Northern Barbarian Kingdom, and it was stuck to death. So what does a country's financial body rely on?Only from the land.

In this era, the land is the root of a country, the root of an emperor, and the root of all ordinary people.

This is not a new century, nor is it a modern society. The collusion between government and businessmen is still on the fringes. Unlike modern times, in the Jing Dynasty, it was a pipe dream to gain power purely by means of business and trade, and it was completely impossible.

As a big businessman in the Warring States period, Lu Buwei's status was much higher than that of the current businessmen, and he still had to rely on "exotic goods to live in". Only by mastering a generation of Qin kings can he control the government. , it is simply impossible.

In the Jing Dynasty, there were no big merchants who were purely engaged in business. After all, business was not very safe, and they might lose everything at any time. Therefore, all wealthy households would control a certain amount of land. The role of land is not just to provide money and food. They want to Land is also needed to master the right to speak.In this era, it is not the collusion between bureaucrats and businessmen, but the collusion between bureaucrats and local tyrants and landlords, or some bureaucrats themselves are local tyrants and landlords.

With the development of science and technology, iron ware gradually replaced bronze ware on the stage of history, and plows made of iron became the advanced farming tools of this era.Then to use a plow, you need an ox or a horse to pull it. Human power is not enough to use a new type of plow, but how can ordinary people have such expensive livestock?

It is very risky to rent cattle and horses from wealthy families. Once some natural disasters* occur, farmers with insufficient financial resources and a large population are prone to bankruptcy. Farmers who lost their land would naturally become powerful tenants to rent and farm for them. This is the characteristic of the feudal era.

There is no way to completely overthrow such a model now, because Dajing's technological level is there. Unless there is a big leap in technology in a few hundred years, otherwise this system cannot be overthrown.Some people may think that feudalism is very backward, but compared to slavery, isn't feudalism more advanced?

Because of the changes in productivity, slavery was overthrown in order to adapt to productivity, so no one can overthrow the feudal system until the productivity changes again, otherwise it will only bring greater turmoil to society.

Emperor Gao was born as a commoner and had seen the suffering of the oppressed people. Therefore, when the country was founded, the interest on loans and the rent of land were stipulated in the form of laws. step.This undoubtedly protected the rights of the common people, and also restrained the status of the landlords, so that these poor landlords would not make any big troubles, and alleviated the contradictions between different classes in society.

But once the local tyrants in these places have a higher political status, jump out of the circle of common people and become nobles and powerful officials, or control such officials, then things will become troublesome.The aristocratic family and Xungui are examples of this.

Mastering the land is only the first step of power, the next step they need to master the tenants on the land.It would be fine if the tycoon only had dozens or hundreds of tenants, but after hundreds of years of accumulation, the aristocratic family has owned a vast land, and each of their families has no less than ten thousand or more tenants. What a force it would be if it stood up?

At the beginning of the army, Xungui robbed countless money and made war fortune. After decades of development, he has also accumulated countless fields. How many tenants and common people do they have under their command?

There are many officials in the aristocratic family, and the nobles do not give up. They have formed two very powerful forces above the court, and they can naturally shade their own family in turn, so as to further expand the land.The bigger the official, the more land, and when there are more land and more tenants, power will naturally come.

Some people think that tenants are useless, so when you talk about the San Francisco Rebellion, what was their source of soldiers?Not even the peasants of the three vassal kingdoms!Why those peasants are willing to follow the rebellion is because the land they live on is held in the hands of the vassals. If they don’t follow the rebellion, they will lose their land and then their lives.The rebellion may succeed, but they will definitely die if they lose the right to cultivate the land. How would you choose?

The same is true for Xungui and the aristocratic family. Holding the land cultivated by so many people means controlling their life and death, which is equivalent to holding hundreds of thousands of soldiers who can die for them.

Having land is equivalent to having tenants. After having so many soldiers who died for them, whether they want to cause turmoil or reduce land taxes is just a matter of words.As long as they stomp their feet casually, they can turn upside down the financial and even administrative affairs of a state capital, and even force officials to step down.

It is because of this power that they can force officials to become their minions and help them gain more power.This is the reason why the aristocratic families and noble families have such power. Similarly, because the Xue family and the Jia family still hold countless fields in their hands and control the local officials, those kings with different surnames treat them So polite.It's not for their official positions, but for the power they control in Jiangnan!

No wonder Mrs. Wang would rather let the daughter of the merchant Xue's family be her daughter-in-law in the original book than Lin Daiyu, who has a more noble status.In addition to her various dislikes towards Lin Daiyu, the power of officials controlled by the Xue family through the land in their hands is also valued by her.Lin Hai has already lost his holy family, how can it compare to the Xue family who is still "powerful and powerful" and can pull his son?

Now that you've figured it out, it's easy to handle.

The source of noble power lies in military power, official position and land.But now the military power in the southeast has been taken away by the imperial court. Officials, they are fighting desperately with the aristocratic family, and they can't escape at all, so there is only one land left.

The same is true for the power of the aristocratic family. The source of their power comes from knowledge, official position and land.However, learning was almost collapsed by Jiang Yuan's movable type printing and Chinese pinyin. The official Shangzheng was fighting with Xungui, and there was only one land left.

In the long run, in order not to breed more tyrants in the future, the best way is to come up with a reasonable legal system.But far water can't quench near thirst, and now this one can't solve the substantive problem at all.

Improving science and technology is also the key to killing the powerful. After the Tang Dynasty, the power of the powerful family has almost disappeared. It depends on the improvement of the technological level of the Tang Dynasty and the military disaster to completely clean up the power of the powerful. It will take several years.

Jiang Yuan hasn't thought of an effective method yet, but it doesn't matter if he can't think of a way. Jiang Yuan sent a letter directly to Lin Jun in Yangzhou. He can always think of a good way through brainstorming.

Lin Jun was also very excited when he received the letter. He left Yangzhou directly by boat and rushed to Hangzhou to join Jiangyuan. Moreover, he really proposed a solution to the problem.

"Is there such a law?" Jiang Yuan almost became pea-eyed after looking at it for a long time, so it is really difficult to say that he is not professional. Why didn't he notice that there is such a law in the Dajing Law? ...

What kind of law is it?

Emperor Gao personally made a decree when he founded the country, which roughly means that each person should not have more than a certain amount of land. Once the value is exceeded, the tax on the excess land will increase by five times.

Of course, this value is divided into levels based on official status.Slave status does not allow you to own land. If you are a commoner, then you have very little land. If you are a person, you can more than double it. If you become an official, it will increase again, and the value of rank promotion will increase accordingly. inclusive.

The land rewarded by the title cannot be managed and cultivated by the person who inherited the title. They only have the right to profit but not the right to use and manage it, which is the same as the dividends of later generations. There is also no way to gain power by land.

Of course, the value of this field can only be used by oneself, and cannot be passed on to descendants, so this regulation is quite reasonable.Jiang Yuan himself doesn't own much land, and it doesn't exceed the line of his second-rank official at all. He doesn't have the right to manage the land granted by the court, he just eats bonuses, so he doesn't know there is such a law.

The emergence of this law is obviously to prevent a large number of land mergers, and it has indeed played a certain role. At least in the Jing Dynasty, the situation of land mergers in the north is simply too little compared to Jiangnan.But in the south of the Yangtze River where the sky is high and the emperor is far away, these nobles and aristocratic families came up with a way to evade the law.

The method is actually very simple, that is, release your own slaves to become commoners, and then divide the land into different farms and manage them under the names of the slaves who became commoners, so that you can reasonably avoid the super high tax in the law.Some families even donated officials to their slaves in order to allow them to manage more land for them. For example, this was the case of the Lai family in Rongguo Mansion.

Although the servants became civilians, their family members were still held hostage by noble families, so naturally they did not dare to betray.Even if there are slaves who have lost their conscience and disregarded their families, how can their power compare with that of the master?As long as the local officials rub it a little, they have to spit out the swallowed food honestly.

"Fortunately" Jia's mother and Mrs. Wang have sold off a lot of Jia's property, otherwise, how could it be just a Lai family plus their dowry slaves, maybe more slaves would have to be released.

It's no wonder that Jia's mother came up with the idea of ​​offering sacrifices to the land. Jia Daishan was an official at the beginning. When he died, there was no one in the family who was an official. The land would not have to pay five times the high tax. It would be better to sell it for money. , so that all the benefits can be collected by her alone, and there is no need to distribute a penny to the group of people in her hometown.

In this way, the law can be avoided, but there is one thing, if the slave violates the law and his home is ransacked, the landowner under his name will not be able to take it back. Lin Jun's idea is exactly this!

"Lord Jiang, His Majesty meant that the noble families and nobles should not be moved, but he didn't say that some slaves released from their mansions should not be moved. It is two different things to attack common people and powerful families, and His Majesty would not mind if you think about it. Lin Jun hooked his lips and smiled quite happily.

Lin Jun himself came from the powerful family of the Lin family, but he was expelled from the family. He knew much about the twists and turns of the Jiangnan side than Jiang Yuan, who had never seen large-scale land mergers in the capital. If you can grasp the key points, now that you have found the firewood under the pot, isn't it not easy to draw firewood from the bottom of the pot?He can think of many ways casually.

Jiang Yuan ordered Lin Jun to continue secretly investigating related matters, while he himself wrote a letter to the capital to report the situation to Situ Sheng, but he still had Song Chen's matter in his heart.

He always has a feeling that the things that can be scrambled by noble families and nobles are absolutely vital to the forces they belong to and cannot be replaced.Snatching the land from the freed domestic slaves is only the first step. This step can only suppress the power of the family and nobles, but it cannot uproot them. At most, it can only snatch more than half of the land and power from them. Without a devastating impact, the residual energy of these people will still be great.Therefore, if you want to further compress their power, you have to think of other ways, and this Song Chen is the key to this matter!

Jiang Yuan lowered his voice and gave orders to his soldiers, "Go back to Yangzhou secretly and order the spies to keep an eye on Song Chen for me. There must be something important in his place. I want you to understand Song Chen's every move, even if it is him. What to eat for breakfast, and which aunt to sleep with at night must also be figured out, we must never let him out of our sight. Understand?"

"Also, at the same time, keep an eye on Wang Zipeng and the head of the Liu family. It is impossible for them to remain silent after Chen San disappeared. I want to see what shameful things are hidden in that letter."

Jiang Yuan secretly took Chen San with him all the way south, and he had been hanging there for several days.Lord Jiang Hou snorted softly, it was time to meet that Chen San again, Jiang Yuan was sure, there must be something else he didn't say!This is the most important thing!