Chapter 198 King Ning is ambitious
Zhu Houzhao had to carry out reforms because he wanted the entire Chinese civilization not to lag behind the West.
The reformist civil servants had to follow Zhu Houzhao in reforming. Perhaps they were doing it for the benefit of their own family capital, or perhaps they were adhering to the ideal of serving the world for the common good and creating peace for all generations.
Because of this, in the sixth year of Zhengde, the reform was still in progress and entered a deep-water period, which had a greater impact on the interests of the powerful gentry group.
Naturally, the powerful gentry will not tolerate their own interests being so damaged. They will try their best to smuggle and evade taxes. They will even try to get rid of the emperor and reformist officials and secretly support some The vassal kings who want to take over the world.
A memorial from Ning Wang Zhu Chenhao requesting an order to expand the bodyguards appeared in Zhu Houzhao's court in the summer of the sixth year of Zhengde. Since Yongle reduced the number of guards for the vassal king, thereby causing the vassal king to have no strong military strength to resist the central court, the central court's response to The feudal king's memorials requesting the expansion of bodyguards were always kept secret, and he would even be severely reprimanded.
But this time, after Ning Wang Zhu Chenhao sent a memorial to the capital asking for an expanded bodyguard, many civil servants chose to remain silent. There was even Xie Na, a scientific and technical officer, who said that Jiangxi was plagued by bandits and Nanchang was an important upstream capital of the southern capital (Nanjing). It is believed that the expansion of King Ning's bodyguard can strengthen the Ming Dynasty's control over Jiangyou and prevent another large-scale civil uprising from getting out of control.
Except for the objections raised by several cabinet ministers and a few ministers, most civil servants did not express any objection to Xie Na's proposal.
Zhu Houzhao knew that most of these civil servants had received money from King Ning and were unwilling to block King Ning's request to expand his bodyguards. He also knew that they also wanted to give King Ning a chance to rebel. As long as he, the emperor, was willing to let King Ning expand his bodyguards, he would Then King Ning could naturally use this to expand his troops and have the possibility of a successful rebellion.
However, Zhu Houzhao did not intend to find out who accepted King Ning's bribe, and he also accepted King Ning's benefits.
According to eunuch Wei Bin's report, the Royal Industrial Company's business received great care from King Ning. Many of the products produced by the Royal Industrial Company were ordered by King Ning at half times the market price, which made Zhu Houzhao himself from Zhengde Er. Since the beginning of this year, he has made more than one million taels of silver from Prince Ning.
Moreover, King Ning now orders or auctions goods at high prices from the Royal Industrial Company in the form of commercial activities almost every year, which makes Zhu Houzhao less interested in attacking King Ning now.
Zhu Houzhao also knew that all the money of King Ning was exploited from the people, which had already caused public dissatisfaction in Jiangxi. Even the civil uprising in southern Jiangxi was related to King Ning. But if King Ning was not allowed to rebel, Zhu Houzhao would not have done anything. Find a way to get rid of this feudal king.
In order to have the opportunity to get rid of this vassal king in the future and allow Ming Dynasty to reduce the salary expenditure on the vassal king, Zhu Houzhao decided to indulge King Ning first and agreed to expand King Ning's bodyguard, making King Ning feel that although he was determined to innovate, he was a greedy emperor. And then bribe yourself in various ways.
Therefore, Zhu Houzhao planned to wait until King Ning completely rebelled, and then annihilate King Ning, so that the Ming Dynasty would have one less vassal king in the future, and at the same time, the central court would make a fortune by getting rid of another vassal king.
Of course, in the process of gradually growing Prince Ning's ambition, Zhu Houzhao himself and the civil servants in Beijing have begun to reap the benefits.
In this way, you can benefit, and the officials can also benefit, and it can also give the civil officials the idea of overthrowing their own rule without thinking about using other ways to fight against themselves, so why not do it.
Therefore, under Zhu Houzhao's instruction and deliberate connivance, everyone from the emperor to the important ministers did not refuse the generous gifts sent by King Ning.
Prince Ning jumped for joy when he learned that Zhu Houzhao agreed to expand his bodyguards. He had actually been mentally prepared that Zhu Houzhao would not agree and would even scold him, but he did not expect that Zhu Houzhao actually agreed to his request to expand his bodyguards. , in King Ning’s view, this was tantamount to lifting his constraints on expanding the army, so King Ning excitedly and immediately ordered:
"Go and invite Mr. Li!" The Mr. Li that King Ning mentioned was Li Shishi, the censor of Zuodu who became an official. As a civil servant who had become an official, he was extremely dissatisfied with Zhu Houzhao's current measures in power, but he did not act like other powerful gentry. He still chose to be patient, but chose to instigate King Ning to rebel.
It happened that King Ning also had this ambition. Of course, the fundamental reason was that they were all dissatisfied with Zhu Houzhao's way of governing. He also believed that the gentry and powerful people in the world must also be dissatisfied with Zhu Houzhao, and considered it a good opportunity to seize the world.
Now that Zhu Houzhao agreed to King Ning's expansion of his bodyguard, King Ning believed that his rebellion was more likely to succeed. When Li Shishi arrived, he told Li Shishi about Zhu Houzhao's agreement to expand his bodyguard, even with a hint of contempt for Zhu Houzhao in his tone. He said contemptuously: "As Mr. Zhu said, Zhu Houzhao is really greedy for money. Now Gu Bu often bribes him with large sums of money, but he actually allowed Gu to expand his bodyguard."
"From this point of view, the prince should continue to offer all kinds of rare treasures and beauties to numb his heart. After all, it is not enough for us to expand the bodyguards alone. We must also immediately purchase iron war horses and stock up on grain and grass. All of these need to be purchased from the imperial court. This is the only way to prevent Zhu Houzhao from being wary!”
Li Shishi said.
"I know that Zhu Houzhao always thinks of himself as a wise king and trumpets new policies to confuse the people, but in fact he is just a fool of Yang Guangzhi!"
Prince Ning sneered.
……
Although Zhu Houzhao supported King Ning to enrich himself, he was not unwary. Now that Jiangnan was stabilized, Zhu Houzhao directly promoted Yan Song to governor of Nanzhili, while Wang Yangming patrolled Jiangxi.
King Ning was not alarmed by Zhu Houzhao's transfer. He was even very happy because he had heard many times among the literati from the south of the Yangtze River that Wang Yangming would make money and had always made the gentry hateful. In his opinion, Wang Yangming's governorship of Jiangxi would naturally make people The Jiangxi gentry turned more towards themselves.
Wang Yangming kept a low profile after taking office in Jiangxi, so low-key that the entire court, including Prince Ning himself, almost forgot about him.
Zhu Houzhao didn't mention Wang Yangming much. When Jiao Fang, the chief minister of the cabinet, anxiously mentioned that King Ning must be guarded against, Zhu Houzhao just smiled lightly and said:
"There is nothing to worry about, Prince Ning. I have already laid a chess piece for him. As long as this person is here, no one in the south can mess with our Ming Dynasty!"
It is worth mentioning that at the end of the sixth year of Zhengde, Ma Wensheng died of illness in the Hetao. Although he had nitroglycerin to extend his life, he still only lived one year longer than in the original history.
Zhu Houzhao felt very sorry for Ma Wensheng's departure. After all, although Ma Wensheng had a soft personality, he was also responsible. He dared to take the blame for himself and was considered a minister with the overall situation in mind. He was a loyal minister, but now he is not tolerated by many civil servants. After Ma Wensheng died, Zhu Houzhao withdrew from the court for three days, but there was little sadness in the court and the public.
For this reason, Zhu Houzhao simply used Ma Wensheng's contribution to regaining Hamiwei and Hetao as an excuse, and on the basis of conferring Ma Wensheng the title of Yunyang Bo, he posthumously awarded him the title of Marquis of Yunyang!
Thank you to the book friend for the painting...丿chen. Thank you to the book friend yangyang9953100 for the reward of 100 starting coins. Thank you to the book friend Super Blood Scholar for the reward of 100 starting coins
(End of chapter)