The literary giants of the late Ming Dynasty began by copying books

Chapter 140 Donglin is speechless
Everyone in the audience was hesitant to listen to Wang Wenlong's words. Everyone came here today to reduce taxes. In the end, Wang Wenlong actually revealed that the country should collect more taxes. However, Wang Wenlong cited examples from Europe, and everyone did not know how to refute. .

Wang Wenlong said loudly: "Nowadays, the public opinion in the world is fierce, businessmen are unable to do business, and even ordinary landowners are being harassed for no reason. Therefore, I only have three suggestions today:

One thing is to open the way for speech. Today, if we want to hear about the sufferings of the people, we must not continue to close our eyes and listen;
The second is to vigorously open up private business. Domestic businessmen who know ordinary people are not very profitable to begin with. Since they can't make a lot of money, why should they be taxed heavily?It is better to liberalize sea trade and impose taxes on sea trade;

The third is to increase revenue and reduce expenditure. We should make profits by issuing ship guides like a Chinese law. Stop putting tax pressure and taxes on ordinary people like us! "

Everyone was stunned when they heard this.

Everyone has seen a lot of Donglin Party members shouting various slogans, and some of them even directly attacked the imperial court with some shocking words, but no scholar has ever heard such shocking remarks as Wang Wenlong.

At this time, Wang Wenlong had already taken out his letter and started reading:

"..."

After Wang Wenlong finished reading, he threw his proclamation on the podium as he said before, and then decisively fled off the podium.

Everyone in the audience was talking loudly.

A scholar said angrily: "This Wang Wenlong is so shameless. It is obvious that the eunuchs and tax collectors are harassing the world, but he does not mention the mine supervisors, but instead tries every means to increase taxes!"

"I think Mr. Jingguan's words are reasonable." The educated gentry objected very much, but the landowners and businessmen with real capital defended Wang Wenlong: "If shipping and sea trade can be opened up, the profits will be huge, even if it is restricted It doesn’t matter if there are heavy taxes, it’s just that the taxes imposed on us and other mainland people make the people too miserable.”

The scholar scolded the merchants: "How can you, the profit-seeking people, say such words?"

The Donglin Party members were all dumbfounded.

What he did propose was to liberalize commerce, open up maritime trade and increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

But when this guy talks about liberalizing business, he doesn't mean not to collect taxes from merchants in the southeast, but to transfer taxes to the sea.

Opening up sea trade does not mean not collecting taxes on sea trade, but opening up ocean trade and issuing large quantities of ship guides.

As for increasing revenue and reducing expenditure, it is even more disgusting. It only talks about increasing revenue through sea trade and ships, and does not mention anything about reducing expenditure.

Did Wang Wenlong break his promise?Really not, but what he said was completely different from what the Donglin Party members had imagined.

After Wang Wenlong came off the stage, all the Donglin Party members looked at him in shock. An Xifan and other bad-tempered ones even wanted to come up and beat him.

But Gao Panlong and Gu Xiancheng were helpless. According to the standard of the Donglin Party's usual remarks, Wang Wenlong's announcement today was really nothing, and the direction of his views did not conflict too much with the Donglin Party, but it was inexplicable. Partially...

Both Gao Panlong and Gu Xiancheng knew that although Wang Wenlong's ideas were not in line with the Donglin Party's ideas, they would be welcomed by some Changzhou gentry, at least they would not cause resentment from the other party.

In this case, if the Donglin Party members spoke harshly to Wang Wenlong, it would have the opposite effect.

Wang Wenlong had already guessed this outcome and took the initiative: "Gentlemen, I followed the outline. The article is already here. You don't need to publish it, but I won't change it."

With his attitude, no one could do anything about him, because there was nothing they could do to change it now. Do they want Wang Wenlong to swallow what he said?
Gu Xiancheng took a deep breath and could only shake his head and said: "Jianyang really put us on the fire."

Gao Panlong also had a wry smile on his face and said to Ye Chengxue, who was still surprised next to him: "Why don't we take Jianyang down to rest first."

Ye Chengxue nodded and quickly dragged Wang Wenlong away. He was afraid that he would be beaten if he ran too slowly.

After Wang Wenlong left, Gao Panlong turned around and said to everyone: "The situation today has become like this. If we break our promise and don't use Jianyang's words, we will be laughed at by the world, so we can only suppress it slowly."

All the Donglin bosses also quickly came to their senses and found that they had no choice but to do this.The Donglin Party's ideas are: opposing eunuchs, broadening the scope of speech and reducing taxes.

On the surface, it seems that except for opposing eunuchs, Wang Wenlong did not say anything today. Wang Wenlong also advocated spreading the word and reducing taxes.

But the true essence of these three propositions of the Donglin Party actually points to imperial power.

They restricted the ability of the imperial power in three aspects: restricting the emperor's minions - the eunuchs; increasing the voice of the officials in the court; and reducing the taxes the imperial power received, and forced the emperor and the scholar-bureaucrats to rule the world together.

Although overseas trade led by the imperial power can make the people rich, in this time and space environment, it is not even in the interests of the most radical Donglin Party.

Because they are scholar-officials, and in this overseas trade, the scholar-official class will also be forced to stand aside.

Therefore, although they cannot openly oppose Wang Wenlong's words, the Donglin Party members' final choice must be to suppress Wang Wenlong's today's proposition.

The people in the audience had already started a heated discussion.

The business gentry strongly agreed with Wang Wenlong's idea.

"I have long said that Mr. Jingguan is a great talent, but this actually points out a clear path."

"Yes, if overseas trade can be opened up, the tax pressure on landowners like us will definitely be reduced. Wouldn't it be better to let those eunuchs collect taxes from maritime merchants?"

"I didn't expect Mr. Jingguan to be born into such poverty. He has suffered so many tortures since he was a child. It's no wonder that he can learn real skills."

Many scholars find it difficult to agree with this.

"Every time this guy opens or closes his mouth, it's just taxes. How can this be true?"

"Although what he said makes sense... it is also too biased."

The business gentry supports the scholar-bureaucrats of the Donglin Party because the Donglin Party is willing to speak for the gentry and merchant class, but there is also a rift between the merchant class and the scholar-bureaucrat class.

Wang Wenlong's suggestion hit Donglin's weakness, and even taking a step back would step on Donglin's bottom line.

Wang Wenlong, on the other hand, is not afraid at all. He has already thought about all the processes today, and the ideas he proposed are exactly dancing on the bottom line of the Donglin Party.

This announcement is generally beneficial to the Donglin Party. The Donglin Party can hold its nose and support him, but it is certainly not satisfied.

That's enough.

The essence of politics is to achieve an outcome that is unsatisfactory to all parties but is barely acceptable. Only such an outcome can be truly balanced and enforceable.

If all the demands of one party are met, it is not called a balance, it is called a treaty of victory.

The proposition put forward by Wang Wenlong was actually the truly feasible method for Ming Dynasty at this time.

Broadening the voice can alleviate certain internal conflicts, and opening up maritime trade can enter the age of great navigation and gain real benefits. However, the start-up funds required for these reforms can only be brought from ships.

The so-called Chuan Yin and Yan Yin are to allow merchants and common people to invest and do business, and then the court will grant business licenses related to lucrative businesses such as ship trading and salt selling.

In this process: merchants and common people invested first, and the court promised to provide subsequent benefits—which in essence were national debts.

(End of this chapter)