I am Emperor Wanli

Chapter 273: If you are not proactive at this time, what future do you have?
Zhu Yijun knew that today's meeting was both useless and useful.

You can never wake up a group of people who are pretending to be asleep.

No matter how tragic the Bojin Incident in Korea was, or how close it was, as long as it didn't happen to them, they would pretend that nothing had happened. It is impossible to make them put away their greedy minds and their claws of plunder!

For people like this, just let them pretend to sleep. When the time comes, if they still refuse to wake up, just let them sleep forever.

But such conferences are actually very useful.

In a sense, this is called unified thinking.

Zhu Yijun actually did not agree with the approach of his grandfather, the Emperor Jiajing. He acted like a riddle teller and let his ministers figure things out on their own. If they made achievements, he would take the blame, but if things went wrong, he would let his ministers take the blame.

In fact, the emperor himself has no confidence.

He discovered the problem, but didn't know how to solve it. He was also worried that if he gave orders and his ministers followed them to solve the problem, and if they messed up, it would affect his prestige.

Totally unnecessary.

In fact, as a superior, being brave enough to take responsibility will make your ministers feel more confident and bold in doing things without worrying about the consequences.

There is no problem in this world that can be solved in one go. It requires constant attempts at various methods to solve it. Sometimes new problems will arise after old ones are solved.

At this time, it is very rare for the ministers to be brave and enterprising.

If everyone plays it safe, does less and makes fewer mistakes, or does nothing and makes no mistakes, problems will accumulate and the hole will get bigger and bigger, and eventually history will repeat itself as it did during the reign of Chongzhen, with the ship sinking and the country being destroyed.

How can we encourage our officials to be courageous in taking on responsibilities and be enterprising in making progress?
In addition to the monarch's courage to take responsibility, another point is to point them in the direction.

Tell them that if they solve any problem, they will be promoted and rise to the top.

Tell officials at all levels to focus on economic development.

Then they will show off their talents, attract investment, develop urban management, stimulate the economy, and those who do well will stand out and have bright careers.

Or maybe stability trumps all else.

They will know what problems cannot arise, this is the bottom line!
And this kind of direction-pointing is the unification of thoughts.

The reason I held this meeting today is to tell all the civil and military officials in the court that surveying the land is now the court's most important task.

Whoever dares to hinder it is making a joke of his career!

Occupying farmland, hiding people, and evading taxes will be the focus of the court's investigation in the future. If you want to keep your official career, you should quickly notify your relatives and friends and stop in time.

You can also volunteer in this area and achieve some results, and you will surely be successful in the future.

If officials were smarter, they would have thought deeply about this conference, and would have thought about increasing revenue from surveying the land, about reducing expenditure from rectifying the administration and reforming the central government, and then about improving the fiscal and taxation system from increasing revenue and reducing expenditure.

If they can make suggestions in this regard, or take the initiative to achieve some results, they will be regarded as the best among all civil and military officials, and I will look at them differently and promote them!
Li Zhi was talking very enthusiastically.

His Mandarin with a Minnan accent does sound a bit difficult to understand.

Some officials in the audience listened attentively, some were daydreaming, some were very serious, and some did not take it seriously.

Xu Jie, Li Chunfang, Zhang Juzheng, Chen Yiqin, as well as high-ranking officials such as Hu Zongxian and Gao Gong, who were sitting in the front row, figured out clearly in their minds the purpose of Zhu Yijun convening this meeting.

They sighed in their hearts that the prince was similar to the late emperor, but also different from him.

The move of convening a meeting of Beijing officials above the sixth rank, telling you his governance philosophy openly and above all else, and pointing out the direction for those officials, big and small, who are eager to advance in their careers, is very clever.

This almost tells you openly the way to get promoted and given a higher rank. Unless you are extremely pedantic and stupid, you will know what to do after this conference.

To occupy farmland and conceal the population, one needs to have sufficient official rank and power, and there are only a few such people in the court.

Now the court is filled with more middle and low-level officials who are in urgent need of advancement.

Xu Jie was even more shocked. He really had not expected the Crown Prince's methods.

He actually convened such an ingenious conference, which not only formed a trend in the court's public opinion, pointed out the direction for everyone, but also gave himself a warning without making a sound.

The effect is no less than the sound of bronze chimes in the Wanshou Palace.

Xu Jie knew that Zhu Yijun was warning him. The consequences of occupying farmland, hiding population, and evading taxes, the current situation of the vassal state of Korea has been shown to everyone, which is very serious and will lead to a civil uprising like a storm.

Everything has been said so clearly and the bronze bell has been struck. If I still don't understand, then I shouldn't blame him for not giving me, a veteran of two dynasties and a cabinet minister for twenty years, a little face.

Ugh!
The masters in the Western Garden are more difficult to serve than each other.

I really want to retire.

Unfortunately, the master of Xiyuan still needs to support himself in the cabinet and balance the situation in the court.

Many people wondered why His Royal Highness the Crown Prince did not put his trusted confidants such as Hu Zongxian and Zhao Zhenji into the cabinet to fully control the government.

They all think too simply!

After all, the current emperor is his father. If the cabinet is full of his people, the one in the Forbidden City will be dissatisfied no matter how open-minded he is. If someone secretly instigates a rift between father and son, how will it end?

Is it really necessary to practice inner Zen?

Three generations of them are people who care about face!
The current situation is so good. Hu Zongxian and other close confidants control the six ministries and local power. The cabinet is led by this veteran of two dynasties. The other two cabinet ministers, Chen Yiqin and Zhang Juzheng, are both in the secret residence of Prince Yu and have served as tutors to the emperor.

The remaining assistant Li Chunfang, although he had a teacher-student relationship with the prince, he was the top scholar in the 26th year of Jiajing. He had knowledge, fame and qualifications, and he entered the cabinet when the late emperor was alive.

What a brilliant situation this is! The emperor gets face, the prince gets benefits, and the father and son live in harmony!

Xu Jie glanced around and knew that His Royal Highness the Crown Prince was standing in a corner, just like his grandfather, secretly observing the expressions of the civil and military officials with a deep gaze.

The shrewd Xu Jie also guessed Zhu Yijun's deeper intentions.

Now it is the Longqing Dynasty, and the emperor does not care about things anymore, leaving all power to him.

The prince seized the opportunity and vigorously carried out reforms to eliminate malpractices. Whether it was done well or not, it was the business of the Longqing Dynasty. What did it have to do with him, the prince?
Xu Jie also tried to reform and eliminate malpractices during the Jiajing New Deal, but he faced a lot of resistance and it was very dangerous. It was easy to fail and even lose his career and life.

Once he fails, those who have been offended will rush forward, and no matter how powerful His Royal Highness the Crown Prince is, he will have to hand over a few people to deal with it.

If that is the case, why not use Gao Gong, Li Chunfang, Zhao Zhenji, or even let Zhang Juzheng explore the way, while leaving the trusted confidants behind?

Gao Gong had the most distant relationship with the Crown Prince, but was pushed to the front.

Following closely behind him were his close relatives Li Chunfang, Zhao Zhenji and Zhang Juzheng, and behind them were his foundation, Hu Zongxian and others.

If anything goes wrong with the new methods such as land surveying, Gao Gong will be the first to hold up the sky if it falls.

Even if it collapses again, he, Li Chunfang, Zhao Zhenji and Zhang Juzheng will support it, and his foundation will not be damaged at all.

As long as Hu Zongxian, Yang Jinshui and other direct descendants continue to firmly grasp the military and financial power, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince can sit firmly in the Western Garden and continue to promote reforms and eliminate malpractices, but he may need to keep changing chess pieces to move forward.

After trying for a few years or even decades, all the problems that should be discovered have been discovered, all the pitfalls that should be stepped on have been stepped on, and all the lessons that should be learned have been learned. It is time for His Royal Highness the Crown Prince's direct subordinates to take action and carry out comprehensive reforms.

By that time, it might not be the Longqing Dynasty anymore, and the person sitting in the Qianqing Hall might be the crown prince.

How could ordinary people guess the thoughts and methods of His Royal Highness the Crown Prince, who could make a figure like the late emperor praise his holy grandson in public?
At the end of the conference, Zhu Yijun did not go on stage to speak. He felt that the message he wanted to convey had been made very clear at this conference of unity and victory.

The direction has been pointed out, the horn has been sounded, and those who are willing to move forward can at least get a consolation prize.

If you rush to the front bravely and achieve good results, you will have a bright future.

For those who are indifferent, haha, their career will be just like that.

If you are not active as an official at this time, what future do you have? !

The meeting had been going on for an hour and a half, and Xu Jie found that more and more people in the venue were looking at him intentionally or unintentionally.

More and more people understand this, so this conference was not in vain.

How could Xu Jie, with such a deep cultivation, show any emotion? He was as amiable as usual, greeting everyone and making them feel warm and relaxed.

After a while, Xu Jie went back to the cabinet duty room to handle official business. After the afternoon court session ended, he returned to his residence. Before he even got out of the sedan chair, he couldn't wait to order, "Call my second brother!"

(End of this chapter)