Borrow the day to change the day

The final evolution of the Shibosi system in the Ming Dynasty was caused by various factors.

Among them, the most important factor is that in the past overseas trade, the emperor ate alone, and the officials did not reap the benefits.

Therefore, as soon as the agent of the sea trade merchant took power, he took advantage of the ignorance of the emperors who had never lived in the deep palace, and fooled him into this result.

And the officials of the Ming Dynasty attached great importance to their own reputation, and many of them even made tax money that damaged the court to please the common people and businessmen, and added a halo of caring for the people like a son to themselves.

Therefore, although some people realized that opening the sea ban and engaging in sea trade could bring prosperity to the imperial court, no one promoted and reformed the system of the Maritime Shipping Department.

However, it is different now.Zhong Jinwei used the profits of state-owned enterprises, and the national policy of feudal North America tied the interests of Ming officials to the court.

The more the state-owned enterprises earn, the richer the honesty gold will be for Ming officials when they retire and return to their hometowns; the more money the court has, the faster the vassal king's feudal North America will be carried out, and the vassal king's vacated interests in Daming will be vacated as soon as possible. come out.

As for other interests, there are also, but those are more indirect interests.

Therefore, when the officials in the Wenhua Palace heard Zhong Jinwei attacking the current system of Shibosi, no one stood up to defend, but just watched what Zhong Jinwei had to say.

When Zhong Jinwei heard Emperor Chongzhen ask him, he replied loudly: "Your Majesty, if the Shibosi system is used well, it will be much easier for Ming Dynasty to become strong and prosperous, and the court will not worry about lack of money. can be relieved..."

Emperor Chongzhen was dumbfounded when he heard Zhong Jinwei eloquently cite the benefits of a reasonable market system.

According to Zhongxing Hou, there is a golden mountain in front of him, but he turns a blind eye, looking for money everywhere, and saving money in order to get more money.

"Master Zhong, do you really have so much money?" Emperor Chongzhen waited for Zhong Jinwei to finish speaking, and first confirmed the matter.

When Zhong Jinwei heard this, he pointed to Zheng Zhilong beside him and said, "He should be very aware of how profitable it is!"

Emperor Chongzhen looked in the direction of Zhong Jinwei's finger and found that it was Zheng Zhilong, a coastal defense guerrilla of the Fujian Navy. He thought that he really knew more about maritime trade than ordinary people, so he asked, "Zheng Qing, answer me truthfully, without any deception. !"

Zheng Zhilong looked at Emperor Chongzhen, and all the senior officials in the palace looked at him from the corner of his eyes. He hesitated for a while, and finally replied truthfully: "Your Majesty, if you ship general goods to Southeast Asia, you can get about three times the profit; if you ship them to Southeast Asia The goods can be sold back to Daming, and the profit can be about three times. This time, as long as it does not sink in a storm or be robbed by pirates, it can make a total of about nine times the profit.”

Emperor Chongzhen fell into a stunned state again, he did not expect the profit to be so large.It's a trivial matter to earn tens of thousands of taels for a boat trip.

He was dazed for a while before waking up.With a slightly angry expression, he turned his head and questioned Wen Tiren: "Wen Qing, why didn't you explain to me that there is such a profitable sea trade? If you say you don't know, I won't believe it!"

Wen Tiren smiled wryly, let him taste the bitter fruit planted by his predecessors today.He went out to answer Emperor Chongzhen and said, "Your Majesty, just now Zheng Guerrilla also said that although the profit is great, the risk is high. There have always been many Japanese pirates along the coast of my Ming Dynasty, although there have been no more in recent years. But there are many pirates, and The Daming Navy has been struggling to protect itself."

Speaking of this, he turned his head to look at Zheng Zhilong, and then said to Emperor Chongzhen: "The Fujian navy was completely annihilated by Zheng Guerrilla before, and it was also captured by him in Quanzhou. This is a case."

"Thus, although the sea trade is extremely profitable, it is not as powerful as the Daming Navy. It can only quench its thirst. But to rebuild a powerful Daming Navy requires a lot of money. Your Majesty should know that a few years ago , the imperial court can’t even pay the border troops, so how can there be money to build naval divisions!”

With what Wen Tiren said, it seemed that there was no solution to this problem.If it weren't for the sudden appearance of Zhong Jinwei, with the money obtained from copying traitors, salt merchants, and fighting Shenyang, Daming would have been trapped in an endless loop of moneylessness.

When Emperor Chongzhen thought of this, he couldn't help feeling more grateful to Zhong Jinwei.At this time, he has long believed that if it wasn't for Zhong Jinwei, according to the evolution of the situation in the second year of Chongzhen, Daming would definitely have died of poverty.

Therefore, he no longer entangled with the past affairs of the Shibo Division, and said to Zhong Jinwei: "Master Zhong, tell me about the specific strategies and benefits of the Shibo Division."

The civil servants in the Wenhua Palace were relieved to see that Emperor Chongzhen was no longer obsessed with historical issues.They all felt sincere admiration for Wen Tiren's witty answer.

"Your Majesty, I just accidentally mentioned the Shibo Department, so I didn't organize it systematically, so I can only talk about it."

Emperor Chongzhen could understand Zhong Jinwei's reason. He nodded and said, "It's okay, Master Zhong just said it."

"One, Daming can open multiple port cities, and goods entering and leaving Daming must pass through these ports. This is for the convenience of management."

"Secondly, different taxes should be levied on different goods entering and leaving Daming. For example, Daming is in urgent need of grain, so it can impose heavy taxes on exporting grain, until no merchant is willing to export grain; while importing grain can reduce tariffs, and even not to collect, thereby encouraging merchants to import grain from overseas.”

"The second point also includes dumping my Ming's products overseas. For example, glass, it should be said that this kind of thing is still used by the rich, so we can advocate dumping overseas, yes, it is dumping. Westerners also have glass, but we compare They have an advantage, beat them, occupy all the markets in Southeast Asia, and earn as much money as possible for Daming."

Emperor Chongzhen smiled when he heard it, as if he saw the money rolling in.

"Third, to build a powerful Daming navy, you can build several more navy according to the region. For example, to escort North America, you must have one or two powerful navy; to protect the coastal safety of Daming, you must also have a navy; for Daming Merchants who want to do business in Southeast Asia or even further afield must have a navy. In addition, it is also an important responsibility for the navy to combat smuggling.”

Wen Tiren frowned when he heard that, Emperor Chongzhen was still a young monarch, and there was still a hint of impulsiveness in his temper.Just now, I talked about the expansion of the [-] new army. Now that Zhongxing Hou said so, he was afraid that Emperor Chongzhen would wave his hand again and say that he would build ten naval divisions.

Therefore, Wen Tiren hurriedly interjected: "Marquis Zhongxing, the imperial court can't build so many sailors now."

Before Zhong Jinwei could answer, Emperor Chongzhen stood up, waved his hand and said, "If it can't be built now, it will be built in the future, and the chaos in the south of the Yangtze River will never be allowed to happen again. I must let the Great Ming Navy cover the sea, and I will Reproduce the grand occasion of the Ming Dynasty's invincible navy during the Yongle period!"