The opening inventory of the top ten young emperors

Crown Prince Zhu Gaochi, who came to report to him, was startled. His fat body took two steps back, and even the fat on his face trembled a few times.
The second prince Zhu Gaoxu was standing beside him. Seeing this, he quickly asked his servants to clean up the place. Then he said, "Father, please calm down. The words in the Heavenly Scroll are a warning. We can learn from them."

Zhu Di nodded approvingly, turned his head to glance at the cautious prince beside him, and sighed softly.
Compared with the second brother, the eldest brother is really not cut out for martial arts, and he is too timid.

For a moment, the thought that had been lingering in his mind before surfaced again.
He couldn't help but frown slightly.

[The uploader mentioned the treacherous prime minister Yan Song. Those who watched the video carefully may ask, didn’t you say that after Zhu Yuanzhang killed Hu Weiyong, there was no prime minister position anymore? How did Yan Song become the prime minister? ]

【Then we have to talk about the changes in the court after Zhu Yuanzhang abolished the position of prime minister. 】
[Whether it was Zhu Houzhao or Zhu Houcong, or the emperors after him, they were all deeply influenced by his decision. It was also from that time that the situation of feudal dynasties being jointly built by the monarch and his ministers turned into a situation where the emperor had the final say.]
[Before this, if the ruler was weak and the ministers were strong, the powerful prime minister could influence the selection of the emperor and dismiss the emperor.]

Emperor Qin Shihuang:……
I hate it.

【However, since Zhu Yuanzhang dismissed the prime minister, the six ministries reported the world's major events directly to the emperor. This was not a problem for diligent emperors like Zhu Yuanzhang. Later on, those emperors who had been pampered since childhood became less and less effective. The emperor had to rely on the establishment of a cabinet to help him sort out and handle government affairs.】
[The head of the cabinet is the chief minister in the court. Yan Song rose to power because of this.]

[There are more than one person in the cabinet, but they only play a supporting role and have no decision-making power, so their power is far less than that of the prime minister. Moreover, the emperors have complete power of life and death over these officials. ]
[Before, when the emperor issued an edict, he had to stamp it with the seal of the Secretariat. After the prime minister was deposed, as long as the emperor wanted, he could issue any unreliable edict.]

[For example, the absurd practice of asking eunuchs to collect taxes also happened in the Ming Dynasty.]

【During the reign of Emperor Chongzhen, the last emperor of the Ming Dynasty, he killed ministers at will. A total of four Grand Secretaries were killed during the Ming Dynasty, and two were killed during the reign of Emperor Chongzhen alone. The Grand Secretaries were members of the Cabinet, the so-called Cabinet Grand Secretaries.】
[During the reign of Chongzhen, the Ming Dynasty was already in turmoil. If it were any other dynasty, they would have coaxed ministers into doing things. But the fact that they dared to kill ministers at this time can only be attributed to the emperor's excessive power.]

【Well, why is this so? The Ming emperors should thank their ancestor Zhu Yuanzhang. 】

Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the scroll and the draft imperial edict on the table with a frown on his face. He then muttered "NND" to himself and pushed the imperial edict aside.
Zhu Di, who was standing by, looked at it and asked in a low voice: "This is one time, that is another time."

At this time in their Hongwu Dynasty, it was imperative to eliminate the prime minister's power.
This time, the left and right prime ministers are in collusion with each other and can do whatever they want. My father's tolerance for the prime minister has reached its limit.

Besides, there is no one in the court who is qualified for the position of prime minister.
Zhu Yuanzhang curled his lips and said, "Let's listen to what Tian Juan says first."

【But did Zhu Yuanzhang do anything wrong? 】
[At least for Zhu Yuanzhang himself, without a prime minister, he was still able to handle government affairs with ease and it did not have much impact. On the contrary, his orders became more accessible, and there was no longer a powerful prime minister who deceived his superiors and subordinates and extorted money from the people.]

Hearing Tian Juan's words, Zhu Yuanzhang's expression eased slightly, and he glanced at the imperial edict again, snorting coldly: "How dare you say that I can't kill all the corrupt officials in the world? Humph!"
Zhu hated corrupt officials the most, and hated being cheated even more. Did Hu Weiyong really think he was a fool? He also said that he could not kill all the corrupt officials in the world.

Old Zhu just didn't believe it. Were those corrupt officials not even afraid of death?
He wanted to kill corrupt officials, one at a time, two at a time, leaving no one alive.

Seeing his eyes slightly red, Zhu Di probably understood what his father was thinking, so he quickly reminded him: "Father, Hu Weiyong is trying to exonerate himself, don't pay attention to what he says."
"Yeah." Zhu Yuanzhang responded solemnly and continued to look at the heavenly scroll.

[For his descendants, except for his son Zhu Di who overthrew his grandson's rule, the emperors after him, despite all kinds of strange things, the country was still the country of their Zhu family.]

Zhu Di: ...Please don't mention this anymore, okay? He has tried his best to reduce the awareness of this matter, okay?

[Although there were many treacherous officials and eunuchs in the Ming Dynasty, as long as the emperor gave an order, no matter whether they were treacherous officials or eunuchs, as long as the emperor wanted to, they would be immediately arrested and killed. This was the case with Liu Jin, Yan Song, and even more so with Wei Zhongxian.]
[However, it cannot be denied that the emperor's power reached its peak after him.]

[This also led to the fact that throughout the Ming Dynasty, due to the limitations of the emperor and because the emperor always lived deep in the Forbidden City, he was seriously out of touch with the suffering of the people and the social environment.]
[To be precise, the emperor can only see what the ministers below want him to see.]

[It was this information gap that interrupted China's communication with the world, and prevented China from absorbing Western modern civilization in a timely manner, let alone integrating it with our own scientific civilization. For example, the controversial maritime ban policy was set during the Hongwu reign and lasted until the end of the Ming Dynasty.]

Zhu Yuanzhang: Isn't it just to keep those Japanese out of the country? Ridiculous, the Japanese are all unfaithful barbarians, what civilization can they have? This Tianjuan is talking nonsense again.

Zhu Houzhao stared at the heavenly scroll without blinking.
Western modern civilization? Integration with local scientific civilization?
This is a new word.

Western scientific and technological civilization? He had heard of it once before. It should be quite impressive. Wasn't penicillin invented by Westerners? It can also cure pneumonia. Zhu Houzhao suddenly remembered that someone had mentioned to him recently that a certain country overseas seemed to have sent an envoy to see him. But he had to deal with Liu Jin's affairs and had been in the Hanlin Academy recently, so he ignored it.
Otherwise, find a chance to meet.

but……
He felt a little depressed, and what he wanted to do now was to beat the Mongols back first.

【Zhu Houzhao began to travel incognito four months after he ascended the throne. During his reign, he traveled all over the country. Compared with other emperors, he was considered to be a very down-to-earth emperor who understood the people very well.】
[Therefore, during the Ming Dynasty, only Zhu Yuanzhang, Zhu Di and Zhu Houzhao were more aware of the sufferings of the people. Zhu Houzhao was also the emperor who was most like his two ancestors, without a doubt.]

【Not only that, Zhu Houzhao was also smart and intelligent, and would not be easily swayed by his ministers. If he had not been so immature, so dandy, so cynical, and died so early, he would probably have been one of the most accomplished emperors after Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di. 】

Zhu Houzhao: ...I'll just take it as you praising me!

[It's a pity that Zhu Houzhao didn't have much time left. We can only speculate about his future policies. But if nothing else, Zhu Houzhao's acceptance of new things and his grasp of government affairs can be said to be the best among all the emperors of the Ming Dynasty. ]

Zhu Houzhao: ...

[Everyone only knows that Zhu Houzhao set up the Leopard Room, but they don’t know that in addition to entertainment and relaxation, he has made the Leopard Room a political center. Memorials are sent to him every day. ]

[Everyone said that it was ridiculous for him to call himself a general, but later they realized that his self-proclaimed title of general and the establishment of a general's mansion allowed him to further consolidate military power in his own hands.]

[Everyone only knows that he has no biological children, but he has adopted more than a hundred godchildren and raised them in the Leopard House. But no one knows how many of his trusted generals who serve him come from among them.]

[He first resolved the internal troubles in the court, then began to resist the Mongols in the north, and also quelled two rebellions during his reign. When these crises were resolved, what do you think he would do given his personality?]

[There was once a phrase that could describe the crisis that ran through the Ming Dynasty: the Japanese in the south and the barbarians in the north. ]
【Zhu Houzhao put down the Mongolian rebellion and brought peace to the northern barbarians. So what should he do next and what did he want to do? 】
[I'm afraid the only threat is the Japanese in the south. 】

[Before Zhu Houzhao was about to die, he had just come into contact with Western envoys. Before that, the Ming Dynasty had been increasingly relaxing its supervision of the maritime ban.]

Zhu Houzhao: It seems that I have really seen the envoy, but the timing is a bit tricky.

Hongwu Dynasty.
Japanese in the south and barbarians in the north?
After ten emperors, our Ming Dynasty is still in such a difficult situation.
After the Ten Emperors, not only was the Mongols in the north not wiped out, but they also had the energy to counterattack northwards?
After the tenth emperor, the threat from the Japanese in the south became increasingly rampant? Those Japanese are really hateful.

Zhu Yuanzhang's face darkened: "Old Four, what do you think?"
Zhu Di pondered for a moment and said, "Father, the biggest threat to our Ming Dynasty is still the Mongols in the north. Although the Japanese are hateful, they are far away on the sea. If we talk about priorities, it is most important to wipe out the Mongols first."

"I think so too." Zhu Yuanzhang snorted. "If Zhang Shicheng and Fang Guozhen hadn't received support from these Japanese foreigners, they would have been wiped out by me long ago."
"By the way, they also killed a Laizhou Prefecture Tongzhi, I think his last name was Zhao, right? He was an envoy sent by our Ming Dynasty. It was extremely abominable."

Unfortunately, the dynasty had just been established, and the remnants of the Mongol king Baobao had not yet been eliminated, so it was not appropriate to launch a campaign, so the only option was to temporarily close the sea and let it go. However, he did not expect that it would become a major threat to his Ming Dynasty in later generations.

Seeing Zhu Yuanzhang's solemn expression, Zhu Di hesitated for a moment and said, "Father, during the search of Hu's mansion, I also found some letters between Hu Weiyong and the Japanese. I am waiting to sort them out with other physical evidence and present them to you."

"Communications with the Japanese?" Zhu Yuanzhang's face darkened immediately. "Tell them to send the letters immediately."
"Yes." Zhu Di responded and immediately sent someone to get it.

At this time, Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the scroll and said seriously, "This policy of banning the sea was originally inherited from the Mongols. I have repeatedly emphasized the ban on the sea and even closed the Maritime Customs. But it seems that the sea may not be banned enough at the moment."

[Speaking of South Japan, the first thing that comes to mind is the country of Little Japan that all Chinese people hate. 】
At this point, a strange background music started playing.

(End of this chapter)