I, Altria, only want to rule China.

Since they couldn't go to the second floor, the two thought it would be a good idea to go to the first floor, so the three of them went their separate ways.

After separating from the two men, Rowling immediately ran to find Her Royal Highness Princess Alice. He needed to ask Alice how to solve the problem of corruption among financial officials in their country.

When Alice heard Rowling was looking for her, she thought for a while and felt that this kind of thing of setting a trap for others was not quite suitable for her. After thinking about it, she decided that it would be better to let Rowling go find his teacher Merlin.

When it comes to cheating people, Merlin is the most suitable person. He doesn't need any reputation anyway. Cheating one person is cheating, and cheating a hundred people is also cheating.

So Alice asked someone to tell Rowling that she had something to deal with and couldn't say anything to him, but she could recommend Rowling to see her teacher Merlin.

Luo Lin heard this and did not refuse. Since this Imperial Master Merlin was the princess's teacher and could teach such a smart princess, he must be more knowledgeable than the princess!

So Rowling went to the Imperial Master's Mansion to find Merlin, and explained the purpose of his visit to Her Royal Highness Princess Alice, and then made a special visit.

When Merlin heard the purpose of Rowling looking for him, he did not refuse. Instead, he welcomed him into his mansion with a smile.

"I can use both civil and military methods to handle this." Merlin thought about what Leah had asked him to do, and decided to trick the other party.

Hearing this, Luo Lin immediately pricked up his ears.

Look, look, he is the national master of Wu State after all. Compared with the national master of Wu State, those so-called scholars or archons of Sassanid Persia are simply useless parasites and should all be thrown out and beheaded.

After secretly praising him in his heart, Luo Lin immediately stood up and bowed to Merlin with unskilled movements, saying, "Please teach me, Master Merlin."

Merlin smiled and nodded, saying, "The so-called method of using force is actually very simple. We can just send troops to confiscate the property of those wealthy nobles. Of course, this method may cause unrest in Sassanid Persia. It is a last resort. I don't think your Majesty will consider it."

Rowling felt that this was not certain. After all, the treasury of the Sassanid Persian Empire was so empty that even the rats had run away. If it was possible to kill all the nobles, Her Majesty Nanali might really do it.

However, the consequences of this idea were too fatal, so Her Majesty Nanali had to give up this tempting idea.

After shaking his head, Luo Lin asked, "Then what is grammar?"

Merlin smiled slightly and said, "This is naturally to reduce unnecessary expenses and find ways to increase more income."

Luo Lin thought this was not a good idea.

Speaking of increasing revenue, the royal family and government of Sassanid Persia had actually been trying to find ways to do it, except for imposing all sorts of heavy taxes and levies like the nobles did.

But when it comes to saving money, there is really no way. After all, Her Majesty Nanali is a woman, and whether she is indulging in dances, building villas, taking care of gardens and so on, all of these are big spenders.

Just when Luo Lin was secretly feeling annoyed, Merlin continued, "However, this method is only a temporary solution and not a fundamental solution. It may alleviate the problem temporarily, but it cannot completely eradicate the problem of Sassanid Persia's financial deficit."

After hearing what Merlin said, Rowling couldn't help but feel a little confused.

There are two methods, one civil and one military, but they were both proposed by you, the national teacher. However, you also said that these two methods can only alleviate the problem of tight treasury in Sassanid Persia, but cannot eliminate it fundamentally.

So what do you mean?

Merlin looked at the confused Rowling and said with a smile: "Why, you don't understand?"

Luo Lin nodded and said honestly: "Forgive my ignorance, I really don't understand it."

Merlin hummed, picked up the teacup again and took a sip of tea, then said, "The so-called way to govern a country is actually between tension and relaxation, between civil and military. If you only use military force, you will end up with a situation where rigidity cannot last long, and if you only use civility, you will end up with a situation where softness cannot be defended."

"If we want to truly solve the financial problems of Sassanid Persia, we must not only increase revenue and reduce expenditure, but also initiate reforms from top to bottom, reduce taxes on civilians, increase taxes on merchants, and crack down on nobles who own fiefs but are of no use to the country."

Luo Lin was moved when he heard this and asked, "Those nobles are quite powerful. The last time we just attacked the Rohan family, Sassanid Persia was already talking about it. If we increase the attack on the nobles, I'm afraid that our Queen will also be in trouble?"

Merlin shook his head and said with a smile, "What kind of trouble can there be? If you attack the Rohan family directly, it will naturally make other nobles have some ideas. It is also expected that they will resist the orders of your Majesty."

"However, Your Majesty can use the treasury of Sassanid Persia to recruit those families and their knights and have them fight against other countries. At the same time, you can preserve the strength of the army under your queen. With one strong and one weak, those nobles will naturally not be a concern."

Rowling had never imagined that the problem that seemed so complicated and even caused headaches for the entire Sassanid royal family and government system could be solved by Merlin in just a few words.

Just as Luo Lin was secretly admiring him, Merlin said meaningfully: "If it is a top-down change, it will be easier to control. If it triggers a bottom-up change, I am afraid it will be a drastic outcome. We must be careful."

Luo Lin was shocked and asked quickly, "Please teach me, Master?"

Merlin nodded and said, "If your Majesty wants to reform, he must first start with the common people to consolidate the foundation. Only when the foundation is solid can we safely start with the wealthy merchants and even the nobles. If the foundation is unstable, there will be disasters. Water can carry a boat, but it can also overturn it. This is the truth!"

"Water can carry a boat, but it can also capsize it!" Hearing this, Luo Lin was shocked.

"Haha, this is what our Majesty often says. She often uses this sentence to remind us that the people are the water, and we officials are the small boat." Merlin laughed.

Hearing this, Luo Lin took a deep breath. He had never thought that the Queen of Wu could see through people's hearts so thoroughly. Luo Lin bowed to Merlin and said, "Thank you for your advice."

After saying goodbye to Merlin, Luo Lin returned to the hotel impatiently and found Holbach and Diderot: "Two Grand Secretaries, take a look at the lives of the common people in Wu State and then look at the lives of the common people in Sassanid Persia. Do you have any ideas?"

Chapter 168: The Persian Empire was fooled

Grand Secretary Holbach and Grand Secretary Diderot looked at each other, wondering what was wrong with Rollin. What ideas could he have? What good would it do to have them?

Seeing that the two were confused and did not answer, Luo Lin said directly: "I talked a lot with the State Master of Wu State today. The State Master told me that the royal family and nobles are like boats, and the common people are like water. Water can make the boat float steadily on the water, but it can also stir up huge waves and sink the boat to the bottom of the water."

"Today's Sassanid Persia is like a giant ship floating on the sea. It looks relatively stable, but undercurrents have long been surging on the sea surface, and it may erupt at any time."

"So, I would like to ask Her Majesty Nanali to reform Sassanid Persia, but I don't know where to start, so I came to ask the two Grand Secretaries for advice."

Grand Secretary Holbach looked at Grand Secretary Diderot again and said, "What does His Majesty Nunnally think? Is he willing to change?"

Of course, Rowling was well aware of Her Majesty Nanali's plan, especially after Merlin's "analysis", Rowling had a clearer view of the current situation of Sassanid Persia.

After a long silence, Luo Lin finally said, "Her Majesty will definitely agree to the change."

After exchanging glances with Grand Secretary Diderot again, Grand Secretary Holbach said, "If we must start a reform, then the best way is not to learn everything from the Wu Kingdom, but to make the nobles understand the benefits of reform."

"You have to know that the Queen of Wu State built up her capital bit by bit from scratch. We in Sassanid Persia have many families with a long history. If we cannot convince them, and we rashly learn everything from Wu State, I am afraid it will shake the foundation of Sassanid Persia."

Luo Lin suddenly thought of what Merlin said.

"Reduce taxes on civilians, increase taxes on merchants, and crack down on nobles who own fiefs but are of no use to the court."

Yes, it was reduced rather than completely exempted like the Wu State, because the finances of Sassanid Persia could not do without this part of income for the time being.

Thinking of this, Luo Lin nodded and asked, "So, what should we do now?"

Grand Secretary Holbach nodded and said, "First, we need to gain the support of the common people, that is, never increase taxes. This requires Her Majesty the Queen to order a reduction in some taxes for the common people, and then use a fixed tax as the collection amount, and never increase it from now on."

"At the same time, Your Majesty needs to enact some policies that are friendly to the small bourgeoisie, and then increase the taxation of the big bourgeoisie."

"Your Majesty, please try to reduce your spending in the future. Once these policies are implemented, the interests of the nobles will inevitably be affected. This requires you to reduce your Majesty's spending to prevent those nobles from turning to the bourgeoisie."

"Of course, if Her Majesty has an army as powerful as Wuguo's, then forget what I said. She can freely implement any policy she wants without worrying about those nobles."

Grand Secretary Diderot glanced at Grand Secretary Holbach and thought to himself, why would it be so troublesome? He could just make Sassanid Persia a vassal state of Wu State. The emperor of Wu State would be obliged to be responsible for Sassanid Persia, and the problem would be solved naturally. If the nobles dared to make trouble, could they defeat the army of Wu State?

Of course, Grand Secretary Diderot also knew that this was simply impossible. After all, the Sassanid Empire had claimed to be an ally of the Wu Kingdom from the very beginning. If it suddenly became the son of the Wu Kingdom, probably no one would be able to accept it.

After thinking for a while, Diderot also expressed his support: "Rolin, you just said that the royal family and government are like ships, and the common people are like water. This sentence is very philosophical."

"Although this statement was told to you by the state teacher of Wu State, no one has ever made such a reasonable statement, whether in Sassanid Persia or Western Europe. This shows how backward Western Europe is compared to Wu State."

"So, I support your idea. Let Her Majesty Nanali start the reform. We need to strengthen our study of the Wu Kingdom, no matter in which aspect."

"As long as the Sassanid Empire learns from the Wu Kingdom earlier and faster than other countries in Western Europe, then the Sassanid Empire will be the most powerful country in Western Europe."

Luo Lin thought to himself, "Aren't you talking nonsense? If it wasn't for the purpose of learning from Wu Kingdom earlier and faster, would I, Luo, have brought back more than 200 international students?"

After thinking for a while, Luo Lin simply asked: "How long will it take for you to finish reading the books open to you in the Wu Kingdom Library? If possible, I think we should return to Sassanid Persia as soon as possible to assist Her Majesty Nanali in starting the reform of Sassanid Persia."

Grand Secretary Holbach shook his head and said:

"Luo Lin, I don't know if you have ever been to the Wu Kingdom Library. If you have, you should know that the part open to us alone has far more books than the entire Sassanid Royal Library. And there are many books that even we cannot understand."

Diderot on the side nodded in agreement, but couldn't help curling his lips and said, "You know, Luo Lin, the writing of Wu State is so advanced that they can typeset horizontally from left to right, and vertically from right to left."

"However, whether it is our Persian writing or those Roman writing, they must follow the pattern of horizontal typesetting from left to right, otherwise it will greatly affect reading. Damn it, why don't we have a writing as advanced as Wuguo's?"

Luo Lin nodded and said, "I discovered it a long time ago. However, this is exactly what we need to learn from the Wu Kingdom. Although we don't have it, we will have it if we learn it."

............

While Roland was discussing with Holbach and Diderot how to promote the reform of the Sassanid Empire, Leah, the emperor of Wu State, was also thinking about how to make Wu State more perfect.

Yes, the Wu Kingdom, which seemed almost perfect to Rowling and others, had a lot of problems in Leah's eyes.

Although Leah is now trying her best to cross the river with Rabbit and Silly Thief Eagle, and does not care whether Rabbit and Silly Thief Eagle will ask her for copyright, she has made a lot of arrangements now, and many of them are actually very similar to those in Ming Dynasty.

For example, the Censorate, the Six Ministries, the Censorate, the Embroidered Uniform Guard, etc., are already infinitely close to the later Ming Dynasty.

But on the other hand, Leah also established a modern democratic system, which raised human rights issues.

These are two completely different systems, and there are bound to be many conflicts between them. This requires Leah and the ministers in the Wu Kingdom's court to find a balance in the middle.

Chapter 169: Every Family Has Its Difficulties

Whether you lean to the left or the right, problems are likely to arise.

To give the simplest example, the system of collective punishment is in conflict with the human rights of the people, but who can say that the system of collective punishment is unreasonable?

To put it bluntly, human rights is a pseudo-concept in itself, created by those wealthy, powerful and influential aristocrats to protect themselves.

Even if something goes wrong, as long as one unlucky person is sacrificed, the family can continue to enjoy themselves without having to bear any responsibility. Isn't this human rights?

However, what is despairing is that human rights are indeed a good thing, because ordinary people, even if they only get a little bit of benefit from them, can live more like human beings rather than animals.

For example, the punishment of nine generations of a family as mentioned just now.

If one person rebels, nine clans will be implicated. Many people in the nine clans who were not aware of the incident and had no intention of rebelling together will be killed for no apparent reason. Is this considered an unprovoked disaster?

Many times, similar conflicts have always existed, but Leah's current Wu Kingdom has been expanding outward and internal welfare has been increasing, so these problems have not yet erupted.

Of course, Leah, the Emperor of Wu, could not turn a blind eye to this situation.

The reason why we pretended not to see them before was because we needed to recuperate and develop people's livelihood, so we couldn't take care of these issues for the time being.

Now, as the Wu State unified China and its territory expanded to its current size, these problems have slowly surfaced.

If you continue to pretend that you can't see, then you are truly blind.

The second issue is newspapers.

The Wu State Newspaper was published by the Wu State court. The articles published in it were either written by Liya, the Wu State Emperor herself, or by the Confucian scholars of the Hanlin Academy.

Although it was not completely divorced from the people, there were not many things that ordinary people liked to read in the Wu State Newspaper.

There are also calls from the public, hoping that Liya, the Emperor of Wu, would allow the public to start newspapers and write things that everyone would like to read.

Allow it or not? Or should we set up censorship and ban the current issue of the newspaper if one word is wrong, so that they won’t say anything they shouldn’t say?

You must know that the existence of the "Wu State Newspaper" is destined to make it possible for Leah's future decrees to spread throughout the world in the shortest possible time, and the existence of the Jinyiwei is destined to make it difficult for the ministers of the Wu State court to deceive their superiors and subordinates as before.

After thinking for a while, Liya said directly: "Let's discuss whether to allow private citizens to publish newspapers, and whether to prohibit private citizens from owning muskets and grenades.

As for newspapers, Leah plans to relax some of the controls a little bit, first allowing private individuals to start two newspapers to test the waters, and if that works, then she will slowly relax more restrictions.

On the contrary, the problem of civilian possession of firearms and grenades is a real headache.

You should know that muskets and hand grenades are no longer rare things among the people. After all, all the soldiers of the Wu Kingdom have been equipped with these things.

So it is not surprising that firearms spread among the people. For example, those who have served in the army for many years and retired, do you think they don’t know how to make such things?

The annual fireworks season alone is enough to get enough materials for gunpowder from it.

In addition, these two things are really easy to use, so now many people use them to hunt in the mountains. Once they encounter tigers or leopards, these are life-saving weapons. It can be said that many people have them in their homes now.

If it was just hunting or something, it would be fine, and Leah really wouldn't stop them. But the current situation is that it is no longer a simple hunting issue, but has developed into a gang war.

In the past few years, there have been hundreds of large and small armed conflicts in the Wu State, with the smaller ones involving dozens of people, and the weapons generally being swords and muskets.

A larger group might have hundreds or even thousands of people, and their weapons might be flintlock rifles, grenades, homemade cannons, and the like.

And those who use these are those martial arts sects

The saying that knights use force to break the law is absolutely true. Those martial arts sects do nothing good and specialize in collecting protection fees, which is a bit similar to the modern underworld.

Although the people of Wu State are gradually living a life of plenty under Liya's governance, there are still some local affairs that Liya can no longer control.

Especially in the south, sometimes the number of people involved in the fight between two gangs for resources and territory can reach thousands or even more.

Moreover, both sides clamored for the government to leave them alone, and they promised not to cause trouble to the government, and just wait for them to finish fighting and collect their bodies.

In the end, it was the troops stationed there that took action and suppressed them.

So firearms must be banned.

Therefore, after Leah raised the question of whether civilians should be allowed to continue to possess firearms, all the ministers in the Wu Kingdom's court began to have a headache.

If we don't ban it, the potential threat is too great, but if we ban it, it's not easy to do so.

After struggling for a long time, Morgan finally put forward his own suggestion: "Banning guns is definitely necessary, but it is not realistic to do it completely across the board. So let's set a deadline first, temporarily one year. Those who voluntarily hand in firearms within one year will be rewarded. If they do not hand in firearms after one year but are discovered, their firearms will be confiscated or even punished.

"As for hunters who make a living by hunting, they must be registered with the government. There must be records of how many bullets they received and how much they used each month. In addition, we must find ways to guide them to change their careers."

"As for those places where wild beasts roam, we can simply dispatch the local garrisons to kill all the wild beasts, so that the people can live in an environment where they can live in peace. This can also be regarded as forcing the hunters to change their professions."