Imperial Master of the Ming Dynasty

"Ever since the old Taoist priest finished squeezing it for me, my neck has felt much better in the past few days."

"So Jiang Lang is really not possessed by a water ghost?"

"If I was possessed by a water ghost, wouldn't you be the first one to repay your kindness and be the one who fished me out?"

"No need!"

After chatting with Cao Jiujiang under the old crooked neck tree, Jiang Xinghuo lay down again.

"Mr. Jiang."

Zhu Gaoxu asked with some curiosity: "Isn't your neck pinched? Why did you lie down again?"

"It's just because I've squeezed it so I can lie down longer."

Jiang Xinghuo looked like it was a matter of course.

"Then you will lecture while lying down today?"

Jiang Xinghuo greeted, "Why are you so restrained? Whatever makes you feel comfortable."

Li Jinglong leaned against the tree trunk, while Zhu Gaoxu was still sitting cross-legged on the ground upright, very respectful.

Seeing Zhu Gaoxu's stern look, Li Jinglong still felt a little ridiculous for a moment, even though he had expected it.

You know, among Zhu Yuanzhang's grandsons, Zhu Gaoxu is the most disgusting one. Almost all relatives, including his uncle Wei Guogong Xu Huizu, don't like him very much.

The main reason is that Zhu Gaoxu has always been looked down upon by everyone, and he is not a polite person.

Is this the same brave scoundrel who stole his uncle's BMW after being trained and dared to kill the Yi Cheng in the street when he was angry on the way to escape? When did you become so knowledgeable about etiquette?

Zhu Gaoxu didn't know what Li Jinglong was thinking, but even if he knew about it, he probably wouldn't care.

For Zhu Gaoxu, Jiang Xinghuo is both his teacher and friend.

Ever since Zhu Gaoxu was a child, everyone around him only made friends with him because of his status and power, and there was no one with whom he could sincerely communicate.

Moreover, there is no gentleman as knowledgeable as Jiang Xinghuo, and his lectures are so insensitive to his temper. There is no verbose nonsense at all, and all the lectures are about running the country.

"Where did we talk last time?"

Zhu Gaoxu looked at Jiang Xinghuo who was lying under the tree and replied: "When it comes to collecting labor, that is, designing a new field tax system, which needs to deal with labor, grain, cattle and seeds."

The last time Zhu Di led his troops into the imperial prison to look for Jiang Xinghuo, Zhu Gaoxu certainly knew that his father was aware of Jiang Xinghuo's existence.

But Zhu Gaoxu didn't take it seriously. Instead, he felt that it was normal for his father to notice something was wrong.

if not?

With his level, he himself didn't believe that he could write the strategy to reduce the vassal state.

Later, Zhu Di just told him that Jiang Xinghuo's strategy was very effective and that he would learn more about politics from Jiang Xinghuo, so he didn't say much more.

And this sentence was taken as some kind of hint by Zhu Gaoxu, who wanted to be the prince.

Anyway, Zhu Gaoxu would never have thought that his father asked him to study hard because his father also followed suit!

Just across a wall, Zhu Di and the other five were already sitting on chairs in the secret room.

Here, Jiang Xinghuo has never been a wordy person when giving lectures.

"Then let's move on to the second point, which is the field tax system for 'grain'."

"Let's review first."

“The reason why food is a problem is not the food itself.”

"This sentence is a bit hard to pronounce, but that's what it means." Jiang Xinghuo looked up at the sky, "What about the fire dragon burning the warehouse, big fights and small fights, and pouring the grain into the dendrobium to check the quality? , the dendrobium is filled to form a cone-shaped tip, and the grain scattered from the cone tip after the official kicks the dendrobium is the default 'loss')."

"That's the saying, there are policies from above and countermeasures from below. Everyone understands."

Li Jinglong, who was standing next to him, perked up for a moment when he heard this. "There are policies above and countermeasures below." It was a very insightful formulation.

Jiang Xinghuo had already understood, but he didn't propose a solution. Instead, he threw the problem to the two of them.

"Then think about it, how can we avoid these abnormal food losses so that the people will not bear such a heavy burden in the field tax process?"

Zhu Gaoxu and Li Jinglong looked at each other and both began to ponder.

Zhu Gaoxu scratched his beard vigorously, which was obviously a habitual action he used to relieve anxiety.

"I think Emperor Taizu Gao's method is good."

"Civil officials peeled off the skin and pulled away the grass, the military generals sent their heads to the nine sides, and the common people showed their orders to the public."

"The military also uses this method to establish authority, and the effect is quite good."

"It's useless to just talk if you don't actually use the knife."

The more Zhu Gaoxu said, the more fluent he became: "If it really doesn't work, it would be a good idea to learn from the current practice of 'killing the ten tribes'."

"I am from the Zhu Shi Clan." Jiang Xinghuo's mouth twitched slightly.

"Then the last one can be removed." Zhu Gaoxu quickly withdrew.

Jiang Xinghuo shook his head.

"No, the experience of Emperor Taizu Gao has proven that not only is this useless, but once the high-pressure policy is slightly relaxed, it will stimulate officials to retaliate and violate it."

Jiang Xinghuo turned to Li Jinglong again: "What did Mr. Cao say?"

Li Jinglong thought to himself, I have never really been in charge of civil affairs... But his expression is very calm. He comes from a high family and has been fond of reading since he was a child. This has cultivated one of his strengths - he can play with his eyes closed.

From this point of view, he is really similar to Zhao Kuo.

The same second generation, the same ability to play.

"It is not appropriate to rely solely on killing. If this is the case, it will definitely trigger a new round of dissatisfaction among the officials. Moreover, as in the late Hongwu period, local officials will no longer serve the court but only serve the government, which will lead to chaos in the Ming Dynasty. It is out of order. Without local support and implementation, it will be difficult to govern the country for a long time."

He paused for a moment and continued: "As for grain loss, we can only start with the supervision system. Supervision should be strengthened as soon as possible to prevent officials from being corrupt, such as setting up a special censor to patrol grain."

"If corruption is discovered, immediate and severe punishment will be given to Nanzhili and other 13 chief envoys. The amount of food lost due to corruption every year is huge. It is not unreasonable and needs to be rectified."

Jiang Xinghuo smiled and said: "Although this method is not as simple and crude as Gao Yu mentioned, it is still not enough to eradicate the evil. After all, the effect of people supervising people is always limited."

"You send the food inspector to monitor corruption among officials, but who is going to monitor whether the grain inspector is colluding with local officials?"

After Jiang Xinghuo finished speaking, he turned over, looked at the two people beside him and said, "I just asked a question, it's your pre-class thinking. Let's officially start now. Today's lecture content is actually "Chinese Currency" part of history."

"Of course, "Chinese Monetary History" itself has a lot of content, and I definitely can't finish it in a short while, so I won't go into details about the other content. I will only talk about things that can solve the food problem in the land tax system at the moment."

""Chinese Monetary History"?"

After hearing this, Li Jinglong couldn't help but mutter in a low voice: "What a weird name."

When he saw Zhu Gaoxu and Jiang Xinghuo looking up at him at the same time, he quickly shut up.