Chapter 65 Rising in the Wind
After hearing the topic, Yang Shen closed his eyes and pondered, then began to write:
I have heard that the emperor rules the world.

There is complete virtue in governing the country, and there is complete achievement in maintaining governance.

The combination of civil and military power is the perfect virtue of governance. The mutual support of military and agriculture is the perfect achievement of governance.

When they are used together and show the same direction, the politics of the world comes from one, and the virtue is complete, like the sun and the moon in the sky. All that shines on them is the virtue of heaven.

He answered the first question in one go.

Ou Zanghua also gave his own answer at this moment:

I have heard that the people are the foundation of the country, and the country is established for the people.

Those who are humble without losing their dignity and crooked without losing their uprightness, are those who put the people first.

The policy of governing the army refers to the policy of governing the affairs on the borders, governing with power and force, punishing the tyrants and suppressing rebellion, so as to save the country and ensure the security of the society.

Soldiers are like fish, and the people are like water.

Fish cannot live without water, and water cannot live without fish.

As time passed, it was soon noon. Most of the tribute scholars had breakfast around the hour of Yin, and by this time they were all starving.

Moreover, hunger cannot be controlled by human will.

The Zhengde Emperor naturally heard these voices, and he said, "Gu Banban, ask the Guanglu Division to prepare some food, so as not to starve my pillars of talent."

"I obey the order."

Gu Dayong responded and when he walked out of the hall, a young eunuch trotted forward. After receiving the oral order, the young eunuch immediately turned around and went to the Guanglu Division.

The Guanglusi was mainly responsible for the food of the outer court, that is, sacrificial food and banquet catering.

Fortunately, the previous Emperor Hongzhi was known for his benevolence and virtue, and he asked the Guanglu Division to prepare food for the palace examinations many times. There were standard provisions, so it was easy to do.

Steamers are started one by one, and large pots are put on the racks one by one.

In less than half an hour, a portion of Emperor Taizu's favorite pumpkin glutinous rice cake, a meat pie, a portion of dried radish, and a cup of green onion tofu soup were brought up by the officials of the Guanglu Division.

Emperor Zhengde also ordered one, and after looking at the simple food, he frowned slightly. He was the ruler of the world, so why was the dinner he was treating so shabby?
By the way, what was eaten in the palace examination in the third year of Zhengde?

Emperor Zhengde recalled carefully that he seemed to
Eh?
It seems like he left early.
At this time, Li Dongyang suddenly stood up and said, "Your Majesty, I have something to say."

This scene instantly attracted everyone's attention, except for the commander of the guards who was in charge of supervising the exam and some of the imperial censors.

"Please speak, Mr. Li." Emperor Zhengde came back to his senses, looked at Li Dongyang and nodded.

Li Dongyang said slowly: "At the beginning of the founding of the country, Emperor Taizu saw the suffering of the people and the hardship of the people's lives. However, the officials were extravagant and even arrogant. In order to rectify this extravagant trend, Emperor Taizu hosted a banquet for civil and military officials on the birthday of Empress Xiaocigao."

"I know, it's 'four dishes and one soup'!" Emperor Zhengde answered quickly.

"That's right," Li Dongyang nodded, looked at the tribute students, and continued, "The palace examination menu was set by the late emperor. The scallion tofu soup is meant to remind you that scallions and tofu are green and white, and justice and integrity are like the sun and the moon."

"I will be taught."

Ou Zanghua and other tribute scholars stood up and bowed.

After everyone finished this educational lunch, they continued to answer questions.

Emperor Zhengde could no longer sit still, so he left as soon as noon passed, leaving Li Dongyang, Liang Chu and a group of deacons to continue supervising the exam.

Time flies, the hour of You has arrived, and the red sun is setting in the west.

The candidates put down their pens and waited for the officiating officer to collect their test papers.

Then, led by the Minister of Rites, they left along the same route.

That night, the Wenhua Hall was brightly lit. The official who received the papers handed over the collected 300 test papers to the sealing official, who stamped them with the sealing seal and sent them to the official in charge of the papers.

Due to the tight schedule, the black papers of the palace examination did not need to be transcribed into red papers, but were sent directly to the examiner in the East Pavilion to wait for reading on the morning of the 16th.

After Ou Zanghua and his fellow tribute students left the palace, they declined many invitations to banquets from their peers and returned to Cheng's house in a carriage.

Qu Feiyan had prepared food early, and when she saw Ou Zanghua coming back, she said cheerfully, "Sir, I bought some peppercorns and farm chicken today, and made mutton and radish soup, a stir-fried chicken with ginger slices, and pears!"

"Haha, Feiyan still understands what I mean." After hearing this, Ou Zanghua couldn't help but smile and praise.

"Hey hey hey"

At the hour of Mao on March 16, 17 examiners entered the East Pavilion and began to review the examination papers.

However, there was only one day to mark the papers. It was a bit difficult to review and evaluate more than 300 examination essays and to determine their quality in such a short time. After all, humans are not machines.

What's more, the tribute scholars were all talents selected through the imperial examination. Although their levels varied, they were still in the same class.

Therefore, in order to save time, there are often some unavoidable "unspoken rules" in marking the palace examination papers.

Just like now, the examiner will pick out the top ten examination papers and submit them to the cabinet ministers in advance.

If nothing unexpected happens, the top three in the first class will often come from these ten test papers, and the other seven will also occupy the top few places in the second class.

The other test papers will be marked by the examiners, who will mark the test papers according to five categories, namely: circle, point, dot, straight and cross.

After the first examiner has marked the papers, he will take turns to review the papers that have been reviewed by other examiners. This is called "turning the table".

After each examiner has finished reading all the test papers, they will be handed over to the chief examiner for overall review and comprehensive evaluation. Each examiner can speak, and the test papers with more circles will be ranked at the top.

Due to the tight time schedule for the palace examination, there was no preferential registration. If the examiner encountered handwriting that was familiar to him and appreciated it, this candidate would naturally have an advantage over other candidates.

This is also one of the reasons why after the imperial examination, all the candidates were eager to hold various banquets.

If a reader from the same hometown recognizes the handwriting, he or she can draw an extra circle and the student's ranking may jump up a few places.

In addition, in theory, the first to third place in the first class were appointed by the emperor.

But that was evaluated based on the test papers submitted by the cabinet. If, during the grading process, the cabinet believed that the test paper was not qualified to be submitted to the emperor, then no matter how well it was written, it would be useless.

Unless the emperor knew a particular scholar and asked him to hear what he had written.

Eh?
This is not important!
At this moment, four of the five cabinet ministers were present in the Wenhua Hall. The only one absent was Yang Tinghe, the Minister of Personnel and Grand Secretary of the Wuying Hall. This was done to avoid suspicion.

The four cabinet ministers each held a test paper in their hands and read it carefully, marking it with red pen from time to time.

After a while, everyone put down their test papers and started discussing.

The level of this palace examination was very high, and the essays were brilliantly written and every word was a gem.

If the scores were based on a percentage system, Yang Shen was in the unique class with 99 points, Ou Zanghua was at 97 points, Zou Shouyi, Yu Ben and Xu Chengming were at 95 points, and the rest of the tribute scholars were between 90 and 95 points.

But the content of the article is somewhat mixed.

Especially Ou Zanghua, the Minister of Rites Liang Chu took out his test paper and commented with some melancholy: "The rest is good, except for the unity of soldiers and farmers. It's a bit unrealistic."

Fei Hong, the Grand Secretary of Wenyuan Pavilion, stroked his beard and said casually, "It has a bit of the meaning of the Yue Family Army's slogan 'We will not tear down houses even if we freeze to death, and we will not plunder even if we starve to death.'"

The Prince's tutor Liu Zhong shook his head and said, "It's even worse than Yue's army. I can't imagine where in the world there is such an army."

"So, how do you think this article should be ranked?" Li Dongyang looked at the three people and asked slowly.

Liang Chu frowned slightly. Although his idea was naive, he only had this question. His answers to other questions were quite good, so he said, "You can be included in the list."

"Good." Fei Hong nodded and agreed.

Liu Zhong even felt that the title of Chuanlu was too high. How could the title of Jinshi be so unrealistic and incredible?

But seeing that Li Dongyang didn't say anything, he nodded.

Then, the ministers continued to review the papers and selected the examination papers for tomorrow's reading, a total of 12 papers. At noon on March , Emperor Zhengde came to Wenhua Hall with a look of joy and listened to the examiner kneeling in front of him to read the papers.

After the reading is completed, the eunuch in charge of ceremonies takes the paper and places it on the imperial desk, and then the next reader reads the next paper.

In order, the first three test papers to be read are the ones that the ministers have judged as the first class in advance. After reading the three papers, unless the emperor orders to continue reading the papers, the remaining examiners will directly let the eunuchs take the papers one by one and place them all on the imperial desk. Then the officials will leave the Wenhua Hall and wait for the emperor to decide the first, second and third place in the first class.

After the imperial approval, the minister would take the test papers back and the emperor could go home from get off work.

Based on the ministers' understanding of Emperor Zhengde, they would basically stop reading after finishing the first three volumes. After all, that's what they did last time.

Therefore, after the examiner read the test papers of Yang Shen, Zou Shouyi and Yu Ben in order, he stopped.

"Huh? Are these the top three nominees of the cabinet?" Emperor Zhengde was stunned for a moment and asked with some confusion.

"Your Majesty, the cabinet thinks these three articles are very good." Li Dongyang, as the chief minister of the cabinet, stood up and bowed.

Emperor Zhengde stood up, took the test paper from the next examiner and saw that it was Ou Zanghua's.

So he asked, "What about this one?"

Liu Zhong immediately stood up and reported, "Your Majesty, this article is very good, but it has flaws. Soldiers are the place of life and death, the way of survival and destruction. Civilians are the neighbors who live together and survive in the fields. In peaceful times, the two are completely unrelated, but in troubled times, the soldiers and the people are indistinguishable. How can they be as close as fish and water?"

Liang Chu said: "Your Majesty, even the Yue Family Army, which has strict military discipline, cannot do this."

Emperor Zhengde picked up Ou Zanghua's test paper and began to read it. Seeing this, Li Dongyang analyzed it sentence by sentence for him.

It is a rare opportunity for the emperor to listen to his serious lectures, and it cannot be missed.

After listening, Emperor Zhengde also felt that the answer to the first question was a bit outrageous.

But he likes Ou Qing!

Among all the civil officials in the court, only Ou Qing could compete with him. The military generals were quite skilled, but they all treated him like a fool. What was the point of competing?
If Ou Qing were to be relegated to the second class, no matter he was assigned to be the head of a department in the court or a prefect in a local area, he would not be able to be summoned at any time on weekdays.

If I force the replacement myself, it would probably cause criticism from the court.

He didn't want to be surrounded by a group of old men and have them recite "zhihuzheya"; that would be too torturous.

So, we have to think of a way!
Wait a minute, Liang Chu just mentioned Yue Family Army?

Emperor Zhengde thought for a moment and said in a serious tone, "Your words make sense, and I also think Mr. Ou's views are too exaggerated."

When these words were spoken, the ministers present felt a sinking feeling in their hearts, knowing that something had changed.

As expected, Emperor Zhengde changed the subject and continued, "But before the Yue Family Army appeared, who could have imagined that there would be such a disciplined army in the world? So I think Mr. Ou's idea is very interesting. Maybe one day in the future, there will be such a team with close military and civilian ties!"

The cabinet ministers fell silent, not because they thought what Emperor Zhengde said made sense.

Instead, they were surprised that their stupid boss was so thoughtful and could think about the future. This is a huge improvement!

Emperor Zhengde walked back to his seat and thought hard before coming up with three idioms: "Therefore, I think Yang Qing's article is true and false, so it can be ranked first. Zou Qing's article seeks common ground while reserving differences, so it can be ranked second. Ou Qing's article carries forward the past and opens up the future, so it can be ranked third."

The three cabinet ministers Liang Chu, Fei Hong and Liu Zhong all looked at the Prime Minister Li Dongyang. As long as Dong Shu gave them a look, they would have a good debate with Zhengde today.

When it comes to verbal disputes, the three of them together are invincible!
But Li Dongyang saw something different in Emperor Zhengde. He was no longer as willful as before and quit his job, nor did he let the eunuchs intervene and make trouble. Instead, he reasoned with the ministers.

Isn’t this a form of progress?

And it’s just one third place. There will be another one in three years.

Why should I cause unpleasantness to Your Majesty over this?

Thinking of this, Li Dongyang clasped his hands together, bowed and said, "Your Majesty, what you said makes sense. I will obey your order."

Seeing this, the three cabinet ministers and other examiners naturally stopped speaking out against the order and bowed, saying, "I obey your order."

Emperor Zhengde's eyes lit up, it turned out that reasoning really worked.

The top three have been decided!

The ministers immediately rushed back to the East Pavilion, filled out the yellow list before dusk, and then handed it to the Shangbao Division to have it stamped with the emperor's seal.

The officials in the Imperial Edict Office then began to write the announcement of the imperial edicts. The yellow list was given to the Minister of Rites, and the announcement of the imperial edicts was given to the Minister of the Honglu Temple to be used in preparation for the announcement ceremony early the next morning.

At the same time, officials from the Ministry of Rites also took action. They sent people to deliver the Jinshi uniforms to each Jinshi in advance for use in the next day's ceremony.

These clothes were custom-made in advance and needed to be returned to the Ministry of Rites. If they did not fit, the Jinshi had to exchange them with others or come to the Ministry of Rites. They were not allowed to make alterations themselves.

Of course, this situation will not happen to Ou Zanghua, the top three Jinshi are just that awesome.

When he received the brand new Jinshi uniform, he put it on at Qu Feiyan's urging.

This set of clothes is in the style of a lanshan, close to official uniform, with a round collar and wide sleeves, dark blue silk with dark green edges, which also reflects the upgrade and transformation of Jinshi into the official system.

Ou Zanghua turned around in front of Qu Feiyan and Xiang Danian, and asked with a smile: "How is it?"

"Very authoritative!"

"Very handsome and free and easy!"

The two said in unison.

"Forget about the official prestige. I like handsome guys." Ou Zanghua smiled and shook his head. Then the two of them went out and he took off his Jinshi uniform.

On March 18th, after all civil and military officials had entered the palace, the Jinshi candidates who had been waiting outside Chengtian Gate began to enter the palace. Their order of arrangement was the same as that of the palace examination, and the venue of the ceremony was still the Huangji Hall.

In front of the Huangji Hall Square, civil and military officials stood on both sides of the Danchi according to their civil and military ranks, and the Jinshi scholars were divided into two rows and stood behind them.

Everyone stood still, ceremonial music started, and the Grand Secretary of the Cabinet held the yellow list in his hand and placed it on the yellow list table.

After everyone was ready, the absolute protagonist, Emperor Zhengde, slowly walked over and accepted the ceremony of three bows and nine kowtows from his ministers.

Then, the ceremony of announcing the successors officially began.

Inside the Hall of Supreme Harmony, an official from the Honglu Temple began to read out the imperial edict: "On March 15, the sixth year of the Zhengde reign, the imperial examination was held for the tribute candidates of the whole country. The first class was awarded the title of Jinshi Jidi, the second class was awarded the title of Jinshi Chuan, and the third class was awarded the title of Tong Jinshi Chuan."

As soon as he finished speaking, the examiner began to open the papers and sang: "In the sixth year of the Zhengde reign, the first place winner of the imperial examination is Yang Shen from Sichuan!"

Inside the palace, a loud-voiced official from the Honglu Temple would repeat, "In the Xinwei Palace Examination in the sixth year of Zhengde, the first place winner is Yang Shen from Sichuan!"

There was an official from the Honglu Temple sitting on the osmanthus tree at the entrance of the main hall. After hearing the voice coming from the hall, he continued to repeat: "In the palace examination of the Xinwei year of the Zhengde reign, the first place winner is Yang Shen from Sichuan!"

The sound spread layer by layer and finally reached the ears of all the scholars in the square.

Yang Shen breathed a sigh of relief after hearing this, then turned around and bowed to his classmates. Led by officials from the Honglu Temple, he walked into the Hall of Supreme Harmony to thank the emperor for his grace.

Seeing this, Ou Zanghua couldn't help but sigh secretly, it was indeed him.
Then, the official of the Honglu Temple on the Danxi shouted: "In the palace examination of the sixth year of Zhengde, the second place in the first class is Zou Shouyi from Jiangxi!"

Zou Shouyi walked out of the team. He looked at Ou Zanghua with comfort in his eyes.

You should know that the second place in the imperial examination was Ou Zanghua, and he was only third.

Ou Zanghua smiled at Zou Shouyi and motioned him to go in and express his gratitude.

The next moment, the official from the Honglu Temple on the Danxi Mountain shouted, "In the palace examination of the Xinwei year of the Zhengde reign, the third place in the first class is Huguang Ou Zanghua!"

After hearing this, Zou Shouyi actually turned around and looked at Ou Zanghua with a sincere smile.

Ou Zanghua straightened his clothes and followed the officials from the Honglu Temple up.

As the saying goes, the orioles have migrated, the dragons have transformed, and the city is full of carriages and horses overnight. Every house has a group of gods on the roof, vying to see the cranes soaring into the sky!

　There is a dinner party tonight, and there is only this big chapter.

　　Ask for a wave of follow-up reading, monthly tickets, and recommendations~
　　Thank you, bosses
　　
　
(End of this chapter)