Volume 1: Birth! Seven time travelers Chapter 051: Only the trend is beyond our control
"Suprachai, the envoy of Siam, pays respect to His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty."
"The messenger is exempt from the formalities."
"Thank you, Your Majesty. Your Majesty, I was sent by our King to come to the Great Ming to report to His Majesty the Emperor. The previous king of our country passed away three months ago, and his son Raja Buddha succeeded to the throne on September 5, the 33rd year of the Wanli reign. I beg His Majesty the Emperor of the Great Ming to follow the previous example and issue the golden seal to officially enthrone my master as the King of Siam."
On the 20th day of the first lunar month in the 34th year of the Wanli reign (1606), Zhu Yijun once again convened a grand court meeting.
Although the two court meetings were separated by more than three months, which was unthinkable for the previous emperors and even the previous emperors of this dynasty, in the eyes of the ministers of the Wanli Dynasty, this was already a rare diligence of the current emperor.
After the grand court meeting in early September last year, before Shen Yiguan could mobilize the Zhejiang Party officials to collectively file a petition for impeachment, Prince of Fu Zhu Changxun packed up his belongings and returned to Luoyang at lightning speed. It is said that before leaving, he personally visited the Ciqing Palace, hugged his brother the Crown Prince and cried to express his loyalty. At this point, the dispute over the national foundation was completely over.
As for Yang Yingwen, he actually did such a morally corrupt thing during his father's death. No one in the entire Ming Dynasty dared to tolerate him. No one else impeached him. The Censorate and the Ministry of Revenue gave their own opinions on how to deal with him: demote him to a commoner, deprive him of his official title, recover the stolen money, clear the land, and send both brothers into exile. Finally, the Empress Dowager came out to make a slight concession: the first four points were to be carried out, but the exile was exempted.
Zhu Youdong did not let off the officials who had already surrendered in the Huangji Hall, but instead dragged out Yang Yingwen, who was the most aggressive, and stepped on him. This certainly made quite a few officials feel unhappy, but it also made other officials make a decision in their hearts.
Machiavelli, a Western political thinker, told a story in his masterpiece The Prince: A feudal lord had a territory with fierce people and lax management, and he could not effectively collect rent for many years. The feudal lord sent an official to rectify the situation. After the official arrived, he ruled cruelly with an iron fist, and after killing many people, he was able to collect rent effectively.
However, at this time, the dissatisfaction of the common people in this territory had reached its peak. If things continued like this, a riot would be inevitable. So the feudal lord killed the official in the name of mercy and justice. In this way, the rent could still be collected, but the emotions of the people in the territory were vented, and the crisis of riot was resolved.
This kind of thing, not to mention in the West, even in China, the emperors of all dynasties have actually used it very skillfully. In the past, there was Shang Yang, and recently there was Zhang Juzheng. In between, there were also countless innocent souls of capable officials... There is no way, this is the common trait of monarchs!
After thousands of years, the ministers were not fools, and they gradually figured it out. That's why Wanli insisted on fighting for the national foundation for fifteen years, but no minister dared to stand up publicly to cheer for His Majesty the Emperor.
What do subordinates fear the most? It is not hard work or short-term low income. What they fear the most is that the monarch does not take responsibility: I do the hardest work for you and offend all kinds of people who I would not offend in private interactions on weekdays. In the end, after the work is done, you abandon me, leaving me with nothing...
Therefore, the most basic principle for a subject is whether to devote all his efforts to a monarch. Putting aside those fearless warriors, the first thing most people should consider is: whether this monarch is responsible!
What Zhu Youdong showed at the grand court meeting that day was that he was particularly responsible!
Therefore, in the past three months, Zhu Youdong's Xinghua Palace has gradually become lively. With the introduction of Xu Guangqi, Yang Tingyun, the censor of the Censorate, took the initiative to come over. At this time, Li Zhizao, who was supervising the maintenance of the river in Henan, also expressed goodwill to Zhu Youdong.
Compared with the reservedness of the literati (the first two became devout Catholics in the original plane of history, and were outliers among the officials of the Ming Dynasty), the military men were much more straightforward. Although the civil officials kept a close eye on the military generals at that time, the military generals could not send their own children to the crown prince like the Duke of Ying and the Earl of Ningyuan. However, the Liu family in Jiangxi, the Ma family in Datong, the Da family in Liangzhou, the Qi family in Gansu, the Lu family in Xining, the Wang family in Yulin, the Du family in Kunshan, etc., all sent their capable clansmen to express their respect to the crown prince through Li Shizhong's channels.
In the eyes of the warriors, they had not seen a royal family member who dared to personally charge into battle for a long time - yes, the crown prince who confronted the censors face to face and did not stop after that and beat them to death was really a real man!
In addition, the grandson was independent of Xinghua Palace, which meant he had opened a government. According to the rules, the Jinyiwei had to send people to serve. Among the many young Jinyiwei who were eager to enter Xinghua Palace to serve the grandson, Zhu Youdong took advantage of his time travel and specially selected two people: Xu Xianchun and Tian Ergeng.
In short, the shogunate of His Royal Highness the Crown Prince is really starting to become lively. Oh, the young eagle is finally eager to try and start flying.
Zhu Youdong retracted his imaginative thoughts and looked at the Siamese envoy at the bottom of the stairs. His mood suddenly became not so good again.
"I heard that more than five years ago, when my grandson was , your king was also born under the protection of the Buddha?"
"No one is wiser than the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty. Your Majesty, although our king is only five years old, he is very intelligent, diligent and studious. Our country's Muay Thai is a local boxing style that is popular in our country based on the martial arts of the great country and the actual situation of our country. Our king started learning boxing at the age of three. Now he has no rivals among his peers. The king has also made many improvements to our country's Muay Thai. Not only that, our king is familiar with various Buddhist classics, has a kind heart, and often goes deep into the people to sympathize with the difficulties of the people..."
"Well, that's a good one. Well, I understand the envoy's intention. Let the Ministry of Rites handle this matter."
"Thank you for the grace of His Majesty the Emperor of the Celestial Empire..."
At the court meeting that day, Zhu Youdong finally confirmed the reason why the Yuheng star on his back exploded more than three months ago. He also confirmed that among the seven time travelers, the fifth one was a reincarnated Thai royal family.
That was it. He remained quiet at the grand court meeting and did not make things difficult for Subachai's request in the slightest.
Because at this time, the Ming Dynasty needed a stable and powerful Siam (Thailand).
The reason is that Myanmar has not stopped.
The Yunnan Provincial Administration Commissioner's Office in the Ming Dynasty had a much larger jurisdiction than today's Yunnan Province. However, its actual control area was far less than today's Yunnan Province. The reason for this was that this was the border area of the Ming Dynasty, and it was difficult for the central government to project its power here.
Therefore, unlike the provincial administration in the interior, the prefectures, counties and districts under the jurisdiction of the provincial administration in Yunnan are divided into two types: direct-controlled and foreign-controlled. The former is a place that can be effectively controlled and enforce the laws of the Ming Dynasty. The latter is mainly for control.
Starting from 1575, Mang Yinglong began to attack Mubang, Mengyang and other places that originally belonged to the foreign states of the Ming Dynasty. However, as a great leader of Myanmar, Mang Yinglong was very smart: on the one hand, he took tough military measures against these foreign states. On the other hand, he sent people to the Ming Dynasty central government and the Yunnan local government to surrender and cry. As a result, after several years, Mubang, Mengyang and other places were actually under the control of Mang Yinglong. The Ming government was still thinking about appeasing this person.
In 1581, Mang Yinglong died. In order to prove that his strategy was not inferior to his father's, his son Mang Yingli began to expand blindly. He changed his father's strategy of being ruthless and cruel, but always keeping a humble smile on his face, and even his face became extremely hateful. This caused the military attack of the Ming Dynasty: in 1583, under the attack led by Liu Jing and Deng Zilong, Myanmar was defeated. All the things that Mang Yinglong had spent a long time to steal were lost by this stupid son.
However, the southwestern border of the Ming Dynasty was closer to Myanmar and far away from Beijing. Therefore, after a failure, Myanmar returned many times. However, the Ming Dynasty could not station a large army in the southwestern border for a long time. Therefore, after decades of tug-of-war, although the Ming Dynasty once won a great victory in which a general led a few hundred people to defeat tens of thousands of Burmese troops, Myanmar still had the advantage in this place. Many foreign prefectures outside Yunnan were gradually taken over by Myanmar.
For the Central Plains regime, the most cost-effective way to deal with the barbarians in faraway places is to use barbarians to control barbarians. It happened that Naresuan of Thailand had already restored his country at this time. In order to resist the attacks of Myanmar and Cambodia, Thailand also needed the help of the Ming Dynasty. So Naresuan took the initiative to pay tribute to the Ming Dynasty, and the Ming Dynasty also gave Naresuan some support. At present, the Toungoo Dynasty of Myanmar is still in its heyday, and the Ming Dynasty needs a powerful Siam.
So, in this environment, what can Zhu Youdong do? All he can do is continue to strengthen his shogunate and speed up the layout of all aspects.
