Prime Minister

Chapter 1152 Family Affairs Become National Affairs

Chapter 1152 Family Affairs Become National Affairs

After the victory in Lanzhou, the emperor was in a very good mood. Recently, several imperial doctors diagnosed him and said that he was fine. The emperor also felt refreshed and all his illnesses were gone. However, Qian Yi was worried and advised the emperor to continue to take care of his body and to reduce his labor and desire.

After hearing Qian Yi's words, the emperor, although knowing that it was not good to hide one's illness and avoid medical treatment, still sent him out of the palace and asked him to work hard to establish the Imperial College Medical School.

"Are there any new beauties in the palace recently?"

The official asked Shi Deyi.

"Yes, yes. I will have someone bring the portrait here right away."

The official nodded, and soon Shi Deyi presented the portrait to the emperor for his inspection.

The emperor looked at it for a few seconds and said with a smile, "I knew at a glance that it was painted by Cui Daizhao."

This Cui Bai was the best painter in the palace. His paintings of birds, trees, and mountains were the best in the world. The emperor liked his paintings very much and promoted him to the rank of waiter.

Everyone knows that Cui Bai is good at painting flowers and birds, but few people know that he is also an expert at painting beauties.

The emperor looked at the paintings of beauties painted by Cui Bai. The beauty was either sitting leisurely leaning on the railing or having lovely eyes. Just a picture conveyed the beauty's appearance and spirit to the emperor.

The emperor was very satisfied and thought that Cui Bai and Qian Yi were both talented people from the people, but they were much better than those in the Imperial Hospital and the Painting Academy.

Soon the official looked at the beauties in the paintings, and couldn't help feeling distracted.

To conquer more land, one will inevitably want to conquer more women to match it. This is something engraved in men's genes.

The official was a little impulsive at the moment. Thinking of this, the official looked at a woman in the painting for a moment, and Shi Deyi immediately understood.

After the death of Empress Dowager Cao, there were even fewer people who could restrain him, so he became more arbitrary.

"Your Majesty, Zhang Yue and Zhang Dun are arguing in front of the palace!"

Hearing the eunuch's report, the emperor was delighted at first, but then he sighed.

Zhang Yue and Zhang Dun were both talents that he admired very much. Zhang Yue served the emperor with sincerity, and Zhang Dun served the emperor with honesty.

Another quality of Zhang Dun that he admired was that he did not form factions. Of course, the emperor also knew that it was impossible to truly avoid factions in the officialdom.

But at least Zhang Shangying and Li Hao, who were recommended by Zhang Dun, were both outstandingly talented.

In this regard, Zhang Yue has both public and private interests.

All emperors hate forming factions, and officials are somewhat paranoid and believe that only ministers who like to be alone have clean hearts, noble character, and are truly loyal to the monarch.

From this point of view, Zhang Dun was one of the few officials who did not form cliques, and he was indeed much better than Lu Huiqing.

Lu Huiqing is very good to those who are good, and very bad to those who are bad.

Lu Huiqing would find ways to deprive others of their interests, even by attacking others, in order to favor or benefit those close to his circle.

Therefore, his reputation is polarized, and even most people have a bad impression of him.

The official said, "Let them come to see me."

……

When the emperor walked outside the hall, he saw Zhang Yue and Zhang Dun standing one on the west side and the other on the east side of the hall.

The official walked up to the two of them and said, "You two, please come closer."

The two men walked in front of the emperor, and the emperor said, "A prime minister and a Hanlin, both are important officials of the country, they should be of one mind to assist me, why do you do this?"

"I know you two have many grievances, but as officials in the same palace, it is inappropriate to talk about these. How about I mediate between you?"

Zhang Yue said: "Your Majesty, the dispute between me and Zhang Dun is not a private matter, but a public one."

"The baojia soldiers are obviously not good at fighting. The generals along the border of Shaanxi would rather hire the foreign people and abandon the baojia soldiers."

"This is not my prejudice. The Khitan and Tangut also gathered together to form an army, but the tribal soldiers usually followed the water and trained themselves by hunting. How could they be like the baojia? If the baojia soldiers replaced the regular soldiers as Zhang Dun said, they would die without a burial place."

The Qing Dynasty also saw its military power collapse early on, so the Qing Dynasty recruited Soldiers to fight. As a result, the Qing army had a saying that they would not fight until Soldiers arrived.

In order to maintain the combat effectiveness of the Solon soldiers, the Qing Dynasty ordered that the Solon people were not allowed to farm and were only allowed to hunt.

Zhang Dun said, "Your Majesty, Zhang Yue advocated building forts and strongholds in various routes of Shaanxi and advancing along the border in sequence, which is really not advisable."

"This Yi connects the upper and lower parts."

The official was surprised and asked, "Why do you say that?"

Zhang Dun asked, "Your Majesty, do you know that officials have built cities and fortresses in the northwest?"

"This has three benefits. One is that you can be assigned a military position and have your merits reported to the court in the future."

"The second benefit is that by building cities and fortresses, these officials can manipulate them to enrich themselves."

"The third benefit is that we don't need to train the troops. If we want to fight a Tangut war in the field, we must train the troops. But if we build a fort, we don't need to train the troops, and we can openly embezzle military pay and military supplies."

"So the court has raised a bunch of useless soldiers and built a bunch of useless cities over the years."

"They didn't think of using the money from building the fort to share with the soldiers on the front line to build a strong army that can fight well, but instead they put all the money into building the fort. This is the harm of valuing things over people."

"I think it would be better to use the baojia soldiers to guard the camp instead of using regular soldiers."

The official's face changed when he heard this. Zhang Yue looked at Zhang Dun's words sideways. It was obvious how many local officials in Shaanxi had been offended. Wang Gui didn't need to do anything. The officials of the entire Shaanxi Road could drown you with their saliva.

The emperor asked, "Is this true, Mr. Zhang? Can the court's money be used in this way?"

Zhang Yue knew that what Zhang Dun said was true, and he had long intended to report the matter to the emperor, but he was worried about offending the officials in Shaanxi. But now Zhang Dun was reckless and revealed the truth.

This was also an unexpected result.

Zhang Dun's story was used by some people on the Internet to evaluate Liaodong in the late Ming Dynasty. But it is not entirely correct when applied to Shaanxi in the Song Dynasty.

Zhang Yue said: "The method of building forts was proposed by Mr. Fan Wenzheng, and the strategy of shallow attack and construction that I advocated also came from him."

"As for the statement in the chapter that Shaanxi has no strong army, aren't the troops of Zhong, Zhe, and Yao elite? And the troops of Miao Shou, Liu Changzuo, Li Hao, Wang Wenyu, Peng Sun, etc. are all strong troops who dare to fight against the Western Xia in the field."

The official said, "But it is an indisputable fact that the troops in Shaanxi embezzled military pay, but they were better than other troops. No wonder most of the court's military funds have been used to build forts in recent years."

Zhang Dun said: "Your Majesty, the court has not allocated enough military pay, and the generals have withheld the pay. After the generals withheld the pay, they took the easy way out and did not train the troops. Therefore, most of the soldiers have to work part-time to make a living."

"The regular soldiers are getting worse day by day."

Zhang Yue remembered that Zeng Guofan had suffered this loss before. He forced the Green Camp soldiers to train with the Hunan Army every day. However, the Hunan Army had food and wages, while the Green Camp soldiers had almost no food and wages. They had to do odd jobs to make a living. In the end, the Green Camp mutinied and Zeng Guofan was forced to jump over the wall and escape.

From then on, Zeng Guofan no longer trusted the Green Camp.

Zhang Yue thought to himself that Zhang Dun was really bold. Yes, he already knew that Wang Gui wanted to dismiss him. Instead of doing that, he might as well give it a try, which was also in line with his outspoken personality.

The more others attack him, the more the government will protect him. No one in the government is easy to deal with.

The official's face looked solemn, which poured cold water on the official's complacency after the victory in Lanzhou.

The emperor said, "You two are both loyal ministers who serve the country. I never expected that I would learn so much from hearing your debate. Our ancestors were right when they said that there should be different opinions in the court."

At this point, the emperor paused and said, "For my sake, the two of you should put aside your prejudices and work together to assist me in state affairs in the future."

Zhang Yue sneered in his heart after hearing this, and Zhang Dun's face was also extremely cold.

Zhang Yue speculated that perhaps what the emperor really wanted to say was that he would only feel at ease if the two of you continued to fight like this.

In this way, family affairs have become national affairs.