Zhu Yunwen was always outspoken, so what he said did not surprise the three Yangs; instead, they nodded in agreement.
After all, having followed Zhu Yunwen along the way, I had witnessed the exploitation of the common people by landlords and officials in many places.
They don't lack food; they simply can't give it to the poorest people at the bottom of society.
If they are fed, who would be willing to work for these scholar-officials and landlords?
If we feed them well, who can control them with food?
The purpose is to keep them hungry, to make them feel starving, and then give them small amounts of food to keep them hanging on.
In this way, these people will work hard and desperately to create value for them just to have a bite to eat.
It sounds cruel, but it's the truth, an indisputable truth, a truth that no one can refute.
Therefore, the root cause lies in the social system, specifically in the scholar-official class and the landlord class.
The landlord class was slightly lower than the scholar-official class. In other words, the landlords exploited the people, while the scholar-officials benefited from the landlords, supported them, and continued to exploit the people.
This has formed such a system.
This system has been around for many years, dating back to a very long time ago, and continues to this day.
Despite some reforms during this period, they were merely superficial changes.
To put it bluntly, the main reason was that the scholar-official class was too united.
But that makes sense, since their interests are involved, they will inevitably unite.
They united to exploit the people, who had no chance to resist.
If, in a particular dynasty, the people are oppressed to the point of unbearable suffering, then the only option is to launch a peasant uprising to overthrow the system.
However, as it turns out, despite the oppression that has led to numerous peasant uprisings over the centuries, this system has continued to exist regardless of its success or failure.
Even if the uprising succeeded and they overthrew a dynasty, they still did not shake the original system after they took over the dynasty.
The original scholars and landlords remained the same as before.
There hasn't been much change at all!
Take Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor, as a good example. When he was a farmer, he was just trying to have something to eat.
He wandered from place to place, and even became a monk at one point.
It was under these circumstances, where he was desperate to survive and just wanted to eat, that he embarked on the path of rebellion.
His goal in revolt was to overthrow the bad system so that the common people could have something to eat.
But did he succeed? No.
The Yuan Dynasty fell, and the Ming Dynasty was born.
But the scholar-official class remained the same.
The nobles were still the same group of nobles.
The wealthy people are still the same group of wealthy people.
Even the relatively lower-ranking landlords within this social class remained the same group of landlords.
The peasants who were exploited in the previous dynasty continued to be exploited in the Ming dynasty.
The only change was the change of dynasty and the change of rulers.
However, these rulers still needed to rely on the influence of scholar-officials, landlords, and nobles in the localities to help them consolidate their imperial power and manage the regions.
Meanwhile, the aristocratic class, the scholar-officials, and the landlords, who were subordinate to the imperial power, continued to exploit and oppress ordinary people without any restraint.
Zhu Yunwen sat on it, his face solemn, and slowly began to speak:
"What was the purpose of the Emperor's uprising? And what were the people of the world thinking? If the Emperor's uprising succeeds, perhaps when he thinks back to his past self, he can only sigh helplessly."
Then they would restrain themselves and the royal family, and try to be more frugal, but what good would that do? Ordinary people wouldn't eat an extra bite just because their grandfather and the royal family were frugal. That's unrealistic and impossible.
Yang Shiqi hesitated for a moment, then spoke:
"Your Highness, please be careful with your words. Although what you said makes sense, His Majesty is not wrong. No emperor throughout history has been able to change this situation, and it's not that His Majesty alone is unwilling to change it."
"So the purpose of calling you all here today is to change this situation. Do you understand what I mean?"
Yang Shiqi, Yang Rong, and Yang Pu all showed expressions of surprise.
They were clearly somewhat shocked by Zhu Yunwen's words.
Then Yang Pu spoke:
"Your Highness, from the Warring States period to Qin Shi Huang, Emperor Wu of Han, Emperor Taizong of Tang, and Emperor Taizu of Song, countless dynasties have ruled the world."
However, as you just said, no one has been able to change this environment, even though Liu Xiu of the Han Dynasty proposed this idea and implemented the land measurement decree.
However, it didn't actually achieve any significant results. Even land consolidation persisted at the time, and was subsequently amplified.
Zhu Yunwen snorted and said:
"When Liu Xiu proposed this concept, his aim was to ensure that the people would have their own land and to curb the control of local powerful gentry over the land."
Although it didn't achieve much, it was enough to show that the idea was feasible. The reason it wasn't very effective was simply because the situation at the time was unfavorable, making it impossible to continue.
But things are different now. The Ming Dynasty has only been established for a short time, and even if we were to implement this system and carry out reforms, it would actually be a good opportunity. We are fully confident that we can use strong measures against the nobles and officials in various regions.
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