The influence of Confucianism on ancient Chinese was by no means limited to being an official by examination. Because Confucianism is not only a set of political ideals, but also includes thinking and cognition of the universe, nature, and all things.

The reason why Zhu Chenglixue, who was criticized and criticized in later generations, flourished in the Song Dynasty was, in the final analysis, that he perfected the traditional Chinese idea of "the unity of heaven and man", and after absorbing the nutrients of Buddhism and Taoism, he made up for the lack of Confucianism's cosmology and world view. It has formed an ideological system that regards Tianli as the source of all things in the universe and as the source of ethical norms, which has put on the sacred cloak of Tianli for Confucian political philosophy, and turned "preserving Tianli and eliminating human desires" into a method of sanctifying the unity of heaven and man.

In the Song Dynasty, this practice of sacralizing political philosophy and teaching Confucianism on the basis of the unity of heaven and man gave Confucianism the upper hand in the struggle against Buddhism and Taoism.

However, in the process of its development, because it was never able to achieve the goal of further understanding the truth (Zhizhi) by deducing the truth of things, it was unable to develop its own natural philosophy, and gradually fell into rigidity and conservatism, becoming a kind of "science of etiquette" that imprisoned the mind and constrained the behavior of monarchs and scholars.

And this "study of etiquette" is not only the monarch and scholars, but also the vast number of working people. The working people, who were bound by feudal etiquette and religion, blindly wanted to get rid of human desires, and naturally they no longer had the spirit of innovation, and even copied the strange tricks and tricks of the West seemed too human.

Of course, even if the working people were innovative, it would be of little use, because the science of science could not form its own system of natural philosophy. Although the goal of "learning from things" has been put forward very early, it has always been in the dilemma of "not being qualified, not knowing" - it is easy to put forward "learning from things", but it is difficult to put forward the method of "learning from things...... Anyway, it has been more than 500 years since the Song Dynasty, and there has been no breakthrough.

That's not really getting started!

At the same time that science fell into a dead end, Yangming Mind came into being. Yang Ming Xinxue actually doesn't know how to "Gewu", and it is precisely because he doesn't know how to "Gewu" that he found the entry point to criticize Zhu Zi's learning. Therefore, Yang Ming Xinxue developed and developed by destroying the conservative and rigid system of science. However, after the destruction, we can only come up with such things as "to conscience", "heart is reason", "heart ontology", and "knowledge of the heart", and in the final analysis, it is still how to become a saint and sage, rather than how to establish a system for pursuing the truth.

If there is any improvement in "psychology" compared with "science", it is that there are fewer rules and regulations, and it is convenient for people with "conscience" to copy Western natural philosophical thoughts.

However, the influence of "science" always exists, and "mind" is easy to fall into nothingness, talk about empty words, and lead Confucianism into Zen - after smashing the frame of "science", the mind is not controlled! The heart is reasonable, and you can copy whatever comes to mind.

Therefore, by the end of the Ming Dynasty, the study of mind had actually declined, and some people entered Zen and Xuan; Some of them studied the West and became Christian; There is also a part of the proposal of "prudence and independence", which is also the path of moral practice...... It can only be described as chaos. In this case, there is another revival of science!

If Zhu Cihong wants to open his golden finger to build a steam engine or something, does he need to use logical thinking, empirical trial and error, and scientific methods, which are rigorous Western natural philosophical ideas?

If you don't use it, can these routines of relying on the unity of heaven and man, the reason of heaven and man's desires, and the conscience, and relying on people to be prudent and independent to perfect heaven and earth?

Or is it simply not about philosophy or science, and just relying on artisans to force development? So what kind of coercive law is it?

Zhu Cihong has a lot of knowledge in mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology, but most of this knowledge is theoretical, and because it has not been used for many years, many of it has been blurred. Even if it is taken out, it is piecemeal, and in the absence of a natural philosophical system at all, how can it be digested by a group of illiterate craftsmen? How to absorb? How to force it?

Give the principle of a steam engine, smash tens of thousands of taels of silver, and give the craftsmen below a deadline to kill their heads, oh, by the way, they have to be circled up, lest they go to the Western missionaries for help...... Can such brute force succeed? Or, if you don't kill your head, you won't be able to hit the board?

Anyway, Zhu Cihong didn't believe it, so he opened a golden finger and climbed the science and technology tree very stupidly, that is, starting from the basics, introducing things like logic, dialectics, positivism, and scientific methods, and introducing them into Confucianism, as a tool and method for Confucian knowledge. In his opinion, step-by-step development is the real shortcut, and if you want to take a shortcut, you will often take a long detour unconsciously!

However, it is not easy to perfectly integrate this set of things into Confucianism, on the one hand, Zhu Cihong's own Confucian skills are not deep enough; On the one hand, there is no perfect entry point...... It wasn't until Dolgon's "Qufu upside down" that Zhu Cihong had a chance to reform the system.

It is much easier to reform Confucianism in the name of Confucius than it is for Zhu Cihong to jump out and argue with all kinds of great Confucian dialectics!

So in the past two years, in addition to being busy with military affairs and government affairs, Zhu Cihong has been tossing this little thing of natural philosophy. Part of it was made by him from memory; Some of them are translated from Western academic classics.

It's not enough to copy alone, you have to imitate Confucius's tone to engrave these truths on the bamboo slips, and you have to make the bamboo slips old - this thing can make Zhu Chunjie very sad! Confucius has been dead for 2,000 years, what should the bamboo slips that have been buried in the ground for 2,000 years look like? And what is the way to keep bamboo slips for so long?

Zhu Chunjie doesn't know how to do it at all!

Fortunately, he found two knowledgeable people, one was Feng Sizhong, who was Zhu Cihong's foreman and guard, and later changed to Feng Sizhong, who was born in the Tianshou Mountain system of artillery. His family has been in charge of the imperial mausoleum project for generations, and he has studied the funeral goods and other things, and he also knows how to forge antiques.

There is also a man named Li Shaoyou, whose name is Wanghu, is Li Ruolian's nephew, who was also a gentleman when he was in Beijing, and his family has loved to tinker with antiques for generations. After he fell into Nanjing, he first mixed with Jinyi Wei, and later mixed into the Gezhijing School. At first, he was in charge of monitoring the Kyoto School.,Later, I became interested in Western Studies.,Learning well.,Now I'm a teacher in the Kyoto School.。

After Zhu Chunjie found these two people, and under their introduction, he found several masters of the Nanjing antique shop, and finally put together a set of teams to forge for Zhu Cihong.

And Zhu Cihong pulled the Hanlin scholars Bi Jiucheng and Su Ziwen into the gang - both of them are Jinshi, and they are Zhu Cihong's confidants and close ministers, so they can write the "posthumous chapter" instead of Confucius.

Now the old "Holy Relics" have been placed in front of Zhu Cihong one by one, and they look like unearthed cultural relics, but whether there are 2000 years or not, it's really hard to say.

After all, no one has ever seen a 2000-year-old bamboo slip!

"Will it work?" Zhu Cihong asked.

"It should ...... Yes! "It was Li Shaoyou who answered him, twenty-four or five years old, looking a little oily and powdery, and he couldn't be relied on when he looked at it!

Zhu Cihong glanced at Feng Sizhong again, Feng Sizhong, who had already paid homage to the artillery envoy of the Generalissimo's Mansion, shook his head: "Emperor, a true expert can't be deceived!" ”

"What then?" Emperor Zhu asked.

"There is a way," Zhu Chunjie said, "The minister heard that Qian Qianyi was going to take Ji Kun north, Ji Kun is an expert, and he also knows several masters of antique shops in Yangzhou. ”

"Oh," Zhu Cihong nodded, "You have a way?" ”

Zhu Chunjie said: "Emperor, the minister can let people go and talk to the people in Yangzhou antique shop, but Ji Kun ...... He's not very talkative. ”

"He is Qian Qianyi's student, if he is willing to help us, it will be easy to deceive......" Zhu Cihong paused, "I know what he wants?" I went and told him that I would succeed! ”