Cai Jing and Su Zhe had already sat down as guests, and Su Xun personally served the tea soup. Cai Jing took a sip, then looked at Su Zhe with a smile, and said, "It's not a secret, there is actually no suitable candidate for the right minister in the hearts of the official family." Lu Jifu, Zhang Tianjue, Han Shipu, and Su Ziyou are not the ideal right minister in the hearts of the officials. But the right minister always has to be done by someone, so among these people, who supports the next person will have a great deal of confidence in worshipping the prime minister. ”

A group of old guys, of course Zhao Ji can't look down on it!

Su Dongpo's son Su Yu, Wu Haogu's younger brother Wu Haowen, Mi Fu's son Mi Youren, Zhao Tingzhi's son Zhao Mingcheng, etc., are Zhao Ji's favorite candidates - if Ji Yi is not a villain, he is also one of them, and he is the most ideal one.

However, these young people are not qualified enough, and they will not even be able to enter the political hall for at least 10 years, let alone become the right minister.

So Zhao Ji could only choose one of the people he didn't like this time to shoot as the right servant.

And Cai Jing, the left servant, has a certain say on this issue. He can at least find a reason to block a few other people, and then put some water on Su Zhe, and Su Zhe will pay homage to him.

"Elder Brother Yuan, Han Shipu is more suitable than me, right?" Su Zhe is also an old man, and he has already guessed Cai Jing's mind a little.

Lu Huiqing is a big villain who is personally disgusted, and he is also the boss of the New Party, he is going to be the right minister, and Cai Jing has no stable days. Zhang Shangying is not a good person, he is notoriously fierce, and anyone dares to scold, that is, Zhang Dian can stop him. Moreover, Zhang Shangying, like Lu Huiqing and himself, are all Jinshi of the Yingzong Dynasty. Although the qualifications are a little worse, he is also an old minister of the Four Dynasties, much older than Cai Jingke.

Therefore, the two bigwigs of the new party are all Cai Jing who wants to be stuck, and the right minister must not give it! So in the old party, it seems that Han Zhongyan, an honest man, is more suitable.

"Han Shipu is still willing to come to Kaifeng Mansion?" Cai Jing asked with a smile. "He is now living a fairy life in the Daimyo Mansion, why bother to come to Kaifeng Mansion, a place of right and wrong?

Moreover, he is a person who has been a left-hand minister, and I am afraid that it will be a bit condescending to be a right-hand minister. ”

Su Zhe smiled and was noncommittal.

Cai Jing took a sip of tea, and then said, "But then again, if Brother Ziyou's claim on the study of positivism is the same as Brother Ling's, I will prevent Brother Ziyou from paying homage to the prime minister again no matter what!" ”

Su Zhe raised his eyebrows, and sure enough, he began to put forward conditions!

"Isn't empirical learning wrong?" Su Zhe asked.

"That's right!" Cai Jing nodded and said with a serious face, "Positivism and rationalism are both correct!" Although it is not the orthodox academic of Confucianism, the truth is absolutely good, and it can do things well.

It's just that...... Brother Ziyou, have you ever thought about how many poor scholars there are in the world? Have you ever thought that the purpose of the imperial examination is not all to select talents for the country, but more importantly, it is actually to give the world's poor people a ladder to heaven! However, many disciplines, colleges, and palaces drawn from positivism and rationalism, many academies, colleges, and palaces, are really about to break the ladder to heaven for the world's poor scholars!

Brother Ziyou, do you really want to see this ladder to heaven that you and I have used lost in our hands? ”

Su Zhe frowned and said nothing.

The education promoted by Yuntai Academy is high-cost, and it will not be able to reduce costs in the foreseeable era - the reason for the popularization of higher education in later generations is not that the cost is low, but that the productivity has been greatly improved, making it affordable for the broad masses of the people.

And in the present and conceivable era, higher education is destined to be enjoyed by only a few. It is not only higher education, but also the "Six Arts Primary School" supporting Yuntai Academy and Biyong Academy, which is also an aristocratic education, which can only be enjoyed by the children and grandchildren of rich and noble families. Although the "Six Arts Primary School" will also admit some particularly bright children for free, the number will not be very large. And there are also geographical restrictions, after all, only Jiehe Commercial City, Haizhou and Kaifeng Mansion have a few Liuyi Primary Schools, so it is naturally impossible to recruit a few children from poor families in particularly distant places.

For the vast majority of poor children in the world, this expensive new education is insulated from them.

Cai Jing sighed: "If Wu Chongdao was born 200 years earlier and became the founding hero of Emperor Taizu, you and I were born in the countryside as a poor child, I am afraid that we can only farm for the rest of our lives, and there will be no chance to see the light of day!" ”

In fact, Cai Jing is a second-generation official, not a son of a poor family. Cai Jing's father, Cai Zhun, was a jinshi in the first year of Renzong Jingyu, and an official servant. And Su Zhe's uncle, Su Lian, is a jinshi in the second year of Renzong Tiansheng, and he can barely be regarded as a second-generation official. However, Cai Zhun and Su Jian are not from official families, and they are not rich, if the Great Song Dynasty took the education route of Yuntai Academy as soon as the country was opened, I am afraid that there will really be no Cai Jing, Cai Bian, Su Shi, and Su Zhe.

Cai Jing said again: "If the world's talented people can't pass the imperial examination, will they really be willing to plant land for a lifetime?" I'm afraid that the smoke will be everywhere, and the world will be in chaos! ”

Su Zhe finally couldn't help but speak: "Yuan Chang, there is still a Zuobang Jinshi now...... It's still expensive on the left! ”

"Is the left list expensive?" Cai Jing looked at Su Zhe, "Who said this?" ”

Says who? Anyway, it wasn't Zhao Ji who said it. Zhao Ji is on the edict and is on the left and right lists, both as jinshi, regardless of whether he is up or down. And there is no provision that the right list jinshi can only be a military attache - the right list jinshi is Yunwen Yunwu!

Moreover, there is also a law school among the seven colleges under the Yuntai Academy, which teaches people to be officials and judge cases. invited the best lawyer and shogunate in Kaifeng Mansion to be a professor, compiled the laws of the Great Song Dynasty and various doorways in the official office into textbooks and carefully taught them, and even arranged to go to Jiehe Shang City and Jingdong Shang City for internships. If the students of the law school become civil servants, I don't know how much better they will be than those traditional jinshi who can only read the books of the sages!

"What does everyone in the world think!" Su Zhe said, "Zuobang Jinshi is 400 out of the millions of scholars in the world, and he is also tested by his ability. And the Jinshi on the right list is only two hundred out of the two thousand people in the three school palaces, and they don't need to pass the liberation test, how can they be compared with the left list? ”

Compared with the right list, the biggest advantage of the left list is fairness! Almost everyone (men) can participate.

And the right list is unfair, except for the three university palaces, it can only be recommended by the military governor of the local government. Because it is impossible to assess the Jinshi on the right list, and there are not so many local officials who understand the positivist school, they can't get out of the papers, how can they be examined? Moreover, the right list also has to be assessed for martial arts, and it has to be skilled in bows and horses. There are no horses in most places in the Great Song Dynasty, how to test the bow horse?

But people at the level of Su Zhe and Cai Jing all know that the ability of the right list of jinshi must be generally stronger than that of the left list, and the result of the long-term competition between the two in the officialdom must be the victory of the right list.

Therefore, the right list is now a quota of 200 people, and it is likely to become 400 or even 600 people in the future, and eventually the share of the left list will be completely squeezed out......

Hearing Su Zhe say this, Cai Jing already knew it in his heart. Su Zhe is really his fellow traveler!

Cai Jing sighed and said, "Brother Ziyou, in fact, the purpose of you and I opposing the right list of Jinshi is out of public intentions!" If it is out of selfishness, are you and my children and grandchildren afraid that they will not be able to enter the Yuntai Academy? can enter the Yuntai Academy, isn't the right list Jinshi nine out of ten? But in this way, the road to heaven for the children of the poor family will be sealed, and in the future, the wealth of the world will be monopolized by the wealthy and powerful generations. The situation will only be more serious than when the noble clan masters control the world! ”

Not to mention, there is really no way to refute Cai's public intentions. Because the elite education represented by the Yuntai Academy Palace is indeed beneficial to Cai Jing's future generations.

Su Zhe nodded and said in a low voice: "But Wu Chongdao is one of the seven scholars of Sumen after all!" ”

Wu Haogu worshiped Su Dongpo as his teacher, although he was a "bad Confucian", but his knowledge was still recognized, so the sixth bachelor of Sumen now added one to him, and he became the seventh bachelor.

And Su Dongpo is now dead, which means that no one can expel Wu Haogu from the division.

In addition, it was not convenient for Su Zhe to deal with Wu Haogu. After all, the Su family has received a lot of favors from Wu Haogu, and if he jumps out to bite Wu Haogu, he will be regarded as unrighteous by Shilin.

Cai Jing laughed: "Just stand by and watch." ”

……

"Metallurgical Academy? Alchemy!? ”

"No, no, at the moment, I mainly study copper and iron, and it has little to do with gold."

"What is there to study about copper and iron?"

"Why not? The business of copper and iron is much larger than gold......"

"That's right!"

"Brother Yizhi, then let's go and meet the master of the Li Guojian."

Su Dongpo's coffin had arrived in Pengcheng, Xuzhou, but it did not go to Haizhou immediately, but stayed in Xuzhou temporarily. Because Wu Haogu had something to do in Xuzhou, he was going to Liguo to see a few Zhu Xingshu and the iron-smelting master Zhou Daxia invited for him, and when he was about to leave, he met Ji Yi and pulled him along with him.

Wu Haogu did not want to enter the fiercely competitive iron smelting industry immediately, but was ready to start with research and development and open a metallurgical college in Jiehe Shang City.

According to what Wu Haogu knew, the metallurgical technology of the Song Dynasty had regressed to a certain extent compared to the Tang Dynasty - the output of iron should have increased, but the quality had declined, and it was not even comparable to that of the Western Xia. The Western Xia sword and the Qing Tang armor were treasures loved by everyone in the army of the Northern Song Dynasty. What's more, even Japanese swords can be sold as fine products in the Great Song Dynasty.

Such a situation is simply unimaginable in Datang!

The decline of the Song Dynasty's military force and the regression of iron-smelting technology are also important reasons. There is no horse pot to throw to the Tang Dynasty, and the iron can't be smelted, this is none of the business of the Tang Dynasty, right?

Therefore, Wu Haogu, a Song Confucian, planned to improve the level of iron-smelting technology in the Song Dynasty very early. But it's one thing to plan, it's another thing to actually get on the horse.

Because the improvement of iron-smelting technology not only needs to burn money, but also requires a large number of iron-smelting talents. This thing is trial and error, one furnace burns hundreds of threads, and there is a determination to burn hundreds of thousands and millions, and the technology must improve, but the premise is to have a group of talents who can burn money!