After coming to this era, except in Sichuan, where the social system was completely disintegrated, Deng Ming could feel the power of the gentry. These people controlled the public opinion and the law of the people, and in places outside Sichuan, Deng Ming wanted to collect grain and grass, carry out propaganda, and buy materials, almost inseparable from this class, and the opinions of the gentry could even influence the decision-making of the local officials.

However, in the Ming and Qing wars, the gentry class played almost no role in helping the Ming army, or the gentry power supporting the Ming court was offset by the gentry power supporting the Qing court. At one time, Deng Ming attached great importance to them because he was aware of the resources at the disposal of the gentry class, but now Deng Ming also understood the Qing court's contempt for them, because in Deng Ming's view, this was really too loose a class, in which each individual was running for his own interests, and was far from forming a class consciousness, or had been wiped out before the powerful monarchy.

As long as Deng Ming did not openly make enemies of the entire gentry class and did not loot them, whether along the Yangtze River or in Shandong, he did not have to worry that the people of this class would completely surrender to the Qing court, just as the Qing court did not have to worry that this class would defend the Ming Dynasty to the death. Deng Ming once thought that the gentry class, with a large number of personally dependent peasants and some local judicial powers, should be similar to the European aristocracy, but now he found that the two were completely different. The gentry did not have natural political rights, and now Deng Mingju's imperial examination is similar to a means of checks and balances, allowing the gentry class to flatter the imperial power to compete for the piece of flesh and bones thrown by the king, thus turning this powerful class into a plate of loose sand.

Considering the words of the inventor of the examination scholar, "All the heroes of the world are in my place", coupled with the fact that the improvement of the modern imperial examination system was completed in the Song Dynasty, which was the most proficient in the means of strong cadres and weak branches, Deng Ming felt that his conjecture was more reasonable. Deng Ming had no doubt that as long as he continued to throw out this bait, he would not worry about the collaborators in the gentry class, and he would not have to worry about their allegiance to the Qing court or the restoration of the former Ming Dynasty - just give such a pitiful Baba a little power, and expect the gentry class to generally have patriotic feelings and determination to martyrdom? Their loyalty to the emperor may not be as good as the affection of their protégés and former officials for their benefactors during the Han and Han dynasties.

Although allowing the righteous army to plunder Shandong will damage the Shandong gentry's perception of Deng Ming and bring him some difficulties in recovering Shandong in the future, Deng Ming regarded the former as the lighter of the two evils when weighing the gentry's evil feelings and the hero's loyalty: it is clear that the strength of the gentry class is more than 100 times stronger than that of the heroes, and now the group around Deng Ming is even more scattered, but in Deng Ming's mind, the value of Xia Jie and other gentry is not as great as that of the bandits!

"The gentry only cares about a little bit of his family property, and cares about whether his descendants have the opportunity to be admitted to the imperial examination and continue the safety of the family, as for whose imperial examination it is, they don't care very much, anyway, as long as they don't fall into the ordinary people who let the mermaids flesh and meat. It's really pitiful, controlling more than ninety percent of the country's population, in his hometown, he is the inheritor of knowledge and the embodiment of justice in the eyes of his father, and his wish is just to be able not to be bullied by the government. Deng Ming and the officers of the guard privately talked about his perception of the Shandong gentry, and Deng Ming never intended to hide his opinion of these Sichuan colleagues: "Even if I kill all the gentry in Laizhou, as long as I treat the gentry in Dengzhou and Qingzhou a little better, they will deceive themselves into thinking that the gentry in Laizhou are their own death, and the so-called will not die if they do not die, maybe they will support the Qing court in their hearts and hope that the Qing court will win, but as long as our army has the upper hand, they will still send us food, that is, the difference between ten or eight cars." ”

"Guogong can consider canceling the imperial examination." Among the officers, Song Wei cautiously said, "Let's see if they will send one less cart of grain." ”

"Then they will fight with me, rob them of their last hope of getting rid of the ordinary people, and send them to hell too." Deng Ming smiled slightly, Sichuan, which is almost entirely immigrant, coupled with the government power to the bottom of the pavilion system, Sichuan's Tongxiucai's envy of the gentry is disappearing rapidly, and their current citizenship rights are more complete than the normal gentry: "However, I cancel the imperial examination in Shandong and will not let the Fujian gentry be my enemy, that is, cancel Shandong, as long as they promise to restore it in a few years, most of them will still be patient." ”

"So is Guogong going to ignore Xia Jie's request?" Another officer asked.

"Of course not, but I'm not for them, but for the empire, we want to support the war in Jiangnan, and we need to make the rebels in Shandong stronger, and it's not enough to rely on these heroes. If the gentry of Shandong can cooperate with the heroes, the Qing court will need to invest more troops here, and we will have the spare strength to clean up Li Shutai and the three feudal kings in Fujian, and don't forget, the Qing court can defeat nine-tenths of the world, Wu, Geng, Shang, and Kong all contribute a lot. When dealing with the Shandong issue, Deng Ming was not even willing to mobilize the Fujian army in the coastal areas, because the military discipline of the Fujian army was also problematic, and the last time Zheng Chenggong besieged Nanjing, Zhang Huangyan fiercely criticized the Fujian army for the plundering problem, and Shandong and the Fujian army did not have the slightest friendship, Deng Ming did not expect the Fujian Ming army to be particularly kind to the strange northern people for no reason.

……

Soon Deng Ming summoned the gentry of Laizhou to a meeting in his army, because he had already released his goodwill to the local gentry through Guò Xia Jie, so these gentry came very happily, especially the famous people around Weixian, who were also most concerned about the safety of the county seat.

"You all know very well what I am looking for you to do, just for the sake of military discipline after the destruction of Weixian City." Deng Ming expressed his attitude straight to the point: "I have already told Xia Juren that I have no control over the rebel army around Weixian at all, and what I need is to quickly sweep Jiaodong, as for the people's livelihood in Jiaodong, to be honest, it is just a thought." ”

Seeing that the gentry on the scene were about to start singing praises, Deng Ming immediately raised his hand to stop them: "But the benevolence of a thought can't last, if Weixian can't break the city for a long time, it will have a great impact on my overall plan, and I won't be able to control a lot at that time, after all, if I am defeated, I will die without a place to be buried, and I can't sit in the world by mercy alone." ”

All the people present were well-read and well-informed, and all of them knew that Deng Ming was telling the truth, and it seemed that Bao Guogong, although young, was not a pout, but a complete pragmatist—and it was not surprising that if Deng Ming was really a naïve and ignorant young man, these gentlemen should have wondered how he could have pulled out an army that could confront the invincible Qing court in a few years.

"I don't know what the villains can do for the country?" Xia Jie took the lead in asking, Deng Ming would definitely not be idle and bored just to gather them to show his ruthlessness, so Xia Jie guessed that Deng Ming might need military salaries or rations, and even some strong men might need to join the army. The people who came to Deng Ming's meeting today are all well-known figures, even many of the commercial houses in the besieged Weixian County are also their property or under their names, if they can't meet Deng Ming's demands, then I'm afraid no one can meet them -- Deng Ming has a reputation for trustworthiness, and even if he is hostile to the Qing court governor, he has never denied this issue, so Xia Jie and the others still intend to trust Baoguogong's guarantee.

"Do you know why I didn't control the rebel army around Weixian?" Deng Ming did not answer immediately, but asked rhetorically.

Who would dare to guess on this issue? They all shook their heads together to indicate that they didn't know.

"First, I am not responsible for their salaries; Second, I don't provide them with food and grass. The so-called short hands and short mouths of people are short, and I gave them weapons early, and now they have nothing to ask for me. If I were to pay the army and rations once a month, I would definitely be able to win over most of them, and if the leader was going to fight against me, his men might not follow him if they were greedy for food. Deng Ming frankly admitted his mistake: "But let me spend money to raise troops in Shandong, I don't want to, all the monarchs know that I want to fight a life-and-death battle with the Qing court in Sichuan, along the Yangtze River, and I have no spare money and surplus grain in my hands." Finally, there is a third point, that is, I do not have enough manpower, and none of the officers of the rebel army are appointed by me, and it is difficult for me to appoint and dismiss them if I do not give them money and food, so no one is afraid of me, and I say that it does not matter at all whether the city is washed or not. ”

"The villain is willing to contribute money and food to the country." finally waited for Deng Ming to stop, and the gentlemen shouted together, since Deng Ming said that he was short of money, he wanted money and food; Deng Ming also said just now that he wanted to be an officer candidate, this is not very clear what Deng Ming means, if Deng Ming said that there are no soldiers, that is what he means to be strong, everyone can work together to get together, but no one dares to send officials, and Deng Ming can't use someone else as his henchman officer.

"I don't want money and food, what do I want your money and food for?" Unexpectedly, Deng Ming was not extortion, he rejected the benefits of the cautious people's initiative to dedicate: "If you give me money and food, I will be responsible for the safety of Weixian, and in addition to managing the salary and food, I also need to clean up the military discipline, and may kill people to establish authority, which is all to spend my jīng strength and make me make enemies with others; In case things are not done well in the future, and any of your shops are damaged and your relatives are plundered, you will feel that you want to spend your money and think that I have broken the contract; Even if I do it properly, most of you will suspect that I took your money to go to Jiangnan, and didn't spend it all on protecting the safety of Weixian, because I took the money, so I won't be grateful to me......"

Deng Ming shook his head again and again: "No, this is completely thankless, it should be done well, and if you don't do it well, you will complain and damage my reputation." Even if you want to make money, how much money can you make from your hands? No, I'm not going to make this kind of loss-making trade. ”