Late Yuan Dynasty: I am the true emperor

Chapter 66: Gongshu's version of the unity of knowledge and action (seeking follow-up reading)

Jin Chaoxing suddenly revealed his identity, leaving the three Qin brothers stunned.

When Qin Li saw his brothers holding Yao Zhaoxian's head and bringing Jin Chaoxing over, he recalled the actions of the Chaohu navy before and suddenly realized what was going on.

That day he suggested to Yao Zhaoxian that he recruit soldiers to defend the city, but Yao Zhaoxian refused on the spot. At this time, the Chaohu navy suddenly came to his door and abducted Subutai's family, which immediately gave him a reason to recruit soldiers.

At that time, he was still thinking that the Chaohu navy was quite cooperative, as if someone had given him a pillow when he was sleepy. Now, thinking back, they were not cooperating with him at all, but were clearly creating an opportunity to send Jin Chaoxing into the city.

Qin Li couldn't help but take a breath of cold air. Marshal Lu was really good at scheming!

If he hadn't been one step faster, Lu Jin might have attacked the city in the next two days. By then, with Jin Chaoxing in the city as an insider, there would be no chance for his Qin family to survive.
"Brother Jin, can you really contact the Chaohu Navy?" Qin Li became much more polite to Jin Chaoxing after learning that he was from Lu Jin.

"Of course, does Chief Clerk Qin really intend to surrender to Marshal Lu?" Jin Chaoxing asked with some disbelief. After all, he was the chief clerk of the imperial court.

Qin Li nodded repeatedly, "Of course we have to join General Lu, otherwise how can we stop Kang Maocai's army with only two or three thousand newly recruited soldiers?"

"Okay then. I'll send someone to contact Commander Liao in Chaohu."

Jin Chaoxing was an insider. It would not be easy for him to contact the outside world after sneaking into the city. Moreover, he was in a passive cooperation position. He would cooperate whenever Liao Yongan attacked the city.

Instead of Jin Chaoxing taking the initiative to ask people outside the city to cooperate, that would be too difficult.

But even so, Liao Yongan still left him an emergency contact channel, which was a small fishing boat parked on the lake near Chao County.

At around nine o'clock that evening, Jin Chaoxing sent his confidant from the same village to deliver a letter to the fishing boat. Half an hour later, Liao Yongjian, who was hiding deep in Chaohu Lake, received the news.

At this time, Liao Yongjian, Liao Yongan, Yin Congdao, Zhang Desheng, Yu Tonghai, Zhao Zhongzhong, this group of Chaohu veterans, and the surrendered generals conquered by Lu Jin were all gathered on a big ship.

When he saw the messenger, Yu Tonghai immediately asked, "What did you say? Chao County Chief Clerk Qin Li rebelled, bringing with him more than 2,000 soldiers and the county, and preparing to surrender the city to us?"

The messenger nodded quickly, "That's right, generals, please send troops into the city quickly. Brother Jin is worried that something unexpected will happen if time passes. Who knows, Qin might have other ideas again."

Liao Yongan raised his hand and interrupted, "How do you prove that you are Brother Jin's messenger? Why are you asking us to attack the city in the middle of the night? Could it be that Chief Clerk Qin Li has set up an ambush?"

After hearing this, the faces of the generals in Chaohu also became serious. Although they had taken away Jin Chaoxing's family, they still could not rule out this possibility.

The messenger said anxiously, "General Liao, you are worrying too much. How could Brother Jin lie to you? Brother Jin said that as soon as you arrive, he will have the city gates opened. As long as the army enters the city, even if Qin Li has other ideas, what can he do?"

Liao Yongan nodded and waved to the generals behind him, "Call the troops, enter the city, light more torches, be alert, and be ready to fight at any time!"

"Yes." The generals immediately agreed.

Liao Yongan's Third Regiment and the Navy were already nearby, and with the help of the Navy's ships to transport troops, the speed was quite fast. At around 11 o'clock that night, thousands of troops arrived outside Chao County holding torches.

The three city gates of Chao County were opened, Jin Chaoxing brought the three Qin brothers out of the city to welcome them. Liao Yongan was completely relieved. With a wave of his hand, he led the main forces of the three regiments to enter the county seat of Chao County and sent out a speedboat to deliver a letter to Lu Jin in Luzhou overnight.

At around four or five in the morning, when the sky was just getting light, in the government office of Luzhou City, Li Shanchang and Lu Jin had a long conversation all night long, and both of them were in high spirits.

Before Li Shanchang came, he thought Lu Jin was just a traditional warrior-style rebel leader, but after meeting him, he found that Lu Jin's tall and strong appearance and handsome face made him look more like a strong and powerful scholar.

After an in-depth conversation with Lu Jin, I found that this general had a high level of cultural education. Although he claimed that he was not a Confucian, he had some unique insights into Confucianism.

“Unification of knowledge and action?!”

Hearing the new words suddenly coming out of Lu Jin's mouth, Li Shanchang instantly felt a burst of inspiration in his mind, as if something was connected.

"Correct."

Lu Jin stood with his hands behind his back, facing the pale sky rising in the horizon, and spoke with great confidence.

“The so-called unity of knowledge and action is not profound. To put it bluntly, it means ‘reading ten thousand books is not as good as traveling ten thousand miles’. No matter how much you read in the classics, it is not as good as doing something practical for the people.

"Mr. Zhang Hengqu of the Song Dynasty wrote the Four Lines of Hengqu, which are about establishing a mind for heaven and earth, establishing a destiny for the people, inheriting the lost knowledge of the past sages, and creating peace for all generations. It is very well said, and it makes one's blood boil and awakens one's hearing!

“But if you just know that it’s not possible, then it’s just empty talk, a false slogan.

“Why has the world fallen to this point today? I think it’s because scholars only know how to do things but don’t know how to do them.

"The officials of the Yuan Dynasty were greedy and levied heavy taxes. In order to make money, they made up all kinds of excuses. They asked their subordinates to pay them a visit. They asked for money for nothing, which was called "spending money". They asked for festival money, birthday money, and regular money. They asked for money for doing things for you, which was called "favor money". They asked for money for complaints, which was called "official money".

"If you find a lot of money, you say you have won; if you find a beautiful state, you say you have a good piece of land; if you find a job nearby, you say you have a good home. You have no idea what loyalty to the emperor and love for the people is.

"Why is it so? Everyone knows but does not act. Except for the Mongolian and Semu officials, perhaps they are illiterate, but aren't the Han officials the same?
“They have read so many books of sages, if they could achieve even one-tenth of what Confucius and Mencius did, let alone half, the world would have been peaceful long ago!

"The meaning of the classics is knowledge, but how to put it into practice? It's all in Gongshuzi's Methodology. "Methodology is not just a method of studying things, but a method of doing things. No matter what you do, if you follow the methodology, you can do it step by step and in a clear and orderly manner. This is the case in military warfare, politics, learning, and doing things!"

You see, this connects the dots. The unity of knowledge and action is a theory proposed by Wang Yangming in the middle Ming Dynasty. He advocated practical learning, but his philosophy of mind was too idealistic, so Lu Jin only used part of it.

Combining Confucianism's "knowledge" with Gongshu's "action" and making both inclusive and progressive will make it easier to promote and will not cause Confucianism to be too disgusted.

Li Shanchang was holding the Gongshuzi 2.0 version in his hand. In addition to Gongshu Ban's life, materialism and methodology, Lu Jin also added an article "Great Unification", which laid a theoretical foundation for conquering the world and expanding territory.

In addition, a new article "Towards Good Skills" was added. This is an article advocating the development of technology. It begins by refuting the Confucian view of "strange and lewd skills" and citing the theory of good and evil to argue that "technology" has no good or bad distinction.

With the same technology, if you use it to make toys for the emperor and only use it for entertainment, then that is "strange and lewd tricks". But if you use it for military and people's livelihood, then it benefits the country and the people.

Just like a knife, if you use it to do evil and gather in the mountains, it is evil. If you use it to defend your home and country and resist foreign humiliation, it is good. Therefore, there is no distinction between good and evil knives.

Similarly, there is no good or bad technology, so it should not be described with words such as "tricks" which have obviously derogatory connotations.

Next, it says that when a new technology emerges, even if it cannot be used for military or civilian purposes at the beginning, as long as it is not extremely evil and does not harm the people, it should not be suppressed, and we should consider the possibility of using it for military or civilian purposes.

At the same time, the Yellow Emperor and Shun Emperor were used as examples. When Yellow Emperor made the wheel, he initially just "cut wood into wheels", that is, cut wood slices, and later developed it to "straighten the wood in the middle of the rope, and bend it to make a wheel".

There was also Emperor Shun who dug a well. He was the first person to dig a well to get water, but at that time it was just "digging a well when thirsty". He would dig a well when thirsty, and there was only a muddy pit. It was Gongshu Ban who improved the well digging technology and added well walls, well platforms, well pavilions, and water-lifting wheels to the wells, making wells practical and popularized throughout the world.

Based on this argument, when a technology first appears, it is mostly unusable. At this time, we must not suppress it, but should find ways to improve it and use it in civilian and military affairs.

Just like the zoetrope invented in the Song Dynasty, the heat generated by the burning candle drives the blades above to make the zoetrope rotate.

It was indeed a toy for entertainment, but who would have thought that the revolving lantern would later become a steam turbine.
Lu Jin hopes to use these articles to change the ancients’ indifference to technological development. Even if they themselves are unwilling to work in the field of technology, they should not be suppressed.

He is still writing the book "Gongshuzi" slowly, and he will write whatever he thinks of and put it in. So far, there is only the manuscript.

However, it still opened Li Shanchang's eyes.

"Your Excellency's unity of knowledge and action is truly wonderful. If all scholars in the world could truly achieve one tenth of Confucius and Mencius as you said, what kind of prosperous world would it be? It is simply unimaginable.

"It's just that the commander-in-chief said that we should use the scriptures to understand and the methodology to act, but I still don't understand. How can I apply it to do things?"

Upon hearing this, Lu Jin threw out a newly written book, "Gongshu Bingfa: Quick Training for Generals", which was a military textbook he was going to give to his uneducated generals for self-study and improvement.

This was the text of a previously cached video that he copied from his mobile phone. The original text was a record of a conversation between a marshal and a general.

This article is about the application of scientific methodology in military affairs.

The so-called methodology is actually a method of doing things. It is not only used in scientific research, but it is to use experience to summarize the order. The first step is what to do, and the second step is what to do. Even if you are a layman, you can get started quickly by following this method. As long as you strictly abide by the regulations, you will not make big mistakes.

Lu Jin handed the book over and said, "Take a look at this book. If you can understand it, you will know how to do things with methodology."

Li Shanchang quickly took it with both hands, opened it and saw that it was full of plain language. It was more like a sermon than a strategy of war. But for a layman, it was indeed a good book that could help one quickly become a qualified general!

Just as he was reading it carefully, a speedboat delivering a letter from outside the city suddenly arrived at the foot of the city. Immediately, the soldiers guarding the city lifted the person up in a bamboo basket, and the messenger was taken all the way to the government office.

"Marshal, a great victory in Chao County! Commander Liao broke into the city tonight. The three regiments have entered Chao County and are controlling the city defenses."

"So fast?!" Lu Jin asked in surprise.

Li Shanchang also looked up when he heard the voice.

Lu Jin took the battle report and read it quickly, and immediately smiled playfully after reading it.

Li Shanchang didn't understand, but still congratulated him.

"Congratulations, Marshal, for taking another victory! Judging from your expression, is there something wrong with Chao County?"

"Oh? Not really. Chao County has been sent down. It's okay to show you this military report. There have been some changes in the plan, but it's nothing serious and there's no loss. It's just that someone in Chao County has the same idea as you, Li." General Lu Jin said as he handed over the report.

After Li Shanchang received the military report, Lu Jin immediately said to the messenger, "Send a message to Chao County immediately, and ask Liao Yongan, the commander of the Third Regiment, to take over the city defense temporarily, and then ask the three brothers of the Qin family, the chief clerks, to come to Luzhou to see me."

"Yes!"

There is one more chapter

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(End of this chapter)