Chapter 15 5. Imperial Examinations

The imperial examination is the third official selection system in the history of the Chinese Empire. The first two are the imperial examination in the Han Dynasty and the recommendation in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties.Recommendation generally refers to the system in which ministers recommend talents to the emperor and take joint and several responsibilities. It existed in the Han Dynasty.Examination, recommendation, and imperial examinations were all called elections in ancient China—election means selection, and election means promotion.From this point of view, elections in modern political life should be called polls or elections, which are just one type of election.

So, what is unique about the imperial examination? Let's look at the inspection and recommendation first.These two election methods are often confused by scholars, but the difference is quite obvious.First of all, the executors of the investigation are officials at all levels of the empire, from the prime minister to the county guard, all have the obligation to inspect and recommend talents.The executors of the recommendation are mostly full-time officials called "Zhongzheng officials" who are served by wealthy families. This has created a family politics of "the upper class has no poor families, and the lower class has no powerful families".

Secondly, there is no division of disciplines in the investigation and examination, and there is no division of disciplines into the classification of recommendation.The Chaju divides talents into categories according to their specialties, for example, they are called scholars with outstanding talents, Xiaolian with good conduct, and so on.This is the subject.The recommendation divides talents into grades, from top to bottom, there are nine grades, so it is also called "Nine Grades of Officials". However, there is no examination regardless of whether it is inspected or recommended.

In other words, only inspections, no exams. What is the result?Investigation becomes a form.At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, he was a scholar, but he was illiterate; he was a filial piety, and his father lived away.Many of the so-called talents are fake and shoddy.Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty simply bought and sold official titles at a clear price, and the empire perished. The situation in the Southern Dynasties is not good.Because they can sit back and reap the rewards, the children of famous families become more and more corrupt and incompetent.They were unable to do big things, refused to do small things, neglected their duties, and finally died together with the dynasty.

Judging by performance, there are counterfeit products; talk about family status, and parasites are born.Can we not reform? Of course not.But what is the solution? take an exam. The imperial examination is a must.It is a great invention of the Chinese to select officials through examinations organized by the state, and it can be said to be the first of its kind in the modern civil service system.But, precisely because it is unprecedented, it needs to be explored.In fact, the imperial examinations in the Tang Dynasty did not depend entirely on the examination papers, and the recommendations of dignitaries and celebrities could also determine admission and ranking.Moreover, since the recommendation is public, it is not easy to cheat.

Such as Xu Ning and Zhang Hu (read Ruhu). Zhang Hu and Xu Ning are both wits and poets.They wanted to compete for the first place in the state examination, so they recited their own poems at the banquet held by Bai Juyi, the governor of Hangzhou.Zhang Hu's famous saying is: The sun and the moon come first, and the mountains and rivers come.Xu Ning recited: "Eternal ages are like Bai Lianfei, and a boundary breaks through the green mountains."Zhang Hu was stunned and couldn't be right, so public opinion unanimously believed that Xu Ning should take the top spot. However, after the mid-to-late Tang Dynasty, the world became more and more popular, and recommending talents to examiners completely turned into malpractice and even bullying others.For example, a man named Pei Siqian openly took a letter of recommendation from the head eunuch Qiu Shiliang, broke into the Gong Yuan (examination authority and examination room) and asked Gao Kai, the minister of rites, for the number one scholar.Qiu Shiliang was so domineering that even the emperor was afraid of him, so Gao Kai had no choice but to say: Can other rankings work?

Pei Siqian replied: As I said above, the champion must be Pei Xiucai. Gao Kai was helpless, bowed his head and said: Then I have to meet him in person, right? Pei Siqian replied again: I am Pei Siqian. This is really outrageous.Therefore, after the Song Dynasty, only examinations were recognized. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the examination room was like a battlefield, and strict defense was strictly guarded from top to bottom.Once fraudulent activities such as leaking information, leaking test questions, buying joints, and impersonating others are found, there will be no one knows how much trouble will be caused, and how many people will be killed.

There is no doubt that it makes sense to stick to exams and rely solely on them.In fact, for the selection of officials, the essential difference between the imperial examination and other methods lies in sixteen words: the establishment of subjects, unified examination, fair competition, and merit-based admission.Only in this way can it eliminate all kinds of interference and go straight to the theme of selecting talents for the empire. Therefore, it also has a supporting policy. The supporting policy is the identification of candidates' qualifications.The first type is students, that is, students of Chinese studies, state studies, and county studies.Because there are places in school, students are also called students, just as bureaucrats have a quota and are called officials.The second type is Xianggong, that is, other scholars who are not students, as long as they meet certain political and physical conditions, they can apply to the prefecture and county, and the prefecture and county will recommend them to take the examination of Shangshu Province.

This is Heiner Baichuan.More importantly, it meant that the imperial government opened the door to the greatest extent, and family status became no longer important, so it was very popular among the landlord intellectuals of the common people.At the same time, it also means that scholars have the possibility of self-recommendation, so some scholars call the imperial examination "bootstrapping". Bootstrapping is also a remarkable improvement. Shengtu and Xianggong who participated in the Shangshu Provincial Examination were called Juren or Juzi in the Tang Dynasty.If it is a regular imperial examination, they must report to Shangshu Province in October of the first year, verify their identity, and take the exam in the first month of the next year (the location is at the capital hall of Shangshu Province in the early stage, and in the Gongyuan of the Ministry of Rites in the later stage), and the list will be released around February month.

Of course, this only refers to the general situation. So, what are the imperial examinations? The Tang Dynasty was divided into disciplines.The first subject is called Xiucai, which is an examination of strategies, and the results are divided into four grades according to the pros and cons of arts and sciences.This is a very difficult subject, and if all the candidates in the scholar test fail, the governor of the state will be punished.As a result, this course was abandoned because no one signed up for it, and scholar became synonymous with students in Ming and Qing Dynasties. The Mingjing is easier to test than the Mingjing, and the Jinshi is easier than the Mingjing.Mingjing and Jinshi are both examination subjects, and the Jinshi subject was invented by Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty. The purpose was to break the restriction of the gentry's monopoly on Confucian classics and open the door to common landlords.Therefore, the academic circles often regard Emperor Sui Yang's establishment of Jinshi Department as the beginning of the imperial examination system.

Facts have proved that the design of Jinshi Section is correct.Confucian classics are studied in the Ming Dynasty, and current affairs policies are studied in the Jinshi's scientific examination.The former only needs to be memorized by rote, but the latter needs to be learned in practice. No wonder there was a saying at that time that "Thirty old Mingjing, fifty young Jinshi". However, people in the Tang Dynasty flocked to the Jinshi department, because the current affairs strategy of the Jinshi department was easier to test than the strategy of the scholar department (you don’t have to be familiar with current affairs while citing classics to propose countermeasures), and the admission rate was only one to two percent.Therefore, Jinshi and the first degree are both possible and face-saving. How can it be unattractive? What's more, Jinshi has a bright future and is a candidate for senior officials.Of course, according to the system of the Tang Dynasty, passing the examination of the Ministry of Rites is only a pass, and the Ministry of Officials has to take another examination.After passing the Ministry of Officials Examination and obtaining the "Spring Pass", you can officially become an official by "holding a certificate to work".But that great success is just around the corner. Therefore, the successful Jinshi attracts the attention of all the people, and they themselves are also full of ambition.In addition to announcing the good news to the family with lacquer posts, thanking the examiner for visiting the prime minister, and attending various banquets with countless names, the happiest thing is to visit the flowers in the apricot garden.People in the Tang Dynasty used Xinghua as the mascot of the imperial examination, so they often appointed the two youngest and most handsome among the Jinshi to be Tanhualang, who rode around the streets to visit famous flowers.This is the common name for Tanhua to be number one and third place in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Of course, the Flower Street and Willow Lane in Chang'an City also opened its doors to these upstarts (at the same time, the fees were doubled).As a result, when singing and singing, when passing cups and changing cups, nestling among the red and greenery, a new bureaucratic group and social class were quietly born. All of this was later summarized into two famous lines by Meng Jiao, a poet of the Tang Dynasty: The spring breeze is proud of the horseshoe disease, and you can see all the flowers in Chang'an in one day. As for those failed exams, except for those who have seen through the world and have no financial means, they can only continue to take the exam year after year.This is unfortunate for them personally, but fortunate for the empire.Because these scholars who may become unstable factors have either been used by them, or they can only waste their time in the examination room, and they will not become a climate at all.No wonder a poet of the Tang Dynasty named Zhao Gu (read Rugu) made such a clear statement: Emperor Taizong really made a good plan, and he made a hero. In fact, Tang Taizong probably thought so too.It is said that he once quietly came to Duanmen when the list was released, and watched the new scholars pass by under the list one by one, and he couldn't help blurting out in secret joy: The heroes of the world have entered my trap! If you read enough, it means a trap or a cage. Of course Tang Taizong can be proud.Because not only the heroes of the world, but even the barbarians from all over the world, Rong and Di, almost all fell into his trap. Such as the Western Regions, such as Tubo.

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