There were not many shattering sounds in other parts of the capital, but near the Jingguo Academy, the imperial palace, and the officials' residential areas, the dense shattering or slight cracking sounds were like the sound of firecrackers, shocking many people so much that they thought it was suddenly New Year's Day.
Minister Jiang Hechuan stood in front of the holy temple and sighed.
"Ten thousand people lamented and sent Fang Yun away. One man shattered the courage of a hundred people. He is truly an unparalleled national hero."
The other examiners stood there quietly, all sighing for Fang Yun.
In the examination room, after Fang Yun finished writing "Fu on Afang Palace", he closed his eyes to rest.
After floating for a long time, "Fu on Afang Palace" slowly fell down.
After writing poems and essays, the next step is to understand the classics.
The most important thing in interpreting the classics is to solve the topic, but the problem is that there is only the word "Qin", so there is no topic to solve, and you need to make a topic for yourself.
Fang Yun thought carefully, and countless holy scriptures involving "Qin" emerged in his mind. There is "Qin Feng" in the "Book of Songs", which are all poems from the Qin State. Even if there is no "Qin" in it, any sentence can become a test question.
Any sentence in the "Spring and Autumn Annals" that involves the history of the Qin State can be used as a topic. As for the sentences in other holy classics that can be used as topics, there are countless of them.
Fang Yun only saw countless words and sentences flying around in front of his eyes. He had no idea what to do and his mind was getting more and more confused. He always felt that this sentence was good, and that sentence was also OK, but when he thought about it carefully, none of them were good. There must be a better one.
Only then did Fang Yun understand the horror of the one-word question. The meaning of the scriptures were all about the contents of the saints' classics, which were the real holy ways. Even if the candidates in the examination room had low academic qualifications and could not touch the core of the holy ways, they were still essentially connected to the holy ways.
If there were fixed test questions on the meaning of the scriptures, the candidates would only have to think about one truth, which would involve only one holy way. But now it is a one-word question, involving all the holy ways related to "Qin", and one has to think about them one by one. The energy consumed is simply terrifying.
"If someone with decision-making difficulties participates in this exam, I'm afraid they will shed tears in the examination room."
Fang Yun was thinking about it when he saw a candidate in front of him, lowering his head in frustration, and slowly walking out of the examination room.
Fang Yun took a closer look and found that the man's imperial examination uniform was very new. It seemed that he was a newly-appointed imperial examination candidate last year. His literary courage was not strong, which must be because there were too many topics to choose from, which confused his thinking and caused his determination to pursue the holy way to waver, causing his literary courage to be shaken, and he had to leave the examination room.
Fang Yun was alert and no longer thought deeply about the exam questions related to "Qin". Instead, he followed the methods in the exam tutorial books, wrote down the questions that suited him one by one, and converted them into words, thinking with his eyes instead of his brain, to avoid confusion as much as possible.
The joint examination was the first test for the Jinshi degree, and more likely the last one. Fang Yun was not at all careless and listed the questions that suited him from books like "The Book of Songs", "The Book of History" and "The Analects of Confucius", in total he listed 233 questions.
"Weiyang."
"Morning Breeze."
"Yellow bird."
"Car neighbor."
"Autumn. Building a platform in Qin."
"The Duke of Jin and the Duke of Qin fought in Han."
"Qin Shi."
"Four meals are missing from Qin."
…
After finishing 233 questions, Fang Yun looked helpless. It was too difficult to choose a suitable question that he was confident would get an A.
At noon, a gentle bell rang. Fang Yun looked up and saw a large porcelain plate falling from the sky. There was hot food on the plate. This was one of the differences between the Jinshi test and the Juren test.
After lunch, Fang Yun took a short break and began to recall the classics and teachings books he had read before, and then began to recall the history from the founding of the Qin State to the end of the Qin Dynasty.
The imperial examination lasted three days. After finishing writing "Fu on Afang Palace", there was still a lot of time left, so Fang Yun was not in a hurry and slowly reviewed the history of Qin.
It was late at night and Fang Yun had not decided what to write, so he simply went to bed.
Before going to bed, Fang Yun was still hesitating. When he was half asleep and half awake, Fang Yun suddenly figured out something.
"Since I am taking the test myself, why should I care about the examiner's intentions? I can just write what I am supposed to write!"
Fang Yun figured everything out and fell asleep peacefully.
The next morning, after Fang Yun finished his breakfast, he read the 233 questions again. Holding a brush, he crossed out one after another, but in the end there were still more than 30 questions left.
Fang Yun started the second round of screening. When he saw the word "yellow bird", he couldn't help but think of the sentence from "The Book of Songs: Xuanniao" that he had been tested on during the imperial examination.
The poem "Xuanniao" praises the Shang Dynasty, while the poem "Yellow Bird" satirizes the Qin Dynasty.
"The Book of Songs: Yellow Bird" involves an allusion. Before his death, Duke Mu of Qin drank with his ministers. When he was drunk, he said that he wanted to live and die together with his ministers. At that time, three ministers of Qin State with the surname "Zi Che" agreed to live and die together with Duke Mu of Qin.
These three ministers were well-known good ministers. It was with their assistance that Duke Mu of Qin gave up fighting for hegemony in the Central Plains and expanded Qin's territory westward, laying a solid foundation for the future of Qin.
After Duke Mu of Qin died, the three loyal ministers and 174 other people were buried with him.
This was not a simple case of burial sacrifice. Whether Duke Mu of Qin was playing the trick of cooking up the dogs after the rabbit died, or because the next Duke Kang of Qin was afraid that his important ministers would seize power, it led to the deaths of three good ministers. So a Qin man wrote a poem "Yellow Bird" to mourn the three good ministers of Zi Che and criticize Duke Mu of Qin for his cruelty.
However, as a modern man, Fang Yun was thinking not only of the three loyal ministers who were buried alive, but also of the 174 people.
Although the Shengyuan Continent no longer has slavery, things like indenture contracts still exist, and the system of burying people alive with their husbands still exists today. When the husband dies, the wife is buried with him, and when the master dies, the servants are buried with him. Except for scholars who have the right not to be buried with their husbands, almost no one can resist the system of burying people alive with their husbands.
Throughout the history of Shengyuan Continent, many people opposed the system of burying people alive with the dead, and many enlightened scholars no longer practiced it, but burying people alive with the dead still occurred from time to time, especially for the purpose of seizing relatives' property.
When Fang Yun thought of this, his heart trembled.
Once he died, he would be conferred the title of Xu Sheng, and the Fang family would be the Xu Sheng family. Even if he had no offspring, the Jing Kingdom royal family would choose one of his nephews to inherit the Xu Sheng family.
Now a large amount of treasures and property are in Yang Yuhuan's hands. The Fang family dare not harm Yang Yuhuan openly, but if someone is tempted by the money and secretly uses means to force or stimulate Yang Yuhuan to commit suicide and be buried with her, this is not what Fang Yun wants to see.
However, the funeral system is a "ritual", and burying people alive with the dead is also a part of "ritual". Although many enlightened scholars no longer practice burying people alive with the dead, no one of high status has called for the abolition of the system. At most, it was expressed privately, but no article was written.
"Even if it's for the last time to help Yuhuan, I should call for the abolition of the inhumane system of burying people alive with their dead. What's more, I hate this kind of 'evil ritual'! How can a person be timid when he is about to die? I see the general trend of the human race, and abolishing burying people alive with their dead is the general trend. If no one takes action against this inhumane 'ritual', then I will personally destroy it!"
However, at the moment of picking up the pen, Fang Yun hesitated, because Fang Yun thought of a famous saying of Confucius, which was dictated by the second sage Mencius.
The first person to make clay figures for burials will have no descendants.
This sentence has always been ambiguous. Whether you are in favor of burying people alive with their loved ones or against burying people alive with their loved ones, you can use Confucius' words to prove that you are right. (To be continued...)