Chapter 590 0585 [Strange and Bizarre Imperial Examination Questions]

Due to the Ministry of Rites exam, the city gates are not closed during this period.

Li Gongmao walked towards the city gate with a lantern, accompanied by his brother Li Gongjian, and behind him were servants carrying things for them.

"Privately minting coins is tantamount to treason..."

The soldier at the city gate suddenly shouted.

Come again?

Li Gongmao felt speechless. He was going to the Imperial Academy to take the exam, but he was threatened by the soldiers halfway.

At this moment, more than one or two candidates entered the city. More than a dozen candidates raised their heads at the same time, and their heads were floating in the wind in the dark.

Passing through the city gate, Li Gongjian whispered: "Brother, this Yi San tribe is too much. I heard that teenagers of thirteen or fourteen years old will also be beheaded."

Li Gongmao sighed: "Those who are too young should not be killed."

This is also a criticized place. Many ministers suggested to the Ministry of Justice that when compiling the "Great Ming Law", the death penalty age of those implicated should be raised. For example, those under the age of sixteen can be exiled to the border. There is really no need to kill them all.

The two brothers came to the outside of the Imperial Examination Hall, and the streets were crowded with people.

There were a lot of candidates this year, 40% of whom were from Zhejiang, Fujian and Jiangxi. Because these three provinces had just been recovered, there were many loopholes between the old and the new, and local officials recommended a large number of candidates to go to Beijing to take the exam.

The court was too lazy to investigate carefully, and the Ministry of Rites was too lazy to review.

Anyway, the three provinces had been temporarily put into one list, and only 20% of the 40% candidates were given the quota of Jinshi.

Go and apply by yourself!

The brothers Li Gongmao and Li Gongjian were under great pressure in this imperial examination. They were given high hopes to revive the "Modao Li Clan".

The founder of the Modao Li Clan was the eleventh-generation grandson of Li Ke. In order to avoid Zhu Wen's butcher knife, he moved to Jiangxi. In the 21st century, he even had millions of descendants.

For example, Li Shanchang originated from Modao Li.

The end of the Northern Song Dynasty was the worst time for the Modao Li Clan, because they were too deeply involved with the Three Sus. Huang Tingjian's biological mother was from the Modao Li family. After Huang Tingjian lost his mother, he was almost raised by the Li family.

They lined up little by little, and two hours had passed in the blink of an eye.

Someone behind them was really bored and took the initiative to talk to the two brothers: "I am Min Anguo, with the courtesy name Bangyan, from Yangzhou, Hanzhong."

Li Gongmao said: "Hello, brother Bangyan, I am Li Gongmao, with the courtesy name Zimian, from Jianchang, Nankang."

Li Gongjian also reported his name.

The three began to chat, mainly about the content of the exam, and gave each other the address of their accommodation, and agreed to drink together after the exam.

After the inspection was completed one after another, the Li brothers went to the three provincial examination halls, but Min Anguo went to the ordinary examination hall.

Li Gongjian cleaned up the examination numbers with a lantern. The Imperial Examination Hall had not been used for a long time, and there were probably cobwebs and other things. If you are unlucky, you may even encounter snakes and rats.

Soon he found that the hall had been cleaned, and Li Gongjian muttered: "The new dynasty is considerate to the candidates."

After carefully nailing the waterproof cloth, Li Gongjian stood outside the hall and stretched.

The examinee next to him was also breathing fresh air. The two greeted each other casually and got to know each other. Li Gongjian's next-door neighbor was Hu Quan.

After a while, before dawn, a patrol officer came.

"Dangdangdangdang..."

The officer beat the gong all the way and shouted: "The exam will start in half an hour. Don't stand outside the hall. Go inside and wait! No more talking, no more noise..."

Behind the officer who beat the gong, there were other officers.

Li Gongjian found that a military officer came to give charcoal, and couldn't help asking: "Does the Ministry of Rites still give charcoal to candidates during the exam?"

"Don't talk," the military officer scolded, but still answered, "This year there is a late spring cold, the government sympathizes with the candidates, everyone gives charcoal to keep warm. Don't seal the call, be careful of being poisoned by the charcoal."

"Dangdangdangdang!"

The military officer who beat the gong shouted: "Listen, candidates in the south, don't seal the call, otherwise you will be poisoned by the charcoal!"

Hu Quan brought a stove and water, lit the charcoal fire and started to cook porridge, and baked the cold white steamed buns by the way.

Finally, it was dawn, and the examiners and invigilators arrived.

The copied exam questions were posted on a huge wooden board, held by twenty or thirty military officers, and walked slowly through various parts of the exam room, reciting the questions as they walked.

In order to keep it confidential, the exam questions could not be printed in advance.

Even today's exam questions were discussed and determined yesterday.

The questions for the next exam have not been determined yet, but the examiners have discussed the general scope.

The rules of the imperial examination in the new Ming Dynasty are extremely strict. Unlike the old Song Dynasty's Ministry of Rites exam, the examiners can actually ask for leave and leave the Imperial Academy in the middle of the exam - it is easy to leak the questions!

The content of the exam has also been greatly increased. Not only mathematics, physics, and practical work have been added, but even the traditional classics questions have changed.

For example, today's content, the old Song Dynasty only tested "The Analects" and "Mencius", but the Ming Dynasty also tested "The Great Learning" and "The Doctrine of the Mean".

Of course, the eight-part essay is still not popular, there are only a few routines similar to the eight-part essay.

Li Gongjian listened to the military messenger reading the test questions, and occasionally poked his head out to look at the wooden board.

The test questions on the wooden board used punctuation marks.

When the candidates received their ticket numbers at the Ministry of Rites this year, the officials of the Ministry of Rites repeatedly emphasized that punctuation marks must be used when answering questions. If there are too many symbols and you can't remember them, at least use commas and periods.

This is very simple for candidates, because they have learned "punctuation (dou)" since childhood, which is the core part of the teacher's teaching.

It is called a sentence when it is completed in one breath.

The pauses in the process of running a line of qi are called punctuation.

When scholars read, they would mark the punctuation by themselves. Zhu Ming just made the periods and commas more standardized and unified.

Li Gongjian copied all the questions first, and finished answering "Mencius" and "The Analects" in the morning.

As for "The Great Learning" and "The Doctrine of the Mean", Li Gongjian seemed a little flustered.

These two things were not compulsory in the old Song Dynasty. Although they were very famous, many candidates had never learned them, or had only studied them briefly.

After Li Gongjian came to Tokyo, he specially bought "The Great Learning" and "The Doctrine of the Mean" with the prince's annotations. He had been locked in the inn to recite them. The articles were not long and he could recite them, but at this moment, some of them had been forgotten.

Fortunately, the court also knew this situation. "The Great Learning" and "The Doctrine of the Mean" only had one question each.

Moreover, there was no need to answer according to the prince's annotations to avoid candidates who had not studied seriously from being dragged down too much.

In general, this imperial examination was just a transition.

Li Gongjian racked his brains and finally finished writing the two articles. After repeated revisions, he felt that there was no problem, so he carefully copied them up.

In the evening, the sky was getting darker and darker, and there were still candidates writing furiously.

No candles were given, and the papers were collected directly.

Because candles are very expensive now, not as cheap as they were in the Ming and Qing dynasties.

In the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, Kou Zhun only lit candles at home and did not like to light oil lamps. He was criticized by Ouyang Xiu for his problematic lifestyle.

A luxury item!

With the development of productivity, by the end of the Northern Song Dynasty, a candle was worth about 100 to 500 coins, depending on the quality.

Two high-quality candles burned out, which was equivalent to a coin gone. Even officials did not dare to use it every day.

At night, I slept in the examination room, and ate, drank, defecated and urinated here.

The next day continued.

Today, the Five Classics were tested, and the content of the test remained unchanged.

On the third day, mathematics, physics, and official document writing were tested.

Li Gongjian first finished the official document writing, and had a headache looking at mathematics and physics.

You can use the new mathematics of the emperor and the prince to solve the problem, or you can use traditional arithmetic since ancient times.

The first question is a chicken and a rabbit in the same cage.

Although Li Gongjian has learned traditional arithmetic, it is limited to the multiplication table and the like. His brain was blown up. He repeatedly gave different data, compared and calculated the results in groups, and finally came up with the answer.

The second question was to calculate the actual area of ​​irregular land.

Li Gongjian was already at a loss.

He could calculate the area of ​​squares and rectangles, but how could he calculate irregular land?

After all, he was a juren who passed the Jiangxi exam. After half an hour of hesitation, Li Gongjian actually figured out the auxiliary lines and split the land into several regular shapes.

The third question was a bucket placed on a flat ground without wind. What forces did it receive?

Li Gongjian scratched his head. There were no living people or animals to touch it. What forces could a bucket receive?

Li Gongjian's understanding of force was probably the strength of people or animals, and if it was expanded a little, it would be wind power and water power.

It was seriously beyond the scope!

The fourth question was to use two iron rods to pry the lock. One rod was one foot long and the other was two feet long. Which one would save more effort?

Li Gongjian was completely confused and felt that the questioner was a psychopath.

I am here to take the imperial examination to be an official, not to be a thief. Why do I have to take the test on the skill of picking locks?

The person who set the questions for mathematics and physics was Huang Shang, who compiled the Daoist Canon for Emperor Huizong of Song.

This guy has already finished studying Dao Yong Ce. Except for agronomy, he is too lazy to study it, but he has a good grasp of other knowledge.

Huang Shang was afraid that the candidates would not be able to answer, so he deliberately lowered the difficulty.

Li Gongjian thought carefully for a long time and suddenly had an idea.

He took out a spare brush and turned the bowl upside down on the table. Press the brush under the bowl, first use half of the brush to pry, and then use the whole brush to pry.

After repeated experiments to experience the strength, Li Gongjian smiled and wrote down the answer.

Hu Quan followed Xiao Chu to study for many years, and he learned a lot of miscellaneous knowledge. In the past two months, he also flipped through Dao Yong Ce and answered various test questions easily.

Although Li Gongmao had not learned these, he performed very magically.

Unlike his cousin, he didn't need to do experiments. He was able to answer the questions correctly by just imagining in his mind and combining it with his daily life experience.

On the last day, the test was about policy essays.

One essay question and three policy questions, which were the same as the old Song Dynasty's Ministry of Rites test.

But the specific content was more practical, with both thinking about big problems and elaboration on real work.

For example, if there was a famine in a certain place, the question would give how much grain was left, how much grain was needed to maintain the original order, and how much grain was needed for the famine victims. Some of the famine victims wanted to cause chaos, so how to help the famine victims, and how to avoid or suppress civil unrest.

This type of question is divergent and can go beyond the given materials.

It can even be traced back to before the disaster, saying that through certain phenomena, he had a premonition that there would be a famine this year, so he made various arrangements in advance, etc. - few candidates would think of this kind of answer, and once written, they would definitely get high scores.

After the four-day exam, countless candidates left the Imperial Academy, and many of them looked lost.

They were almost crying!