Chapter 24

In the early years of the dynasty's founding, the Son of Heaven examined the candidates himself in the Chongzheng Hall; later, once the realm was well settled and the love of learning steadily rose and scholars grew as numerous as crucian crossing the river, the Chongzheng Hall — being the place of daily audience — proved less bright and spacious than the Jiying Hall, which had been built expressly for the great banquets of ministers at the spring and autumn festivals and the feasts of kin at the Winter Solstice and the Sage's Birthday; and so the site of the palace exam was moved to the latter.

Zhuo Siheng and the crowd of candidates entered by the main gate, the Deqing Gate, and passed along the imperial way, the Imperial Guard ranged on either side, their martial bearing severe and their armor bright; led by officials of the Ministry of Rites, they walked through the very center of the dynasty, advancing toward the Jiying Hall.

This road alone had a good many candidates walking it drenched in sweat and taut with nerves.

The back of the man in front of Zhuo Siheng was already showing a trace of damp.

But some walked it flush with confidence, as if victory were already in hand and their names already known to the throne.

The flying eaves of the Jiying Hall were the first to meet the eye; thin clouds drifted off, and the sky was bluer than lake or sea. Everyone's footsteps and breathing were pressed lower than low by this solemn, enormous building.

Officials of the Ministry of Rites, high and low, had long been waiting respectfully before the hall; the Minister of Rites took up the ceremonial baton and led the candidates into the hall.

Inside, the hall was resplendent but not extravagant — at once a display of the loftiness of imperial power and an elegant, generous purity. All around the hall's gallery, curtains had been hung and seats set out, each seat hung with a wooden tablet bearing a name. Even with seats for a hundred set out, there was still vast room to spare in the Jiying Hall; attendants stood ranged like screens, and some of the marking and ceremony-observing officials waited respectfully, headed by the reigning Grand Councillor, while at the very front the dragon throne stood still empty.

Once the candidates had taken their places in the hall, the officials of the Ministry of Rites made their announcement, and after a few loud calls of ceremony, the reigning emperor entered the hall unhurriedly.

Under the officials' guidance everyone made their kowtow in unison, and then someone read out the imperial edict, which stressed once again why the grace examination had been opened and how the emperor cherished talent, and bade everyone answer with all their might, to display their gifts and mettle and so bathe in imperial grace.

This was the first time Zhuo Siheng had seen the reigning Son of Heaven; only he could not raise his head, and having kowtowed his thanks for the imperial grace, was led to his seat, made another bow, and sat.

Brush, ink, paper and inkstone were all ready; the most important exam in every candidate's life was about to begin.

Only on reaching this place did Zhuo Siheng understand why the examinations were a scholar's lifelong pursuit. Attain one level of standing and the recognition that goes with it, and you receive the courtesies of a level higher still — this experience of the higher need for self-affirmation made it hard indeed for the scholars of the realm not to flock to it, and to fling away one or two decades of their years in bitter toil at their books.

But he was still one policy-essay paper away from "ascending to the very summit."

The palace exam was unlike any other: the emperor set the question and examined the candidates himself, the question announced by the reading of an edict, the time limit four hours; at noon the papers were collected, names pasted over and transcribed, and read by the emperor himself or recited by a designated official, with the Grand Councillor deliberating alongside and the other officials passing them round to read; in the end the Son of Heaven decided the three of the first rank, while the second, third and fourth ranks were judged by the assembled officials.

The quiet of the Jiying Hall was broken by the emperor; his voice came down from the high seat, as if from far away, yet deep and forceful: "Begin."

The Grand Councillor, Shen Minyao, answered, "As Your Majesty commands," then took the edict from the attendant's hands with both of his, unrolled it and read out the question aloud:

"Emperor Wen of Han relied on moral transformation alone, and punishments were all but set aside; Emperor Zhang governed with leniency and generosity, and the people rested in his blessing. Yet this year the reports of capital cases run to the thousands; cold and heat fall out of their order, flood and drought work their calamities. By what cultivation did they attain that state, and by what have we come to its reverse? The worthy and the base are not yet told apart; the corvée and the taxes are not yet made even; the laws and ordinances are altered again and again. We would fain reform and set these right — how may it be done, that there be no cares and all be settled?"

When it was done, Zhuo Siheng went numb, and so did all the candidates.

What was this, a Han-dynasty-encyclopedia triple-header? Why had the emperor lately got his eye on the Han?

He'd all but used up those Han allusions and figures on the first two papers — where was he supposed to dig up more for the old fellow?

No end to it, was there?

Zhuo Siheng had one more layer of trouble than the others: the "cold and heat out of order, flood and drought working calamities" in the question really just meant climate anomalies causing all sorts of disasters. He knew perfectly well, of course, that such intermittent seasonal climate disasters were bound up with human activity, and with the activity of the earth, and even with sunspots — but he couldn't write that; if he wrote anything, he could only attribute this sort of phenomenon to a warning from Heaven above.

Zhuo Siheng sighed.

Hard as it was, the question still had to be answered; and Zhuo Siheng, thinking it over a little, felt the emperor had set it with real skill. First he said that Emperor Wen of the Western Han had been good at governing by moral transformation, its effect like rain moistening things without a sound, so that penal law was scarcely needed; then that Emperor Zhang of the Eastern Han had governed with leniency, and the people's lives were happy and content; yet the emperor himself faced a situation of disaster upon disaster, with over a thousand death sentences reported in a single year — a terrible headache. Why could the state reach such a level in the Han's time, and not now? Was his own dynasty undiscerning in its use of men? Were corvée and taxes not yet sorted out? Were adjustments to the laws not thoroughly carried through? Offer your ideas, then — how is the state to be made secure and free of cares?

One could hardly say: it's Your Majesty who's not up to it, so the state isn't either?

Besides, all the way south from the north Zhuo Siheng had seen scenes of peace and calm, which showed the emperor was no ruler of misgovernment, and had his strategies for governing — only that many things simply didn't turn out as he wished.

As he ground the ink Zhuo Siheng roughed out a draft in his head, and suddenly hit on a very good angle of approach; he ground no more, but hurried to dip the brush and note it down first.

There was one thing Zhuo Yan had always admired in his son: that his mind was quick and often flashed with ready wit, yet he was neither hurried nor slow, steady and carefully composed. He'd felt this was a quality fit for one who would rise to the height of a minister's station.

Zhuo Siheng's showing in the first two exams would surely not have disappointed him.

This time was the same.

The thorny question made it hard for many candidates to set brush to paper, and this time there was a further difficulty: though there were curtains to left and right to screen off cheating, there were none in front, and the candidates' seats were laid out in a ring around the Jiying Hall, so that by raising one's head one could see, across the hall, how the candidate opposite was answering. Some, quick of mind, hit on their opening quickly, and had by now long since written a great deal, brush racing like a dragon; some wrote and stopped, weighing their words, but were deep in thought all the same. But for those who hadn't yet settled where their essay would land, watching others' brushes fly and wrists dance filled the heart with nerves and anxiety — and anyone whose nerve was a touch weaker would find it harder still to think of anything.

Zhuo Siheng was the sort who put pressure on others: his speed at drafting was truly very fast, and he was used to writing it all in one breath and then reviewing and adding or cutting from the top, grinding as he wrote, the ink not keeping up with his use of it, so that he half wished he could write with one hand and grind fresh ink with the other. By now he wielded the brush as fluently as a rollerball pen, and wrote out an essay as fast as filling in a bubble sheet — environment shapes a person, sure enough.

In two hours he'd written his first draft, then spent an hour revising — a few places wiped out and rewritten, a few simply cut to avoid wordiness, what remained all evidence that cut straight to the argument, and the final judgment too tied tight to the question.

Striking out for novelty was not his aim: the emperor, in these ten years on the throne, had seen the palace-exam papers at least three times, and with the realm's talents so many, he'd surely have seen his fill of answers both novel and antiquarian. Zhuo Siheng used no flashy arguments, only offered a new perspective from which to examine those seemingly hackneyed points — which often could strike fresh sparks of thought. This was Zhuo Siheng's own method of switching the angle from which he looked at a problem again and again, and applied now to answering the question, it came to his hand with ease.

Most important of all, every character was an answer he'd thought over in earnest, a close-woven reply crafted with real care and skill — the culmination of all his years steeped in the art of examinations.

The last hour he spent transcribing it onto the exam paper; writing out a several-thousand-character essay in a correct, formal hand was exhausting too, and Zhuo Siheng felt a faint damp heat on his forehead, and as he set down the brush at the end let out the very lightest breath.

That breath was not the easing of nerves, nor the slackening of a burden set down, but a kind of satisfaction and sigh at completion.

It was the best essay Zhuo Siheng could write in four hours.

At his signal, the sealing official came up at once to collect the paper. By now quite a few had handed in, and many were still writing furiously; Zhuo Siheng looked for Fan Xiliang but didn't see him, and since he couldn't very well crane his neck around, he had no way to look to either side. Tong Shipei, though, opposite him, seemed to have just handed in his paper too and to be emptying his mind — and seeing Zhuo Siheng, bold as he truly was, actually dared sneak him a little smile.

But he at once lowered his head again, pretending to be pondering and savoring the exam. For his father Tong Duo had always known his knack for a fast brush, and had warned him before the exam that if he handed in too early without checking properly, he'd be punished after the exam by being forbidden to go out — which for Tong Shipei was worse than a beating, though of course his father had never had the heart to strike him even once.

Who knew which of the ministers ranged in the Jiying Hall just now might be an old friend of his father's, watching his every move on the old man's behalf and waiting to report? Tong Shipei was very much on his guard — but having lowered his head, he couldn't help tipping it up the tiniest bit again to grin at Zhuo Siheng diagonally across from him.

The two were of a kind in their youthful high spirits, neither of a stiff, staid temperament; seeing no invigilator passing by, Zhuo Siheng returned him a smile.

At the last quarter-hour, to warn the candidates who hadn't yet finished, an attendant lit a stick of incense before the throne: when it burned out, brushes down. The little points of ash glowed; before long it would burn to its end.

The chime sounded, and the palace exam was over.

Every candidate, finished or not, laid down his brush alike, and was led out by the officials of the Ministry of Rites to a side hall to await the results.

The palace exam did not send people home to wait for word — that was just where the thrill of it lay. You sat in the side hall while, in the main hall, the emperor might at that very moment be reading your essay; the thought alone was a little exciting. And the results came out on the spot: that very afternoon the names were called and degrees conferred, robe and tablet bestowed, and the new graduates rode out the palace gates to the assembly hall. The whole procedure was elaborate and complete, and the three of the first rank were honored to the utmost.

In the side hall all the anxious unease and eager longing were hidden in silence. Zhuo Siheng sat off to one side, his thoughts drifting for some reason, and recalled an amusing thing his father Zhuo Yan had once told him: after the palace exam of his own year, one man had fainted from sheer nerves; he'd later been placed fifteenth in the second class — an excellent result too — but because of that one faint had been nicknamed "the Swooning Jinshi."

At the time he'd thought the man very funny — he himself hadn't been so nervous even for the gaokao. But only by living through it did he understand the feeling: the judgment of fate was next door, and here he could only sit dryly and wait — what torment.

Still, thinking now of his father and himself back then, of this Swooning Jinshi, of the whole road he'd traveled, he shook his head in a private smile, at once self-mocking and at ease.

Meanwhile the Son of Heaven and his ministers in the main hall of the Jiying Hall had their eyes all on the great designs of the state, wholly unaware of the little moods of the scholars next door.

The emperor had already looked over a few papers, and finding them of about average level, had the officials of the Ministry of Rites read them aloud first, looking closely only when he heard an occasional good one. And the essays already read were passed on into the hands of the other palace-exam graders.

Fifty-odd essays read, the emperor came to feel, on the contrary, that this year's candidates were a good deal stronger than last year's: some had refined, correct diction, able to give even stale clichés a graceful bearing; some argued rigorously, every thread tight and the tension well judged. In short, each had his strengths. After a little sifting, more than ten essays were stacked into the attendant's palm, and he felt them hard to rank one above another, not knowing whom to place in the first class.

But this mood of the emperor's lasted only until just before the sixty-first policy-essay paper was read to the end.

The rites official had read only the opening argument when the emperor at once found it remarkable, and had it brought over to read closely himself, beating time in admiration as he read.

This essay was truly extraordinary!

Most began their argument from Emperor Wen and Emperor Zhang of Han; but this one, from the outset, first stated a position: Your Majesty, let us not look first at Emperor Wen and Emperor Zhang, but at the political achievements of their time, and at the political inheritance that came before them. That these emperors governed by such methods was not necessarily because their characters were so, but possibly because the circumstances they took over forced them to choose thus.

First, before Emperor Wen came Emperor Hui and the Former and Later Young Emperors, two rulers the histories do not acknowledge — this was the age when the Lü clan held court. Sima Qian simply did not write a "Basic Annals of Emperor Hui," but wrote a "Basic Annals of Empress Lü" straight off, from which one sees that what Emperor Wen inherited was in fact the age of the Lü. The age of Empress Lü is rated high in both the Records of the Grand Historian and the Book of Han, held to be a time when "the realm was let free of the sufferings of the Warring States"; and with the Way of Huang-Lao giving the people rest and recovery, "all under Heaven was at peace, punishments were seldom used, the people applied themselves to husbandry, and food and clothing grew ever more abundant."

So when Emperor Wen came to the throne, ministers like Zhou Bo, Chen Ping and Xiahou Ying put to death the disloyal Lü clan — this was upheaval at the top; yet the common people still lived and worked in good order. Guanzi once said, "When the granaries are full the people know propriety; when food and clothing suffice they know honor and shame." Why, then, would Emperor Wen have needed radical measures to consolidate his rule? He needed only to carry on his predecessors' popular and effective policies, and even, on that footing, to lighten the corvée and taxes further and abolish the harsh statutes — and moral transformation would flourish of itself.

Second, look again at Emperor Zhang's father, Emperor Ming of Han: during his reign he too was renowned for clean administration and a settled realm; he set store by Confucian education, took the social climate firmly in hand, and the population grew. So when Emperor Zhang came to the throne, he had a relatively Confucian-and-Daoist, mutually illuminating environment; and in such an environment, a climate of leniency and generosity was an inevitable choice — for society had already received moral instruction, so that going along with it needed little change, and was also the least costly strategy of governance. It was precisely because Emperor Zhang chose to go along with it that the later Reign of Ming and Zhang came about.

So my view is this: the true merit of Emperor Wen and Emperor Zhang was their ability to suit their measures to the times and to the place — not the so-called "relying on moral transformation alone" or "governing with leniency and generosity." This too was why those two reigns reached the level His Majesty so admires.

His Majesty asks how he might be like them; I would urge His Majesty first not to think of being "like" them, but of being "unlike." Their suiting of measures to the times required only going along with what was already there — but not every reign and every age can decide the direction of its policy this way. Emperor Xuan was a ruler of restoration: the wars and chaos before him could only be called a devastation of living souls; how was he to carry on the strategy of what came before? Carry on whose? Wang Mang's? Impossible. So his choice was to open up an age of his own. "Rise and fall lie in knowing men; success and failure lie in establishing governance." To be able to choose to go along with things is one set of conditions; but where one cannot go along, one must create something new. The question that troubles His Majesty ought not, in truth, to be how to carry on, but how to open up a new situation, a new age.

...

Following this, it set out the problems the state currently faced, and the attitude and means needed to meet them, citing widely throughout, ranging and weaving among the historical sources — from which one saw that this man had read broadly and had a strong, well-stocked memory. Most important, he could turn all this knowledge to use within his prose, every thread tight, woven and arrayed like a spread of stars, with not a word of exaggeration or startling bombast, every character bearing on the point he wished to argue. And beyond its fresh perspective, the essay's diction too was antique and unadorned, with much of the flavor of Tang prose. It neither sprawled nor rambled, nor dragged in the superfluous; spare and vigorous, yet with its turns and its measure of pace and pause, it drew the reader in — a fine essay, fine thought, fine policy, fine response, truly!

The emperor handed this paper to the Grand Councillor, Shen Minyao, his delight at gaining a talent beyond concealing: "Minister Shen, look at this essay too!"

Shen Minyao had already been struck when he'd heard it read; looking at it now, he understood why the emperor was so pleased. He knew in his heart that unless the Wenqu Star of literary fortune truly descended from the heavens to answer the several dozen papers yet to come, there would likely be no one after this to surpass this young man. He passed the paper to the several graders seated below to read as well, and bowed to the emperor in reply: "A fine essay deserves a purple-gold saddle."

The emperor nodded with a smile.

Sure enough, right through to the reading of all the essays, though there were one or two also very excellent papers, none ever matched this essay and this argument.

The emperor chose the first rank almost without hesitation; and the other ministers, after deliberating, set out the rankings of the remaining candidates too, and reported them for the Son of Heaven to look over.

At last, when the officials of the Ministry of Rites came to the side hall to summon everyone back to the main hall, another four hours had passed. Though food had been granted by the palace in the meantime, to everyone it tasted like chewing wax, and no one could eat much of it.

They formed up again in their earlier order and filed into the main hall of the Jiying Hall. The seats had all been removed now; below and to the west of the imperial throne stood Bai Cong, Grand Academician of the Hongwen Academy, and the Grand Councillor Shen Minyao had taken his place directly below and before the throne, while at the foot of the steps seven Imperial Guardsmen of the Golden Guard stood ranged in a column — this arrangement being the order for the coming reading of the ranks at the imperial desk and the calling of the names.

The hundred-odd scholars had all but stopped even breathing.

"Present the policy essays of the three of the first class."

When the rites official had called this out, Shen Minyao took with both hands, from the Minister of Rites He Jinghui, a tray bearing three exam papers laid out in a row, and reverently set it on the imperial desk before the emperor. These were the original answer papers, found by matching the transcribed copies' numbers, the names still sewn tightly over; the emperor took the gold seal from Bai Cong and stamped the three in turn with the imperial seal, and Shen Minyao took up the topmost, slit open the sealed line with a gold pick, and revealed the name.

He froze.

But he had no time to hesitate, and at once, as custom dictated, showed the name to the emperor.

The emperor too checked slightly; his eyes rested quietly on where the candidate was from, thoughtful for but an instant, then he raised his head and, lifting his voice a little: "First class, first place — Shuozhou — Zhuo Siheng."

For so vast a hall as the Jiying, this was not, in fact, an especially loud voice, but it was very clear — and somehow, for some reason, many felt there was a lightness, a note of gladness, in the emperor's voice.

Zhuo Siheng heard these words of the emperor's clearly. His own name spoken from the mouth of the Son of Heaven — at first he was dazed, and then came a feeling stronger than joy, as if all his effort had at last won its reward, all he'd given had not been in vain: a feeling more entrancing than wild elation.

"First class, first place — Shuozhou — Zhuo Siheng." Shen Minyao took up the call after the emperor.

"First class, first place — Shuozhou — Zhuo Siheng." Bai Cong followed.

"First class, first place — Shuozhou — Zhuo Siheng." He Jinghui after him.

By now the call had reached the foot of the steps, and the seven Imperial Guardsmen took it up in turn: "First class, first place — Shuozhou — Zhuo Siheng."

The military men's voices were like great bells, and the seven callings of the name echoed through the Jiying Hall.

Only now did Zhuo Siheng step unhurriedly from the ranks, walking pace by pace to the very front of the line.

His mind felt very clear — the calm left once the excitement had boiled away — and it made him look forward beyond measure to the next part of the ceremony.

This was one of the most important reasons he had longed to take first place.

Before the seventh guardsman, the rites official guided him to a stop, and the guardsman saluted him and asked, "Congratulations, Court Champion. By imperial command I ask: what is your native place, and the names of your father and grandfather?" The emperor had not yet formally conferred the degree, so by the rules the first-placed man could not yet be called zhuangyuan, but was styled Court Champion instead.

Zhuo Siheng returned the salute and answered in a very calm, clear voice: "A man from Ningshuo Commandery in Shuozhou; my grandfather Zhuo Wenjun, my father Zhuo Yan."

The guardsman then raised his voice: "First class, first place — Zhuo Siheng, a man from Ningshuo Commandery in Shuozhou; grandfather Zhuo Wenjun, father Zhuo Yan."

The remaining six guardsmen passed the call along just so.

Up in the Jiying Hall now, the many officials were all stunned where they stood, gazing quietly at the newly minted zhuangyuan standing at the foot of the steps, head bowed, his bearing outstanding. Every one of them knew the names of his grandfather and father, and knew why those two names had vanished — the emperor included; he too gazed quietly at Zhuo Siheng, and for a moment there was even a dazed, faraway look in his eyes.

When He Jinghui and Bai Cong had finished their calls, it came round again to Shen Minyao; shocked as he was, he too finished the last call.

The emperor said, "Come up the steps and answer."

Zhuo Siheng climbed the imperial steps. As the top of the first class he might bow rather than kneel to receive the conferral, so he only stood: ahead and to his right was the reigning chancellor, ahead and to his left the reigning Grand Academician of the Hongwen Academy, and directly before him, the Son of Heaven.

"Where is your native place?" the Son of Heaven asked.

"A man from Ningshuo Commandery in Shuozhou."

"Your father's and grandfather's names?" the Son of Heaven asked again.

"My grandfather Zhuo Wenjun, my father Zhuo Yan."

Zhuo Siheng did not know whether the dead could know of things in this world, but just then he wished beyond measure for a true passage between the living and the dead, so that they might hear him now carrying his own name and his family's back before the golden throne and the sage-emperor.

The emperor looked at him, took up the imperial brush, and in vermilion before the name on his answer paper wrote:

First class, first place; conferred the degree of zhuangyuan.

Then the tip of his brush hung a moment in the air, paused, and came down again to write something more.

Shen Minyao could see it, and having seen it, his feelings were very mixed; still, as custom dictated, he reached out to receive the paper — but was stopped by the emperor's gentle words: "Let him receive the grace himself. This is also for him to receive from My hand on behalf of his grandfather and his father."

This was a distinction no zhuangyuan of any past dynasty had ever had. Zhuo Siheng was a little flustered — his father had never told him he'd have to receive the conferred paper from the emperor himself. Only at Shen Minyao's low summons, with no time to think, he stepped up one more stair, and the emperor held out his answer paper to him with both hands, then suddenly said: "Your grandfather and your father were virtuous ministers and able officials. I hope you can carry on their character, and that three generations may stand in the court."

Zhuo Siheng was slightly stunned, and his voice, without his knowing, had begun to tremble faintly: "Your servant will surely carry out Your Majesty's gracious command."

The emperor nodded and bade him rise and lift his head. This was the first time Zhuo Siheng had seen the emperor: the Son of Heaven before him looked a touch younger even than an ordinary man just past thirty, his beard not thick, his air very mild, his smile with a kind of warm gentleness to it — not like a man who would set so sharp an exam question.

Zhuo Siheng had no chance to look further; having given his thanks, he returned to the foot of the steps, and the emperor's spoken conferral was relayed to Shen Minyao: "Zhuo Siheng of Shuozhou, conferred first place in the first class, the degree of zhuangyuan."

The calls rang out one after another again; and Zhuo Siheng's gaze dropped slightly, and he saw clearly the vermilion imperial comment the emperor had written on his policy-essay paper:

First class, first place; conferred the degree of zhuangyuan.

And, besides, four more characters:

A whole house of the worthy and the valiant.