Three Kingdoms

  Chapter 340 The Road of the Merchant

   Fei Qian looked at Cui Hou. In fact, he had considered this issue before.

  For Cui Hou, if it is only for the convenience of ruling, Fei Qian can turn a blind eye, because Cui Hou wants to gain a higher status and greater power, he must either rely on Fei Qian or others.

  Fei Qian only needs to stare, and when Cui Hou is about to bet on the other side, he will stop him.

   There are many advantages and disadvantages to doing this. The advantage is that it is easy and simple, but it seems a bit cruel and selfish.

   It’s like knowing that the young man is full of blood, but he chooses to seduce him with his beauty, and then after he stumbles, he just said that a certain family has already seen that you have bad intentions...

  Whose fault?

   Whose fault is it again?

  Doing this is in line with the Confucian concept. Confucianism is about self-cultivation and self-cultivation. How to cultivate yourself and how to cultivate your character depends on yourself. Generally, except for family members and teachers, few people will take care of others.

   Put delicious food in front of gluttons, beauty in front of lustful people, and money in front of greedy people, so as to test people's hearts and select talents?

  This is the concept and method of the Han Dynasty, but it does not conform to Fei Qian's concept, mainly because it does not conform to the method of Fei Qian's future generations.

  The most important thing is that it does not conform to the status quo of Fei Qian.

  No one wants to break their own cards, especially when there are no cards, and Fei Qian doesn't have too many cards in his pocket, so he must play every card carefully.

Cui Hou can be said to be in charge of all of Fei Qian's wealth now. If some small or big things cause the general to renounce, then although it may not be as fatal to Fei Qian as Guan Erye, it will definitely be a waste Lost a lot of time.

   But for Fei Qian, the most precious thing now is time.

  This method of testing the loyalty of subordinates is indeed too costly for the current stage, so Fei Qian simply wants to take this opportunity to eliminate the possibility of Cui Hou repeating in the future and reduce some dangers as much as possible.

  Fei Qian looked away, turned to Cui Houdao, "Yongyuan, do you know where the word merchant comes from?"

  Cui Hou was stunned for a moment, thought and thought again, but still shook his head.

  Cui Hou really didn’t think about it, and he didn’t study it. Everyone who does business calls it that. Who would pay special attention to why it’s called that?

Fei Qian said: "Shang Tang's seventh generation ancestor, Gaozu Wang Hai trained cattle in Shangqiu, and later used cattle to carry loads to and from other tribes, bartering things. He is the earliest ancestor of merchants. Because Wang Hai was a member of the Shang clan, Hence the merchant's name."

  Everyone suddenly nodded.

   "Then why can a merchant, or the seventh ancestor of Shang Tang, Wang Hai, have something to exchange?" Fei Qian looked at Cui Hou.

By now, everyone has basically understood that the reason why Fei Qian said these things was mostly aimed at Cui Hou. Although everyone didn't quite understand Fei Qian's intentions, they didn't say anything, and listened quietly. watch.

   "...Is it because of what the farmer produced?" Cui Hou looked at the pot beside him and replied.

   Feiqian nodded, then shook his head again, and said: "Yongyuan is right but not completely right. Strictly speaking, it should be everyone's labor, and the word labor..."

  "Farmers plowing the fields are called labor, women and children weave and weaving are called labor, coachmen drive horses, it is also labor, scholars write, it is also labor, even you and I galloping on the battlefield to regain our homeland are also labor..."

   "Yongyuan, you sell and sell, which is actually labor." Fei Qian looked at Cui Hou and said.

Fei Qian tried to explain the meaning of labor as simply as possible, but it was still a bit of a mouthful, but fortunately, Cui Hou was more or less a gangster in the mall, so he quickly grasped the point, and the expression on his face revealed a kind of brilliance. Said: "What the envoy means... means that the business I do is actually a kind of labor like a farmer?"

Although Confucianism has not yet discriminated against merchants to the extent of later generations, under the famous saying that "a gentleman is a metaphor for righteousness, and a villain is a metaphor for profit", merchants have gradually become representatives of pursuing interests. 'Little people', some gentry children who study dead books, have also begun to despise people who are engaged in business gradually, which naturally affects other people and has some opinions on businessmen.

  Now here in Feiqian, you can hear a comment that equates business with agriculture. Although Cui Hou is not overjoyed, he also feels that his waist seems to be straighter.

At least Cui Hou can confirm that Fei Qian doesn’t want some gentry children to close their eyes and plug their ears when they talk about money, as if looking at one more word and saying one more word of money will pollute their eyes, ears, mouth, and soul. Instead, Cui Hou is regarded as an existence on an equal footing with farmers and other industries.

"If a farmer who is good at planting is always unwilling to farm in his own country and only wants to work for the enemy's country, no matter how many such farmers are, it will be useless; No matter how many talents there are, they should be killed; among the ancient merchants, there were also many sages. Zigong made Confucius gain power and made them stand out. Tao Zhugong was rich and liked to practice his virtues. "

In fact, in ancient times, if we talk about the time of researching wealth, China was farther back. During the Spring and Autumn and Warring States period, people including Zigong and Fan Li had already had a deep understanding of business, but after the rise of Confucianism, one was for The one-sided understanding of Confucius’ words, one is that in order to better manage the people, the centralized upper-level politics prefer to use household registration and other means to permanently bind the people in a small area, so that they can work from generation to generation without causing trouble. It is difficult to manage a businessman who is highly mobile and has seen some of the world. Therefore, most of the time, he is trying to suppress it, which has led to several small signs of capitalism in China, and then he was ruled by feudalism. strangled.

Fei Qian looked at Cui Hou and said seriously: "Now our foundation is too weak. We made such an arrangement in order to send troops to the county as quickly as possible. Above all, when we are seeking profit for the country, that is what we are really proud of, and the Cui family will surely gain both fame and fortune."

  Cui Hou was silent for a while, obviously thinking about what Fei Qian said. After a while, Fang stood up, solemnly bowed to Fei Qian, and said: "Today's envoy's words must be firmly engraved in my heart, and I dare not forget them."

   Fei Qian also stood up and helped Cui Hou up, but accidentally pulled the wound on his thigh again, so he grinned in pain again, yelled, and immediately swept away the serious atmosphere just now...

   The truth about Zhou Yu’s death:

At that time, Zhuge Liang played a very out-of-tune and ugly piece. Considering that Zhuge was an envoy, Zhou Yu listened to it with all his strength. Lang Gu".

  (end of this chapter)