Chapter 1266: Trading the Country for Money

either side of him was a young maid, each in their early twenties, holding bowls, chopsticks, and handkerchiefs to attend to him. Whenever Du Jianjiang's eyes fell upon a dish, they would pick it up...Chapter 1266: Trading the Country for Money

"Greetings, Your Highness, the Princess Consort."

After respectfully thanking each other, Nangong Shuzhong and the others sat back down one by one.

Though they were told to sit down, everyone remained stiff and awkward, only daring to rest half their buttocks on the chairs. Although there was a small table in front of them laden with delectable dishes from Imperial Kitchen, guaranteed to be top-notch in terms of color, aroma, and taste, no one paid any attention to the food.

They knew that the Crown Princess would inevitably have to give them a lecture.

As expected, after everyone had taken their seats, Su Jinping continued, "The four social classes—scholar, farmer, artisan, and merchant—have always placed merchants at the bottom, just above slaves."

After Su Jinpa's opening remarks, the first sentence he uttered turned the faces of the assembled tycoons ashen.

Subsequently, Su Jinping continued, "Actually, this statement is rather one-sided.

"Although merchants are profit-driven and may appear to be solely focused on personal gain, it must be acknowledged that a nation and society are incomplete, even impossible to establish, without the existence of a merchant community."

The four classes of scholars, farmers, artisans, and merchants all have their own significance. For a complete national society, none can be missing.

"Take the most ordinary silk weaving as an example, merchants invest money to hire peasant women to raise silkworms, or they can also be raised by peasant women themselves. After reeling the silk, merchants will purchase it. Thus, merchants feed the first group of people, the peasant women raising silkworms."

After acquiring the silk, merchants would employ workers to process it into textiles. In this way, the merchants supported a second group of people—the textile processing workers.

After the silk was processed, merchants still needed to find people to weave it, so merchants supported a third group of people, the weavers.

"Silk is spun into cloth, and after dyeing, the cloth becomes satin. Merchants then support a fourth group of people: dyers."

"This brocade has been produced, and the merchants have brought it to the market for sale. This allows our Qin people to dress in fine clothes, displaying the grandeur of a great nation and showing the prosperity of the common people."

"This is just one aspect of the industry. Others go to the fields and purchase fruits and grains directly from farmers, then transport them in bulk to bustling towns for sale. Although this practice lowers the prices farmers receive, merchants successfully prevent a large amount of fruits and grains from rotting in the fields. Without merchants centralizing purchases, even if ordinary people went to the farmers' fields to buy at market price, how much could they actually purchase"

“Therefore, merchants bargain for lower prices, conduct centralized purchasing, and then transport goods to other regions for sale. Although this may seem like they are taking advantage of farmers, the reality is quite the opposite. It is precisely because merchants exist that farmers dare to grow crops on a large scale. Farmers do not have to worry about unsold produce, as there will always be merchants willing to offer a price and bear the costs of risk, transportation, and spoilage in order to earn greater profits.”

Speaking of this, Su Jin swept her phoenix eyes across the excited tycoons present, and said faintly: "A merchant, who benefits all under heaven, supplies what people need and fulfills their desires. Buying Nan Shan's stones to fill Bei Hai's abyss, trading mountains and rivers with money."

Finally, Su Jinpa concluded with Shen Wansan's most famous saying.

This sentence, actually a casual remark made by Shen Wansan after summing up the essence and insights of merchants, also became, paradoxically, the scripture that all merchants should follow. However, it was also the very blade with which Shen Wansan, unwittingly, handed to the founding emperor, leading to his family's annihilation.

Shen Wansan's intention was that everything in the world, the needs of others, what others desired, stones from Mount Nanshan, and gullies from the North Sea, all these things could be traded and bought and sold. However, the literal ambiguity of this sentence is too great.aring this, Li Chen nodded and said, "Then I shall follow your orders, General. I will immediately issue a dispatch to you, and you can send people to order the Liao Dong army to march urgently into t...