Zhang Juzheng did not even glance at the text of the memorial.
"Wang Yan, Great Ming belongs to His Majesty, not to you. Anyone with eyes could see the intent behind this memorial. Are you truly planning to rebel?"
Wang Yan shook his head. "Old Zhang, you are judging a gentleman's heart by your own petty mind. Let me ask you: does Great Ming have laws? Were the things Chen Hong and Feng Bao did facts or not? I did not make these laws, nor did I alter the relevant statutes. They were established by Taizu, the founding emperor of Great Ming.
"What do you mean, anyone with eyes could see? Did it take anyone with eyes to see it? Even an ordinary commoner—no, calling them commoners is giving them too much credit—even a three-year-old child understood that murder must be repaid with one's life and debts with money. What, just because they were the seal-holding and brush-wielding eunuchs of the Directorate of Ceremonial, because they served at His Majesty's side, they could not be punished by law? Then what was the law for?
"On the contrary, precisely because they served at His Majesty's side, they should have set an example and obeyed the law. Knowing the law and breaking it, harming the people—what was that? It was a challenge to the authority of Great Ming's laws, a challenge to the majesty of the Emperor of Great Ming! It blackened His Majesty's name and the royal family's name. Once word spread, how would the people view officials like us? And how would they view His Majesty?
"Old Zhang, do not think so darkly about everything. I am handling this according to the law. Old Hu is proof enough of that. Back when I was a registrar in Chun'an, his second