From childhood to adulthood, we have seen a lot of serial dramas about ancient times, especially the role of "Xiucai", which is often mentioned in ancient TV series or movies, and even Mr. Lu Xun's book "Kong Yiji" also describes the image of a depressed person who can't pass the xiucai but pretends to be a reader to face the face of guilt. Then many people may wonder what is the class status of the ancient "show talent" in today's society? Is it really a pedantic reader like Kong Yiji? Or it will be as everyone thinks: the ancient xiucai is a reader who has not achieved any fame and has not earned money.
Some people even think that the ancient Xiucai is far worse than the village chief of their village, and the village chief can at least find a few "good friends" in the village, and can also drive hundreds of thousands of cars. Poor and low status. Now let's discuss whether Xiucai is really a low social class and poor.
First, how difficult was it to be admitted to the talent examination in ancient times? Much more difficult than the current 211 universities, at least quite the current key university master's degree graduates, and is respected by all industries.
During the Qing Dynasty, the imperial examination system reached the most perfect and scientific stage, so let's compare the admission rate of Xiucai in the middle of the Qing Dynasty with the admission rate of key universities now.
During the Qing Dynasty, Xiu was admitted twice in three years, and needed to be taken three times, the first examination was the county examination presided over by the county order, and after passing the county examination, it was the prefectural examination, that is, the second examination, the examination presided over by the prefect, these two levels were passed by the child, and this time it was only considered to have the qualifications to obtain the xiucai. The third is the hospital examination, only those who have passed the county examination and the prefectural examination are eligible to participate, and at least one good performance show is required to recommend it. The college examination is presided over by the provincial school administration, and the children who pass the college examination are the real talents, of course, the talents are divided into three levels, but they are all meritorious people, belong to the class of scholars, and more importantly, they have the qualifications to participate in the examination.
During the Qing Dynasty, Xiucai was admitted twice in three years, and the number of people who took the exam in each county was about three hundred to five hundred, and the number of people admitted each time was about twenty with the difference in the size and population of each county. The acceptance rate is about 5%. Now the province with the highest admission rate of our 211 universities is about 14%, the lowest admission rate is about 4%, and the average admission rate is about 9%. In this way, the ancient Xiucai was much lower than the current 211 University admission rate, that is, the difficulty of being admitted to the Xiucai was much greater than that of the current key universities.
If you compare it with the current civil service examination, it is also much rarer, why do you say so? Although the civil service admission rate is lower, the best college students generally rarely go back to take the civil service examination, so it seems that there is a lot of competition, but in fact, most of the most elite talents do not go to the civil service examination. The selection of talents basically includes the most elite local talents, so the actual competitiveness is much greater.
Second, the ancient Xiucai in the ten miles and eight villages is also a person with a head and a face, can be exempted from all taxes, good grades of Xiucai the country also has to provide her with grain and silver every month, any Xiucai can go to the nearby county college to teach or study, are they really poor?
If you are far worse than Xiu, if you compare with most people in the local area, then Xiu Cai is definitely a figure with a head and a face in the eight villages. In Mr. Lu Xun's writings, Kong Yiji was not very poor because he was too pedantic, and not being able to pass the show was the root cause of his poverty. If Kong Yiji is admitted to Xiucai, let alone eat fennel beans, drink a little wine, even if he eats and drinks twice a day, there is no problem, his tax-free land can be rented to the hired farmers to plant, the rent is collected every year, and the county will also issue fixed grain every month, and life will not have any difficulties. In fact, if Kong Yiji really became a xiucai, it would be a local squire with a lot of privileges, and money would not be a problem at all.
Third, Xiucai is already a person with meritorious reputation, has entered the class of scholars, and has the qualifications to continue to examine people, perhaps they are the future of the high-ranking officials and nobles, the future is immeasurable.
Another reason why Xiucai was respected in ancient times is that Xiucai is the potential stock. Everyone watched on TV that there were a lot of big families of Miss Qianjin who were willing to marry a young showman, and those very beautiful little family jaspers were also very eager for young shows to like themselves. Now many people think that this is actually false, thinking that the ancient writers were all readers, and this kind of plot is that the talents are daydreaming.
However, from the data handed down from many ancient times, it is not a fake that beautiful women fall in love with young talents, but a practical situation in ancient times. Because when you are young, you can be admitted to the talent of the people, that is basically the dragon and phoenix among the people, and there is a great hope that you will be admitted to the people or even the soldiers, that is not only a matter of abundant food and clothing, but the glory of the ancestors, so that future generations can follow the glory and wealth for several lifetimes.
Although the status of ordinary civil servants today is far worse than that of the ancient xiucai, they do not have too many privileges and are not so admired. But this phenomenon just shows that our society has made great progress, completely eliminated the hierarchical difference between people and people, and thus become more equitable between people and people.