What books can I ask about the study of the imperial examination system?

The imperial examination system is an examination system for selecting officials in ancient China, and it is also an important phenomenon in the history of China and even human administration and culture. It sprouted in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, began in the Sui Dynasty, came into being in the Tang Dynasty, and ended in the New Deal period in the late Qing Dynasty, lasting 1300 years. As an important part of China's ancient political system, the imperial examination system has been accompanied by numerous criticisms, including swearing and singing bad songs. The former is the source of all evil, the crime of all ages; The latter is considered as the origin of modern civil service system and the originator of rational administration. The research on the imperial examination system has always been an outstanding research in the history of Chinese political system, education and culture. Several generations of scholars at home and abroad have worked hard in this garden, and the results are numerous and almost meaningless. However, "from the side of the ridge, the height is different." If we use the analytical framework of modern administrative culture to examine the imperial examination system and study its positive and negative effects on ancient administrative activities in China, we still face many problems. This paper attempts to analyze the imperial examination system from the perspective of administrative culture, and discuss its relationship with China's ancient administrative participation, administrative ethics, administrative efficiency and administrative cost, and its position in China's ancient administration. I. Imperial Examination System and Administrative Participation Administrative participation or participation in administration in the sense of modern administration refers to the process in which members of society directly or indirectly influence the government's administrative decision-making and supervise the exercise of their power through various legal channels. Of course, the administrative participation in ancient China is not equal to the administrative participation in the modern sense, and its content is much less than that in modern times. It only means that every member of society may pass the exam to become a state administrative official and participate in the management of state affairs. From this perspective, the imperial examination system is conducive to expanding administrative participation. Before the imperial examination system came into being, there were several ways to select administrative personnel in China, such as the system of killing Qing, the system of imperial examination, and the system of nine grades being standardized. Official system is a kind of aristocratic politics. Under this kind of politics, administrative participation is only a qualification possessed by the aristocratic class, because this period was dominated by patriarchal politics and implemented the principle of national organization. Patriarchy is directly related to political hierarchy, state structure and state organization. Anyone related to the king will have more opportunities to participate in the administration. The higher the political level, the more prominent the official position. The patriarchal political system, in which the family is connected with the country, and the relatives are one, makes the people who can participate in administrative activities only within the scope of princes, nobles and QingDafu families, and the average person has no opportunity and possibility to participate in administrative activities. At the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, with the great changes in society, an intellectual class appeared in China. During the Warring States period, gentry were mostly used by Qing Dafu, known as "retainers", that is, "door guests", and many of them became officials of regional state power. Powerful vassals and officials did not hesitate to break through the system of ministers in the world since the Western Zhou Dynasty. They took the lead in selecting some people who were not noble but outstanding in talent to hold important positions, defeating the old forces for them and opening up a new world of activities. This is a great historical progress, because it broke the hereditary system of relying entirely on blood, thus increasing the opportunities and possibilities for ordinary scholars to participate in administration. Unfortunately, this increase in opportunities for administrative participation has not formed a series of institutionalized regulations, but a short-lived article under the special historical conditions of the decline of the status of "* * *", the loss of central administrative authority and the rapid development of vassal power. Hanxing has been stable for a long time, and it is possible for the state to select officials on a larger scale. In the Han Dynasty, officials were mainly appointed through inspection and collection. These two methods of appointing officials should be handled by county officials. Because the recommendation system is the central link, sponsors have great power to choose officials. As a result, the wind of bribery was rampant, and the feudal landlord class was forced to wither when choosing officials. However, the specific employment has gradually embarked on a self-enclosed environment of cronyism, wealth and power, and there have been a lot of corruption phenomena of "taking people by name" and "taking people by family". At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Guangfa rose. Although Wei Wendi's "Nine-grade Zheng Zhi" system has the intention of selecting sages, it is influenced by the gate valve, resulting in the situation that "the top grade has no poverty and the bottom grade has no gentry", which greatly limits the ability of the lower intellectuals to participate in politics. Therefore, in the history of China's official selection system, there is no method that has been criticized by people at that time and later generations since its birth, like the Nine-Grade Zheng Zhi system. Judging from several official selection systems before the emergence of the imperial examination system, China people's administrative participation was restricted by many conditions, especially their birth, property, status and fame. In western and medieval Europe, there were almost no civil servants in the administrative system of the integration of politics and religion controlled by nobles and churches. /kloc-Before the 5th century, all "officials" in Britain were nobles and priests. In France before16th century and Germany before17th century, it was the vassals who ruled the country. Japan is similar. Until the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the Emperor had only a nominal name. The actual ruler is the feudal Lord-Daming, and his subordinate officials are mainly hereditary warriors. It can be seen that in medieval Europe and Japan before the Meiji Restoration, "nobles are always nobles and civilians are always civilians". There are few legal ways for people in the lower classes to form a bureaucratic team. The door of administrative participation is completely closed to ordinary people, and it is impossible for the lower class to participate in the administrative activities of the country. Strictly speaking, the imperial examination system based on examination began in the Sui Dynasty and was formed in the Tang Dynasty. By the Northern Song Dynasty, the imperial examination legislation, such as sealing letters, recording honors and withdrawing, had been completely improved, and the remnants of the recommendation system had been eliminated. Everything must pass the examination, and the imperial examination system is mature and stereotyped. It was in the Northern Song Dynasty that the administrative system of civil servants managing the country was established completely and firmly, and aristocratic politics and martial politics basically withdrew from the historical stage of feudal China, thus turning a new page in the administrative history of China. Legally speaking, the imperial examination system is super-class, and once it is passed, it will undoubtedly be promoted to the ruling class (of course, in fact, the broad masses of lower classes cannot enjoy the right to take exams because they can't get education). In order to prevent aristocratic bureaucrats from stealing power, feudal emperors often seriously safeguarded the super-class nature of the imperial examination system. There have been records of cracking down on cheating in the examination room since the Tang Dynasty, and the examination case in the Qing Dynasty is even more bloody. Therefore, it should be admitted that the imperial examination form is the fairest form of talent selection that can be adopted in feudal times. It expanded the social level of introducing administrative personnel in feudal countries, and in history, it did attract a large number of middle and lower class people into state administrative agencies at all levels. Of course, the candidates in the imperial examination can't come from the poor, but they may come from landlord families with certain real estate. Even if the landlord's children are rich, if the imperial examination fails, they can only stay in the social status of "local tyrants and evil gentry" and cannot become members of the state administrative organs. On the contrary, even the children of landlords with poor families may become senior administrative officials with excellent results in imperial examinations. This way of employing people in the examination is reasonable, which makes it possible for the administrative organization to be composed of cadres of the ruling class, effectively maintaining the normal operation of the state machine. In the Song Dynasty, the range of candidates in the imperial examination was expanded. Prior to this, scholars from "industrial and commercial miscellaneous" backgrounds have been excluded from official career. The Song Dynasty broke through this restriction, and the candidates were "not interested in music and discs, and not interested in their hometown". (3) Don't talk about family status. Industrial and commercial miscellaneous courses can be tested by themselves. By the end of the Northern Dynasties, even monks and Taoists could take the exam, as long as they had talents and talents. The expansion of the scope of candidates in the imperial examination undoubtedly played a role in expanding administrative participation and selecting relatively high-quality administrative personnel. The significance of expanding administrative participation lies in ensuring national unity. In feudal society, the greatest resistance to national reunification came from hereditary aristocrats with their respective regions and families as the background, and the imperial examination system of equal examination naturally denied aristocratic politics, thus making the supreme imperial power transcend hereditary aristocrats and extend to the "cold soil" of the middle and lower classes, giving these cold soil the opportunity to run administrative institutions with their navel, and their possibility and hope of participating in administrative activities are far greater than those of lower-level intellectuals under aristocratic politics and military politics. Therefore, they always kept a submissive attitude towards the central government, and the imperial power provided opportunities for administrative participation through the imperial examination system and gained a broad social foundation. Over the past two thousand years, the evolution of China's unification and division has been synchronized with the evolution of the administrative participation system itself. The supervision system established in the Han Dynasty changed the Shi Qing Shi Lu system, which only nobles could participate in administrative activities, restrained the expansion of military aristocratic groups, and made up for the disadvantages of the Ren Zi system, which played a very positive role. The expansion of administrative participation was one of the reasons why the Han Dynasty became the first stable unified dynasty in China. During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the implementation of the "nine-product system" in administrative participation was beneficial to aristocratic families. The result is that "famous families are educated and won the glory of the world; If the surname is cold, there is no way to advance. " O a large number of scholars from humble origins, although talented in governing officials and directors, are blocked by the barriers of the world and cannot participate in the management of state administrative affairs and give full play to their intelligence. Therefore, this period is the longest period of division of China's construction society. In the Tang Dynasty, the imperial examination system was formally born. In the mid-Tang Dynasty after the Anshi Rebellion, the imperial court vigorously developed civilian politics and expanded the imperial examination, and the imperial examination scholars began to dominate the political affairs. By the Northern Song Dynasty, the imperial examination system was fully mature, which made the hereditary nobility as a social stratum basically disappear in the history of China (that is, the boundary between "clan" and "cloth" disappeared. As for the Mongolian nobles in the Yuan Dynasty and the Eight Banners nobles in the Qing Dynasty, they are all exceptions in the case of national struggle. After the Northern Song Dynasty, the internal division of the feudal regime (common in the early feudal society) basically disappeared. Compared with China people's administrative participation in different periods, the imperial examination system centered on recruitment and entrance examination is more reasonable and legal. Free registration for the examination eliminates the disadvantages of narrow vision and low level of knowledge under the procuratorial system, at least in terms of registration, there can be no survivors. The specific and strict cultural examination has established a unified measurement and employment standard that can be directly tested, clearly grasped and grasped. This kind of examination is limited to the test of several kinds of knowledge, so it embodies the spirit of standardization and impersonality, and ensures that the administrative participation of ordinary intellectuals is based on highly institutionalized and impersonal legal procedures and systems. Because the imperial examination system is quite open and competitive in administrative participation, it is mainly manifested in the provisions of open application, selection of talents and talents, and "everything is subject to literature" These regulations, in principle, apply to everyone except prostitutes, gifted students, Li, soap and children from criminal families; An ordinary citizen, as long as he studies hard, will have the hope of passing the exam, which will inspire him to take a chance and lead to the competition of administrative participation. Feudal autocracy originally prohibited competition; However, there was a strong and unified centralization in ancient China. Just as the bankruptcy of individual landlords and the rise of individual farmers to landlords not only did not harm the whole landlord class, but also brought vitality to it, the implementation of the open policy and allowing a certain degree of competition to participate in state administrative activities will not shake the autocratic monarchy system, but will make it more consolidated and bring vitality to it continuously. In the long feudal society, managers at all levels who have achieved fruitful results in the process of state administration rarely failed to realize administrative participation through scientific methods; At the same time, administrative officials who have a negative impact on state management activities are rarely experienced people who are not the same way. Two. Generally speaking, administrative ethics refers to a series of reasonable and appropriate values, behavioral norms and politicians' moral qualities about administrative activities formed in order to realize and maintain certain administrative ideals and administrative order in administrative practice. Judging from the relationship between imperial examination system and administrative ethics, imperial examination system not only helps to educate officials, the administrative subject of feudal dynasty, but also plays a certain role in creating a clean government. At the same time, the imperial examination system is connected with studying-one wants to take exams and the other wants to be an official-to make a fortune, which in itself is a corrosion of the politician's soul. Among the administrative officials produced by the imperial examination, there are not only a large number of diligent and honest people who "worry about the world first, but enjoy the world later", but also many "big officials get rich, small officials get rich"

Brief introduction of imperial examination system

The imperial examination system refers to a system in which the imperial court allows ordinary people and officials to voluntarily register with the government, and then select talents from them. After passing the examinations of different subjects, they are awarded official positions according to their achievements. The imperial examination system was formally implemented in the Tang Dynasty. It has been closely associated with the history of Chinese civilization for more than 1,300 years, ending with the last Jinshi examination in the twenty-seventh year of Guangxu in the Qing Dynasty.

The imperial examination system in ancient China experienced several periods:

Sui Dynasty is the origin of the ancient imperial examination system in China. After the Sui Dynasty unified the whole country, in order to adapt to the development and changes of feudal economic and political relations, expand the participation of the feudal ruling class in political power, and strengthen centralization, the power of selecting officials was brought back to the central government, and the imperial examination system replaced the former nine-grade system. In the third year of Yang Di Daye, Emperor Yangdi set up the Jinshi Department, and selected Jinshi through examinations.

The Tang Dynasty was a period when the imperial examination system in ancient China was complete. Examination subjects in the Tang Dynasty are divided into two categories: regular subjects and system subjects. The exams held in stages every year are called regular classes, and the temporary exams held by the emperor are called making classes. The main subjects of regular subjects are Ming Jing and Jinshi. There are two kinds of candidates who take part in the imperial examination: one is students from imperial academy, Hong Wen Pavilion, Chongwen Pavilion and various state and county academies, which were called students at that time. After they pass the exam at school, they can take part in the imperial examination held by the imperial court in Shangshu Province, also called provincial examination. Second, ordinary scholars who are not in the library can apply to the local state and county governments. Local prefectures and counties take the examination step by step, and those who pass the examination passively take the provincial examination in Chang 'an, the capital of Shangshu Province. Such a person is called "xianggong" Candidates who are sent to take the provincial examination can be called jurors and admitted to the provincial examination. The first name is champion or head. Those who pass the imperial examination are only qualified to be an official, and cannot directly get an official position. They must pass the examination of the official department before they can be awarded official positions. The official examination is held after 10 every year and before the following summer. The official department will announce the official position obtained by the examiner in accordance with the procedure of "three notes and three songs", and issue a letter of appointment in the name of the emperor after approval by Shangshu, Menxia and the emperor.

Song Dynasty was the reform period of ancient imperial examination system in China. Due to the development of feudal economy in Song Dynasty, the small and medium-sized landlord class gradually grew, and people who wanted to be officials urgently demanded to step onto the political stage through the imperial examination while their economic strength grew stronger. Therefore, compared with the Tang Dynasty, the imperial examination system in the Song Dynasty developed significantly. First, the imperial examination in Song Dynasty relaxed the scope of admission and appointment. In the Tang dynasty, no more than twenty or thirty people were admitted to the Jinshi, and at least a dozen were admitted. Jinshi in Song Dynasty is divided into three classes, the first class is called Yu, the second class is called Jinshi origin, and the third class is called Tongjinshi origin. As many as 200 to 300 people, or even 500 to 600 people, were admitted at one time in the Song Dynasty. In the Tang dynasty, being an official was only a qualification for being an official, and actually granting an official position had to pass the official examination. In the Song Dynasty, once hired, you could be an official, and the top one could get a senior official. In the Song Dynasty, candidates' origins were not restricted, and even monks and Taoists could take the imperial examinations. Second, the Song Dynasty established a three-level examination system once every three years. The emperor personally took the court examination, and all candidates became the emperor's disciples, avoiding the formation of a clique between candidates and examiners in the name of teachers and students. Third, since the Song Dynasty, the imperial examinations have been officially copied by affixing their names, and a new system has been established to prevent malpractice for personal gain. Sticking a name means sealing a name, place of origin, etc. On the examinee's test paper, and copying it is to copy the examinee's test paper separately. In this way, when marking papers, examiners not only don't know the names of candidates, but also can't identify the handwriting of candidates, thus achieving absolute fair competition. These methods were inherited by Ming and Qing dynasties. Fourthly, in the content of the examination, we changed the practice of only examining poetry and fu in the Tang Dynasty, added the content of Confucian classics and righteousness to the Jinshi, and set up the courses of "knowing the law", "examining the law and making the sentence just", and the successful candidates were appointed as judicial officials.

The Ming Dynasty was the heyday of the ancient imperial examination system in China. The rulers of the Ming Dynasty attached great importance to imperial examinations, and their methods were more rigorous than those of previous dynasties. Before the Ming Dynasty, the school was only one of the ways to transport candidates for the imperial examination. In the Ming dynasty, becoming an official became the only way for the imperial examination. People who entered imperial academy to study in the Ming Dynasty were generally called Guo Jianzi. There are generally four kinds of supervisors: those who send students to prison for study, those who send bureaucratic children to prison, those who send people to prison and those who donate money to prison. Great changes have taken place in the procedure and content of the imperial examination system in Ming Dynasty. The imperial examination is divided into three grades: after having obtained the township examination, the senior high school entrance examination and palace examination. The rural examination is a local examination held by the southern and northern Zhili provinces and ministries. The location is in the south, where the Beijing government and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are stationed. Once every three years. The examinee in middle school is Juren, whose name is Xie Yuan. Participants will take the court examination presided over by the emperor. Palace examination is divided into three categories, namely, three first-class scholars, several second-class scholars and several first-class scholars ... Through step-by-step examination, the rulers can choose the most useful talents from them. An important change in the content of imperial examinations in Ming Dynasty was the establishment of the system of taking stereotyped writing of scholars. Zhu Yuanzhang, the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, adopted Liu Ji's suggestion and stipulated that all levels of examinations should use four books and five classics. The author can only answer according to the classic explanations of Cheng and Zhu in Song Dynasty, and is never allowed to express his own opinions. In Ming Xianzong's time, he even created the format of "stereotyped writing", requiring the article to be dual paragraph by paragraph in form. Piling and carving are completely divorced from social reality. Therefore, it imprisons people's thoughts more than poetry and prose in Tang and Song Dynasties, which makes the imperial examination system fully serve the needs of emperor's autocracy, and at the same time leads the imperial examination system itself to a dead end.

The Qing Dynasty was the period when the ancient imperial examination system in China disappeared. The imperial examination system in the Qing Dynasty was basically the same as that in the Ming Dynasty, but the policy of ethnic discrimination was implemented. Manchu enjoys all kinds of privileges, and it is not necessary to pass the imperial examination to be an official. The imperial examination is only a ladder for Han officials to participate in political power one day. The content of the imperial examination still uses the eight-part essay of the Ming Dynasty to imprison the literati's thoughts. After that, it gradually declined and its disadvantages became more and more. Although the rulers of the Qing Dynasty criticized the cheating in the imperial examination, the cheating became more and more serious due to the defects of the imperial examination system itself, which became an obstacle to historical progress and was finally eliminated.

Generally speaking, the advantages of implementing the imperial examination system in ancient times outweigh the disadvantages. From a personal point of view, its enthusiasm reflects that a person from an ordinary family wants to enter the imperial court, get a high title, and then be promoted and made a fortune, honor his ancestors, have a prosperous career and be rich. Everything depends on the imperial examination. Its negativity reflects that if an ordinary person attaches great importance to his fame, or is bent on being an official for other reasons, he will devote all his life's efforts to studying hard, and he could have started other opportunities for road development, but all of them will not be considered. Some people can't go to high school on the day they die, can't fulfill their lifelong wishes, and finally hold a grudge. Therefore, sometimes we can't blindly regard the imperial examination as a life-and-death political battlefield, wasting good time and gradually accelerating social corruption. From the social point of view, it embodies its enthusiasm, opens the examination, attracts many poor scholars to enter the political power, and makes them understand that taking the imperial examination can be a good way out. It is conducive to expanding and consolidating the political foundation of feudal rule and improving the administrative efficiency of society. It changed the situation that nobles dominated state affairs in the early feudal society, and the majority of civilian landlords entered the imperial examination as officials, which injected vitality into the feudal regime. The imperial examination system has become the only fair objective basis for selecting officials, which is conducive to the formation of a high-quality civil service team. The combination of reading, examination and being an official, and the combination of power, position and knowledge have created the tradition of respecting teachers and attaching importance to education in China and the atmosphere of diligent study, further promoting the prosperity of literature. As a civil service selection system, its negative side is that the imperial examination directly led to the selection of hundreds of thousands of Jinshi and nearly one million juren. This huge community will certainly nourish many corrupt officials or despicable black sheep. They do their jobs but don't do their jobs, and the policies given by the emperor to their parents are not implemented. The implementation of stereotyped writing in Ming and Qing Dynasties severely restricted candidates in both content and form, which made many intellectuals not pay attention to practical knowledge, bound their original active thoughts, did not promote the development of academic culture, but corrupted the good social atmosphere. Until the late Qing Dynasty, the imperial examination system seriously hindered the development of science and culture, which was one of the important reasons for the backwardness of natural science in modern China.

Along the way, the ancient imperial examination system experienced constant reform and progress, and the ancient imperial examination evolved into the current college entrance examination. In fact, the current college entrance examination also has some historical existence of the imperial examination system at that time, and the two have something in common. For example, the test papers at that time were all labeled with names, and now the college entrance examination system also needs to be labeled with names to prevent the phenomenon of favoritism and malpractice. For example, the imperial examination is to select the best people in the country, and the college entrance examination is also national, which is conducive to more elites gathering. Like the person who took the first place in the exam at that time, the higher the official position. The current college entrance examination is also the best university to choose the highest score, and the future is determined by the score. Secondly, the current college entrance examination system is more advanced than the ancient imperial examination system, and you have to stay in school for three days and three nights until the exam is successfully completed. Now the college entrance examination doesn't have to be like this, but it will take two days to complete four courses in different subjects. In the ancient imperial examination system, only men were allowed to take the exam, and officials were even more masculine. Now, both men and women can take the college entrance examination, and the gender discrimination system has been abolished. The ancient imperial examination system created conditions for the mutual transformation of members of different classes in feudal society. The opportunity to be an official is determined by the examination, and the only way out after graduating from high school is to be an official. Now the college entrance examination is to choose the major you are interested in according to your own preferences, and then develop towards your ideal and finally get the opportunity to apply for a job. After winning the first place in the ancient imperial examination, he was the champion, and there was no higher education. Now, after the college entrance examination system, it is an undergraduate course, and even continues to take postgraduate, doctoral and postdoctoral exams, and it is promoted step by step. In the ancient imperial examination system in the Qing Dynasty, there were chaotic situations such as fraud cases and Jiangnan prisons, and the means were sinister and sinister, which made people panic. However, there are also fraud incidents in the current college entrance examination, but with the use of scientific and technological means and the severity of punishment, there are few introductions.

Therefore, the imperial examination system is related to the current college entrance examination, and the country is also improving its shortcomings step by step. The implementation of a system is bound to have advantages and disadvantages, and how to achieve perfection is exactly what China has been thinking about. To transport and train talents from all walks of life for the country, or to bring them into the current college entrance examination system, we must adhere to the principle of fairness, vigorously develop education and improve the overall quality of the people. This is the only way to revitalize China.

Supplement: What procedures do students need to become tribute students and what exams do they have to pass?

Palace Examination-Palace Examination takes an examination written and invigilated by the emperor himself in the palace, which is called palace examination. Candidates who succeed in the palace examination are called Jinshi. Palace examination is the highest-level examination in the imperial examination system, which began during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Tang Dynasty and has been followed in subsequent dynasties.

The imperial examination in Qing Dynasty was held in the third year of Shunzhi (1646). The imperial examinations in the early Qing Dynasty were held outside Tiananmen Square. In the fifteenth year of Shunzhi (1658), it was changed in front of the hall of supreme harmony in Danyong. In the first year of Yongzheng (1723), it was moved to the main hall because of the cold weather. After Qianlong, palace examination was changed to Baohe Hall. The topics of court examinations are generally decided by the emperor. In order to prevent leaks, the reader secretly drew up a topic and immediately sent it to the emperor for reading. After that, it was supervised by the producer and auditor on the spot, and the printing office was on alert all night. After Gong Sheng's answer sheet, it will be graded by the marking officer. After repeated reading, the papers were ranked, and the names, resumes and three generations of the top ten papers were hidden and presented to the emperor for ranking.

After the ranking was determined, the examination paper officer introduced the top ten to the emperor, and then wrote the big and small gold lists. The small golden list was given to the emperor for his royal viewing, while the big golden list was hung outside the left gate of Chang 'an on the day of transmission, and then the golden hall transmission ceremony was held in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, which was a grand ceremony for the emperor to announce the first place in the Jinshi. There are three types of Jinshi in Qing Dynasty, one is for Jinshi discipline, the other is for Jinshi origin, and the third is for fellow Jinshi origin. The top three in Grade A are also called "No.1 Scholar", "No.1 Scholar" and "Flower Exploration" respectively, and are awarded the positions of editor and editor by the Hanlin Academy.