It was like a repeat of the literary examination day. The two instructors stood behind the lectern, turned around, and as soon as their gazes swept over, everyone rose to their feet. Greetings were offered in uneven voices, addressing them as "Greetings, Masters." Even the princes were no exception. However, one could still hear the clear voices of girls coming from behind the screen, which was quite different from the Imperial Academy.Ji Ze nodded: "You may be seated." After speaking, he and Li Tao each took their seats beside the lectern.In this era, all masters had seats, unlike later classrooms where teachers could only stand while students sat. A master without a seat would be heavily criticized by people of this time as disrespectful to the master."The Inner Study Hall was established by imperial decree to educate the royal descendants. Therefore, the lessons must focus primarily on the various princes and princesses, progressing step by step and teaching according to each student's aptitude. This differs from the teaching methods used in the Imperial Academy."With these opening words, Ji Ze set the tone for future instruction: "The accompanying students in attendance will certainly have differences in their lessons compared to the princes and princesses. Those who are ahead in progress should review more, while those who are behind must catch up as quickly as possible."Immediately afterward, Ji Ze began calling on students one by one, starting with the youngest, Princess Zhiling, giving on-the-spot questions for assessment.Before the class began, Ji Ze had clearly done his homework. From the Analects studied by both Princess Zhiling and the Seventh Prince, to the Doctrine of the Mean and Great Learning studied by the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Princes, and the Thousand Character Classic studied by the Eldest Prince, he conducted assessments in tiers and levels. Some were asked to recite certain passages, others to analyze specific texts. He quickly completed the entire comprehensive assessment, gaining a clear understanding of the princes' and princess's grasp of knowledge.The accompanying students also took this opportunity to roughly gauge how much their own studies differed from those of the princes and princess.Fu Xuechen, who had crossed over, had only received a small portion of the original host's memories in her mind. It took over half a year to gradually grasp the original host's family relationships and inherit the horseback riding, archery, fist and foot techniques, and a set of swordplay that the original host practiced daily. However, unlike martial arts, which relied mostly on muscle memory, textual memory depended mainly on the mind, and this could not be inherited.Therefore, when Fu Xuechen read textual books from this era, she mainly relied on the relevant knowledge she had brought from her previous life. Fortunately, the written language of the two eras was basically the same, and she was relatively familiar with traditional characters, able to recognize most of them. After crossing over, with a bit more practice, she had no problem even with writing after half a year.Additionally, the basic theories of Confucianism and the development of classics, histories, philosophies, and literature in this era happened to be largely similar to her previous life. Works like the Analects were basically consistent from the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods up to the end of the Han Dynasty, just as in her previous timeline. This allowed her to seamlessly adapt and even borrow poetry and essays from after the Han Dynasty in her previous life to get by.But when it came to the current lessons, Fu Xuechen was still somewhat at a loss. She knew a few chapters of the Analects, but what were the Doctrine of the Mean and Great Learning? How would she know!She hadn't majored in Chinese Language and Literature in her previous life. She could only be thankful that the textbooks of this era were all language-based. Memorizing texts wasn't a problem for her, as her memory was decent. Reading comprehension was even easier for someone who had already graduated from university in her previous life. And if worse came to worst, she could always go back and have Fu Yuchen teach her the analysis of the texts' meanings.The Sixth Prince was being tested on reciting the passage "The way of the gentleman is vast yet subtle" and analyzing its meaning—a total of over a hundred characters. Fu Xuechen flipped through the book to find this section, quickly skimmed the preceding text, and silently breathed a sigh of relief. From the beginning of the text to this passage, it was only about eight hundred characters in total. Given a day, she was certain she could memorize it as well.As for the meaning, with her level of classical Chinese comprehension from over a decade of language studies in her previous life, she could grasp roughly seventy to eighty percent of it after a single read. For the remaining unclear or ambiguous parts, she could simply find an opportunity to consult the teacher. The teachers of this era adhered to Confucius’s philosophy of "teaching without discrimination" and upheld moral integrity, so they were generally very patient in imparting knowledge, answering questions, and resolving doubts. There was no need to worry about them withholding knowledge.Reflecting on the teaching methods of this era, Fu Xuechen couldn’t help but shake her head. She wondered whether high school or university students from later times, if they were to attend classes in this era, would be shocked to find the coursework surprisingly simple, leading them to think, "I could do this too," or "So I’m actually this smart."No foreign languages, no history, geography, or politics, let alone mathematics, physics, chemistry, or biology—just classical Chinese language studies. With over a dozen subjects condensed into one, who wouldn’t be overjoyed and exclaim how easy it was?To put it simply, take the Doctrine of the Mean that the Sixth Prince was studying—its entire text was just over 3,500 characters, fewer than some chapters of modern web novels. The teacher’s requirements were merely to recite the entire text fluently, thoroughly understand its meaning, and expand on the analysis of passages into essays. Scholars here essentially spent their entire lives studying only language and literature, which was why so many could recite the Four Books and Five Classics backward and forward!Master Ji’s teaching method was highly flexible and straightforward. He would call students up to recite the latest content they had learned and analyze its meaning. Mistakes were pointed out and corrected on the spot, followed by repeated study and penalties such as reciting again, copying the text, or writing characters multiple times. Only when a student passed a spot check without errors would the teacher proceed to the next passage, first reading it aloud with punctuation, then providing a preliminary analysis, and finally assigning it for memorization—a cycle repeated over and over.Punctuation, in this context, meant adding simple commas and periods to a text, which was one of the important roles teachers played for their students in the academy.Unlike vernacular novels, newly printed classics, histories, philosophies, and literary collections of this era contained no punctuation marks.Fortunately, in Mingde Hall, the students were either descendants of meritorious officials or scions of scholarly families. The books these study companions brought from home were all older editions that had already been punctuated, sparing Fu Xuechen the trouble of figuring out the punctuation herself.Otherwise, like some students from humble backgrounds in the Imperial College who had to purchase books from the market or borrow and copy new editions, reading thousands of characters without a single punctuation mark would have been exceedingly difficult.After most of the morning had passed, Grand Academician Ji finally finished with all the students. Nodding in satisfaction, he handed over the supervision duties to Hanlin Li, Teacher Li, and left Mingde Hall.He would return every three to five days to conduct spot checks and assess the students’ progress. The remaining teaching tasks, such as assigning and reviewing classwork, answering students’ questions, and providing multi-faceted explanations of new lessons, were all handled by Teacher Li.There was no concept of recess in the schoolhouse; whether lessons were taught depended entirely on the teacher's discretion. Teacher Li appeared quite amiable and was not one to closely supervise the students. After Master Ji left, he settled comfortably by the lectern, holding a book in his hand and reading. Only after a long while would he look up to glance around the classroom.The entire schoolhouse was enveloped in an atmosphere of serene tranquility, as everyone had yet to become familiar with one another.
Chapter 13
The Prince Does Not Compete for the Throne