Emperor Zhengde

Chapter 27 Pharmaceutical Engineering of Nitroglycerin

Zhu Houzhao continued to talk about his ideas on opening a bank, especially the important role of the central bank in stabilizing the empire's financial order. As an emperor, his purpose was naturally not as simple as just maximizing his own interests.

Of course, since the commodity economy of the Ming Dynasty has not yet become active and the monetary system is still very chaotic, it is difficult to establish a central bank and issue currency directly from the beginning, because the main currency of the Ming Dynasty is still grain, and the Taicang, which accounts for the main source of national income, basically stores grain.

Silver did not become the main currency until after the Jiajing period, when the Age of Discovery began and large amounts of silver flowed into the Ming Dynasty through trade from the West.

Therefore, the first bank cannot be a central bank, but in Zhu Houzhao's view, it must be a financial institution that stores most of the wealth of Ming society.

Xu Jing was born into a wealthy merchant family, and as a juren, he was not stupid. After Zhu Houzhao explained to him the concept and operation of banks, he almost understood them. He just said:

"Your Majesty, what you said seems to be similar to opening a bank, but what I want to say is that the treasure notes of the Ming Dynasty are worthless now, private money is rampant, and the currency system is already in chaos. Now the world mostly trades in gold, silver or physical objects. If Your Majesty opens a bank to mint coins, it may make the currency system even more chaotic."

What Xu Jing said just now made Zhu Houzhao realize that currency reform was also imminent in the Ming Dynasty. Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, who did not understand finance, made the financial market of the Ming Dynasty very chaotic, which seriously affected the development speed of the empire's commodity economy.

"For the time being, the so-called bank is not like a money house that mints coins and exchanges them. However, I will ask the Ministry of Revenue to reform the currency system and prohibit private coinage. But for now, it is only used for storing gold and silver and lending. The gold and silver obtained from the seizure of property by Wang Yue and other rebels, as well as the gold and silver obtained by the Royal Tax Bureau and even the national treasury in the future will be stored in the Royal Bank, and the Royal Bank will pay the interest.

Of course, the Royal Bank's profit model is lending. I will ban private lending and fundraising at that time. Under such conditions, I believe that you, Xu Jing, can use the money obtained from the Royal Tax Bureau's seizure of property and the money obtained from taxation to create more wealth."

After Zhu Houzhao said this, Xu Jing couldn't help but laugh. He understood that as long as the emperor banned private fundraising and lending, the so-called Royal Bank would naturally be very profitable, so he said, "Then I will follow your majesty's order and prepare to set up a Royal Bank. When the time comes, please give me convenience and grant official positions to the people I recommend. This way, I can gather such talents. Otherwise, how can those money shop owners be willing to work for the court?"

"I will naturally give you convenience. I asked you to do it because I couldn't find such talents. If you can find someone here, I will naturally treat you as a national talent." Zhu Houzhao nodded and asked Xu Jing to do it immediately. He knew that as a wealthy businessman, it would not be difficult for Xu Jing to find a few people who were good at gold and silver trading.

After listening to Zhu Houzhao's detailed explanation, Liu Jin and the other eight tigers understood what Zhu Houzhao meant. Although it was the first time they heard of the concept of a bank, they also understood that once they followed the emperor to establish such a bank similar to a money shop, it would mean eternal wealth!
First of all, His Majesty the Emperor is undoubtedly the richest man in the world. Once he wants to open a royal store, for Liu Jin and other eight tigers, the Royal Bank is the royal store. That means no one dares to manage this store, and it will not go bankrupt, and it will continue to make money.

Therefore, Liu Jin and others responded positively to Emperor Zhu Houzhao's request for them to invest, and they directly thanked the emperor for his grace.

Xu Jing had been immersed in the joy of being an official. He had always wanted to enter the official career. Although he was born into a wealthy businessman, the imperial examination fraud case in the 12th year of Hongzhi made him lose the qualification to be an official.

Therefore, he was indeed very happy that Zhu Houzhao had given him the opportunity to be an official. Now the emperor was going to grant him wealth and honor, make him a shareholder of the Royal Bank, and let him give full play to his strengths and open the Royal Bank. He really didn't know how to thank the emperor.

Xu Jing found that the 100,000 taels of silver he spent at the Royal Exposition were not a loss at all. He couldn't help but think to himself that in the future, whenever the Emperor wanted to spend money, he would be willing to give it to His Majesty, because it seemed that the Emperor would not treat him unfairly.

Now that His Majesty the Emperor wants to open a bank, he is not stingy and immediately says that he will take out all the cash he has.

Liu Jin and the other eight tigers had already learned from following Emperor Zhu Houzhao to establish the Royal Industrial Company that investing money in His Majesty the Emperor would bring benefits, and the benefits were not small. They knew that their emperor was not the kind of master who was willing to take money from his servants for free.

However, Zhu Houzhao did not intend to let only Xu Jing, Liu Jin and other eight tigers invest. He had to let Xu Jing, Liu Jin and other eight tigers go to the dignitaries in the court to solicit investment. He wanted to give these people a chance to show their loyalty. If these people were willing to invest money to help himself as the emperor, he would naturally benefit from these people. If these people were unwilling to help him, Zhu Houzhao could also use this to distinguish who was truly loyal to him.

After instructing Xu Jing, Liu Jin and other eight tigers to raise investment, Zhu Houzhao did not say any more to Xu Jing and others. Instead, he took Qiu Ju to the Royal Industrial Experimental Base to continue researching the pharmaceutical engineering of nitroglycerin.

The scale of the current Royal Industrial Experimental Base has expanded, and many more instruments have been added. Especially with the emergence of glass, the chemical experiments in the Royal Industrial Experimental Base have better experimental conditions. At the same time, stimulated by Emperor Zhu Houzhao's generous rewards for those who made technological breakthroughs, a group of young eunuchs who first followed him to make soap have now almost become technical backbones.

The reason why Zhu Houzhao was obsessed with the pharmaceutical engineering of nitroglycerin was not only because he wanted to make a fortune by creating a miracle drug to treat heart disease, but more importantly, he wanted to master the control method of glyceryl trinitrate in order to prepare for the production of trinitrotoluene.

After all, this would realize the military value of nitro explosives.

When Zhu Houzhao came to the Royal Industrial Experimental Base to observe the pharmaceutical engineering of nitroglycerin, it was still Qiu Ju who actually operated it. Qiu Ju himself did not dare to let his master touch this stuff, and even found a eunuch to help him. But the fact is that the trinitroglycerin is no longer dangerous, because Zhu Houzhao only let Qiu Ju use one drop of nitroglycerin and diluted it several times with distilled water.

However, what is important in the production of nitroglycerin ester drugs is not the early reaction but the later crystallization technology and product purity. After all, this is something that is going to be ingested by humans, and it requires several phases of clinical trials.

Zhu Houzhao had asked Qiu Ju to find monkeys to create a pathological model of heart disease, but how to make monkeys suffer from diseases such as angina pectoris was also a difficult problem.

(End of this chapter)