严复的“会通”与自由

从清末开始,中国与西洋接触的规模迅速扩大,出现了前所未有的两个强劲文化体系相互碰撞与融合的现象。由于文化上的非对等关系,又加上政治和经济等原因的影响,与西洋文化的接触便带上了生死存亡的危机感,显现出更为复杂的状态。从而使中国在近代国家的形成过程中,积极导入西洋文化的潮流与执拗维护传统文化的潮流并存,欲以欧化破坏中国传统的倾向与固守旧有礼教政俗的倾向并存,问题的两面性非常显著。在其夹缝之间,严复摸索出了独自的中西文化"会通"方法。

Yan Fu's 'Cultural Mergence' and Liberty

Beginning from the late Qing Dynasty,contact between China and the West began to accelerate,which inevitably led to cultural collision and cultural mergence.In addition to the political and economic inequality in the relationship of China and the West,the infusion of Western culture into China gave rise to a sense of crisis among intellectuals.The process of formation of a modern state in China was accompanied with the two conflicting tides: the influx of Western thoughts and the maintenance of Chinese traditional culture.Yan Fu,however,found a unique way for the convergence of Chinese and western cultures.