ABSTRACT
European notions about China and the Chinese have changed more than once over the centuries. In antiquity, China was a mysterious place about which little was or could be known. Through the Middle Ages and up to the end of the 18th century, it was known as a huge country with a stable administration and refined customs and manners: a country which one might well admire. In China, wrote Leibniz, even the peasants behave with a dignity and a reserve which in Europe we find only among the nobility; and they never lose their temper.
