ABSTRACT
The main concern of a Confucian scholar was to understand the essence of his culture so that he knew how to apply his learning. The aim of the defenders of Confucianism was to arrest the disintegration of the Republic and the decay of morality which affected the conduct of public and private affairs. The debate between the Confucian conservatives and the modern iconoclasts continued. The barrenness of conservatism left the essence of the Confucian tradition seriously eroded. In Ch'en's appraisal, modern European civilization had in every aspect outstripped China. The decline of the Chinese civilization was due to a host of reasons which had inhibited and stifled the individualities and abilities of the Chinese. Total Westernization would never result in total eradication of the Chinese tradition; it would arrive only at a reconciliation of the two, preserving what was strong and obliterating what was weak in a natural process of selection.
