Like a happy and secure childhood, Confucian civilization bestowed upon its practitioners the self-confidence to meet the challenge of the West. Since Confucianism was essentially an agnostic ideology, concerned with the management of the visible world, the post-Confucians experienced little of the spiritual angst that afflicted Hindus, Muslims, and Christians in their collision with the “materialism” of industrial society.
正如一个快乐的童年对人的影响一样，儒教文明给予其奉行者面对西方挑战的自信。由于儒教在本质上是一种不可知论的意识形态，只关注可见的世界的管理，所以后儒家弟子们几乎没有经历过那种印度教徒、穆斯林和基督徒在与工业社会的“唯物主义”的冲突中所引发的精神痛苦的折磨。