歐洲激進啟蒙時期（1685-1740）對中國經典及思想之讚賞

Admiration of China and Classical Chinese Thought in the Radical Enlightenment (1685-1740)

十八世紀初期的歐洲，存在著一場關於如何詮釋中國儒學思想的激烈爭論：激進啟蒙運動將儒學視為本質上的無神論與唯物論，為斯賓諾莎主義的一種變形；這類見解一部份是受到諸如弗西鄂斯、坦普爾、聖埃弗勒蒙、培爾、柯林斯與弗雷烈等人顛覆性的著作所致，但實際上更為主流啟蒙陣營的一支溫和派（以阿爾諾、馬勒伯朗士神父與拉科塞等人為代表）所影響。這支溫和派大抵上接受激進派的主張，更無意與之對抗，因而也接受貶抑中國古代思想聲望的立場。反對陣營的主力為萊布尼茲與耶穌會成員，認為中國古代哲學緊扣著「自然神學」與「天命所授」等概念；這種見解由於遭逢教皇體制的打壓，並受到索邦神學院的責難而未能興盛。

The European controversy over how to interpret Chinese Confucianist thought, during the early eighteenth century left the Radical Enlightenment's conception of Confucianism as essentially atheistic, materialist and as resembling Spinozism, in a generally rather strong position. This was partly because the subversive argument put forward by writers like Isaac Vossius, William Temple, Saint-Evremond, Pierre Bayle, Anthony Collins and Nicolas Freret was, in effect, supported by one wing of the moderate mainstream Enlightenment, most notably by Arnauld, Malebranche, and La Croze, who arrived at broadly the same conclusion out of opposite motives, wanting thereby to damage the reputation of classical Chinese thought (and also that of the Jesuits). The opposing view upheld by the Jesuits and Leibniz, according to which classical Chinese philosophy embraces 'natural theology' and a providential God, did not prosper so well as it came to be opposed by the Papacy and condemned by the Sorbonne.