Although Toynbee was 39 years old at this time, his academic thinking was still in the early stages and he did not know much about the situation in China. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info Therefore, on the issue of China, Toynbee was easily persuaded and refuted by Zhou Hexuan.

It wasn't until the middle and late periods, after Toynbee traveled to China twice, that he really had a systematic understanding of China, and finally became a "Chinese fan".

In 1974, Toynbee had an exchange with the Japanese scholar Daisaku Ikeda, and the content of the conversation was compiled into "Looking Ahead to the Twenty-first Century".

Toynbee's bold prediction that humanity would develop into a monolithic society, and that the traditional methods of conquest by force would hardly work again in the age of atomic energy. If the world can be peacefully reunified, it will certainly be based on geography and culture as the main axis, and it will continue to crystallize and expand. This spindle is not in the United States, the USSR and Europe, but in East Asia. China, on the other hand, is the core of a unified world, and the Chinese nation has the advantages in the political and cultural fields and has unparalleled experience, and China will achieve a dominant position in the 21 st century.

Toynbee said this at a time when China had not yet finished a special decade, and no one would have believed it at all.

Even when Daisaku Ikeda asked Toynbee which country he would like to be born in if he could live a new life, Toynbee said without hesitation that he would like to be born in China.

Of course, this is Toynbee in his later years, he was pessimistic about Western civilization, so he believed that Eastern civilization would dominate the world.

Toynbee, in middle age, was not yet a pessimist, but a romantic.

The two were not dwelling on religious issues, and Toynbee said: "The development of civilization lies in facing and overcoming challenges, and every time a challenge is overcome, it is a progress of that civilization." ”

"I agree with that." Zhou Hexuan said with a smile.

The students in the audience were very surprised, because Toynbee said that the challenge of civilization, Zhou Hexuan had just told them some time ago, and the theories of the two masters were surprisingly consistent.

Zhou Hexuan also said: "The industrial revolution in the West is a process of challenge and response. Western civilization has overcome the challenge, so it has made a qualitative leap forward, and led the entire human civilization to progress. The Chinese civilization is now also facing challenges, as long as it can overcome this hurdle, the Chinese civilization will usher in a new life. ”

Toynbee said with a smile: "From the perspective of the development history of Chinese civilization, it is only a matter of time before it will definitely overcome the challenge." The Chinese civilization is one of the most unique civilizations in the world, and it already has the core to overcome various challenges, provided that the state of great unification is restored. ”

"China is waiting for an opportunity," Zhou said with a smile, "such as another world war." ”

"It is quite possible," said Toynbee, gloomily, "that the state of affairs in Europe today is not optimistic, and that the dangers of capitalism are endless." In the next 20 years, Europe will either have a great revolution or a war of great proportions. The existing capitalist system must be reformed, otherwise it will slide into the abyss step by step. This kind of reform can only be carried out smoothly through revolution or war reshuffle. ”

I grass!

Zhou Hexuan felt extremely shocked, the master is worthy of being a master, and he can see through history!

Toynbee, who was not only a historian and an expert on international issues, but also had a unique perspective on economics, said: "Economists, including Adam Smith, believed that the only effective way to increase national wealth was freedom." I couldn't agree more with this view, because the Industrial Revolution was the job of free competition to replace the medieval controls that controlled the production and distribution of wealth, so that the productive forces could be greatly unleashed. But freedom is not perfect, laissez-faire can break monopoly and regulation, but it will give birth to new forms of monopoly, and then brew fierce social contradictions. At this time, the power of control is needed to intervene and pull the excessive freedom back into the correct and orderly track. ”

State capitalist ideas?

Before Zhou Hexuan could speak, Toynbee smiled and said, "I like the Chinese theory of yin and yang very much, which can be used to explain the development of capitalism. The economic system under the control of the Middle Ages is the extreme yin state, and laissez-faire capitalism is the extreme yang state, which will be transformed into yin. At this time, the harmony of yin and yang is needed, well, in traditional Chinese thought, it is the golden mean. ”

"Mr. Toynbee, you have a deep understanding of Chinese culture." Zhou Hexuan said funny.

Toynbee shook his head and said, "I don't understand Chinese, let alone Chinese Chinese." Everything I know about China has been translated and relayed by a friend. To be honest, Chinese was too difficult to learn, and I didn't have the experience to delve into it. Therefore, there are probably omissions and errors in the part of my treatise on China, thank you for correcting it earlier. ”

Zhou Hexuan smiled: "Speaking of China, Mr. Toynbee doesn't seem to agree with the existence of Xia Shangzhou? ”

Toynbee said: "I think the Xia Dynasty is a legend, and the Shang and Zhou did exist, but it is possible that they did not form a valid political entity. ”

"Mr. Toynbee, please see." Zhou Hexuan took out a stack of photos from his briefcase, which was taken by a reporter from Ta Kung Pao.

Toynbee looked at it carefully with interest and asked, "Is this a recent photo of that archaeological site in Shandong?" ”

"That's right," Zhou Hexuan said, pointing to the jade on the picture, "this is Zhang, this is Qi, this is Bi...... These are the rituals of Chinese civilization that have been continued from ancient times. They have many functions, such as subordination, such as diplomacy, and the most important role is to worship the heavens and gods. Ritual utensils are the materialized manifestation of the ritual system, and the appearance of ritual instruments proves that a political system has been formed. These ritual vessels appeared in the Neolithic Age, indicating that since that time, Chinese civilization has continued to this day, and its core spirit is still retained. ”

"That doesn't prove that Xia Shang Zhou is a politically unified country, it can only show the super-long continuity of Chinese civilization." Toynbee said.

Zhou Hexuan said with a smile: "As we said earlier, the core of Chinese civilization is the idea of the unity of heaven and man. The ruler of the Zhou Dynasty was called the Son of Heaven, which means the herdsmen of the heavens, and the heavens and the people were united. The idea of great unification also sprouted in Zhou, and the whole world was not the king's land, but all the tribes and nationalities who used these ritual weapons at that time should theoretically believe in the Son of Heaven. Even though the rights were not unified, the Zhou dynasty was certainly unified culturally and politically. ”

"No, no, no, your argument is too far-fetched," Toynbee shook his head repeatedly, "I have studied the sub-feudal system of the Zhou Dynasty, which is equivalent to the feudal system of Europe. To use a not-so-vivid analogy, Zhou Tianzi is like the emperor of the Habsburgs, nominally representing orthodoxy, but it is just a decoration. Can you say that the Habsburg Emperor, who had lost his authority, was able to rule Western and Central Europe? At that time, could Western and Central Europe be called one country? ”

Zhou Hexuan smiled helplessly: "Okay, let's end this argument, because no one can convince the other party." ”

This is really impossible to debate, because the standards of Chinese and Western archaeology are different. The standard in the West is to have temples, walls, and bronzes, while China attaches more importance to the discovery of jade, because jade is an important feature of Chinese civilization.

Toynbee and Zhou Hexuan chatted ramblingly, one moment about human civilization, one moment about European and American politics, one moment about East Asian cultural circles, and occasionally about the economy.

The students listened with flying eyebrows, and Luo Jialun, who was in charge of recording the conversation, was also excited.

Many of the conversations between the two were conjectures and inferences, as well as various academic breakthroughs. For future generations, these things may be able to be said by a junior high school student, which is a matter of common sense.

But now in the late 1920s, their exchanges were astonishingly advanced, prophetic, and groundbreaking.

A casual sentence may seem to many students to open the door to a new world, and their understanding of history, culture, and the world has changed.

Commonly known as refreshing the three views.

The next day, Tsinghua's school-running magazine published the full text and details of the exchange between the two, and the news title was called "The Collision of Ideas between Two Eastern and Western Masters".

This journal was circulated by students and even reprinted by other universities in Beiping, which caused great repercussions in the cultural and academic circles of the north.

It wasn't until 80 years later that this report was dug out of the pile of old papers and posted on the Internet in full, which immediately caused a sensation and heated discussion. Because it predicts World War II, capitalist reform, and the rise of China.

Netizens began to spoof, making photos of Zhou Hexuan and Toynbee into various emojis, jokingly calling them "Great Prophets" and "Law Wizards".