Several points must first be clarified before entering into a detailed discussion of this theme.

"man’s ultimate concern" is a religiously loaded expression in the context of Christianity. It is defined in this paper as the human pursuit -- spiritual, social or moral -- which transcends the subject’s present physical existence and immediate material interests towards an ideal, but remote, future. The future is to be, or is hoped to be, a living reality, either in this world or the next.

Secondly, to render our discussion more realistic and less scholastic, I will frequently use two metaphors to describe or animate the rich meaningfulness of man’s ultimate concern and economic development: God, in the broad wide sense, and Mam-mon, money or the devil.

Finally, the approach to their relationship will be more anth-ropological than philosophical, though in the final analysis the ultimate itself is a matter of metaphysics. The relation of God to Mammon is meaningful only when related to human nature and to immediate and future human concerns. Empirical life tells us that humans are half angel and half devil. As a rational soul, on the other hand, one always hopes to rise above one’s imperfect nature and to reach absolute truth, beauty and goodness. This is a dream, both indispensable and impossible. It is in this sense that an anth-ropological approach can interpret the existence of God -- an anthropomorphic deity, utopia or ultimate concern -- as a pro-jection of that dream; as such it is a necessary hypothesis which defies verification or falsification, and serves not only as a hope but as a normative force by which one regulates one’s daily behavior.

The constant conflict between God and Mammon or dream and reality reflects a pair of deep-rooted yet contradictory human desires; it constitutes also the most important antinomy in the process of human history. Each asserts its own necessity and validity, but takes the rejection of the other as the prerequisite of its own existence. History develops through the efforts made by man for their equilibrium, but the antinomy itself can never be solved, for otherwise history would come to its end. If we surrender ourselves to a literal or fundamentalist interpretation of what Jesus Christ said: "One cannot serve both God and money" and try to suppress the latter, it would amount to considering humans divine and denying the historical antinomy. This, in turn, often paves the way for political totalitarianism and stifles the individual’s creativeness in economic life. As a matter of fact, humans are slaves of two masters. This does not necessarily contradict the pre-cept that one should not be a slave to two masters, for otherwise God would not have sent Jesus Christ to this world. To a large extent, "ought to be" is demanded only because of the lack of the "what is" that is expected in human behavior.

The relationship between one’s ultimate concern and eco-nomic development incorporates at least three questions:

The second question refers to a matter of fact while the other two are somewhat hypothetical in nature. I will concentrate on the first one and then shift to the third.

The first question is most interesting for three reasons: historical, academic and political. It brings to mind Max Weber’s Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, a sociological ap-proach to the historical and historic success of modern industrial capitalism. This has inspired some scholars to uncover a pro-position similar to Weber’s from the Chinese economic miracle, so as to explain what has been happening in the Confucian cultural milieu. Even the masses, who know nothing about Max Weber and have little interest in abstract theoretical reflection, are confronted in one way or another with this hypothesis. It is raised as a question because the mass media, whose principal task is to prevent the loyalty to the ruling political ideology from being discredited, says that altruism (or the spirit of Lei Feng) doe not contradict the profit-motivated market economy. So, when scholars try to locate a god which can promote capital accumulation, the official propaganda advocates that the two masters, God and Mammon, are not enemies but, perhaps, potential friends.

The absolute faith in God on the part of Calvinists made pos-sible, in a very peculiar way the non-utilitarian pursuit of wealth, namely, making money not for the sake of money; as a result of which the traditional gap between God and Mammon was bridged. This connection was inferred by Max Weber from what already had happened; it is a postulate rather than a verified causal relation. Weber’s analyses, including those concerning China, opened a new vista. We can take his hypothesis as a framework for a creative reflection upon Chinese concerns and problems, but we must bear in mind that, even if Weber’s conclusion can be proved, it stands only as a unique case in history and has no universal significance. His critical judgment of Chinese religions is not contemporary. Chinese readers, whether they agree or disagree with Max Weber, find it difficult to resist the temptation of his argument. Is it not justifiable to say that the Chinese ultimate concern cultivated with-in the Confucian tradition, can act as a dynamic spiritual force advancing China’s material modernization? A negative answer would almost equal cultural nihilism and is not acceptable to many Chinese people. It would be rational, however, to investigate the Chinese ultimate concern first before saying yes or no.

Historical documents and contemporary reflection both tell us that the mental combination of Heaven and man is the ultimate concern upon which is built the whole value system of traditional Chinese culture. This unity determines in the final analysis the interpretation and understanding of "what is true", "what is good" and "what is beautiful". In spite of its apparent similarity to other (e.g. Christian) metaphysical speculation on unity, one must ask about its immanent manifestation in everyday life, without which metaphysics would be empty talk. Let us focus first upon the term Heaven. It was understood often as cosmic nature or the whole universe; mixing with Zen Buddhism, it became the aesthetic basis of traditional Chinese art and poetry. Another objectification of the idea of Heaven points to the external social surroundings which lead logically to the Confucian social ideal of a classless world in which altruism prevails and equality triumphs (the ideal of Da-tong). The first interpretation of Heaven, we are told, stands in sharp contrast to the traditional Christian doctrine that cosmic nature is to be used and conquered by man, and is therefore of great consequence in solving contemporary ecological problems.

What is more important, the combination of Heaven and man centers around man himself, rather than God, and presupposes what is called "inner transcendence". This brings man to the infinite within this world, thus excluding the utterly visionary and insubstantial Christian paradise in the other world. With such a perfect and beautiful ultimate concern, what else on earth does the Chinese mind need from the outside world to better its spiritual life? The Kingdom of all the kingdoms is here. Confronted with this theoretical deduction -- a little oversimplified through restatement, but still true in essence -- one cannot help asking why it is that the Chinese ultimate concern, unlike the Calvinistic doctrine which started to work almost as soon as it was established, has had to wait for 2000 years for a chance to find a similar opportunity. How explain away the fact that in China now money talks while God remains silent? What accounts for the aggravated abuse and viola-tion of natural resources for quick success and immediate profit, a common sight in everyday Chinese economic life?

According to a questionable academic argument, the positive aspects of the Chinese tradition have almost been destroyed as a result of the iconoclastic attack upon Confucianism since the beginning of this century, especially the application of the radical theory of class and class struggle after 1949. This called upon the intellectual elite to devote its time and energy to the creative re-building or transformation of their cultural heritage. Some ambi-tious but naive young and middle-aged philosophers are working very hard in their studies and classrooms for an ideal blueprint which might regulate the future development of Chinese cultural and economic activities. Admirable as their efforts are, they fail to realize that they have been caught up in a serious hermeneutical problem.

What constitutes a real, living tradition that transcends the division of "past", "present" and "future" is not merely something one can find in books or historical documents. Its "application" -- to use one of Gadamer’s key concepts -- depends not only upon how the content is interpreted and re-interpreted on the part of the intelligentsia, but upon how this is received, accepted and inter-nalized by the whole nation. Books can be burned, temples pulled down and rituals banned, or new values come in, old customs can disappear and current interpretations can obscure and reduce to oblivion their predecessors, but the spirit of Confucianism survives living in the Chinese people, the great majority of whom might never have read Confucius. The relevant point is that the spirit or tradition is what really works in an essential sense upon the whole nation and exercises substantial influence upon its economic activities. In other words, tradition in its final analysis is a matter of anthropological empiricism, rather than of pure philosophical meditation. I will argue in the following that, owing to the lack of a religious tradition in the Western sense, the combination of Heaven and man as the ultimate concern cannot positively promote Chinese economic development. For the benefit of comparison and contrast, my argument will center around and develop two Christian phenomena pertinent to the re-examination of Con-fucianism: institutionalization and God as an invisible supervisory authority.

Christianity as an institutionalized doctrine invited vehement attack during the Age of Enlightenment and still remains a ready-made target for extreme liberals. For more than a thousand years the Church attempted to control the European mind by mono-polizing the interpretation of the Bible; it institutionalized the Christian world into a hierarchy of often repressive power. Never-theless, we can never overestimate the other side of the coin. It was the institutionalization itself that made the diffusion of biblical knowledge possible. The message that God delivers nature to man and encourages him to subjugate it was recorded in Latin. It was through the interpretation by the Church as mediator that the notion merged into the European consciousness and subconsciousness and became part of the tradition. The translation of Holy Scripture into various vernaculars helped to reinforce what was already a well-organized, systematic indoctrination. The shaping of the human consciousness as separate from nature and as master of nature is one of the great contributions by Christianity to the development of modern science. To meet the challenge of environmental crises, contemporary theology returns to the Bible for another kind of interpretation. As is mentioned above, something written or im-plied in books does not automatically become a constituent part of the established value standards and behavior patterns. It takes time to internalize new interpretations.

The situation with Confucianism is different. It used to be considered as the official ideology, but was never institutionalized. There was no Confucian Church or Party to organize nation-wide preaching. This is the weak, as well as the strong, point of Con-fucianism. What is more, the Confucian literati, who lacked a mis-sionary consciousness and overstressed introspective self-cul-tivation, tended to look down upon the illiterate masses. As a result, there existed a big gap between Confucian metaphysics and Con-fucian immanence. Such Christian ideas as the existence of God, free will, an immortal soul, original sin and salvation are basic concerns common to theology and empirical life. But it is not so with Confucianism. Hence, when contemporary philosophers engage in the discussion about the "union of Heaven and man" as the Chinese ultimate concern, we must ask how the Chinese pea-sants, who make up over 80 percent of the Chinese population, understand it. So far I have not found any empirical investigation, nor do I think that our erudite metaphysicians would condescend to such trivial things.

Since reliable reports based on field work are not available, we have to trust our eyes: what has been happening around us pro-vides testimony to the peasants’ and even urbanites’ understanding. This is embodied in a familiar Chinese saying whose literal word-to-word translation is: "When you are near a mountain, eat the mountain; when you are near a river, eat the river." For it to make sense, we must re-translate it as, "Rely on the mountains and rivers in your neighborhood for a living." But the second version is highly misleading. The metaphor "eat" used in the saying comes from another Confucian idea that "People take food as Heaven" -- also a word-for-word translation. It is not an ordinary figure of speech in the rhetorical sense; "eat" here means swallowing up one mountain after another and one river after another. This is another kind of "combination of Heaven and man" from which the question naturally follows: when the Chinese ultimate concern remains a patent locked in the philosopher’s ivory tower, can it have any positive bearing upon the economic activities of a whole nation? A theory that attempts to explain the world is not necessarily one that can help to change the world.

What of the traditional social ideal of Datong? Can moral strength generate a powerful material force, as Marx put it, within the Chinese cultural context? To look into this equally dubious hypothesis which Chinese theorists tend to take for granted, I will shift from Heaven to man.

Anthropocentricity is the distinctive feature of Confucianism as compared with Christianity. It underlies the unity of Heaven and man. In his Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, Professor Wing-tsit Chan sums up the entire history of Chinese philosophy with one word: humanism. This idea of man as the center of the universe proves very influential in understanding the Chinese tradition. My question is: how to define the term human? Both theories and facts tell us that in the context of Chinese tradition the meaningful sense of human is not the social human as opposed to the state as a political institution, nor the noumenal human or the human in one-self as opposed to specific, individual persons in the phenomenal world. Rather, it refers first and foremost to the natural person in a father-son relationship. The relationship between the state and individuals was and still is regarded by most Chinese people as an extension of that father-son relationship. That is the deep structure upon which is built the whole value system of Confucianism and of metaphysics as its superstructure. What motivates Chinese hard work in either rural or urban districts is a natural desire or hope that one can live up to one’s father’s expectation and bring about a better future for one’s children. Chinese emigrants in the past serving as coolies in America put up with racial discrimination and died in exile. Today, educated people go to the West and accept what is called by them "second class citizenship". If it were not for the family, all the economic or political or spiritual reasons would be irrelevant.

When the Chinese become very rich, the first consideration is not a donation to charity or public welfare, but investment in their home towns so as to prove that they have added honor to their ancestors. Even in resistance to foreign invasion, the battle cry put forward by the government is almost always the same: Safeguard your family and defend your country. It is not by chance that family is put before country. The Chinese people as a whole are not ready to devote their lives to an abstract noble ideal unless the family is broken and the family members cannot survive. For the family they can do anything, even at the cost of their lives. Some went so far as to betray their motherland and work as Chinese quislings. This is the primitive or original, yet ever dynamic, Confucianism inter-nalized by the Chinese people; it is a far cry from the well-designed theories coming out of meditation in one’s study. Family, as a Japanese sinologist pointed out, is the real Great Wall in China.

Mao Tse-dong was the first political leader in this century who not only had an insight into the Chinese tradition, but mani-fested great flexibility in taking advantage of that tradition. When he went to the peasants to start a communist revolution, he did not read to them the Communist Manifesto nor did he preach altruism or the ideal of Datong. Instead, he adapted to the peasants’ basic requirement for the survival of their families by putting forward a simple slogan: "Down with the Local Tyrants and Redistribution of the Land!" Its economic and, to a large extent, social implication was anything but communistic, yet he succeeded. Of course, he changed his strategy after coming to power in 1949. With an identi-cal insight and flexibility, Deng Xiao-ping gave the land back to the peasants in a very particular and effective way, which immediately rejuvenated the peasants’ ideal in life and subsequently created powerful material force: economic reform was started. Without this strategic reorientation in the rural districts, which was based on a proper understanding of Chinese historical and cultural con-ditions, the open door policy which made possible ushering in a series of Western ideas would have been out of the question.

Problems with the Chinese revolution and reconstruction are in essence a matter of the peasantry. This is not only because they constitute the largest part of the population, but because their basic value standard is shared by the whole nation, including the in-tellectuals. Hard work for the next generation, specified as "for one’s own children", is the real cultural dynamism that caused the enduring boom in Chinese economic life. If this could be regarded -- though I do not think so -- as "ultimate concern", it could never be proved by adopting a proposition similar to Weber’s or deducing it from the metaphysical philosophy of the union of Heaven and man, or elaborating the social ideal of a classless world where altruism prevails. The natural man in the sense of father-son relationship maintains an everlasting vigor and vitality, but it also backfires. Its inevitable aftereffects are unacceptable, both to capitalism and to socialism, let alone communism. The Chinese dilemma which accompanies its success is really unique.

Can altruism, accepted at least in theory by means of mass indoctrination, become a normative force which puts a limit on the search for profit? We now shift from the first to the third question: can God interfere and keep human greed in check?

According to Mencius, this seems impossible: "He who seeks to be rich will not be benevolent. He who wishes to be benevolent will not be rich." Contemporary moral philosophers who set themselves the task of promoting traditional merit do not think it impossible. Positively speaking, Mencius also said, they argue, that everyone can be a saint ("All men can be Yaos and Shuns"). Negatively, The Great Learning teaches that "the morally superior man must be watchful over himself when he is alone." Both are very much quoted; the latter was even adopted by Liu Shao-qi, the late Chairman of the PRC and the No-Two- Party leader next to Mao Tse-dong, as one of the most important propositions in his famous work The Self-Cultivation of a Communist Party Member. Putting both sides together, one might argue that one can be im-mune from corruption by oneself. This is also a very strong belief held by Chinese intellectuals, (though they may disagree among themselves on what is the ultimate good). This position, both traditional and contemporary, is blind to some theoretical problems.

First, the correct and accurate statement concerning ultimate concern in its moral sense is that everyone ought to be a saint, rather than that everyone can be a saint. It is just because of the fact that in real life all men or most men cannot be saints that we set the impossible as our ideal. Mencius changed "ought to" into "can", a logical fallacy due to his metaphysical desire. With "can" as a misplaced and misleading mediator, the vital difference between "to be a saint" and "ought to be a saint" is obscured. This is a problem shared by all Oriental and Occidental pure idealists and moralists. Its disastrous effects on economic, political and social life in history go without saying.

Secondly, how can one be watchful over oneself when one is alone; how can one guarantee one’s self-control? The answer is to rely on oneself; one does not need an external authority to keep a watchful eye upon one. One is one’s own moral master, and hence almost equal to the divine. But historical and empirical facts have proved again and again that alone one cannot deal successfully with Satan. Apart from law, one needs God absolutely or a "categorical imperative" which entails the divine being as the supervising authority. To be free from that guide is to be free to become a devil.

Time-honored Chinese wisdom from Mencius through Neo-Confucianism, from the Song and Ming Dynasties to their con-temporary followers under the banner of "Confucianism at its third historical stage", has made a serious mistake: in its pursuit of the Infinite, it came back consciously or subconsciously to man the finite and takes the latter as the former. "Humanism" or "altruism" in this sense is no rival to human greed and cannot ensure healthy economic development.

It does not follow, however, that this fails to do justice to the noble ideas embodied in the historical and contemporary Chinese moral heros. I tend to believe their stories; modern hermeneutics is not positivistic verification. I do not challenge the credibility of those stories, only because I believe that the ideals conveyed by them are indispensable for us, though we may never be able to reach them. When we read and interpret, we should not confuse two things in the same narrative: the myth and the truth in mystery.

In conclusion, let me sum up my argument in two connected respects: the Chinese dilemma concerning the ultimate concern and economic development, and the problem of the Chinese intellectual elite in regard to this dilemma.

Family in China is the motive force as well as a hindrance in the process of modernization. It is the secret of China’s economic boom and the source of its potential problems. This mental Great Wall can neither be dismantled nor kept intact. Peasants, the most family-orientated class, took the lead in the historical economic reform and contributed a solid foundation for its further progress. In spite of the positive role they play, they are connected closely with all the aftereffects, especially those big problems for China: environmental violations, population explosion and educational degeneration. Tradition has given them neither a firm faith nor a definite, stable ultimate concern. When they are freed from po-litical and ideological control, they are free to do anything. They can facilitate or jeopardize economic development. Even political ideas cherished by the intellectual elite -- the democratic system, social justice and human rights -- might turn out to be dangerous and even catastrophic if put into practice without a careful in-vestigation into some possible responses from the peasantry whose understanding of those ideas differs greatly from that of the intellectuals.

Family and the peasantry are mainly an empirical matter in China. Sober-minded politicians always take them seriously if they want to succeed and remain in power. On the other hand, the in-tellectual elite as a whole -- with some possible exceptions among sociologists -- is preoccupied with its own concerns. Now, there exists a strong and obvious "messiah complex" among the elite stratum who consider themselves to be the saviors of Chinese culture and the representatives of the future China. The critical methods they borrow from the West are anything but self-reflexive. They complain about the decline of Chinese ultimate concern, but neglect the fact that this is their own ultimate concern, not that of the nation as a whole. They like to talk about the Western inte-llectual tradition, but omit the two pacesetters from their ela-boration: Socrates and Jesus Christ. According to Socrates, the only true wisdom consists in knowing that you know nothing. He also regarded himself or the intellectuals as a little gadfly and the state or society as a noble, though sluggish, horse. Jesus, born in a manger, united with the rank and file and offered his vicarious sacrifice. Both are noble because they are humble. Unfortunately, the real significance of the two paradigmatic martyrdoms in the Western tradition falls outside the Chinese intellectuals’ mental horizon. "Happy are those who are humble" cannot humble their pride. Their minds are inflated with beautiful, yet abstract, ideas originating from the Enlightenment, though they do not know how to enlighten the peasants and refuse to enlighten themselves on their own problems.

So, the Chinese dilemma involves both the masses, especially the peasants, and the intellectual elite. They are separated, rather than united. Is this not ironic given the ideal of the unity of Heaven and man? How to solve the dilemma? The question itself poses another dilemma. Here, I make bold to offer a tentative but radical suggestion: the first step for our arrogant and optimistic elite is to discern the way leading to Hell, before dreaming of the royal road to Heaven. A sense of one’s own crises is much more helpful than a comfortable hallucination about oneself. We must always keep in mind the saying written above the temple at Delphi: "Know thyself."

of female in material things and in producing human beings during primitive economic times. With respect to material production, their level then was very low. Women collected natural fruit, while men hunted for animals, but because of poor instruments men often came back with nothing, whereas the collection of fruit by women was the main source of food. In their state of group marriage, everyone knew his or her mother without knowing the father; child bearing was considered the business of women alone. In both material and human production women occupied a dominant position and were respected by everybody. With men they worked hard for the development of humankind, but did not ride roughshod over people by means of their position. Hence, their personalities were sound and beneficial. In such a time women had both position and personality, but they could not be said to have had independent individual personalities. They were conscious of a heavy dependence upon nature and human beings; there was no place for a sense of independent personality.

Progress in productive tools changed the natural division of labor. The rise of agriculture and livestock provided a new productive force. In addition, individual marriage replaced group marriage so that people knew their own parents. Child bearing was no longer a holy affair, but a burden binding women in the family. Men came to occupy the authoritive position in society originally held by women. With the establishment of the system of private property, women no longer had an independent personality, but became an exploited and oppressed part of men’s property.

The development of economy and the progress of the marriage relation need not have led to the loss of women’s personality, but the fact is just the contrary. We have seen several antinomies above: first, women invented primitive agriculture, contributed to the invention of fire and livestock farming, and helped to bring about the development of the economy and progress in history. At the same time, women showed themselves less competent than men in such productive activities as agriculture and livestock farming, which made them subordinate to men; second, women contributed to the continuation of the human race, but child bearing bound them in families and deprived them of the opportunity to take part in social activities; third, males created the culture and value system and made themselves subjects of the society, while treating females as object and tools. Although these are historical antinomies, they were inevitable for human beings in their efforts to free themselves for the bonds of nature. In a society of low productive power, it is an axiom that the weak are prey to the strong. The backwardness of production and its corresponding feudal system and culture could not provide room for an equality of both sexes. Therefore, for the progress of the economy it was unavoidable that women’s personality would be sacrificed. In the dark ages in China as well as in the West women could not participate in politics and the praiseworthy characters of the female were also distorted: women become jealous due to living together with their husband’s concubines; they became self effacing due to being subject to maltreatment; and they became narrow-minded through living for a long time in the boudoir without going out. In the meantime, the distortion of the male personality was manifested in another way. Many men were subordinate to other men due to the social system which gave primary to the father’s rights so that they had no personality of their own. In the family, marriage for the sole purpose of child bearing and expression of the sexual impulse without love alienated the human essence of males.

The industrial economy destroyed the natural sense of the family as the basic unit. Great quantities of labor were needed by large industry. This created opportunities for women to enter social life, to participate in economic activities, to earn salaries, and hence no longer to be the property of others. This provided a good basis for their positions as social subjects. In addition, the democratic system, corresponding to the industrial economy, promoted such ideas as "all are equal in terms of money"; "all are equal before the law", "all are equal before God". This gave rise to public opinion favorable to the independence of women as regards their personality. All this was helpful in awakening women’s personalities as subjects. In industrial society women actively fulfilled their obligations while seeking their legitimate rights and interests in activities which constantly improve their personality. However, the following elements in industrial society frustrated the development of women’s personality or even subjected it to certain deviations.

First, industrial production places the machine at the center; it aims at producing material objects and is determined by the investment of human power and other resources; it emphasizes physical labor and operational technology, and the proportion of physical labor is much greater than that of mental work. This situation is unfavorable to women; they suffer sexual discrimination in seeking a job, which hinders the establishment of women’s personalties as subjects.

Second, due to the backwardness of ideas in comparison to the progress of the economy, certain feudal ideas such as "the male has dignity while the female is humble" and "a woman should be subordinate to a man" still fetter women, and influence social expectations regarding their role and value. This gives rise to certain dilemmas for women in seeking their rights and fulfilling their obligations. Many women feel a tension between their role in society and in their family, and in seeking a position in social life while feeling a sense of obligation to be a good wife and mother.

Third, the male culture inclines women to be masculine: as society has long been dominated by men the behavior of successful men in social life is taken as the pattern for all people. As women have not created their own pattern of behavior, they must conform to the pattern of man’s behavior so that their role in social life will more easily be accepted. This stage cannot be surmounted until women fully participate as subjects in society. Although the slogans such as "equality for both sexes" play a great role in freeing women from the fetters of family to become subjects in society, they are harmful to the maintenance of the distinctively female personality. In China, a trend toward the masculinization of women was strong after the 1950s, and reach its height in the 1970s. The "Iron Young Woman" in the 1950s was very similar to the male physique; in the 1970s the dress, even the style of women’s hair, was masculinized. Coming into 1980s, people exclaimed with surprising that "there are no woman in this country"; they began to doubt whether the "strong woman" was perfect in personality. Women refused to be masculinized.

However, people have no answer to the question what is the ideal personality for women? They sink into puzzlement and inertia. Men are afraid of their wives being "strong women", and women themselves fear being "strong women". In order to be thought of as tender, many women do not dare to show their talent, but then they worry about being too feminine; they do not know how to mould their personalities. The solution to the problem requires further development in the economy as well as constant progress in ideology; one is complementary to the other.

The modernized economy is a great revolution over the traditional one and will bring about change in all facets of society. The female personality will be developed and improved in the process of the modernization of society and its ideal will be realized.

First, the productive mode of the modernized economy helps manifest the personality of women as subjects. In modern industry, what determines the production is no longer physical human strength, but the application of a high level of technology, which increases the proportion of mental work. Now in some developed countries, the proportion of mental work versus physical labor approximates 1:1, while the value created by the former far exceeds that created by the latter. Therefore, the application of high level technology will reduce or eliminate the physical inferiority of women in production, and enable women to give play to their superiority in patience, carefulness and nimbleness. This is obviously indicated in developed countries: in the U.K. women have more job opportunities than men.

Second, the operational mode of a modernized economy enables women to choose the job suited to them. The open, dynamic pattern of the economy enables women to find positions of their own in a wider range of social activity. In developed countries, women are exploring molding ideal personalities. They are not the traditional good mothers and wives who sacrifice themselves in a closed family context, nor are they the so-called strong women of industrial times. They develop their own standard and hope to get a valuable job with flexible hours and a good location; they hope to take account of both family and career. Some women give up work and become housewives while bring up their children, but their return to the family is for the purpose of educating their children and giving their children the natural love of a mother so that the children can grow soundly. In the meantime, they engage in further studies to give play to their potentialities or to develop their interests, so that they will be more competitive when they take up a career after their children have grown up. Such exploration is praiseworthy under the conditions of a modernized economy; it advances the civilization of the whole society.

Third, the high educational level of society, the high degree of democracy and the modernization and socialization of house work due to the modernization of the economy will enable women to elevate their quality as human beings, to demonstrate their personality, to strengthen their competitive power in social life, and to realize a sound personality. There will be a day when we need no longer emphasize that the male and the female differ and recognize that there is something common to both sexes. Then the peculiar and varied beauty of the character and personality of the female will demonstrate itself naturally in the world.

Of course, molding the female personality depends not merely on the progress of economy and is not merely a matter for women alone. It depends on the consistent efforts of the whole society; this requires theoretical work by scholars to find the incompatibilities and in time eliminate them.