西方科学与徐光启“内圣外王”理想的实践

Western Science and Xu Guangqi’s Practice of “Internal Saints and External Kings”

面对晚明衰颓,儒家"内圣外王"理想的追求更具现实急迫性。徐光启在对中西学术深入学习比较后,创造性地将西方科学融入对内圣外王的追求中。他试图通过引进西方的天文历算知识、农业水利技术、军事装备等达成"外王"的追求;同时,通过推广西方演绎逻辑,开辟了由智达德的新途径,希冀实现"内圣"。徐光启的努力激发了明清之际中西科学会通的高潮,促进了科学方法融入儒学,提供了儒学与科学良性互动的范例。

In the face of the serious social and political crisis in late Ming, the thought of "internal saints and external kings" had to remold. Having studied and compared the science between China and the west, Xu Guangqi creatively put western science into the remodeling process of "internal saints and external kings". He attempted to introduce western astronomy and calendar, agricultural water conservancy technology, military equipment and so on to the remodeling of "external kings", and he tried to promote Western deductive logic, open a new way from intelligence to morality, to complete the remodeling of "internal saints". Xu Guangqi’s work inspired Western science in late Ming and early Qing, promoted the scientific paradigm method into Confucianism and provided a good example of the interaction between Confucianism and science.