What is the enlightenment significance of Wei Yuan's "learning from foreigners to control foreigners" in the modern history of China?

Source: Wei Yuan was a person who explicitly proposed to learn from the West in the modern history of China. He pointed out in "Description of a Sea Country": What is a book? As the saying goes, "attack foreign countries with foreign countries, pay foreign countries with foreign countries, and control foreign countries with foreign countries." The so-called "learning from foreign countries" mainly refers to learning a set of advantages of western capitalist countries in military technology. Wei Yuan said, "The skills of foreigners are three: one warship, two firearms and three training methods." He not only advocated buying guns from the west, but also emphasized the introduction of advanced industrial technology from the west. It refers to resisting aggression and defeating the enemy. Wei Yuan definitely raised the question of whether to learn from the "skills" of western countries to the question of whether to defeat foreign invaders. He stressed that those who are not good at learning from foreigners should be controlled by foreigners. Wei Yuan stood in the position of anti-aggression, took learning from foreigners as a means, and took controlling foreigners as the purpose, showing brilliant patriotic thoughts.

Today's explanation: by learning advanced western military technology, we seek ways to resist powerful countries.

Later, it means: learn advanced technology from the West to resist the West-stones from other mountains can attack jade, which was put forward by Wei Yuan in his Atlas of the Sea.

Historical significance: The so-called "learning from foreigners" means learning from the West. Today, this is a very common proposition, and no one will object. But in the era of Wei Yuan's life, this is a groundbreaking theory, because China's ancient and heavy door has just been opened, and people are full of traditional ideas of "China is superior to the country" and "China is inferior". They only advocate "exchanging summer for foreign countries" and even dare not think about "exchanging foreign countries for summer". In order to convince people to accept his idea of "learning from foreigners", Wei Yuan had to distinguish between native foreigners in China history and foreigners from Europe and America. He wrote: The so-called "barbarian name" refers to those ethnic minorities who live around China but are unknown to Wang Hua, not from highly civilized Europe and America. But in fact, they are different from the native "Yi" in China's history. They are "strange people" in the world and "good friends" in the region, which are worth learning. He also criticized those who adhered to the traditional concept of "respecting China and restraining foreign countries" and opposed "learning from foreigners".

He also pointed out that learning from the West is not about learning everything in the West, but about learning the "long skills" of the West, that is, what is the "long skills" that the West is more advanced than China. Based on the reflection on the reasons for the failure of the Opium War (the backwardness of China's military weapons is one of the reasons for the failure of the Opium War), Wei Yuan believes that there are three ways to "learn from foreigners": first, warships, second, firearms, and third, ways to train troops. Based on his own understanding of the West, in the book, most people in China at that time had never seen or heard of sky ruler, sky observation tube (mercury hygrometer), chronograph, celestial ship (hot air balloon), wind spear (air gun), deck ship (warship), telescope, celestial gun, water harp, organ, wind saw, water saw, air mill and water mill. It also mentioned the newly invented Italian voltaic cell, electrostatic instrument and lightning rod. From the traditional point of view, these "foreign skills" introduced by Wei Yuan are all "strange skills and cunning" and "the end of form", which is absolutely impossible to learn. Once we learn these "strange skills and tricks", a person may feel depressed about things, lose morality and destroy social atmosphere. It is also for this reason that he opposes "learning from foreigners" and learns from the West. Wei Yuan seriously refuted this view. He pointed out: ancient saints, they can't help each other, they are eager to conquer the world. Are these the last things? The compass was made by Duke Zhou and the kettle was made by Zhou Li. These are all useful things. They are strange skills, but they are not smart. Today's western equipment uses wind, water and fire to seize nature, connect gods and exhaust the power of eyes and ears for civilian use. What's wrong? Therefore, "learning from foreigners" is not only a "strange skill but also beneficial to the national economy and people's livelihood, in line with the" sage's way. " He particularly emphasized that "learning from foreigners" must seize the opportunity and speed up the process, because "time depends on time, wisdom can take the lead, and wisdom can't delay time". It is now or never, and "learning from foreigners" can't wait.

In Wei Yuan's view, "learning from foreigners" is only a means, not an end. The purpose is to "control foreigners". In today's words, the so-called "controlling foreigners" is to defeat and stop the invasion of China by western powers, change the situation that China is backward and beaten, and thus make the Chinese nation stand among the nations of the world. Therefore, if "learning from foreigners" embodies the openness of Wei Yuan's thought, then "controlling foreigners" does. Openness and patriotism are an organic whole and cannot be separated, let alone separated. Without "learning from foreigners", it is impossible to "control foreigners", but "control foreigners" must be based on "learning from foreigners". The painful lessons of the Opium War made Wei Yuan initially realize that China is far behind the western capitalist powers, and the laggards can only defeat the advanced ones by learning from them and catching up with them.

Wei Yuan further pointed out that "learning from foreigners can be divided into" good teachers "and" poor teachers ",and only" good teachers "can subdue" four foreigners "; Those "bad teachers" are controlled by foreigners. It can be seen that whether they are "good teachers" is the key to the success of "learning from foreigners". So what is a "good teacher"? First of all, we should "gain an insight into the feelings of foreigners", which is the premise of whether "learning from foreigners" can achieve results. In Wei Yuan's words, to learn from foreigners, we should first understand the feelings of foreigners as well as our desks, mattresses, sleeping and eating. To understand foreigners' feelings, we should set up a translation library to translate foreigners' books and introduce the relevant situation of western countries to China people. He introduced in detail the geographical position, historical evolution, climate, products, transportation and trade, national customs, culture and education, religious calendar and so on of all countries in the world, especially in Europe and America. Secondly, we should attach importance to talents, which is the condition for the success of "learning from foreigners". In his view, with good music, there is no good horse in the world that you can't control. If you have a good general, there will be no foreign aggression that you can't resist. If the country is rich and the people are strong, it will not succeed. As long as you work hard to govern and attach importance to talents, there is no reason not to enrich Qiang Bing. So the poverty of a country is not whether it has enough financial resources, but whether it has talents. "Countries with insufficient financial resources are not poor, and talents are not competitive. This is called poverty." In order to solve the shortage of talents who can learn from foreigners. Some people can drive hurricanes, be familiar with sand lines and use guns. They were all approved by the prefect of the navy, selected together with the governor, sent to Beijing for testing, and distributed the skills of the coastal navy. He also advocated hiring technicians from France, the United States, Portugal and other countries to teach technology and make use of it, so as to "learn from the West and use it for China". Third, we should work hard. Therefore, heaven refuses to accept, human feelings are not conducive to sleep, and talents are vain. "Anger and worry are not only the driving force to save the day, people's hearts and talents, but also the guarantee to learn from foreigners. Although China lost in the Opium War, as long as we are angry, energetic, hypocritical, cosmetic and successful. If the net comes to an end, we will work hard, do practical things, make full use of the favorable conditions of "being in the right place at the right time, learning to ride" and learn from advanced western things, then China will surely become a rich and powerful country like Europe and America, with an open atmosphere and rising wisdom.