Until the breakdown of the Empire, Confucian texts were studied appreciatively rather than critically. One does not criticize common sense unless one is anxious for the reputation of a crank. With the blinding dawn of Western knowledge, Confucianism went into the wastebasket. Two years in New York were worth a generation of study over the ancient authorities. From time to time, under the Republic, the various governments discussed plans for educational reform, or haphazardly encouraged the dying traditionalist schools; but nothing could restore the prestige of classicism. Strangely, the greatest impetus toward classical learning was provided by the challengers of the classics. Modern Chinese scholarship, using Western methods of critical study, and armed with new specializations undreamed of by the archaists, found that the traditional authorities were valuable not only for what they pretended to be--plain, direct, factual records--but also as source material for penetrating interpretations. The Chinese have turned to this task since the opening of the various scientific agencies of the National Government at Nanking and have already produced works of importance on their own past. They have pushed back their scientifically ascertainable history almost a thousand years. The modern Chinese students, who hated the classics when they were mouthed by sedate old scholars ignorant of the modern world, now devote themselves to the classics to criticize them; criticizing them, they study them; studying them, they love them. The "science of the country" (Sinology) has recently been added to the curriculum of the modern schools; it is causing a veritable renaissance. In fact, the Chinese are constantly becoming more anxious to find precedent for political growth and development in their own past rather than in the past of the West, which they could never appreciate as much as do Westerners. The actual Confucian movements do not warrant attention. Militarists have sponsored little Confucian coteries, or have paid for the publication of sumptuous editions of the Confucian classics, with the expectation of acquiring a reputation for benevolence and intelligence. Wu P'ei-fu, the most accomplished scholar among the military leaders of his period, who owed part of his prestige to his scholarship, was diligent in promoting Confucianism. With his decline (1926) his example was no longer felt to be worth following; Confucianism as a practical political expedient passed from the scene. It gave too little sanction to the raising of local conscript armies, inflation of the currency, and the doubling of taxes. Its complete silence on such necessities could not be taken for consent.