This is a history of China for the 900-year time span of the late imperial period. A senior scholar of this epoch, F. W. Mote highlights the personal characteristics of the rulers and dynasties and probes the cultural theme of Chinese adaptations to recurrent alien rule. No other work provides a similar synthesis: generational events, personalities, and the spirit of the age combine to yield a comprehensive history of the civilization, not isolated but shaped by its relation to outsiders. </p>
This vast panorama of the civilization of the largest society in human history reveals much about Chinese high and low culture, and the influential role of Confucian philosophical and social ideals. Throughout the Liao Empire, the world of the Song, the Mongol rule, and the early Qing through the Kangxi and Qianlong reigns, culture, ideas, and personalities are richly woven into the fabric of the political order and institutions. This is a monumental work that will stand among the classic accounts of the nature and vibrancy of Chinese civilization before the modern period. </p>

第二版是精装，增加了插图，还加入了张祥龙、陆扬教授的序。制作也更为精美。
如果说中国文化是一座宏大的宫殿，那先秦思想就是这座宫殿的基础。
该书是美国流传已久的一本介绍中国早期思想的必读书，以流畅明晰的笔法、高超的见识和深厚的文化比较的功力，对儒家、道家、墨家、名家、法家的思想和代表人物进行了简明精妙的介绍。同时又以宏观的话题，如宇宙论、世界观 、知识论、政治哲学、人性论等贯穿在对这几大学派的的介绍和分析中，既高屋建瓴，又曲尽其妙，是大家小书的典范。

This brief paperback introduction to the basic ideas that underlie traditional Chinese culture focuses on the "Golden Age" (600 B.C.-150 B.C.) of Chinese philosophy.