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For too long, the history of contact between China and the West has been portrayed as a one-sided encounter: Europeans were said to have "discovered" China, while Chinese responses to the West went largely unnoticed. In this volume, D.E. Mungello dispels the myth that China was a silent partner in the dialogue between Eastern and Western civilizations. Although they did not reciprocate in sending ships, cultural emissaries or religious missionaries westward, neither did the Chinese passively accept Europe's enthusiastic embrace of their culture, arts and manufactures. Aspects of Western art, language, science and religion made significant inroads into Chinese culture, which are only just coming to the attention of Western historians. At a time when the West is once again setting its sights on strengthening ties with China, Mungello's text seeks to offer crucial historical perspective. It reminds us that the political and economic dominance of the West is actually characteristic of only the past two centuries, prior to which it was China that led the world in terms of economic and political development, and in the sophistication of its high culture and technological achievement.