We should adopt the right approach to cultural traditions. Only if we remember our history can we open the path to the future. Only if we are good at learning from and continuing what we inherit can we be good innovators. Fine traditional cultural is, for its country or nation, at the root of its ability to continue and develop. To abandon this would be to cut off its spiritual lifeline. We need to be adept at combining the continuation and promotion of fine traditional culture with the development of that of today, fusing them together such that with tradition comes development and with development comes the continuation of tradition.
As traditional culture forms and develops, it’s inevitably constrained and influenced by the limitations of people’s knowledge, the conditions of the time, and that society’s institutions. It is also unavoidable then, that there will be things about it that have become obsolete or that are now ready to be discarded. This demands that as people are learning about, studying, and applying traditional culture they make the ancient serve the present and develop the new from the old. We need to make sensible choices based on the needs of new practice and new times, and not unthinkingly just transplant the past into the present. We must observe the principle of making the old serve the present and learn from the past for today, being discerning as we pass traditions on, and not simply extolling the past over the present, or disparaging the present in extolling the past. We must work harder to see traditional culture being creatively translated and innovative developed into something that can be blended and interlinked with the culture of today, and see it serve the call of our era to cultivate people of culture.