In 1915, 陈独秀 published the inaugural manifesto of Youth Magazine (later renamed New Youth), titled “A Call to Youth.” In it, he outlined six standards that would become foundational to the New Culture Movement.

At their core, these principles championed democracy and science. More broadly, they called on young people to break free from feudal constraints and to participate in China’s modernization with an active, open, and practical spirit. The document was not merely editorial; it was programmatic.

The six principles were as follows:

Independent rather than servile.
This was a call for independent personality — the rejection of submissiveness and inherited deference.

Progressive rather than conservative.
An appeal to align with the forward movement of history, to renew rather than preserve reflexively.

Enterprising rather than reclusive.
An encouragement toward engagement, initiative, and outward action instead of retreat.

Cosmopolitan rather than isolationist.
A demand for openness — intellectual and cultural — and an embrace of global horizons.

Practical rather than ornamental.
An insistence on substance over empty rhetoric, utility over hollow formalism.

Scientific rather than speculative.
A commitment to reason, logic, and empirical inquiry in place of superstition and fantasy.

Taken together, these six standards were not abstract moral slogans. They formed an orientation — a posture toward modernity. They redefined what it meant to be young in a country struggling between inheritance and transformation.

Even a century later, the clarity of the structure remains striking. Each pair establishes tension between an old disposition and a new one. The choice is framed plainly. The responsibility is placed squarely on the individual.

History tends to soften manifestos into quotations. But in 1915, these words were not academic. They were directional.