其次，中國的文學和批評隻應該在中國的條件下學習的想法與曆史相對論者的主張近似，依照那個想法，為了研究莎士比亞，隻能是在唯一的文藝複興時期，而不是在現代批評的時期。如果我堅持不改，他正好指控我有現代人的“種族優越感”。事實上，同族的歐洲的漢學家與罪犯誰更願意看未曾觸及的中國的文化？我不願意看到中國的文學和批評遭受這樣的命運，正相反，我希望它們在西方被閱讀、被處置、被研究和被欣賞，就像西方文學與批評一樣。
最後，施密特關於英文批評家寫有關莎士比亞的類比是不適當的，因為我是用英文寫有關中國的文學和批評。如果一個以英語為母語的批評家用漢語寫莎士比亞或約翰遜博士，他將被勸告很好地熟悉中國的文學與批評術語，以便在能理解的條件下向有文化的中國讀者解釋莎士比亞和約翰遜。那就是我為什麼努力這樣做的原因，不僅在本書中，我前此的四本書和眾多論文也都這樣做了，而不是相反。用說英語的讀者能夠理解的方式把中國的文學和批評推薦給他們，盡量做到不要篡改中國文學和批評的性質。如果說這就是“種族優越感”，它一定是“種族優越感”的特別的形式。
筆者所存信件是林理彰寄來的英文打字手稿，不知是否發表過。為了存真，我們把英文原稿附錄於下：
T he Editor，T he H umanities Association Review，
I wish to reply to，and clarify，certain points raised by J。 D。Schmidt in his review of my book，Chinese T heories of Literature，which appeared in your journal（Vol。28，No。1）。
To begin with，I am ethnically and cultu rally a Chinese，having been bor n and brought up in Peking（where I attended school university，and graduate school），and my native lan-guage is Chinese。 I might add that to this day I still write po-ems and let ters in Classical Chinese。
It is therefore the height of irony that Schmidt should ac-cuse me of“Europeanism”and“ethnocentrism”，and to com-pliment me condescendingly on my“quite admirable com mand of the Chinese language”。 If what he really means is that in-tellectually，I am too Westernized in my penchant for analysis and categorical I would reply as follows。
First，it is simply not tr ue，as he asserts，that categori-zation is not typical of Chinese thought。 Just think of those e-nor mous Chinese E ncyclopedias in which all available knowl-edge is classified under categories like“heaven”，“earth”，etc。In fact，another reader accused me on“the typically Chi-nese penchant for categorization”。I feel somewhat like a Martin L uther King being called both a“racist”and an“Uncle T om”at same time。
Secondly，the idea that Chinese literature and criticism should be studied only in Chinese terms is analogous to histor-icism，according to which，for in Shakespeare should be stud-ied only in terms of Renaissance rhetoric，but not teams of modern criticism。 Had I insis ted on this，it would have been just if to accuse me of“ethnocentrism”。As a mat ter of fact，this mentality is akin European Sinologues and Sinophiles who would like to see Chinese culture，untouched。I have no wish to see Chinese literatu re and criticism meet such a fate，on the contrary，I want them to be read，handled，studied，and enjoyed as Wester n literature and criticism are。