Abstract: The flowering of scientist trend of thought during the May 4th period was the inevitable coures of China's progress towards moderniaztion as well as the positive trend of modernity.However,it drowned humanism,i.e. replacing the “human law” with the “material law” as revealed by scholars of the Xueheng school,and appeared as a negative trend of modernity to some degree.The Xueheng scholars criticized scientism and advocated traditional culture,criticized the literary outlook of historical evolution of science,and opposed literary realism and romanticism.We can not judge this attitude of theirs as reactionary to the progress of history.Seen from another angle,this attitude contains the introspection and readjustment of the negative factors towards modernity.

Key words: the Xueheng scholars, scientism, new humanism, cultural conservatism, modernity