In the Restoration Movement, Yan Fu was a reformist thinker who opposed stubborn conservatism and advocated restoration. He not only expounded the necessity, importance and urgency of reform, but also translated Huxley's theory of evolution based on "natural selection, survival of the fittest", which had great influence at that time. After the Reform Movement of 1898, he devoted himself to the translation of western bourgeois philosophy and social theory and natural science works, and was a bourgeois enlightenment thinker. Yan Fu believes in Darwin's theory of evolution and Spencer's vulgar theory of evolution. This is the theoretical basis of his political thought and educational thought. In Yuan Qiang, Yan Fu pointed out that the strength of a country depends on three basic conditions: "first, strong blood and physical strength, second, strong intelligence and wisdom, and third, strong virtue and justice." He fantasized about strengthening national prestige through bourgeois physical, intellectual and moral education. Therefore, today, politics should be unified in three aspects: one is to drum up people's strength, the other is to enlighten people's wisdom, and the third is to promote people's morality. The so-called drum up people's strength means that the people of the whole country should have a healthy body, opium should be banned, and the bad habit of foot binding should be banned; The so-called enlightened people's wisdom is mainly to replace the imperial examination with western learning; The so-called new people's morality mainly refers to abolishing autocratic rule, implementing constitutional monarchy, advocating "respecting the people" and demanding reform and political reform, but he also advocates that "it is impossible to get together." The specific method of "eliminating without haste" is realized through education, that is, in China at that time, constitutional monarchy could only be implemented after people's wisdom enlightened. In a word, the theory of "saving the country through education" is a prominent ideological feature of Yan Fu.

Yan Fu advocated that political reform must be carried out, otherwise the country would perish. The first step of reform is to abolish stereotyped writing. Yan Fu elaborated on the harm of stereotyped writing: stereotyped writing can harm the country, unless it destroys itself, and the harm lies in making the world incompetent. If it makes the world without talents, what can it do? There are three great evils: "first, ignorance", "second, bad intentions" and "third, wandering hands". Yan Fu advocates running more schools. He once discussed that western countries attach importance to education and appreciated the compulsory education that "people don't study and blame their parents". Because the ignorance and wisdom of China people are far from each other, they naturally cannot surpass others. Based on this idea, Yan Fu actively runs schools. Besides personally serving as the prime minister of Beiyang Naval Academy for twenty years, he also helped others to run schools, such as Tianjin Russian Museum and Beijing Yi Tong Academy. Yan Fu called for the establishment of a complete school system to popularize education in order to "educate the people". According to the system of capitalist countries, he proposed that school education in China should be divided into three sections, namely, primary school hall, middle school hall and university hall. Children before primary school admission 16; Middle school absorbs 16 to 2 1 year-old teenagers who are fluent in arts and sciences and have a primary school foundation; Study in the university hall for three or four years, and then enter a special school for professional study in different disciplines. At the same time, we should also send smart people who have studied well abroad to study and cultivate talents with expertise in learning.

In addition, Yan Fu also attached great importance to women's education. He appreciated the establishment of Zheng Jing Girls' School at that time. It is believed that this is the beginning for women in China to get rid of the shackles of feudal ethics, and it is also the beginning for women in China to become self-reliant. Starting from the purpose of saving the nation from extinction, he thinks that women's self-improvement is "the deepest foundation of the country". He also advocated that women, like men, should not only study in girls' schools, but also participate in social activities. If you don't participate in social activities, there is no difference between the girls' school and the feudal private school, so it is meaningless. Obviously, he considered women on the premise of social change, especially women's own liberation, so he emphasized the importance of participating in social activities for girls' school students, which is why he is higher than the average person in women's education.

Yan Fu advocated western learning and opposed the Westernization School's view that "middle school is the body and western learning is the use". He has repeatedly compared middle school with western learning: "China attaches the most importance to the three cardinal guides and the five permanent members, while westerners say equality comes first;" China kisses, while Westerners Shang Xian; China governs the world by filial piety, while the west governs the world by public; China respects the Lord and the west enriches the people ... also for learning. China is knowledgeable, while westerners rely on manpower. In short, western learning is "academically false and true." He also pointed out that "China people are fond of the past and ignore the present, while western manpower is superior to the past." "It must have been awkward in the past." So he thinks that even if Yao, Shun and Confucius were born today, they should learn from the West. To save the nation and survive, we must learn western learning and learn the western "ambition": "It is not that western learning is beneficial to foreign languages, but that it is only superficial to abandon it in foreign languages." He believes that "middle school has the body of middle school, and western learning has the body of western learning." Divided into two sides, the combination will stop. " He believed that we should realize "consistency between body and use" and "consistency between sex and use", reform the political system, and put forward the asset stage education policy of "taking freedom as the body and democracy as the peace".

From the viewpoint of "consistency of body and use", he specified the teaching contents and methods in each stage in the envisaged academic system. In his view, in the primary school stage, the purpose of education is to make children "reach an appropriate text for each article", "familiarize themselves with classics and make sense of history", "learn old lessons, nine times out of ten", and translate "the simplest and most practical general studies" in western learning with easy-to-understand words as auxiliary reading materials. In teaching methods, more explanations are used to reduce the workload of reciting. In the middle school stage, "Western learning" is the mainstay, "foreign language classes account for seven tenths and Chinese classes account for three tenths", and it is stipulated that "everything is taught in foreign languages". In college, I mainly studied "western learning". As for "Chinese", it means "I have to take exams without homework; There are books, no classes, and scholars who listen to books spare no effort. " He believes that for teenagers, they should be guided to analyze and learn some specialized knowledge so that they can benefit from it.

The problem of scientific method is an important aspect of Yan Fu's view of western learning. He once translated Moeller's Famous Studies (formal logic) and actively promoted and introduced "Famous Studies". He believes that induction and deduction are two important means to establish science. For thousands of years, there have been more "deduction" and less "induction" in China, which is one of the reasons why there are many academic lies and the national economy and people's livelihood are sick. Yan Fu pays more attention to induction, advocates "observing and investigating in person" and opposes "those who ask and talk more are all between words (paper and ink) and don't know the facts". He once used Huxley's words: "Reading and learning wisdom are second-hand. Those who can take the universe as my outline and all things as my words are the ones who can really learn from their ears. "