陈旭麓先生是在大学时代就已崭露头角的有思想的史学家和有学术的思想者，自上个世纪四五十年代之交由国学转向近代史研究后，先生便"日益以万象杂陈、新陈代谢飞速的近代社会作为自己朝夕思辨的契机"，孜孜求索百余年来的世路、心路和去路，即使是在大批判的吼声湮没一切的严酷年代里，仍坚持以爝火萤光探照民族苦难的症结。"文革"结束后，先生在事变启导的严峻反思中以丰厚的历史感写出百年递嬗的曲折骨脊，最终完成以"新陈代谢"为旨趣的近代史学科体系的重构。

CHEN Xu-lu, who has shown his talents since his college days, is a historian with deep insights and a thinker with strong academic background. Since he shifted his focus from ancient Chinese civilization to modern Chinese history in the end of 1940s and the beginning of 1950s, CHEN has engaged in the study of the complicated and rapidly changing modern society, exploring the social and mental development of the past century as well as its future. Even in the tough time of "mass criticism", CHEN still made great efforts to diagnose the national crisis by himself. After the "Cultural Revolution", CHEN, with his serious reflection on the tortuous development of the past century, he finally accomplished the systematic re-construction of modern Chinese history based on the concept of "metabolism".