Polemics on Confucius in Europe around the XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries On October 18th 1700, the Faculty of Theology of Sorbonne prohibited three books on China, written by Jesuits. The sentence blamed the use of expressions labelled as false, preposterous, full of errors and slanderous to the Christian religion. The violence of polemics rises the evidence that Confucius was not unknown in the 17th-18th centuries Europe. On the contrary, he has come to embody new values. From philosopher of Natural Law, endowed with the prestige of venerable school master, his public perception slowly evolves to a personification of a model for Europe. The personification took tentative definitions to regulate social conduct in a lay manner, a universal symbol of a state kingdom governed with no connection to theological principles.