The West contacted China; China did not contact the West.
"Manifest Destiny."
"Why climb Everest? Because it is there."
"The Conquistador mentality."
Those are all western concepts for better and for worse, the first American, the second English, the third Spanish. All are manifestations of the same part of the western soul.
The golden age of Chinese exploration ended in the first third of the fifteenth century and never extended farther than the Indian Ocean because, according to Wikipedia, Chinese,
"...were content trading with already existing tributary states nearby and abroad. To them, traveling far east into the Pacific Ocean represented entering a broad wasteland of water with uncertain benefits of trade."
The part of the western soul captured by the examples above can be fairly characterized as ambitious, curious, and violent. But not content.
The same part of the Chinese soul is not fairly characterized with the opposite of each of the three terms applied to the west. However I would argue that the souls are most near opposite on the component described here as "ambitious" as applied to the west and as "content" as applied to China by Wikipedia.
There is a confidence behind the west's ambition that it seems to me is not as prevalent in China's soul. And something else too is suggested by the Wikipedia entry. China was content not to explore the Pacific because of the "uncertain benefits of trade." That's confidence's twin opposite: fear.
