在西欧历史上,十六—十七世纪是从封建主义向资本主义过渡的时期。而这个过渡时期,它首先与新航路的开辟紧密地联系在一起的。本文试图从分析欧洲人探求新航路的背景,指出它是欧洲的商业资本家和封建主、贵族为了要到东方进行掠夺才积极寻求通往东方的新航路的。因此,其后果必然是欧洲殖民者对殖民地掠夺的开端,由于殖民者掠夺大批财富涌入欧洲,为资本主义生产的发展创造条件。同时,历史事实进一步证明资本主义的发展正如马克思所说的“资本 In the history of Western Europe, the sixteen-seventeenth centuries were a period of transition from feudalism to capitalism. And this transitional period, first of all, is closely linked with the opening of the new route. This article tries to analyze the background of the European exploration of the new route, pointing out that it is Europe’s commercial capitalists and feudal lords, and the aristocrats actively seek the new route to the East in order to plunder the East. Therefore, the result must be the beginning of the colonial plunder by the European colonialists. As the colonists plundered a great deal of their wealth into Europe, they set the stage for the development of capitalist production. At the same time, historical facts further prove that the development of capitalism, as Marx put it, "capital