 The concept of meritocracy spread from China to British India during the seventeenth century, and then into continental Europe and the United States.With the translation of Confucian texts during the Age of Enlightenment, the concept of a meritocracy reached intellectuals in the West, who saw it as an alternative to the traditional "ancient regime" of Europe.Voltaire and François Quesnay wrote favourably of the idea, with Voltaire claiming that the Chinese had "perfected moral science" and Quesnay advocating an economic and political system modeled after that of the Chinese.