Under the impact of social change and the emergence of new trends of thought, the Idea of University has suffered from a lot of changes. We can discern here three phases of change: from the ideal period it moved to the positivist period, and then from the positivist period it moved to today's administrative period. Today, the so called "renewal" of university education not only means its "betterment", which emphasizes the efficiency of university administration, but also a kind of "revolution", interpreted as re-evolving towards its original spirit. It is here that I propose to read, through a creative interpretation, the message of "great learning" as the basic spirit of today's Chinese universities. The renewal of today's university education should take a direction imbued with the spirit of contrast: on the one hand, it should always keep an ideal of its own and balance the technological development with humanities; on the other hand, it should always try to return to its original inspiration and emphasize the holistic function of reason and formation of characters. University education has to develop the universalizing dynamism and the critical spirit of science, but in the meanwhile it should draw its spiritual resources from its traditional culture as mediated by creative interpretation. This article will explain first the universalizing dynamism and the critical spirit of science, then go on to discuss the concept of "living tradition" and compare the "rationality" of modem science and technology with the "reasonableness" of traditional culture. Last but not least, a discussion will be done as conclusion on how could we conduct the renewal of university education today.