[99] Rousseau, Pestalozzi and Froebel were also in this sense realists, but they held that the educational value of knowledge lay not in itself, but only in so far as it was an instrument for developing the faculties of the mind.

[100] Henry Barnard (English Pedagogy, second series, p. 192), speaks of Hoole as “one of the pioneer educators of his century.” According to Barnard he was born at Wakefield, in 1610, and died in 1666, rector of “Stock Billerica” (perhaps Stock with Billericay), in Essex.

[101] A very interesting suggestion of Cowley’s is that another house be built for poor men’s sons who show ability. These shall be brought up “with the same conveniences that are enjoyed even by rich men’s children (though they maintain the fewer for that cause), there being nothing of eminent and illustrious to be expected from a low, sordid, and hospital-like education.”

[102] It would seem as if these Puritans were more active in body than in mind: even the seniors, like the children at Port-Royal, tombent dans la nonchalance. Dury has to lay it down that “the Governour and Ushers and Steward if they be in health should not go to bed till ten.” (p. 30.)

[103] It is a sign of the failure of all attempts to establish educational science in England that though the meaning of “real” and “realities” which connected them with res seemed established in the sixteen hundreds, our language soon lost it again. According to a writer in Meyer’s Conversations Lexicon (first edition) “reales” in this sense occurs first in Taubmann, 1614. Whether this is correct or not it was certainly about this time that there arose a contest between Humanismus and Realismus, a contest now at its height in the Gymnasien and Realschulen of Germany. For a discussion of it, see M. Arnold’s “Literature and Science,” referred to above (p. 154).

[104] Many of Petty’s proposals are now realized in the South Kensington Museum.

[105] Later in the century Locke recommended that “working schools should be set up in every parish,” (see Fox-Bourne’s Locke, or Cambridge edition of the Thoughts c. Ed., App. A, p. 189). The Quakers seem to have early taken up “industrious education.” John Bellers, whose Proposals for Raising a College of Industry (1696) was reprinted by Robt. Owen, has some very good notions. After advising that boys and girls be taught to knit, spin, &c., and the bigger boys turning, &c., he says, “Thus the Hand employed brings Profit, the Reason used in it makes wise, and the Will subdued makes them good” (Proposals, p. 18). Years afterwards in a Letter to the Yearly Meeting (dated 1723), he says, “It may be observed that some of the Boys in Friends’ Workhouse in Clerkenwell by their present employment of spinning are capable to earn their own living.”

[106] Petty does not lose sight of the body. The “educands” are to “use such exercises whether in work or for recreation as tend to the health, agility, and strength of their bodies.”

I have quoted Petty from the very valuable collection of English writings on Education reprinted in Henry Barnard’s English Pedagogy, 2 vols. Petty is in Vol. I. In this vol. we have plenty of evidence of the working of the Baconian spirit; e.g., we find Sir Matthew Hale in a Letter of Advice to his Grandchildren, written in 1678, saying that there is little use or improvement in “notional speculations in logic or philosophy delivered by others; the rather because bare speculations and notions have little experience and external observation to confirm them, and they rarely fix the minds especially of young men. But that part of philosophy that is real may be improved and confirmed by daily observation, and is more stable and yet more certain and delightful, and goes along with a man all his life, whatever employment or profession he undertakes.”

[107] “In this respect,” says Professor Masson, “the passion and the projects of Comenius were a world wider than Milton’s.” (L. of M. iij, p. 237.)

[108] Of Education. To Master Samuel Hartlib (“the Tractate” as it is usually called), was published by Milton first in 1644, and again in 1673. See Oscar Browning’s edition, Cambridge Univ. Press.

[109] The University of Cambridge. The first examination was in June, 1880.

[110] “Believe it, my good friend, to love truth for truth’s sake is the principal part of human perfection in this world and the seed-plot of all other virtues.” L. to Bolde, quoted by Fowler, Locke, p. 120. This shows us that according to Locke “the principal part of human perfection” is to be found in the intellect.

[111] Lady Masham seems to consider these two characteristics identical. She wrote to Leclerc of Locke after his death: “He was always, in the greatest and in the smallest affairs of human life, as well as in speculative opinions, disposed to follow reason, whosoever it were that suggested it; he being ever a faithful servant, I had almost said a slave, to truth; never abandoning her for anything else, and following her for her own sake purely” (quoted by Fox-Bourne). But it is one thing to desire truth, and another to think one’s own reasoning power the sole means of obtaining it.

[112] “I am far from imagining myself infallible; but yet I should be loth to differ from any thinking man; being fully persuaded there are very few things of pure speculation wherein two thinking men who impartially seek truth can differ if they give themselves the leisure to examine their hypotheses and understand one another” (L. to W. M., 26 Dec., 1692). Again he writes: “I am persuaded that upon debate you and I cannot be of two opinions, nor I think any two men used to think with freedom, who really prefer truth to opiniatrety and a little foolish vain-glory of not having made a mistake” (L. to W. M., 3 Sept., 1694).

[113] Compare Carlyle:—“Except thine own eye have got to see it, except thine own soul have victoriously struggled to clear vision and belief of it, what is the thing seen or the thing believed by another or by never so many others? Alas, it is not thine, though thou look on it, brag about it, and bully and fight about it till thou die, striving to persuade thyself and all men how much it is thine! Not it is thine, but only a windy echo and tradition of it bedded [an echo bedded?] in hypocrisy, ending sure enough in tragical futility is thine.” Froude’s Thos. Carlyle, ij, 10. Similarly Locke wrote to Bolde in 1699:—“To be learned in the lump by other men’s thoughts, and to be right by saying after others is much the easier and quieter way; but how a rational man that should enquire and know for himself can content himself with a faith or religion taken upon trust, or with such a servile submission of his understanding as to admit all and nothing else but what fashion makes passable among men, is to me astonishing.” Quoted by Fowler, Locke, p. 118.

[114] For Rabelais, see p. 67 supra.

In the notes to the Cambridge edition of the Thoughts Locke’s advice on physical education is discussed and compared with the results of modern science by Dr. J. F. Payne.

[115] “Examinations directed, as the paper examinations of the numerous examining boards now flourishing are directed, to finding out what the pupil knows, have the effect of concentrating the teacher’s effort upon the least important part of his function.” Mark Pattison in N. Quart. M., January, 1880.

[116] Michelet (Nos fils, chap. ij. ad f. p. 170), says of Montaigne’s essay: “c’est dÉjÀ une belle esquisse, vive et forte, une tentative pour donner, non l’objet, le savoir, mais le sujet, c’est l’homme.”

[117] Pope seems to contrast Montaigne and Locke:

Perhaps as Dr. Abbott suggests he took Montaigne as representing active and Locke contemplative life.

[118] See “An introduction to the History of Educational Theories,” by Oscar Browning.

[119] “History and the mathematics, I think, are the most proper and advantageous studies for persons of your quality; the other are fitter for schoolmen and people that must live by their learning, though a little insight and taste of them will be no burthen or inconvenience to you, especially Natural Philosophy.” Advice to a young Lord written by his father, 1691, p. 29.

[120] “Il n’y a point avant la raison de vÉritable Éducation pour l’homme.” (N. H., 5th P., Lett. 3. Conf. supra, p. 227.)

[121] “La premiÈre Éducation doit donc Être purement nÉgative. Elle consiste, non point À enseigner la vertu ni la vÉritÉ, mais À garantir le coeur du vice et l’esprit de l’erreur. Si vous pouviez ne rien faire et ne rien laisser faire; si vous pouviez amener votre ÉlÈve sain et robuste À l’Âge de douze ans, sans qu’il sÛt distinguer sa main droite de sa main gauche, dÈs vos premiÈres leÇons les yeux de son entendement s’ouvriraient À la raison; sans prÉjugÉs, sans habitudes, il n’aurait rien en lui qui pÛt contrarier l’effet de vos soins. BientÔt il deviendrait entre vos mains le plus sage des hommes; et, en commenÇant par ne rien faire, vous auriez fait un prodige d’Éducation.” Ém. ij., 80.

[122] “Exercez son corps, ses organes, ses sens, ses forces, mais tenez son Âme oisive aussi longtemps qu’il se pourra. Redoutez tous les sentiments antÉrieurs au jugement qui les apprÉcie. Retenez, arrÊtez les impressions ÉtrangÈres: et, pour empÊcher le mal de naÎtre, ne vous pressez point de faire le bien; car il n’est jamais tel que quand la raison l’Éclaire. Regardez tous les dÉlais comme des avantages: c’est gagner beaucoup que d’avancer vers le terme sans rien perdre; laissez mÛrir l’enfance dans les enfants. Enfin quelque leÇon leur devient-elle nÉcessaire, gardez-vous de la donner aujourd’hui, si vous pouvez diffÉrer jusqu’À demain sans danger.” Ém. ij., 80.

[123] “Effrayez-vous donc peu de cette oisivetÉ prÉtendue. Que diriez-vous d’un homme qui, pour mettre toute la vie À profit, ne voudrait jamais dormir? Vous diriez: Cet homme est insensÉ; il ne jouit pas du temps, il se l’Ôte; pour fuir le sommeil il court À la mort. Songez donc que c’est ici la mÊme chose, et que l’enfance est le sommeil de la raison.” Ém. ij., 99.

[124] “Il n’y a pas de philosophie plus superficielle que celle qui, prenant l’homme comme un Être ÉgoÏste et viager, prÉtend l’expliquer et lui tracer ses devoirs en dehors de la sociÉtÉ dont il est une partie. Autant vaut considÉrer l’abeille abstraction faite de la ruche, et dire qu’À elle seule l’abeille construit son alvÉole.” Renan, La RÉforme, 312.

[125] “Tout est bien, sortant des mains de l’Auteur des choses; tout dÉgÉnÈre entre les mains de l’homme.”

[126] “Nous naissons faibles, nous avons besoin de forces; nous naissons dÉpourvus de tout, nous avons besoin d’assistance; nous naissons stupides, nous avons besoin de jugement. Tout ce que nous n’avons pas À notre naissance, et dont nous avons besoin Étant grands, nous est donnÉ par l’Éducation. Cette Éducation nous vient ou de la nature, ou des hommes, ou des choses. Le dÉveloppement interne de nos facultÉs et de nos organes est l’Éducation de la nature; l’usage qu’on nous apprend À faire de ce dÉveloppement est l’Éducation des hommes; et l’acquis de notre propre expÉrience sur les objets qui nous affectent est l’Éducation des choses.” Ém. j., 6.

[127] “Puisque le concours des trois Éducations est nÉcessaire À leur perfection, c’est sur celle À laquelle nous ne pouvons rien qu’il faut diriger les deux autres.” Ém. j., 7.

[128] “Vivre ce n’est pas respirer, c’est agir; c’est faire usage de nos organes, de nos sens, de nos facultÉs, de toutes les parties de nous-mÊmes qui nous donnent le sentiment de notre existence. L’homme qui a le plus vÉcu n’est pas celui qui a comptÉ le plus d’annÉes, mais celui qui a le plus senti la vie.” Ém. j., 13.

[129] “On ne connaÎt point l’enfance: sur les fausses idÉes qu’on en a, plus on va, plus on s’Égare. Les plus sages s’attachent À ce qu’il importe aux hommes de savoir, sans considÉrer ce que les enfants sont en État d’apprendre. Ils cherchent toujours l’homme dans l’enfant, sans penser À ce qu’il est avant que d’Être homme. VoilÀ l’Êtude À laquelle je me suis le plus appliquÉ, afin que, quand toute ma mÉthode serait chimÉrique et fausse, on pÛt toujours profiter de mes observations. Je puis avoir trÈs-mal vu ce qu’il faut faire; mais je crois avoir bien vu le sujet sur lequel on doit opÉrer. Commencez donc par mieux Étudier vos ÉlÈves; car trÈs-assurÉment vous ne les connaissez point.”

[130] “La nature veut que les enfants soient enfants avant que d’Être hommes. Si nous voulons pervertir cet ordre, nous produirons des fruits prÉcoces qui n’auront ni maturitÉ ni saveur, et ne tarderont pas À se corrompre: nous aurons de jeunes docteurs et de vieux enfants. L’enfance a des maniÈres de voir, de penser, de sentir, qui lui sont propres; rien n’est moins sensÉ que d’y vouloir substituer les nÔtres.” Ém. ij., 75; also in N. H., 478.

[131] “Nous ne savons jamais nous mettre À la place des enfants; nous n’entrons pas dans leurs idÉes, nous leur prÊtons les nÔtres; et, suivant toujours nos propres raisonnements, avec des chaÎnes de vÉritÉs nous n’entassons qu’extravagances et qu’erreurs dans leur tÊte.” Ém. iij., 185.

[132] “Je voudrais qu’un homme judicieux nous donnÂt un traitÉ de l’art d’observer les enfants. Cet art serait trÈs-important À connaÎtre: les pÈres et les maÎtres n’en ont pas encore les ÉlÉments.” Ém. iij., 224.

[133] Rousseau says: “Full of what is going on in your own head, you do not see the effect you produce in their head: Pleins de ce qui se passe dans votre tÊte vous ne voyez pas l’effet que vous produisez dans la leur.” (Ém. lib. ij., 83.)

[134] “Or, toutes les Études forcÉes de ces pauvres infortunÉs tendent À ces objets entiÈrement Étrangers À leurs esprits. Qu’on juge de l’attention qu’ils y peuvent donner. Les pÉdagogues qui nous Étalent en grand appareil les instructions qu’ils donnent À leurs disciples sont payÉs pour tenir un autre langage: cependant on voit, par leur propre conduite, qu’ils pensent exactement comme moi. Car que leur apprennent-ils enfin? Des mots, encore des mots, et toujours des mots. Parmi les diverses sciences qu’ils se vantent de leur enseigner, ils se gardent bien de choisir celles qui leur seraient vÉritablement utiles, parce que ce seraient des sciences de choses, et qu’ils n’y rÉussiraient pas; mais celles qu’on paraÎt savoir quand on en sait les termes, le blason, la gÉographie, la chronologie, les langues, etc.; toutes Études si loin de l’homme, et surtout de l’enfant, que c’est une merveille si rien de tout cela lui peut Être utile une seule fois en sa vie.” Ém. ij., 100.

[135] “En quelque Étude que ce puisse Être, sans l’idÉe des choses reprÉsentÉes, les signes reprÉsentants ne sont rien. On borne pourtant toujours l’enfant À ces signes, sans jamais pouvoir lui faire comprendre aucune des choses qu’ils reprÉsentent.” Ém. ij., 102.

[136] “Non, si la nature donne au cerveau d’un enfant cette souplesse qui le rend propre À recevoir toutes sortes d’impressions, ce n’est pas pour qu’on y grave des noms de rois, des dates, des termes de blason, de sphÈre, de gÉographie, et tous ces mots sans aucun sens pour son Âge et sans aucune utilitÉ pour quelque Âge que ce soit, dont on accable sa triste et stÉrile enfance; mais c’est pour que toutes les idÉes qu’il peut concevoir et qui lui sont utiles, toutes celles qui se rapportent À son bonheur et doivent l’Éclairer un jour sur ses devoirs, s’y tracent de bonne heure en caractÈres ineffaÇables, et lui servent À se conduire pendant sa vie d’une maniÈre convenable À son Être et À ses facultÉs.” Ém. ij., 105; also N. H., P. v., L. 3.

Sans Étudier dans les livres, l’espÈce de mÉmoire que peut avoir un enfant ne reste pas pour cela oisive; tout ce qu’il voit, tout ce qu’il entend le frappe, et il s’en souvient; il tient registre en lui-mÊme des actions, des discours des hommes; et tout ce qui l’environne est le livre dans lequel, sans y songer, il enrichit continuellement sa mÉmoire, en attendant que son jugement puisse en profiter. C’est dans le choix de ces objets, c’est dans le soin de lui prÉsenter sans cesse ceux qu’il peut connaÎtre, et de lui cacher ceux qu’il doit ignorer, que consiste le vÉritable art de cultiver en lui cette premiÈre facultÉ; et c’est par lÀ qu’il faut tÂcher de lui former un magasin de connaissances qui servent À son Éducation durant sa jeunesse, et À sa conduite dans tous les temps. Cette mÉthode, il est vrai, ne forme point de petits prodiges et ne fait pas briller les gouvernantes et les prÉcepteurs; mais elle forme des hommes judicieux, robustes, sains de corps et d’entendement, qui, sans s’Être fait admirer Étant jeunes, se font honorer Étant grands.

[137] “L’activitÉ dÉfaillante se concentre dans le coeur du vieillard; dans celui de l’enfant elle est surabondante et s’Étend au dehors; il se sent, pour ainsi dire, assez de vie pour animer tout ce qui l’environne. Qu’il fasse ou qu’il dÉfasse, il n’importe; il suffit qu’il change l’État des choses, et tout changement est une action. Que s’il semble avoir plus de penchant À dÉtruire, ce n’est point par mÉchancetÉ, c’est que l’action qui forme est toujours lente, et que celle qui dÉtruit, Étant plus rapide, convient mieux À sa vivacitÉ.” Ém. j., 47.

[138] It would be difficult to find a man more English, in a good sense, than the present Lord Derby or, whether we say it in praise or dispraise, a man less like Rousseau. So it is interesting to find him in agreement with Rousseau in condemning the ordinary restraints of the school-room. “People are beginning to find out what, if they would use their own observation more, and not follow one another like sheep, they would have found out long ago, that it is doing positive harm to a young child, mental and bodily harm, to keep it learning or pretending to learn, the greater part of the day. Nature says to a child, ‘Run about,’ the schoolmaster says, ‘Sit still;’ and as the schoolmaster can punish on the spot, and Nature only long afterwards, he is obeyed, and health and brain suffer.”—Speech in 1864.

[139] All this is very crude, and so is the artifice by which Julie in the Nouvelle HÉloÏse entraps her son into learning to read. No doubt Rousseau is right when he says that where there is a desire to read the power is sure to come. But “reading” is one thing in the lives of the labouring classes to whom it means reading aloud in school, and quite another in families of literary tastes and habits with whom the range of thought is in a great measure dependent on books. In such families the children learn to read as surely as they learn to talk. They mostly have access to books which they read to themselves for pleasure; and of course it is absurdly untrue to say that they learn nothing but words and do not think. In my opinion it may be questioned whether the world of fiction into which their reading gives them the entrÉe does not withdraw them too much from the actual world in which they live. The elders find it very convenient when the child can always be depended on to amuse himself with a book; but noise and motion contribute more to health of body and perhaps of mind also. While children of well-to-do parents often read too much, the children of our schools “under government” hardly get a notion what reading is. In these schools “reading” always stands for vocal reading, and the power and the habit of using books for pleasure or for knowledge (other than verbal) are little cultivated.

[140] “Il veut tout toucher, tout manier; ne vous opposez point À cette inquiÉtude; elle lui suggÈre un apprentissage trÈs-nÉcessaire. C’est ainsi qu’il apprend À sentir la chaleur, le froid, la duretÉ, la mollesse, la pesanteur, la lÉgÈretÉ des corps; À juger de leur grandeur, de leur figure et de toutes leurs qualitÉs sensibles, en regardant, palpant, Écoutant, surtout en comparant la vue au toucher, en estimant À l’oeil la sensation qu’ils feraient sous ses doigts.” Ém. j., 43.

[141] “Voyez un chat entrer pour la premiÈre fois dans une chambre: il visite, il regarde, il flaire, il ne reste pas un moment en repos, il ne se fie À rien qu’aprÈs avoir tout examinÉ, tout connu. Ainsi fait un enfant commenÇant À marcher, et entrant pour ainsi dire dans l’espace du monde. Toute la diffÉrence est qu’À la vue, commune À l’enfant et au chat, le premier joint, pour observer, les mains que lui donna la nature, et l’autre l’odorat subtil dont elle l’a douÉ. Cette disposition, bien ou mal cultivÉe, est ce qui rend les enfants adroits ou lourds, pesants ou dispos, Étourdis ou prudents. Les premiers mouvements naturels de l’homme Étant donc de se mesurer avec tout ce qui l’environne, et d’Éprouver dans chaque objet qu’il aperÇoit toutes les qualitÉs sensibles qui peuvent se rapporter À lui, sa premiÈre Étude est une sorte de physique expÉrimentale relative À sa propre conservation, et dont on le dÉtourne par des Études spÉculatives avant qu’il ait reconnu sa place ici-bas. Tandis que ses organes dÉlicats et flexibles peuvent s’ajuster aux corps sur lesquels ils doivent agir, tandis que ses sens encore purs sont exempts d’illusion, c’est le temps d’exercer les uns et les autres aux fonctions qui leur sont propres; c’est le temps d’apprendre À connaÎtre les rapports sensibles que les choses ont avec nous. Comme tout ce qui entre dans l’entendement humain y vient par les sens, la premiÈre raison de l’homme est une raison sensitive; c’elle qui sert de base À la raison intellectuelle: nos premiers maÎtres de philosophie sont nos pieds, nos mains, nos yeux. Substituer des livres À tout cela, ce n’est pas nous apprendre À raisonner, c’est nous apprendre À nous servir de la raison d’autrui; c’est nous apprendre À beaucoup croire, et À ne jamais rien savoir. Pour exercer un art, il faut commencer par s’en procurer les instruments; et, pour pouvoir employer utilement ces instruments, il faut les faire assez solides pour rÉsister À leur usage. Pour apprendre À penser, il faut donc exercer nos membres, nos sens, nos organes, qui sont les instruments de notre intelligence; et pour tirer tout le parti possible de ces instruments, il faut que le corps, qui les fournit, soit robuste et sain. Ainsi, loin que la vÉritable raison de l’homme se forme indÉpendamment du corps, c’est la bonne constitution du corps qui rend les opÉrations de l’esprit faciles et sÛres.” Ém. ij., 123.

[142] “Exercer les sens n’est pas seulement en faire usage, c’est apprendre À bien juger par eux, c’est apprendre, pour ainsi dire, À sentir; car nous ne savons ni toucher, ni voir, ni entendre, que comme nous avons appris. Il y a un exercice purement naturel et mÉcanique, qui sert À rendre le corps robuste sans donner aucune prise au jugement: nager, courir, sauter, fouetter un sabot, lancer des pierres; tout cela est fort bien: mais n’avons-nous que des bras et des jambes? n’avons-nous pas aussi des yeux, des oreilles? et ces organes sont-ils superflus À l’usage des premiers? N’exercez donc pas seulement les forces, exercez tous les sens qui les dirigent; tirez de chacun d’eux tout le parti possible, puis vÉrifiez l’impression de l’un par l’autre. Mesurez, comptez, pesez, comparez.” Ém. ij., 133.

[143] E.g.—What can be better than this about family life? “L’attrait de la vie domestique est le meilleur contrepoison des mauvaises moeurs. Le tracas des enfants qu’on croit importun devient agrÉable; il rend le pÈre et la mÈre plus nÉcessaires, plus chers l’un À l’autre; il resserre entre eux le lien conjugal. Quand la famille est vivante et animÉe, les soins domestiques font la plus chÈre occupation de la femme et le plus doux amusement du mari. Ainsi de ce seul abus corrigÉ rÉsulterait bientÔt une rÉforme gÉnÉrale; bientÔt la nature aurait repris tous ses droits. Qu’une fois les femmes redeviennent mÈres bientÔt les hommes redeviendront pÈres et maris.” Ém. j., 17. Again he says in a letter quoted by Saint-Marc Girardin (ij., 121)—“L’habitude la plus douce qui puisse exister est celle de la vie domestique qui nous tient plus prÈs de nous qu’aucune autre.” We may say of Rousseau what Émile says of the Corsair:—“Il savait À fond toute la morale; il n’y avait que la pratique qui lui manquÂt.” (Ém. et S. 636). And yet he himself testifies:—“Nurses and mothers become attached to children by the cares they devote to them; it is the exercise of the social virtues that carries the love of humanity to the bottom of our hearts; it is in doing good that one becomes good; I know no experience more certain than this: Les nourrices, les mÈres, s’attachent aux enfants par les soins qu’elles leur rendent; l’exercice des vertus sociales porte au fond des coeurs l’amour de l’humanitÉ; c’est en faisant le bien qu’on devient bon; je ne connais point de pratique plus sure.” Ém. iv., 291.

[144] Elsewhere he asserts in his fitful way that there is inborn in the heart of man a feeling of what is just and unjust. Again, after all his praise of negation he contradicts himself, and says: “I do not suppose that he who does not need anything can love anything; and I do not suppose that he who does not love anything can be happy: Je ne conÇois pas que celui qui n’a besoin de rien puisse aimer quelque chose; je ne conÇois pas que celui qui n’aime rien puisse Être heureux.” Ém. iv., 252.

[145] This part of Rousseau’s scheme is well discussed by Saint-Marc Girardin (J. J. Rousseau, vol. ij.). The following passage is striking: “How is it that Madame Necker-Saussure understood the child better than Rousseau did? She saw in the child two things, a creation and a ground-plan, something finished and something begun, a perfection which prepares the way for another perfection, a child and a man. God, Who has put together human life in several pieces, has willed, it is true, that all these pieces should be related to each other; but He has also willed that each of them should be complete in itself, so that every stage of life has what it needs as the object of that period, and also what it needs to bring in the period that comes next. Wonderful union of aims and means which shews itself at every step in creation! In everything there is aim and also means, everything exists for itself and also for that which lies beyond it! (Tout est but et tout est moyen; tout est absolu et tout est relatif.)” J. J. R., ij., 151.

[146] “Je n’aime point les explications en discours; les jeunes gens y font peu d’attention et ne les retiennent guÈre. Les choses! les choses! Je ne rÉpÉterai jamais assez que nous donnons trop de pouvoir aux mots: avec notre Éducation babillarde nous ne faisons que des babillards.” Ém. iij., 198.

[147] “ForcÉ d’apprendre de lui-mÊme, il use de sa raison et non de celle d’autrui; car, pour ne rien donner À l’opinion, il ne faut rien donner À l’autoritÉ; et la plupart de nos erreurs nous viennent bien moins de nous que des autres. De cet exercice continuel il doit rÉsulter une vigueur d’esprit semblable À celle qu’on donne au corps par le travail et par la fatigue. Un autre avantage est qu’on n’avance qu’À proportion de ses forces. L’esprit, non plus que le corps, ne porte que ce qu’il peut porter. Quand l’entendement s’approprie les choses avant de les dÉposer dans la mÉmoire, ce qu’il en tire ensuite est À lui: au lieu qu’en surchargeant la mÉmoire, À son insu, on s’expose À n’en jamais rien tirer qui lui soit propre.” Ém. iij., 235.

[148] “Sans contredit on prend des notions bien plus claires et bien plus sÛres des choses qu’on apprend ainsi de soi-mÊme, que de celles qu’on tient des enseignements d’autrui; et, outre qu’on n’accoutume point sa raison À se soumettre servilement À l’autoritÉ, l’on se rend plus ingÉnieux À trouver des rapports, À lier des idÉes, À inventer des instruments, que quand, adoptant tout cela tel qu’on nous le donne, nous laissons affaisser notre esprit dans la nonchalance, comme le corps d’un homme qui, toujours habillÉ, chaussÉ, servi par ses gens et traÎnÉ par ses chevaux, perd À la fin la force et l’usage de ses membres. Boileau se vantait d’avoir appris À Racine À rimer difficilement. Parmi tant d’admirables mÉthodes pour abrÉger l’Étude des sciences, nous aurions grand besoin que quelqu’un nous en donnÂt une pour les apprendre avec effort.” Ém. iij., 193.

[149] I avail myself of the old substantival use of the word elementary to express its German equivalent Elementarbuch.

[150] “Who has not met with some experience such as this? A child with an active and inquiring mind accustomed to chatter about everything that interests him is sent to school. In a few weeks his vivacity is extinguished, his abundance of talk has dried up. If you ask him about his studies, if you desire him to give you a specimen of what he has learnt, he repeals to you in a sing-song voice some rule for the formation of tenses or some recipe for spelling words. Such are the results of the teaching which should be of all teaching the most fruitful and the most attractive!” Translated from Quelques Mots, &c., by M. BrÉal.

[151] In these visits he observed how the children suffered from working in factories. These observations influenced him in after years.

[152] In these aphorisms Pestalozzi states the main principles at work in his own mind; but this bare statement is not well suited to communicate these principles to the minds of others. For most readers the aphorisms have as little attraction as the enunciations, say, of a book of Euclid would have for those who knew no geometry. But as his future life was guided by the principles he has formulated in this paper it seems necessary for us to bear some of these in mind.

What he mainly insists upon is that all wise guidance must proceed from a knowledge of the nature of the creature to be guided; further that there is a simple wisdom which must direct the course of all men. “The path of Nature,” says he, “which brings out the powers of men must be open and plain; and human education to true peace-giving wisdom must be simple and available for all. Nature brings out all men’s powers by practice, and their increase springs from use.” The powers of children should be strengthened by exercise on what is close at hand; and this should be done without hardness or pressure. A forced and rigid sequence in instruction is not Nature’s method, says he: this would make men one-sided, and truth would not penetrate freely and softly into their whole being. The pure feeling for truth grows in a small area; and human wisdom must be grounded on a perception of our closest relationships, and must show itself in skilled management of our nearest concerns. Everything we do against our consciousness of right weakens our perception of truth and disturbs the purity of our fundamental conceptions and experiences. On this account all wisdom of man rests in the strength of a good heart that follows after truth, and all the blessing of man in the sense of simplicity and innocence. Peace of mind must be the outcome of right training. To get out of his surroundings all he needs for life and enjoyment, to be patient, painstaking, and in every difficulty trustful in the love of the Heavenly Father, this comes of a man’s true education to wisdom. Nothing concerns the human race so closely and intimately as—God. “God as Father of thy household, as source of thy blessing—God as thy Father; in this belief thou findest rest and strength and wisdom, which no violence nor the grave itself can overthrow.” Belief in God which is a part of our nature, like the sense of right and wrong and the feeling we can never quench of what is just and unjust, must be made the foundation in educating the human race. The subject of that belief is that God is the Father of men, men are the children of God. To this divine relationship Pestalozzi refers all human relationships as those of parent and child, of ruler and subject. The priest is appointed to declare the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men.

The only text I have seen is that reprinted by Raumer (Gesch. d. PÄd.). From Otto Fischer (Wichtigste PÄdagogen), I learn that this is the edition of 1807, which differs, at least by omission, from the original of 1780.

[153] There are now four parts, first published respectively in 1781, 1783, 1785, and 1787 (O. Fischer). The English translation in two small vols. (1825) ends with the First Part, but Miss Eva Channing has recently sought to weld the four parts into one (Boston, U.S.—D.C. Heath & Co.), and in this form the book seems to me not only very instructive but very entertaining also. Not many readers who look into it will fail to reach the end, and few are the books connected with education of which this could prudently be asserted. “All good teachers should read it with care,” says Stanley Hall in his Introduction, and if they thus read it and catch anything of the spirit of Pestalozzi both they and their pupils will have reason to rejoice.

[154] In the pages of this Journal Pestalozzi taught that it was “the domestic virtues which determine the happiness of a nation.” Again he says: “On the throne and in the cottage man has equal need of religion, and becomes the most wretched being on the earth if he forget his God.” “The child at his mother’s breast is weaker and more dependent than any creature on earth, and yet he already feels the first moral impressions of love and gratitude.” “Morality is nothing but a result of the development of the first sentiments of love and gratitude felt by the infant. The first development of the child’s powers should come from his participation in the work of his home; for this work is what his parents understand best, what most absorbs their attention, and what they can best teach. But even if this were not so, work undertaken to supply real needs would be just as truly the surest foundation of a good education. To engage the attention of the child, to exercise his judgment, to raise his heart to noble sentiments, these I think the chief ends of education: and how can these ends be reached so surely as by training the child as early as possible in the various daily duties of domestic life?” It would seem then that at this time Pestalozzi was for basing education on domestic labour and would teach the child to be useful. But it is hard to see how this principle could always be applied.

[156] Pestalozzi was with the children at Stanz only during the first half of 1799.

[157] As Pestalozzi wrote to Gessner (How Gertrude, &c.): “You see street-gossip is not always entirely wrong; I really could not write properly, nor read, nor reckon. But people always jump to wrong conclusions from such ‘notorious facts.’ At Stanz you saw that I could teach writing without myself being able to write properly.” He here anticipates a paradox of Jacotot’s.

[158] Years afterwards Napoleon, though he could not foresee Sedan, got a notion that after all there was something in Pestalozzi; and that the aim of the system was to put the freedom and development of the individual in the place of the mechanical routine of the old schools, which tended to produce a mass of dull uniformity. With this aim, as Guimps says, Napoleon was quite out of sympathy, and whenever the subject was mentioned he would say, “The Pestalozzians are Jesuits”; thus very inaccurately expressing an accurate notion that there was more in them than could be understood at the first glance.

[159] Pestalozzi had from this country some more discerning visitors, e.g., J. P. Greaves, to whom Pestalozzi addressed Letters, which were translated and published in this country; also Dr. Mayo, who was at Yverdun with his pupils for three years from 1818 and afterwards conducted a celebrated Pestalozzian school at Cheam. Dr. Mayo in 1826 lectured on Pestalozzi’s system at the Royal Institution. Sir Jas. Kay-Shuttleworth and Mr. Tufnell also drew attention to it in the “Minutes of Council on Education.”

[160] The disciple is not above his master, and if parents and teachers are without sympathy and religious feeling the children will also be without faith and love. This cannot be urged too strongly on those who have charge of the young. But there is no test by which we can ascertain that a master has these essential qualifications. As in the Christian ministry the unfit can be shut out only by their own consciences. But let no one think to understand education if he loses sight of what Joseph Payne has called “Pestalozzi’s simple but profound discovery—the teacher must have a heart.” “Soul is kindled only by soul,” says Carlyle; “to teach religion the first thing needful and also the last and only thing is finding of a man who has religion. All else follows.”

[161] In 1872, a Congress in which more than 10,000 German elementary teachers were represented, petitioned the Prussian Government for “the organization of training schools in accordance with the pedagogic principles of Pestalozzi, which formerly enjoyed so much favour in Prussia and so visibly contributed to the regeneration of the country.”

[162] Did Pestalozzi make due allowance for the system of thought which every child inherits? Croom Robertson in “How we came by our Knowledge” (Nineteenth Century, No. 1, March, 1877), without mentioning Pestalozzi, seems to differ from him. Croom Robertson says that “Children being born into the world are born into society, and are acted on by overpowering social influences before they have any chance of being their proper selves.... The words and sentences that fall upon a child’s ear and are soon upon his lips, express not so much his subjective experience as the common experience of his kind, which becomes as it were an objective rule or measure to which his shall conform.... He does, he must, accept what he is told; and in general he is only too glad to find his own experience in accordance with it.... We use our incidental, by which I mean our natural subjective experience, mainly to decipher and verify the ready-made scheme of knowledge that is given us en bloc with the words of our mother-tongue” (pp. 117, 118).

[163] One of the most interesting and most difficult problems in teaching is this:—How long should the beginner be kept to the rudiments? With young children, to whom ideas come fast, the main thing is no doubt to take care that these ideas become distinct and are made “the intellectual property” of the learners. But after a year or two children will be impatient to “get on,” and if they seem “marking time” will be bored and discouraged. Then again in some subjects the elementary parts seem clear only to those who have a conception of the whole. As Diderot says in a passage I have seen quoted from Le Neveu de Rameau, “Il faut Être profond dans l’art ou dans la science pour en bien possÉder les ÉlÉments.” “C’est le milieu et la fin qui Éclaircissent les tÉnÈbres du commencement.” The greatest “coach” in Cambridge used to “rush” his men through their subjects and then go back again for thorough learning. To be sure, the “scientific method” suitable for young men differs greatly from the “heuristic” or “method of investigation,” which is best for children. (See Joseph Payne’s Lecture on Pestalozzi.) But even with children we should bear in mind Niemeyer’s caution, “Thoroughness itself may become superficial by exaggeration; for it may keep too long to a part and in this way fail to complete and give any notion of the whole” (Quoted by O. Fischer, Wichtigste PÄd. 213).

[164] Nearly 20 years ago (1871) appeared a paper on “Elementary National Education” in which “John Parkin, M.D.,” advocated making all our elementary schools industrial, not only for practical purposes, but still more for the sake of physical education. The paper attracted no notice at the time, but now we are beginning to see that the body is concerned in education as well as the mind, and that the mind learns through it “without book.” The application of this truth will bring about many changes.

[165] Herbart, when he visited Pestalozzi at Burgdorf, observed that though Pestalozzi’s kindness was apparent to all, he took no pains in his teaching to mix the dulce with the utile. He never talked to the children, or joked, or gave them an anecdote. This, however, did not surprise Herbart, whose own experience had taught him that when the subject requires earnest attention the children do not like it the better for the teacher’s “fun.” “The feeling of clear apprehension,” says he, “I held to be the only genuine condiment of instruction” (Herbart’s PÄd. Schriften, ed. by O. Willmann, j. 89).

[166] First look to himself, but there may be other causes of failure as well. The great thing is never to put up contentedly, or even discontentedly, with failure. In teaching classes of lads from ten to sixteen years old, when I have found the lessons in any subject were not going well, I have sometimes taken the class into my confidence, told them that they no doubt felt as I did that this lesson was a dull one, and asked them each to put on paper what he considered to be the reasons, and also to make any suggestions that occurred to him. In this way I have got some very good hints, and I have always been helped in my effort to understand how the work seemed to the pupils. Every teacher should make this effort. As Pestalozzi says, “Could we conceive the indescribable tedium which must oppress the young mind while the weary hours are slowly passing away one after another in occupations which it can neither relish nor understand ... we should no longer be surprised at the remissness of the schoolboy creeping like snail unwillingly to school” (To G., xxx, 150).

[167] With Morf’s summing-up it is interesting to compare Joseph Payne’s, given at the end of his lecture on Pestalozzi:

I. The principles of education are not to be devised ab extra; they are to be sought for in human nature.

II. This nature is an organic nature—a plexus of bodily, intellectual and moral capabilities, ready for development, and struggling to develop themselves.

III. The education conducted by the formal educator has both a negative and a positive side. The negative function of the educator consists in removing impediments, so as to afford free scope for the learner’s self-development. His positive function is to stimulate the learner to the exercise of his powers, to furnish materials and occasion for the exercise, and to superintend and maintain the action of the machinery.

IV. Self-development begins with the impressions received by the mind from external objects. These impressions (called sensations), when the mind becomes conscious of them, group themselves into perceptions. These are registered in the mind as conceptions or ideas, and constitute that elementary knowledge which is the basis of all knowledge.

V. Spontaneity and self-activity are the necessary conditions under which the mind educates itself and gains power and independence.

VI. Practical aptness or faculty, depends more on habits gained by the assiduous oft-repeated exercise of the learner’s active powers than on knowledge alone. Knowing and doing (Wissen und KÖnnen) must, however, proceed together. The chief aim of all education (including instruction) is the development of the learner’s powers.

VII. All education (including instruction) must be grounded on the learner’s own observation (Anschauung) at first hand—on his own personal experience. This is the true basis of all his knowledge. First the reality, then the symbol; first the thing, then the word, not vice versÂ.

VIII. That which the learner has gained by his own observation (Anschauung) and which, as a part of his personal experience, is incorporated with his mind, he knows and can describe or explain in his own words. His competency to do this is the measure of the accuracy of his observation, and consequently of his knowledge.

IX. Personal experience necessitates the advancement of the learner’s mind from the near and actual, with which he is in contact, and which he can deal with himself, to the more remote; therefore from the concrete to the abstract, from particulars to generals, from the known to the unknown. This is the method of elementary education; the opposite proceeding—the usual proceeding of our traditional teaching—leads the mind from the abstract to the concrete, from generals to particulars, from the unknown to the known. This latter is the Scientific method—a method suited only to the advanced learner, who it assumes is already trained by the Elementary method.

[168] Most parents do not seem to think with Jean Paul, “If we regard all life as an educational institution, a circumnavigator of the world is less influenced by all the nations he has seen than by his nurse.” (Levana, quoted in Morley’s Rousseau.)

[169] I will quote the first paragraph of this work which is still considered mental pabulum suited to the digestions of young ladies and children:—

“Name some of the most Ancient Kingdoms.—Chaldea, Babylonia, Assyria, China in Asia, and Egypt in Africa. Nimrod, the grandson of Ham, is supposed to have founded the first of these B.C. 2221, as well as the famous cities of Babylon and Nineveh; his kingdom being within the fertile plains of Chaldea, Chalonitis, and Assyria, was of small extent compared with the vast empires that afterwards arose from it, but included several large cities. In the district called Babylonia were the cities of Babylon, Barsita, Idicarra, and Vologsia,” &c., &c.

[170] I shall always feel gratitude and affection for the two old ladies (sisters) to whom I was entrusted over half a century ago. More truly Christian women I never met with. But of the science and art of education they were totally ignorant; and moreover the premises they occupied were unfit for a school. As all the boys were under ten years old, it will seem strange, but is alas! too true, that there were vices among them which are supposed to be unknown to children and which if discovered would have made the old ladies close their school. The want of subjects in which the children can take a healthy interest will in a great measure account for the spread of evil in such schools. On this point some mistresses and most parents are dangerously ignorant.

[171] Having watched the “teaching” of pupil-teachers, I find that some of them (I may say many) never address more than one child at a time, and never attempt to gain the attention of more than a single child. So, by a very simple calculation, we can get at the maximum time each child is “under instruction.” If the pupil-teacher has but three-quarters of the pupils for whom the Department supposes him “sufficient,” each child cannot be under instruction more than two minutes in the hour. The rest of the time the children must sit quiet, or be cuffed if they do not. What is called “simultaneous” teaching in, say, reading, consists in the pupil-teacher reading from the book, and as he pronounces each word, the children shout it after him; but no one except the pupil-teacher knows the place in the book.

But perhaps the dangers from employing boys and girls to teach and govern children are greater morally than intellectually. Whether he report on it or not, the Inspector has less influence on the moral training than the youngest pupil-teacher. Channing has well said: “A child compelled for six hours each day to see the countenance and hear the voice of an unfeeling, petulant, passionate, unjust teacher is placed in a school of vice.” Those who have never taught day after day, week after week, month after month, little know what demands school-work makes on the temper and the sense of justice. The harshest tyrants are usually those who are raised but a little way above those whom they have to control; and when I think of the pupil-teacher with his forty pupils to keep in order, I heartily pity both him and them. Is there not too much reason to fear lest in many cases the school should prove for both what Channing has well described as “a school of vice”? (R. H. Q. in Spectator, 1st March, 1890.)

[172] Since the above was written, another “New Code” has appeared (March, 1890), in which the system of measuring by “passes,” a system maintained (in spite of the remonstrances of all interested in education) for nearly 30 years, is at length abandoned. We are certainly travelling, however slowly, away from Mr. Lowe. Far as we are still from Pestalozzi there seems reason to hope that the distance is diminishing.

[173] This short sketch of Froebel’s life is mainly taken, with Messrs. Black’s permission, from the EncyclopÆdia Britannica, for which I wrote it.

[174] This office was first filled by Langethal and afterwards by Ferdinand Froebel. I learned this at Burgdorf from Herr Pfarrer Heuer, whose father had himself been Waisenvater.

[175] For this quotation, and for much besides (as will appear later on), I am indebted to Mr. H. Courthope Bowen. See his paper Froebel’s Education of Man.

[176] The educator as teacher has his activity limited, according to DeGarmo, to these two things; “(1) The preparation of the child’s mind for a rapid and effective assimilation of new knowledge; (2) The presentation of the matter of instruction in such order and manner as will best conduce to the most effective assimilation” (Essentials of Method by Chas. DeGarmo, Boston, U.S., D. C. Heath, 1889). Besides this he must make his pupils use their knowledge both new and old, and reproduce it in fresh connexions.

[177] “Little children,” says Joseph Payne, “are scarcely ever contented with simply doing nothing; and their fidgetiness and unrest, which often give mothers and teachers so much anxiety, are merely the strugglings of the soul to get, through the body, some employment for its powers. Supply this want, give them an object to work upon, and you solve the problem. The divergence and distraction of the faculties cease as they converge upon the work, and the mind is at rest in its very occupation.” V. to German Schools.

[178] I entirely agree with Joseph Payne that where the language spoken is not German, it would be well to discard Kindergarten, KindergÄrtner, and KindergÄrtnerin. All who have to do with children should master some great principles taught by Froebel, but there is no need for them to learn German or to use German words. The French seem satisfied with Jardin d’Enfants, but we are not likely to be with Children-Garden. Playschool might do.

[179] Contrast this with what has been said by an eminent thinker of our time: “No art of equal importance to mankind has been so little investigated scientifically as the art of teaching.” Sir H. S. Maine, quoted in J. H. Hoose’s M. of Teaching.

[180] Here Jacotot’s notion of teaching reminds one of the sophism quoted by Montaigne—“A Westphalia ham makes a man drink. Drink quenches thirst. Therefore a Westphalia ham quenches thirst.”

[181] See H. Courthope Bowen on “Connectedness in Teaching” (Educational Times, June, 1890). Mr. Bowen quotes from H. Spencer—“Knowledge of the lowest kind is un-unified knowledge: science is partially unified knowledge: philosophy is completely unified knowledge.”

[182] As I have said above (p. 89) these methodizers in language-learning may, with regard to the first stage, be divided into two parties which I have called Complete Retainers and Rapid Impressionists. Two Complete Retainers, Robertson and Prendergast, have, as it seems to me, made, since Jacotot, a great advance on his method and that of his predecessor Ascham. As I have had a good deal of experience with beginners in German, I will give from an old lecture of mine the main conclusions at which I have arrived:—“My principle is to attack the most vital part of the language, and at first to keep the area small, or rather to enlarge it very slowly; but within that area I want to get as much variety as possible. The study of a book written in the language should be carried on pari passu with drill in its common inflexions. Now arises the question, Should the book be made with the object of teaching the language, or should it be selected from those written for other purposes? I see much to be said on either side. The three great facts we have to turn to account in teaching a language, are these:—first, a few words recur so constantly that a knowledge of them and grasp of them gives us a power in the language quite out of proportion to their number; second, large classes of words admit of many variations of meaning by inflection, which variations we can understand from analogy; third, compound words are formed ad infinitum on simple laws, so that the root word supplies the key to a whole family. Now, if the book is written by the language-teacher, he has the whole language before him, and he can make the most of all these advantages. He can use only the important words of the language; he can repeat them in various connections; he can bring the main facts of inflection and construction before the learner in a regular order, which is a great assistance to the memory; he can give the simple words before introducing words compounded of them; and he can provide that, when a word occurs for the first time, the learners shall connect it with its root meaning. A short book securing all these advantages would, no doubt, be a very useful implement, but I have never seen such a book. Almost all delectuses, &c., bury the learner with a pile of new words, under which he feels himself powerless. So far as I know, the book has yet to be written. And even if it were written, with the greatest success from a linguistic point of view, it would of course make no pretension to a meaning. Having myself gone through a course of Ahn and of Ollendorf, I remember, as a sort of nightmare, innumerable questions and answers, such as “Have you my thread stockings? No, I have your worsted stockings.” Still more repulsive are the long sentences of Mr. Prendergast:—“How much must I give to the cabdriver to take my father to the Bank in New Street before his second breakfast, and to bring him home again before half-past two o’clock?” I cannot forget Voltaire’s mot, which has a good deal of truth in it,—“Every way is good but the tiresome way.” And most of the books written for beginners are inexpressibly tiresome. No doubt it will be said, “Unless you adopt the rapid-impressionist plan, any book must be tiresome. What is a meaning at first becomes no meaning by frequent repetition.” This, however, is not altogether true. I myself have taught Niebuhr’s Heroengeschichten for years, and I know some chapters by heart; but the old tales of Jason and Hercules as they are told in Niebuhr’s simple language do not bore me in the least.

says the Student in Faust; and a notion—a very pleasing notion, too—remains to me about every word in the Heroengeschichten.

These, then, would be my books to be worked at the same time by a beginner, say in German:—A book for drill in the principal inflexions, followed by the main facts about gender, &c., and a book like the Heroengeschichten. This I would have prepared very much after the Robertsonian manner. It should be printed, as should also the Primer, in good-sized Roman type; though, in an appendix, some of it should be reprinted in German type. The book should be divided into short lessons. A translation of each lesson should be given in parallel columns. Then should come a vocabulary, in which all useful information should be given about the really important words, the unimportant words being neglected. Finally should come variations, and exercises in the lessons; and in these the important words of that and previous lessons should be used exclusively. The exercises should be such as the pupils could do in writing out of school, and viv voce in school. They should be very easy—real exercises in what is already known, not a series of linguistic puzzles. The object of the exercises, and also of a vast number of viv voce questions, should be to accustom the pupil to use his knowledge readily. (But some teachers, young teachers especially, are always cross-examining, and seem to themselves to fail when their questions are answered without difficulty.) The ear, the voice, the hand, should all be practised on each lesson. When the construing is known, transcription of the German is not by any means to be despised. A good variety of transcription is, for the teacher to write the German clause by clause on the black-board, and rub out each clause before the pupils begin to write it. Then a known piece may be prepared for dictation. In reading this as dictation, the master may introduce small variations, to teach his pupils to keep their ears open. He may, as another exercise, read the German aloud, and stop here and there for the boys to give the English of the last sentence read; or he may read to them either the exact German in the book or small variations on it, and make the pupils translate viv voce, clause by clause. He may then ask questions on the piece in German and require answers in English.

For exercises, there are many devices by which the pupil may be trained to observation, and also be confirmed in his knowledge of back lessons. The great teacher, F. A. Wolf, used to make his own children ascertain how many times such and such a word occurred in such and such pages. As M. BrÉal says, children are collectors by nature; and, acting on this hint, we might say, “Write in column all the dative cases on pages a to c, and give the English and the corresponding nominatives.” Or, “Copy from those pages all the accusative prepositions with the accusatives after them.” Or, “Write out the past participles, with their infinitives.” Or, “Translate such and such sentences, and explain them with reference to the context.” Or, questions may be asked on the subject-matter of the book. There is no end to the possible varieties of such exercises.

As soon as they get any feeling of the language, the pupils should learn by heart some easy poetry in it. I should recommend their learning the English of the piece first, and then getting the German viv voce from the teacher. To quicken the German in their minds, I think it is well to give them in addition a German prose version, using almost the same words. Variations of the more important sentences should be learnt at the same time.

In all these suggestions you will see what I am aiming at. I wish the learner to get a feeling of, and a power over, the main words of the language and the machinery in which they are employed.

[183] I append in a note a passage from the old edition of this book referring to the Cambridge man of forty years ago. “The typical Cambridge man studies mathematics, not because he likes mathematics, or derives any pleasure from the perception of mathematical truth, still less with the notion of ever using his knowledge; but either because, if he is “a good man,” he hopes for a fellowship, or because, if he cannot aspire so high, he considers reading the thing to do, and finds a satisfaction in mental effort just as he does in a constitutional to the Gogmagogs. When such a student takes his degree, he is by no means a highly cultivated man; but he is not the sort of man we can despise for all that. He has in him, to use one of his own metaphors, a considerable amount of force, which may be applied in any direction. He has great power of concentration and sustained mental effort even on subjects which are distasteful to him. In other words, his mind is under the control of his will, and he can bring it to bear promptly and vigorously on anything put before him. He will sometimes be half through a piece of work, while an average Oxonian (as we Cambridge men conceive of him at least) is thinking about beginning. But his training has taught him to value mental force without teaching him to care about its application. Perhaps he has been working at the gymnasium, and has at length succeeded in “putting up” a hundredweight. In learning to do this, he has been acquiring strength for its own sake. He does not want to put up hundredweights, but simply to be able to put them up, and his reward is the consciousness of power. Now the tripos is a kind of competitive examination in putting up weights. The student who has been training for it, has acquired considerable mental vigour, and when he has put up his weight he falls back on the consciousness of strength which he seldom thinks of using. Having put up the heavier, he despises the lighter weights. He rather prides himself on his ignorance of such things as history, modern languages, and English literature. He “can get those up in a few evenings,” whenever he wants them. He reminds me, indeed, of a tradesman who has worked hard to have a large balance at his banker’s. This done, he is satisfied. He has neither taste nor desire for the things which make wealth valuable; but when he sees other people in the enjoyment of them, he hugs himself with the consciousness that he can write a cheque for such things whenever he pleases.”

[184] On this interesting subject I will quote three men who said nothing inepte—De Morgan, Helps, and the first Sir James Stephen. De Morgan, speaking of Jacotot’s plan, wrote:—“There is much truth in the assertion that new knowledge hooks on easily to a little of the old thoroughly mastered. The day is coming when it will be found out that crammed erudition got up for examination, does not cast out any hooks for more.” (Budget of Paradoxes, p. 3.) Elsewhere he says:—“When the student has occupied his time in learning a moderate portion of many different things, what has he acquired—extensive knowledge or useful habits? Even if he can be said to have varied learning, it will not long be true of him, for nothing flies so quickly as half-digested knowledge; and when this is gone, there remains but a slender portion of useful power. A small quantity of learning quickly evaporates from a mind which never held any learning except in small quantities; and the intellectual philosopher can perhaps explain the following phenomenon—that men who have given deep attention to one or more liberal studies, can learn to the end of their lives, and are able to retain and apply very small quantities of other kinds of knowledge; while those who have never learnt much of any one thing seldom acquire new knowledge after they attain to years of maturity, and frequently lose the greater part of that which they once possessed.”

Sir Arthur Helps in Reading (Friends in C.) says:—“All things are so connected together that a man who knows one subject well, cannot, if he would, have failed to have acquired much besides; and that man will not be likely to keep fewer pearls who has a string to put them on than he who picks them up and throws them together without method. This, however, is a very poor metaphor to represent the matter; for what I would aim at producing not merely holds together what is gained, but has vitality in itself—is always growing. And anybody will confirm this who in his own case has had any branch of study or human affairs to work upon; for he must have observed how all he meets seems to work in with, and assimilate itself to, his own peculiar subject. During his lonely walks, or in society, or in action, it seems as if this one pursuit were something almost independent of himself, always on the watch, and claiming its share in whatever is going on.”

In his Lecture on Desultory and Systematic Reading, Sir James Stephen said:—“Learning is a world, not a chaos. The various accumulations of human knowledge are not so many detached masses. They are all connected parts of one great system of truth, and though that system be infinitely too comprehensive for any one of us to compass, yet each component member of it bears to every other component member relations which each of us may, in his own department of study, search out and discover for himself. A man is really and soundly learned in exact proportion to the number and to the importance of those relations which he has thus carefully examined and accurately understood.”

[185] This essay, which was written nearly twenty-five years ago, I leave as it stands. I take some credit to myself for having early recognised the importance of a book now famous. (June, 1890.)

[186] This proposition has been ably discussed by President W. H. Payne. Contributions to the Science of Education. “Education Values.”

[187] “The brewer,” as Mr. Spencer himself tells us, “if his business is very extensive, finds it pay to keep a chemist on the premises”—pay a good deal better, I suspect, than learning chemistry at school.

[188] Helps, who by taste and talent is eminently literary, put in this claim for science more than 20 [now nearer 50] years ago. “The higher branches of method cannot be taught at first; but you may begin by teaching orderliness of mind. Collecting, classifying, contrasting, and weighing facts are some of the processes by which method is taught.... Scientific method may be acquired without many sciences being learnt; but one or two great branches of science must be accurately known.” (Friends in Council, Education.) Helps, though by his delightful style he never gives the reader any notion of over compression, has told us more truth about education in a few pages than one sometimes meets with in a complete treatise.

[189] J. S. Mill (who by the way, would leave history entirely to private reading, Address at St. Andrews, p. 21), has pointed out that “there is not a fact in history which is not susceptible of as many different explanations as there are possible theories of human affairs,” and that “history is not the foundation but the verification of the social science.” But he admits that “what we know of former ages, like what we know of foreign nations, is, with all its imperfectness, of much use, by correcting the narrowness incident to personal experience.” (Dissertations, Vol. I, p. 112.)

[190] It is difficult to treat seriously the arguments by which Mr. Spencer endeavours to show that a knowledge of science is necessary for the practice or the enjoyment of the fine arts. Of course, the highest art of every kind is based on science, that is, on truths which science takes cognizance of and explains; but it does not therefore follow that “without science there can be neither perfect production nor full appreciation.” Mr. Spencer tells us of mistakes which John Lewis and Rossetti have made for want of science. Very likely; and had those gentlemen devoted much of their time to science we should never have heard of their blunders—or of their pictures either. If they were to paint a piece of woodwork, a carpenter might, perhaps, detect something amiss in the mitring. If they painted a wall, a bricklayer might point out that with their arrangement of stretchers and headers the wall would tumble down for want of a proper bond. But even Mr. Spencer would not wish them to spend their time in mastering the technicalities of every handicraft, in order to avoid these inaccuracies. It is the business of the painter to give us form and colour as they reveal themselves to the eye, not to prepare illustrations of scientific text-books. The physical sciences, however, are only part of the painter’s necessary equipment, according to Mr. Spencer. “He must also understand how the minds of spectators will be affected by the several peculiarities of his work—a question in psychology!” Still more surprising is Mr. Spencer’s dictum about poetry. “Its rhythm, its strong and numerous metaphors, its hyperboles, its violent inversions, are simply exaggerations of the traits of excited speech. To be good, therefore, poetry must pay attention to those laws of nervous action which excited speech obeys.” It is difficult to see how poetry can pay attention to anything. The poet, of course must not violate those laws, but, if he has paid attention to them in composing, he will do well to present his MS. to the local newspaper. [It seems the class is not extinct of whom Pope wrote:—

[191] Speaking of law, medicine, engineering, and the industrial arts, J. S. Mill remarks: “Whether those whose speciality they are will learn them as a branch of intelligence or as a mere trade, and whether having learnt them, they will make a wise and conscientious use of them, or the reverse, depends less on the manner in which they are taught their profession, than upon what sort of mind they bring to it—what kind of intelligence and of conscience the general system of education has developed in them.”—Address at St. Andrews, p. 6.

[192] “Comme vous n’avez pas su ou comme vous n’avez pas voulu atteindre la pensÉe de l’enfant, vous n’avez aucune action sur son dÉveloppement moral et intellectuel. Vous Êtes le maÎtre de latin et de grec.” BrÉal. Quelques Mots, &c., p. 243.

[193] Mr. Spencer does not mention this principle in his enumeration, but, no doubt, considers he implies it.

[194] “Si l’on partageait toute la science humaine en deux parties, l’une commune À tous les hommes, l’autre particuliÈre aux savants, celle-ci serait trÈs-petite en comparaison de l’autre. Mais nous ne songeons guÈre aux acquisitions gÉnÉrales, parce qu’elles se font sans qu’on y pense, et mÊme avant l’Âge de raison; que d’ailleurs le savoir ne se fait remarquer que par ses diffÉrences, et que, comme dans les Équations d’algÈbre, les quantitÉs communes se comptent pour rien.”—Émile, livre i.

[195] This is well said in Dr. John Brown’s admirable paper Education through the Senses. (HorÆ SubsecivÆ, pp. 313, 314.)

[196] After remarking on the wrong order in which subjects are taught, he continues, “What with perceptions unnaturally dulled by early thwartings, and a coerced attention to books, what with the mental confusion produced by teaching subjects before they can be understood, and in each of them giving generalisations before the facts of which they are the generalisations, what with making the pupil a mere passive recipient of others’ ideas and not in the least leading him to be an active inquirer or self-instructor, and what with taxing the faculties to excess, there are very few minds that become as efficient as they might be.”

[197] A class of boys whom I once took in Latin Delectus denied, with the utmost confidence, when I questioned them on the subject, that there were any such things in English as verbs and substantives. On another occasion, I saw a poor boy of nine or ten caned, because, when he had said that proficiscor was a deponent verb, he could not say what a deponent verb was. Even if he had remembered the inaccurate grammar definition expected of him, “A deponent verb is a verb with a passive form and an active meaning,” his comprehension of proficiscor would have been no greater. It is worth observing that, even when offending grievously in great matters against the principle of connecting fresh knowledge with the old, teachers are sometimes driven to it in small. They find that it is better for boys to see that lignum is like regnum, and laudare like amare, than simply to learn that lignum is of the Second Declension, and laudare of the First Conjugation. If boys had to learn by a mere effort of memory the particular declension or conjugation of Latin words before they were taught anything about declensions and conjugations, this would be as sensible as the method adopted in some other instances, and the teachers might urge, as usual, that the information would come in useful afterwards.

[199] On this subject I can quote the authority of a great observer of the mind—no less a man, indeed, than Wordsworth. He speaks of the “grand elementary principal of pleasure, by which man knows, and feels, and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy,” he continues, “but what is propagated by pleasure—I would not be misunderstood—but wherever we sympathise with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried on by subtile combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by pleasure alone. The man of science, the chemist, and mathematician, whatever difficulties and disgusts they may have to struggle with, know and feel this. However painful may be the objects with which the anatomist’s knowledge may be connected, he feels that his knowledge is pleasure, and when he has no pleasure he has no knowledge.”—Preface to second edition of Lyrical Ballads. So Wordsworth would have agreed with Tranio: (T. of Shrew, j. 1.)

[200] This remark, I am glad to say, is much less true now (1890) than when first published. Indeed some purveyors of books for children are getting to rely too exclusively on the pictures, just as I have noticed that an organ-grinder with a monkey seldom or never has a good organ. Of large pictures for class teaching, some of the best I have seen (both for history and natural history) are published by the S.P.C.K.

[201] Tillich’s boxes of bricks (sold by the B’ham Midland Educational Supply Company, and by Arnold, Briggate, Leeds), are very useful for “intuitive” arithmetic: for higher stages one might say the same of W. Wooding’s “Decimal Abacus” with vertical wires.

[202] The grammar question is still a perplexing one. There are Inspectors who require children (as I once heard in a remote country school) to distinguish “7 kinds of adverbs.” Then we have children discriminating after the fashion of one of my own pupils, (I quote from a grammar paper,) “Parse it.” “It is a prepreition. Almost all small words are prepreitions.” In such cases it is very hard indeed to find any common ground for the minds of the old and the young. The true way I believe is to lead the young to make their own observations. The way is very very slow, but it developes power. I have lately seen an interesting little book on these lines, called Language Work by Dr. De Garmo (Bloomington, Ill., U.S.A.)

[203] Books for a beginner should contain a little matter in much space, and, as they are usually written, they contain much matter in a little space. Nothing can be truer than the saying of Lakanal, “L’abrÉgÉ est le contraire de l’ÉlÉmÉntaire: That which is abridged is just the opposite of that which is elementary.” When shall we learn what seems obvious in itself and what is taught us by the great authorities? “Epitome,” says Ascham, “is good privately for himself that doth work it, but ill commonly for all others that use other men’s labour therein. A silly poor kind of study, not unlike to the doing of those poor folk which neither till, nor sow, nor reap themselves, but glean by stealth upon other’s grounds. Such have empty barns for dear years.” (School Master, Book ij.) Bacon says (De Aug., lib. vj., cap. iv.), “Ad pÆdagogicam quod attinet brevissimum foret dictu.... Illud imprimis consuluerim ut caveatur a compendiis: Not much about pedagogics.... My chief advice is, keep clear of compendiums.” And yet “the table of contents” method which I suggested in irony I afterwards found proposed in all seriousness in an announcement of Dr. J. F. Bright’s English History: “The marginal analysis has been collected at the beginning of the volume so as to form an abstract of the history suitable for the use of those who are beginning the study.”

I would rather listen to Oliver Goldsmith: “In history, such stories alone should be laid before them as might catch the imagination: instead of this, they are too frequently obliged to toil through the four Empires, as they are called, where their memories are burthened by a number of disgusting names that destroy all their future relish for our best historians.” (Letter on Education in the Bee: a letter containing so much new truth that Goldsmith in re-publishing it had to point out that it had appeared before Rousseau’s Emile.) A modern authority on education has come to the same conclusion as Goldsmith. “The first teaching in history will not give dates, but will show the learner men and actions likely to make an impression on him. Der erste Geschichtsunterricht wird nicht Jahreszahlen geben, sondern eindrucksvolle Personen und Thaten vorfÜhren.” (L. Wiese’s Deutsche Bildungsfragen, 1871.)

[204] Dr. Jas. Donaldson has well said of the educator:—“The most unguarded of his acts, those which come from the depth of his nature, uncalled for and unbidden, are the actions which have the most powerful influence.” Chambers’ Information sub v. Education, p. 565.

[205]

[206] I fortify myself with the following quotation from the Book about Dominies by “Ascott Hope” (Hope Moncrieff). He says that a school of from twenty to a hundred boys is too large to be altogether under the influence of one man, and too small for the development of a healthy condition of public opinion among the boys themselves. “In a community of fifty boys, there will always be found so many bad ones who will be likely to carry things their own way. Vice is more unblushing in small societies than in large ones. Fifty boys will be more easily leavened by the wickedness of five, than five hundred by that of fifty. It would be too dangerous an ordeal to send a boy to a school where sin appears fashionable, and where, if he would remain virtuous, he must shun his companions. There may be middle-sized schools which derive a good and healthy tone from the moral strength of their masters or the good example of a certain set of boys, but I doubt if there are many. Boys are so easily led to do right or wrong, that we should be very careful at least to set the balance fairly” (p. 167); and again he says (p. 170), “The moral tone of a middle-sized school will be peculiarly liable to be at the mercy of a set of bold and bad boys.”

[207] As I have been thought to express myself too strongly on this point, I will give a quotation from a master whose opinion will go far with all who know him. “The moral tone of the school is made what it is, not nearly so much by its rules and regulations, or its masters, as by the leading characters among the boys. They mainly determine the public opinion amongst their schoolfellows—their personal influence is incalculable.” Rev. D. Edwardes, of Denstone.

[208] About Preparatory Schools I find I am at issue with my friend the Head Master of Harrow (See Public Schools, by Rev. J. E. C. Welldon, in Contemporary R., May, 1890). I do indeed incline to his opinion that very young boys should not be at a public school, but I cannot agree that they should be at a middle-sized boarding school. I hold that they should live in a family (their own if possible) and go to a day school. Day Schools have now been provided for girls, but for young boys they do not seem in demand. English parents who can afford it send their sons to boarding schools from eight years old onwards. This seems to me a great mistake of theirs.

[209] “What is education? It is that which is imbibed from the moral atmosphere which a child breathes. It is the involuntary and unconscious language of its parents and of all those by whom it is surrounded, and not their set speeches and set lectures. It is the words which the young hear fall from their seniors when the speakers are off their guard: and it is by these unconscious expressions that the child interprets the hearts of its parents. That is education.”—Drummond’s Speeches in Parliament.

[210] In what I have said on this subject, the incompleteness which is noticeable enough in the preceding essays, has found an appropriate climax. I see, too, that if anyone would take the trouble, the little I have said might easily be misinterpreted. I am well aware, however, that if the young mind will not readily assimilate sharply defining religious formulÆ, still less will it feel at home among the “immensities” and “veracities.” The great educating force of Christianity I believe to be due to this, that it is not a set of abstractions or vague generalities, but that in it God reveals Himself to us in a Divine Man, and raises us through our devotion to Him. I hold, therefore, that religious teaching for the young should neither be vague nor abstract. Mr. Froude, in commenting on the use made of hagiology in the Church of Rome, has shown that we lose much by not following the Bible method of instruction. (See Short Studies: Lives of the Saints, and Representative Men.)

[211] This theory of the educator’s task which makes him a disposer or director of influence rather than a teacher, led Locke to decry our public schools, for in them the traditions and tone of the school seem the source of influence, and the masters are to all appearance mainly teachers. Locke’s own words are these:—“The difference is great between two or three pupils in the same house and three or four score boys lodged up and down; for let the master’s industry and skill be never so great, it is impossible he should have fifty or a hundred scholars under his eye any longer than they are in the school together, nor can it be expected that he should instruct them successfully in anything but their books; the forming of their minds and manners requiring a constant attention and particular application to every single boy which is impossible in a numerous flock, and would be wholly in vain (could he have time to study and correct everyone’s particular defects and wrong inclinations) when the lad was to be left to himself or the prevailing infection of his fellows the greatest part of the four-and-twenty hours.” But the educator who considers himself a director of influences must remember that he is not the only force. The boy’s companions are a force at least as great; and if he were brought up in private on Locke’s system, he would be entirely without a kind of influence much more valuable than Locke seems to think—the influence of boy companions, and of the traditions of a great school. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that our public schools used to be, and perhaps are still to some extent, under-mastered, and that the masters should not be the mere teachers which, from overwork and other causes, they often tend to become. The consequence has been that the real education of the boys has in a great measure passed out of their hands. What has been the result? A long succession of able teachers have aimed at giving literary instruction and making their pupils classical scholars. Both manners and bodily training have been left to take care of themselves. Yet such is the irony of Fate that the majority of youths who leave our great schools are not literary and are not much of classical scholars, but they are decidedly gentlemanly and still more decidedly athletic.

[212] I append a note written from a different point of view—“With how little wisdom!” certainly seems to cover most departments of life. Seems? Yes; but are we not apt to overlook the wisdom that lies in the great mass of people? In some small department we may have investigated further than our class-mates, and may see, or think we see, a good deal of stupidity in what goes on. But in most matters we do not investigate for ourselves, but just do the usual thing; and this seems to work all right. There must be a good deal of wisdom underlying the complex machinery of civilised life. Carlyle’s “Mostly fools!” will by no means account for it. At times one has a dim perception that people in general are not so stupid as they seem. Perhaps a long life would in the end lead us to say like Tithonus,

There is a higher wisdom than the disintegrating individualism of Carlyle. Far better to believe with Mazzini in “the collective existence of humanity,” and remembering that we work in a medium fashioned for us by the labours of all who have preceded us, regard our collective powers as “grafted upon those of all foregoing humanity.” (Mazzini’s Essays: Carlyle.) This is the point of view to which Wordsworth would raise us:—

Though unable to share in “the pure bliss” of Wordsworth we may take refuge with Goethe in the thought that “humanity is the true man,” and enjoy much to which we have no claim as individuals. Tradition, blind tradition, must rule our actions through by far the greatest part of our lives; and seeing we owe it so much, we should be tolerant, even grateful.

[213] Professor Jebb has lately given us the main ideas of the great Scholar Erasmus. “In all his work,” says the Professor, “he had an educational aim.... The evils of his age, in Church, in State, in the daily lives of men, seemed to him to have their roots in ignorance; ignorance of what Christianity meant, ignorance of what the Bible taught, ignorance of what the noblest and most gifted minds of the past, whether Christian or pagan, had contributed to the instruction of the human race.” (Rede Lecture, 1890.) Erasmus evidently fell into the error against which Pestalozzi and Froebel lift up their voices, often in vain—the error of forgetting that knowledge is of no avail without intelligence. What is the use of lighting additional candles for the blind?