I illJjfep^ 7 THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES t FOWLER & COLWELL, BOOKSELLERS 221 West Second Stre -? 3 > THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL ADAPTED FROM DIE ERZIEHUNG DER MENSCHHEIT OF F. FROEBEL BY WILLIAM H. HERFORD B.A. LOND. SOMETIME MEMBER OF THE UNIVERSITIES BONN BERLIN AND ZURICH AUTHOR OF Tlte School: Essay towards Humane Education t BOSTON, U.S.A. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 1896 Library L/3 anna Sncll (OF JENA) WHO AFTER LEARNING AND PRACTISING lit HER OWN LAND THE ART AND MYSTERY OF THE KINDERGARTEN UPHELD IN ENGLAND DURING TWENTY-FIVE YEARS WITH UNWEARIED ZEAL AND PERSEVERANCE THE BANNER OF F. FROEBEL THIS LITTLE. BOOK DESIGNED TO SERVE THE CAUSE OF HUMANE EDUCATION IS DEDICATED BY HER OLD COMRADE AND FRIEND Ube E&itot V TABLE OF CONTENTS. PA6E3 FROEBEL'S LIFE AND WORK/- xi AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION . . . . . . 1-23 1. THE NURSLING . . . . . ., . 24-27 2. THE CHILD 28-47 3. THE BOY 48-67 4. SCHOOL 68- A. PRELIMINARY 68 B. SUBJECTS OF TEACHING 69 1. INSTRUCTION IN RELIGION . . . . 71 iL STUDY OF NATURE ...... 73 ill FORMS 77 "Tv. MATHEMATIC 83 V. LANGUAGE 85 O. PRELIMINARY 85 b. WRITING AND READING .... 88 VI. AKT 91 C. HOME AND SCHOOL 93 MEANS OF EDUCATION IN COMMON SCHEME OF . . 97-98 RETROSPECT 103 CONCLUSION 107 INDKX 109 EDITOR'S PREFACE. THE purpose of this little book is to give to young people, who are seriously preparing themselves to become educators, a brief yet full account of Froebel's c< Theory " of Education ; his " Practice," or Plans of Method, being reserved for a second part. The work from which "The Student's Froebel" is adapted "Die Erziehung der Menschheit" was published in the maturity of its author's powers (1826), while he was still hoping to effect an actual Reform of the teach- ing and training of Youth, from Infancy, up to Man- and Woman-hood. Froebel is known over the world as founder of the " Kindergarten " rather than as ex- ^ ponent of a New Education, because experience showed him that a practical Reform of Education must begin at the very beginning. From the centre of Mother's love and Mother's wit, he unfolded in Theory the early training of Man ; which, while doing full justice to the immediate needs and tastes of our Little Ones, should prepare for all Human Development : because Youth and Maturity are but Man's larger growth. The book in which this is done, " The Education of Humanity," via EDITOR'S PREFACE. was never competed. The first part only, which gives principles and methods for Training and Instruction of Man, from birth up to the end of Boyhood, thus em- bracing two- thirds of the time fixed by immemorial custom and by law, for pupilage, was published. With marvellous skill in adaptation and invention, Froebel fitted to the former of these periods the beautiful "Means" Gifts, Songs, Games. Occupations which give to the Kindergarten, when ruled in his spirit, its preciousness, as true Heaven on Earth for little Children. He left us, his successors, to adapt analogous means for the development of later stages, saying once : if in three hundred years' time his ideas were completely realised, he should rejoice in Heaven. A careful study, even of this little book, will show that Froebel's principles ask to be realised in the education of all ages ; that his Motto of Theory "Harmonious Development" and his Watchword of Method " Learn by Doing " are of uni- * versal application in the province of teaching : in a word, that he has drawn the lines upon which "to follow Nature," the necessary aim of all Education, but of doubtful meaning with his forerunners, becomes the * Law of Discipline. Two English translations only, both published at New York, are known to the Editor. The *. former, by Josephine Jarvis (Lovell & Co., 1886) is a monument of faithful pains; yet, through linguistic dif- ficulties is sometimes scarcely intelligible. The latter, by W. N. Hailmann, Superintendent of Public Schools, EDITOR'S PREFACE. ix Indiana (Appletons, 1888), is, when he matter is considered eminently facile and readable; rounding, perhaps, Froebel's ridges and angles more smoothly than he might approve. This Editor would be made happy by knowing that the perusal of his little book had introduced to the study of Hailmann's excellent version any who are not strong enough in German speech to attempt the original. The Editor has tried to give what is Froebel's own, in English as close as possible to the very words of his author; retaining the German custom of commencing a noun with a capital letter. The larger divisions of the present work are those of F. Seidel's edition of the Menschen-erziehung (Vienna and Leipzig, 1883), which has been employed for translation. For the numbered sections ( 1, &c.) the Editor is alone responsible. THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL N^Trtof ov5( Works and Days, 40. ,/grfil)er ober fpater/ abev immer gcwif/ wtrb fid) bie Statin; an allem Sl)un bev ?0lenfd)en vad)cn, bag wibec fte felbjl tjl." ^ "What we do not call Education is more precious than that which we call so." R. W. EMERSON. FROEBEL'S LIFE AND WORK.* FRIEDRICH WILHELM AUGUST FROEBEL was born April 21, 1782, in a Thuringian village, Oberweissbach, of which his father was the hard-working pastor : a grave, somewhat stern, but loving-hearted man. Losing his mother within his first year, having kind elder brothers but no sister, the child was left much to himself, with few playmates and little outdoor freedom. ( His father tried to teach him his "rudiments," and failed. He found the boy dull, and placed him in the Girls' division of the village school, of which he was official superintendent. For this irregu- larity Friedrich was always grateful, and he repeated to his dying-day the hymns he had learnt there. ' In a short account of his own life, he says : I came to school on a Monday morning while the girls were repeating aloud the text of Sunday's sermon, " Seek ye first the Kingdom of God," and to this day (forty years later) the tone of every word is fresh in my memory. At ten years of age, his mother's brother, Pastor Hofmann of Stadt Ilm, took Friedrich to live with him and attend the Town School. Here he learned pretty well; preferring the classes on Religion and Arithmetic : evincing certainly no precocious wisdom or goodness, as we judge by his illustrations of boy- ish mischief (post, p. 61, 5), told with a gravity most un- consciously comic. When fifteen (1 797) Friedrich returned home, and was placed for two years, as pupil in Wood-craft, * Taken chiefly from the biography by F. Seidel, prefixed to his edition of Froebel's Writings, 1883. ill FKOEBEL'S LIFE AND WORK. with a Forester, whose neglect of the instruction due from him left the lad of rare gifts and character to unfold his own powers, unimpeded. Good books his master had ; so Friedrich worked at Botany, studied Mathematic, and made a map of the neighbourhood. Near the end of 1799, a messenger being wanted to bring to his brother Traugott, Student of Medicine at Jena, the half-yearly allowance, Friedrich, having left the Forester, volunteered on this service. When at Jena he begged leave to stay till the Easter vacation ; afterwards returned for a year, and devoted himself to hearing lectures. The two brothers lived most frugally, but found that an allowance, spare for one, was not enough for two. After his brother's departure, Friedrich, unable to pay their joint debts of some ^5, or less, was committed to the University prison, where he spent nine weeks : mending his Latin, with help of a fellow- prisoner ; studying Winckelmann's Letters on Art; and writing a Mathematical Essay. By pledging his small ex- pectations, Friedrich was released and returned home. Next year he worked on a farm, but was recalled home by his father's failing health, and had the happiness of minis- tering to his father's comfort, till his death, February 1802. Left wholly to his own resources, he worked for his bread, as clerk secretary book-keeper, during three years and more, when a small legacy from his fatherly uncle Hofmann made him think a settled profession possible. At mid- summer 1805 he set out for Frankfurt, hoping to make himself an Architect. On the way, he visited a farmer friend, who at parting begged from Froebel in German fashion a verse or motto for his album. " Not knowing what he said " for no idea of becoming an Educator had then entered his mind ! Froebel wrote : Gieb du den Menschen Brot : mein Streben sei, sie ihnen selbst zu geben, "Be it yours to give men bread : mine, to give them themselves" His call was on the way ! When Froebel had already begun work with an archi- tect, a Frankfurt friend introduced him to Gruner, Head PROEBEL'S LIFE AND WORK. xiii of the new Model School, and formerly a pupil of Pestaloazi. Gruner said to him : " Let architecture alone ; become a teacher." With hesitation, Froebel accepted a place with him ; and, at once, with a class of children before him, felt he had found his life-work. Thenceforward all events became steps towards realising that ideal Education of Man by the Harmonious Develop- ment of Body, Mind, and Heart, which Froebel conceived more completely and vividly than any of his precursors. In August 1805, Froebel visited Yverdun, where Pestalozzi had his Institute; was kindly received, and in three weeks learned enough to make him wish to come again. He taught under Gruner for two years, and made his class, of forty girls and boys, the model class of the Model School. In method, his great achievement was to lay the foundation of Geography in " Home-knowledge " ; that is, points of the compass forms of surface courses of streams, roads, as a Being endowed with Perception and humanity : Reason, is to become fully and clearly conscious of this byhi v s eal nis own Essence the Divine that is in him, and to make it manifest in his own Life. The Education Education of Man is the Awakening and Training of his Hu- of Man is J ' . & . the training manity to Consciousness and Reflection, so that his of Man to y . ' . . express the outward Life maybe an Expression of this inward inward law in his actual Law life. 3. Recognition of this eternal Law, with Insight into its Foundation and the Variety of its Operations, True is Sci&nce Science of Life: and that Law, when sdlncTof applied in Practice by the thinking Creature on and kno e w that by itself, is Science, of Education. Science of A System of Rules issuing from Knowledge of that Education * , . . is to apply Law, designed to enable rational Beings to become that law to . 3 . ' practice. conscious of their Destination, and to fulfil it, is Doctrines of Educa- Doctrine of Education. tion are the rules growing Voluntary Application of this Knowkdae (science, from faith in * Artof^' or doctrine] so as to develop and train rational Teachmg^is Beings, in order to attain their true Destiny, is O this Science to tram ra- tionaibeings. 4^ r^^ ^ m Q f Education is to produce a pure, faithful, complete, and therefore holy, Life. Life-wisdom Knowledge and Practice united ; Theory and and n perform e - Application coalescing into pure, faithful, and com- ance united ; , T . . , . . T ., . , the highest plete Living ; this is L^fe-w^saom. and best To be wise is the highest Endeavor possible to achievement , . . . ,., ,1-, , /.r. of Man. Man; it is also the highest Result of Mans self- determining Power. INTRODUCTION. 3 To educate oneself and others, with conscious \\kJom's Purpose, is the two-fold work of Wisdom. WoV-to This Work commenced with the first Appearance andVthers of Man on Earth ; it was in full Action as soon as the Individual began to be completely self-conscious ; began with it asserts itself to-day as the necessary Claim for all ^a*^ Human-beings ; and as such will by-and-by find onearth> Hearing and Fulfilment. Thus to work is to walk an d now is on the Eoad which alone " leadeth unto Life " ; which uTe^ht and guides without fail to the Satisfaction of Man's ThJoniy inward, and not less of his outward, Needs ; the leaXth into Way, therefore, which conducts, through consistent, pure, and holy Living, to the Blessed Life. 5. The Divine in Man, which is his Essence, is Education u to be unfolded and brought to his Consciousness by MaiJ-Tom- means of Education ; and Man himself is to be raised hjsown ess> to a Consciousness of living up to, and realising in nature, that Freedom, the Divine which acts within him. worthy of* : The Divine as it exists in Nature is to be brought to show him to Man's Knowledge by Education; which, at the Nature' 1161 same time, is to show that both Nature and Man are governed by ... T like laws governed by similar Laws. *& Man. Education is to lead Man to realise in his Life the Truth that Nature and Man came forth from God, are ruled by God, and rest in God. Education should guide Man to the Understanding Education, of himself ; to Peace with Nature ; and to Union brings man __. , , . , to know him. with God. Education, therefore, has to raise the self; to live Human-being to a Knowledge of himself and of Nature, and Humanity ; to a Knowledge of God and of Nature ; with God : and to the pure and holy Life which follows from pure and * holy Life. this Knowledge. The above five sections are given in the exactest 4 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. version which I have found possible of F. Froebel's own words. ED. The -within. F. proceeds, his expression being somewhat La of C Man, abridged, while nothing is added. known only 6. The Essence or Divine Part of Things, and shew out- ey of Man, is known through their outward Expression Hence, con- [cannot be known otherwise]. Hence must be ad- wh" which' mitted that the Utterances [i.e., outward effects, or i> d imme. n results], whether of Man or of other Creatures, are cerned. c r the Matters with which Training and Instruction are concerned. So far is undeniable : now comes one of F.'s axioms, which may seem to many by no means self-evident. ipsedixit. The Nature of Things demands that in every Re- lation we infer not directly, but inversely, from the Outward to the Inward, and from the Inward to the Outward. inference His argument is '.-- Great harm in family and behavior to school, endless misconstruction leading to fatal tentionis iniustice, come from direct inferences from often fatally J ' . i i i T unjust. outward and visible behavior to the unseen purpose ; to the heart. And the fact, obvious to careful observation on which F. builds up his axiom, is : Achiidtjiat A Child which seems good, outwardly, is often not is so, some- good, inwardly : i.e., does not try to be good out of times, only !,* 11 to please; Love and with Self-control, but is contented to while one . outwardly seem so: while one who is outwardly rough and froward is . ' . J & often striving wilful often has within It a most zealous Endeavor tf do right. to do right; likewise, an apparently inattentive Child may have within It a steady Though tfulness that hinders Its heeding things outward. INTRODUCTION. 5 7. Therefore Education and Instruction should Education from the very first be passive, observant, protective ; the first and rather than prescribing, determining, interfering. This follows, F. says, from the definition of We should Education : that Education is, simply, helping g^ltmpiy the Divine within us to come forth, to act. they ukfno We must assume that the young Human-being aims hana> surely, if unconsciously, at what is best for itself, and feels within it Power and Means to attain this. So the Duckling hurries into the Water ; a Chick scratches on the Ground for its Meat, and the young Swallow catches Food on the Wing. These, he says, are fair illustrations. They know what they are about ! So does a child, when it tests everything, with tongue and finger ; tries every movement, and reaches after every new object. 8, To young Plants and Animals we give Space, space, and and Time, and Rest, knowing that they will unfold reTt^r" to Beauty, by Laws working in each. We avoid young , i t T-I f ,-i i animals and acting on them by Force, for we know that such plants: Intrusion upon their natural Growth could only injure their Development. Yet Man treats the we treat young Human-being as if It were a piece of Wax, a S'beings lump of Clay ; out of which he can mould what he they w U e s r will ! Men ! as you stroll through Garden or Meadow, Field or Copse, why use you not your Senses to perceive what Nature by her silent Language A pi antf would teach you? Behold the Plant you call it |> n d T p g res . Weed : when grown under Pressure and Constraint d^ia^tT you scarcely guess its natural Life and Purpose, meaning; But in open Ground see what Regularity it shows, f r ee*hows how its inward Life becomes manifest ; a Sun of blauty" 1 * 6 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. green Rays, a Star of Leaves, comes forth out of the Thus, our Ground ! Your Children too, O Parents, have it in children, ' forced by them to become Creatures fully developed into unfit sur- roundings, Beauty i but if you early force on them Form and grow stunted * J -distorted Work, that are unsuited to their Nature, they will m spirit. grow stunted and misshapen, through those un- natural Conditions. AH coercive 9. All Training and Instruction which prescribes, may injure and fixes, that is, interferes with Nature, must tend growth. to limit and injure, if we consider the Action of the Divine, and take Man as in his primal Beauty and original Health. To borrow a Lesson from Plant-culture : the Vine has to be pruned, but pruning by itself brings no Fruit ; indeed, by pruning, the Vine may be killed, or its power of bearing Fruit ruined, unless the Gardener proceed most cautiously, heeding the nature of the Plant. In the Treatment of Animals and Plants, we often take the right Course, while with Human-beings we begin quite wrong. Yet in all Things [animals, plants, human beings], are work- ing Powers, that flow from one Spring, and act by similar Laws. . . . in fa<-t, an As Matter of Fact, an unspoiled original Condition unspoiled original st.-.tt [3 rarely to be seen in Nature: least of all in Man. rarely exists * in objects ; p or that very Reason, always, and above all in the most rarely in Man: individual Human-being, the unspoiled Condition must be assumed, until the contrary be proved : otherwise, wherover really found, it would soon be impaired. When however, we are able to judge with Certainty that the original Condition has been and when spoiled ; then a directly coercive mode of Treatment perversion . ,, -, ,, u certainly IS Called IOr. INTRODUCTION. 7 Emphasizing the difficulty involved in this inferred, certain inference, F. insists, that even when wil- entersT ful naughtiness has to be stopped ; even then : even where . . T . , interference Doctrine, Training, and Instruction have to be far is needed, i i ^ e must more passive and observant, than interfering and interfere as r littleaspos- coercive, because needless Interference and Coercion sibie. impair the simple Development, and steady Pro- gress of Humanity. For [as F. never tires of in- sisting], to realise the Divine in Man and through Man's Life, with Freedom and Self-determination, is the very Goal of all Education, the Aim of Life ; what Man is in the World for. If Teachers, Elders, persist in trying to force pupils into some form of character and work _. which parents prefer, instead of helping young ones to grow into what God made them for, the aim of true Education is absolutely defeated. Yet with the firmest and strongest pronounce- ment that every form of pressure and compulsion should be avoided, by all who have charge of children, wherever possible, and as long as possible, F. combines the plain admission that false choice, wrong deed, on the part of child or pupil are never to be yielded to, are not to be taken as inevitable, but resisted and put down whenever necessary ; that is, when through inherited character social circum- stances, etc., the passive, waiting method has been duly tried, and plainly failed. 10. Abstract Truth and the Ideal of Conduct coercion must, and do in fact, exert themselves inexorably unavoidable and unconditionally. But they do this only where necessity -KT ' 1 * 11 W '" k g 3C ~ .Necessity speaks out in Circumstances, and the knowiedged 8 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. by the sub- individual Character ; and where the Necessity will jectsofit. * * one day be acknowledged by those to whom the Pressure is applied. To sum up the extreme difficulty and danger of all coercion, while acknowledging it to be some- times inevitable, he gives an oracular utterance, of power methinks to make all teachers examine their ways. ta\ipsedixu In good Education genuine Instruction and true that must Teaching, Necessity calls forth Freedom, Law evokes Self-determination, external Constraint calls forth internal Free-will, Hate from without evokes Love from within. Wherever Hatred begets Hatred, and Law calls into being Deceit and Crime ; where Constraint produces slavish Feeling, and Necessity Sense of Bondage; wherever Pressure destroys inward Activity, and Severity engenders Rebellion and Falsehood : there all genuine Education, all true working of teaching and instruction, is at an end. AH human That this latter State of Things may be escaped, and m U ustact y as the former attained, whatever acts with Authority higher must go to work observantly. This is secured when so that all all Education, Teaching, Instruction, though acting arbitrary is with Authority, bears yet the incontestable Stamp banished. ., ',* i . of being itself subject to an over-ruling Xaw, an inevitable Necessity, which excludes Caprice. TrueEduca- H- All true Education and Teaching therefore, gTveand 10 every genuine Educator and Teacher, has to be actite and always, in every Detail, two-sided ; to give and take ExeTami join and divide command and obey act and bear manage and let alone be fixed and movable. The Above both Child or Pupil is to be so likewise ; and betwixt the Pupii-a two Tutor and Pupil, Command and Obedience ' INTRODUCTION. 9 rules unseen a third Term, whereto Tutor and Pupil third term, . the abstract are alike and equally sumect. This third is the Right, is " ruling. ideal Best the abstract Eight as- it issues from the The Teacher Conditions of each Case, and expresses itself, im- i%u'tTrmh, personally. The Teacher has to express, simply and firmly, sometimes even gravely and severely, his and the clear Acquaintance with, and quiet Obedience to, quick to dis. this third Term. The Pupil, too, has a wonderfully ? command is arbitrary fine Feeling for it. A Child rarely fails to see orimper- whether what Parent and Teacher order or forbid, comes from themselves personally, arbitrarily or is the Expression of universal and necessary Truth, speaking through them. 12. Willing Submission to this changeless third NO detail is Term, whereto Teacher and Pupil are equally subject, obey ab- ought to be expressed in every Command of, the Teacher, to the minutest Detail. So, the universal Formula for Instruction is : Do this, and see, in this particular Case, what will follow from your Action, and what Knowledge it will bring you. And the Prescription for Life itself, for every one is: Manifest in your outward Action, your spiritual Being, that which lives in you, your true Life ; and see what your Being needs and what it is like. Thus, Jesus says, the divinity of his mission is to be known : " If any man willeth to do His [Ev : John vii. 17.] will, he shall know of the teaching whether it be of God or whether I speak from ^myself ." Hence the following Demand is understood, and the Method of its Fulfilment is given, at the same Time. The Aim of the Educator, the Purpose of Teaching, is to make the Special, universal, and the 10 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. Universal special, and prove the existence of both : it is to make the Outward inward, to make the Inward outward, and show the necessary Unity of them : it is to consider the Finite infinitely, and the Infinite finitely, and to realise them both ; it is to perceive and behold Divineness in the Human, to prove the Being of Man in God, and to exhibit them united in Life. The course prescribed is seen more clearly, to come from Man's Nature, asserts itself more positively, the more Man contemplates Humanity in From the himself , in the rising Generation, and in the historical its S iife! y what Development of Mankind. a child's 13. If, then, to realize the Infinite by means of must be dis- the Finite, the Heavenly by the Earthly, the Divine fostered. by Man and through Man's Life, thus cherishing his The child originally Divine Nature ; if this comes to us as in- weicomed as disputably the sole End and Aim of Education, what a gift of God. follows but that the human Being must be regarded [Deodatus, in this Light from the very beginning of Its existence? Adeodatus, .^ /~ii -i i T->- i < T r-{ i Theodore, Every Child in Kight or Its Soul is to be received as Theodotus, * _ . . Theodosius, something Divine appearing in human Form as a feminines, Pledge of God's Grace, a Gift of God. Such the occur to us.] " early Christians, by the Names they gave their Children, really acknowledged them to be. 14. Every Child ought to be acknowle cared for as an essential Member of Huma nectioiiwith thus Parents, as Guardians, ought to feel themselves all past, . . present! and responsible to God, to the Child, and to Mankind. folding of Just so, Parents ought to regard the- Child as in mankind. . necessary Connexion with the Present, the Past, and the Future of human Development; and bring the Child's Training into Accord with the Claims of The child to 14. Every Child ought to be acknowledged and as in a neces- r cared for as an essential Member of Humanity : and INTRODUCTION. 11 Mankind's Development, as it has been, is, and shall be 15. Man Humanity in Man as an outward Man is not m- ./> . i i to be taken Manifestation is on no Account to be viewed as ascom- r* 11-11 pleted, but complete, nxed, accomplished; but as continuously ascominu- unfolding from one Stage of Development to another; folding is a ever growing towards a Goal which rests in Eternity ?ai resting and Infinitv. bosom of . . God - True, each successive Generation, each successive AH genera- Individual, has to^pass through, for himself, all bdmduait; previous human Development : and he does pass fhe S entire U8 through it, or he would not understand either the oflh^h^man Past or the Present ; but this is in the living Way of growth, U not self-active Growth, not by lifeless Copying 16. Humanity in every Individual ought to be Each human presented in the Shape that is his own ; so that the present u Nature of Humanity and of God, as infinite, eternal, his^nway": and containing all Variety, may be felt, and recog- infinite e , T , , i -, capabilities nised, and ever more distinctly perceived. of Man will XT m -I -i m ( i r ^ s h wn - JNo true, genuine Tending and 1 raining of Man- Adequate kind can grow, bloom, bear fruit, and ripen out of Ma^'cfn any other root but full and complete Knowledge of f? m full y * Man from the earliest Commencement of his Being : Man. AH whatever else needs to be known and used in this methods of Tending and Training will, if earnestly sought, be grow out of found to follow naturally from this Knowledge. . . . ledge. 17. Hence follows simply what Parents ought to Parents do and to be, for their Children's Welfare. They pure ; fun ought to be pure and clean in Word and Deed ; to worth, as be filled with a Sense of the Worth and Dignity of guardians of Man; to consider themselves Guardians of a Gift of and study' Its destiny* God; to study the Function and Destiny of Man, with all Ways and Means of reaching it 13 THE STUDENTS 7ROKBEL. 18. Children, Members of a Family, wffl best exhibit the native Gifts, known or unknown, of the Family, if each Child, each Member, unfolds itself most completely and moat originally. So Human- npwtgg a {TmVlrMri tm i-*nn xna Mffmlmi OI HumamtT. wfll best represent the Union of God and Man, which exists really though unperceived, if each Individual unfolds Itself as completely and originally as pos- sible - 19- Therefore from Its very Birth, from Us first Appearance upon Earth, the Child should be taken for what It is [Man, in germ], and hare a free, all- ~\ : :."" round Use of Its Strength. No one Limb or Power should erer be fostered at the Expense of the rest : .- -.. the Child should not be fettered, bound, swathed : nor by and by, held in Leading-strings. The Child should learn as early as possible to find within Itself the Centre of all Its Powers ; on this Centre to rest ; and resting on it to act and more freely. It should be taught to grasp and hold fast with Its own Hands ; to stand and walk on Its own Feet ; to look and see with Its own Eyes ; thus to use all Its Powers equally, evenly 20. The Child's first Expression is that of Force. The Exhibition of Force calls out Counter-force; hence the Child's first Crying ; hence It kicks against whatever resists Its feet; hence It seizes whatever Its Hands touch. Soon after, or along with this. social Feeling is developed in the Child : hence Its SmUtng, Its evident Pleasure at moving Its Limbs in comfortable Warmth, bright Light, and pure fresh Air : this is the first awaking of the Child's human Consciousness. INTRODUCTION. 13 21. The earliest Utterances of the Child that what the is, the first Expressions of human Life; are; hei p fui" s iu Rest and Unrest, Pleasure and Pain, Smiling folding and Crying. Rest, Pleasure, and Smiling betoken andsmiimg. whatever, in the Child's feeling, suits the pure feds hinder- ing It marks development of Its being ; that is, of Human Life fcy Uneasi- at the Child's Stage : to keep these undisturbed, all crying. the Care, which is the beginning of Education, must be applied. Uneasiness, Pain, and Crying betoken at first whatever hinders human Development in the Child : and all Rudiments of Education must attend to these, trying to find out and remove their Causes. 22. In the earliest Crying, or Expression of At first, no Uneasiness, there is assuredly no Self-will; but theexpr^ Self-will springs up very early we cannot tell when, uS^t. or how as soon as ever the little Being, scarcely ^ u up more than a human Plant, begins to feel that It has My^nse been left by some one's Caprice or Indolence, to that neglect' f which causes It Uneasiness or Pain. When this sad Feeling has once infected the Child, Self-will, first and ugliest of Faults, is alive 23. Even when the right Way is taken, there Man ^ to may be Errors in Method. It is Man's Nature and %** Destination to be trained-up to endure severe Pains ^b! by and heavy Burdens through the bearing of light ^ nglig ones. When therefore Parents and those in charge Therefore, are convinced that the Child, which seems uneasy and even cries, has really got all that It needs ; and that whatever could hurt It has been removed ; then must some- they not only may, but ought to, leave the Child to to"them- e Itself and give It Time to recover. For if the little creature has but once, not to say often, by dint of 14 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. They must it patient Crying extracted from those who have peT, e bycry- charge of It, Help and Sympathy not really needed, needed" they have lost thereby much Ground not easy to re- ei*e they" cover. The little Creature has so fine a Perception of have learned -i T i < i " to get thdr the Weakness of those around It, that if they give own way." the Opportunity, It prefers using Its Power in the easier Way of governing them, than in doing or bearing anything, for Itself. in first stage 24. At this stage the human being is called called ' Suckling and in every sense deserves the name : its sole" 11 for, Man, at this stage, does nothing but assimi- toVmbibe! late the variety of what is outside him. Hence this first stage of human development is so inexpressibly momentous for the Child's present and future life. Hence the Momentous is it for present and future Life, that at mcrf this Stage nothing unwholesome, or mean ; nothing orbent doubtful, or bad, be absorbed. The Look, the Coun- tenance, of all about the Child should be clear and Every ob- steady, wakening aud nourishing Trust. Every i^sho'uidb* Environment ought to be clean and bright: pure ^pe^: p iest e> Air, clear Light, open Space however scant the be taken-fn^ Furniture. For alas! what has been imbibed .scarcely in Childhood, the Impressions of Youth, are often throw! o'ut. hardly to be overcome throughout Life ; because in earliest years the whole Being is surrendered [laid open like a sensitive plate] to Impressions from without. The severest Conflicts with Self, in later Years ; the most painful [moral] Experiences ; have often had their first Causes in this Stage ; hence is the care of the Nursling so all-important ..... The child's 25. Mothers know that the first smile makes an * Epoch in the Child's development j for it comes INTRODUCTION. 15 not from a self-feeling only, but from a social Mothers, as feeling, also ; at first between Mother and Child ; M epoch " then with father and family ; later between brothers and sisters, other human beings, and the Child. This Feeling of Community, which unites the Child The first at first with Mother, Father and Family, is the Germ is the seed .of Religion. of all genuine Religiousness, of all genuine Endeavor after Union with the Eternal, with God. 26. Genuine Religion, true and living ; Piety Ttue and such as will endure through Danger and Conflict, in AW in Needs and Straits, in Joy and Happiness ; must come Childhood. to the Human-being when It is a Nursling, or not at all ..... When, therefore, a Mother is seen to lay her sleeping Babe on its comfortable Bed, with a devout upward Look to their heavenly Father for His protection and loving Care, the Beholder is touched; and the Act is full of Blessing for the bu Child. Thus, too, when she takes it up from Rest, smiling and happy, her Lips moving in Prayer, as though It were given her anew ..... 27. If Parents desire to provide for their Chil- Parents, dcsinng to dren this unshaken Prop, this never- vanishing Centre, secure for as the highest Portion for Life, then they must children this . prop, this always be visiblv. as well as inwardlv united with centre, must " m -. m f not be afraid their Children, when in quiet Chamber, or in the of joining ^ visibly with open Air they feel and acknowledge themselves to A * m in be in union with their God and Father, in Prayer, say not- Let no one ever say, " The children will not under- cannot drc ' stand it"; this were to rob them utterly of their San"-- higher Life. They do understand it, and will under- what mind!? stand it, if only they have not already run wild ; if 16 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. only they are not already too much estranged from themselves and from their Parents. They understand it, not by their Intellect, but in their inmost Souls piety, 33 Thus germinating and thus fostered, Religion will and tended, be victorious over all Storms and Dangers of Life. come the This is the Fruit of earliest Example left by religious Parents, even when the Child seems not to have heeded or understood. The result of all living example of Parents is equally certain : [bad, alas \ as well as good]. Develop- 28. Not alone for the special Growth of the ment should be looked religious Feeling in Man. but for his whole Growth, on as con- & . ' . ' tinuous. most important is it that his Development steadily advance from one Point, and be always viewed and tended as continuously advancing. Life being really of one piece, without sharp divisions for the years, like the seasons, melt one into another it is, F. says, harmful to treat the stages of human life : nursling child boy, girl youth, maiden old man, matron Successive as though they were really separated. Yet should not* i n common life and parlance, they are thus re e a iiy we treated. Successive stages emphasize their differences so much that the humanity which makes them all one seems forgotten. TOO often so The Boy forgets that he was once a Child ; that the MM forgets Child will one day be a Boy : the Adult has forgotten youth has no his own earlier stages of Development, and speaks of eing a Child, Boy, Youth, as beings of separate Nature and Gifts from himself. Now this making of Divisions and Contrasts, as it springs from Want of early and steady Attention to the Unfolding of one's own Life, INTRODUCTION. 17 is false and artificial, and cannot but be hurtful, in many Ways which need not be specified. 29. It would be altogether otherwise if Parents NO stage of did but consider their Child in Relation to all Its growth to be stages of Development, without overlooking any. If, especially, they would consider that the vigorous Complete unfolding, and complete Unfolding and Improvement of each at each stage, succeeding Stage of Life depends on the vigorous, depends on the full complete, and original Development of every pre- development of that one ceding Stage. This Point is too often overlooked or which precedes. unheeded by Parents. They assume the Human- Boy being to be a Boy if he has attained Boy-age ; they y oung e ma n assume the Human-being to be a Youth and Man duly through because he has reached Man's Years. [But the truth Boy-hood. is not so !] The Boy is not a Boy, or the Youth a Youth, simply because he has attained the Age of Boy and Youth ; but by Virtue of having lived through, first, Child- then Boy-hood, faithful to A man is . truly grown- the Claims of his Soul, and Mind, and Body. Just , U P when he has fulfilled so, Man becomes a man not simply by reaching the ^ <^ ies of average Years of Manhood, but by fulfilling the <^ c for Duties of all preceding Stages of Life Childhood, Jj|j 1 jj ind> Boyhood, Youth. Parents, otherwise able and intelligent, will require a Child to show Itself already a Boy or Youth ; especially ask the Boy to show himself a Man ; thus skipping the Stages of Boy and in child and Boy it is Youth. It is one thing to see and heed in the Child right to see 7 . the Youth or Boy in Germ, or Outline the Youth and Man. a "d Man . that will be : that will one day be. It is quite another, to look wrong to J ask Boy or upon and behave to the actual Boy as though he Youth to * conduct him- were already a Man; to expect Child and Boy to 2read lh m^ h show himself Youth and Man ; to feel and think, act and behave, as though he really were so. Parents B 18 THE STUDENT'S FEOEBEL. who expect this overlook or have forgotten the Processes through which alone they themselves are become able Parents and useful Human-beings ; for this was by living through the very Stages of Life which they now wish their Child to skip. Neglect of 30. This neglect of the early, especially of the earliest very earliest, Stages of Development, in reference to prepares the later, puts almost insuperable Obstacles in the great diffi- ' r r cuities .Way of the Boy's future Teacher and Educator. A for the * J Educator. j} ov so treated thinks, in the first Place, that he may omit entirely Instruction belonging to an earlier Age. TO set a Again, the Effect is most injurious, most weakening, before the when a distant [quasi final! Aim is set before the child, is L- 1 J most hurtful. ]j O y too soon ; something external to be copied, or to be tried for ; e.g., Preparation for a certain Office The human or Sphere of Action [beyond the child's present every'iife- horizon, however desirable in the possible future], have but one For Child, Boy, Human-beings of every Age,- ought and do, what to have one sole Aim : to be at each Stage what this befits that . . ' . stage. Stage requires. Then each succeeding Stage will grow like a fresh Shoot, out of a healthy Bud ; and the Individual will, with like Effort on each succeed- ing Stage, be just what that Stage demands : for the adequate Development of the Human-being, on each Life-stage as it comes, is effected by an adequate Development of the Human-being on each preceding. Stage, and in no other Way. Theac- 31. Be this especially noted with Reference to Sen/eand unfolding and improving natural Activity in the natural to Production of outward Results ; that is, to foster be a unfoioed Industry, Love of bodily Work. People in general industry" have false Notions about manual Toil and Industry ; INTRODUCTION. 19 about all Activity for material Results, as though Mean, fai* , . j i j a i notions aboi I it were oppressive and lowering deadening, vul- w or k; garising instead of what it is: life-waking and used, wakes life-feeding: and it is more than that; it bears within it a Power to give Life ..... S 32. " God created Man in His own Image, in the ( F -'s great . motto : Image of God created He him : " therefore Man ought "Leam by . doing.") to create and work like God. His Spirit, the Spirit Man, of Man, should hover over the shapeless Chaos, and God's like- move it ; so that Form, and what bears Life in itself, ancT'c^ates may come forth. This is the high Meaning, the deep Significance, the great Aim, of all Toil and ofMan The Spirit of Man should move Industry ; of all Doing and Creating, as we are quite chYos^d justified in calling it. By means of Toil and Industry, f^l! 1 we become like unto God, if our Working 1 is accom- Man's work is like God's panied by a clear Thought even by the faintest whena . thought Idea that by our Doing we present outwardly what a feeiing- is internal, and clothe with Body what is spiritual : 'hat our doing puts that we thereby put invisible Thought into visible into visible ,* * . form what is Forms, and give to what is eternal and dwells in internal: gives finite the Spirit, an outward, finite, and "transitory Ex- j^? 10 istence. We thus become truly like unto God, and spiritual * and infinite. rise ever more toward the Knowledge of Him ; thus God comes inwardly and outwardly nearer to us. Eternally true is the Word of Jesus : " The poor [the The toilers toiling multitudes] have the Kingdom of Heaven," if Kingdom of thfey only knew it, and by Industry in Work realised they but' it. Children, too, possess the Kingdom of Heaven ; children for they yield themselves up willingly and trustfully Kingdom. to the active formative Impulse within them, when foUo W th their not hindered by the Conceit and false Wisdom of im'^utse^ ,1 . < i when not their elders. hindered by 33. The notion that Man toils and works solely 20 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. The notion to support his Body his Husk to earn Bread, that the sole, -_-_ . ,. . . _ or chief House, and Clothes is an JLrror, is lowering ; to be purpose of i i Work, is to put up with, perhaps ; on no account to be spread : support the . . . . body, is for it is not true. Originally and properly, Man works to realize outside him the Spiritual, the Divine, which dwells within him; that he may thus learn to know his own spiritual Nature, and the Nature of God. The Bread, Dwelling, Clothes, which come to him us : food, thereby, are to boot ! . . . . Therefore, Jesus says : sheiter g are- " Seek ye first the Kingdom of God ; " that is, aim first at representing in your Life and by your Life what is Divine, and "all the rest," whatever your earthly Life needs beside, " will be added unto you." Thus, also, Jesus says : " My Meat is to do the will of God : to act, to work, as God hath laid it on me." Therefore the Lilies of the Field, which, in Man's View, toil not, are arrayed by God more splendidly The Lilies than Solomon in all his Glory. Does not the Lily not-SIe 1 send forth Leaves and Flowers ? Does she not in plough ifot her Beauty make known the Nature of God ? The duce beauty Fowls of Heaven, that in Man's View sow not, and joy. c labour not, are they not exhibiting in all that they do when they sing, when they build their Nests Man learns in all their manifold Actions the Spirit, the Life, realize the which God placed in them ? To this end God feeds and Nature, and sustains them. Thus Man, from the Lilies of Place, cir- the Field, from the Fowls of Heaven, should learn cumstances, . . shall permit, to set forth in Deed ar d Work, in Form and Matter, as he can, the Nature given him by God : in what Manner he shall do so whether small and in- significant, or great and mighty this, Place and Time, Rank or Calling, will decide 34. Now, all spiritual Workings, when they INTRODUCTION. 21 turn into finite Phenomena, demand Succession in Time. If, therefore, a Person at any Period of Life, early or late, has neglected to exercise a Power within him, it is inevitable that at some if at any time or other he will experience a Want through power has not having unfolded that Power : something: will neglected, , & a defect will not be his, which would have been his, had he exist - used all his Powers. For, by the universal Laws Such defect under which we are living, that neglected Activity Siu'^st'foi would have had some Result, had it not been the'^heeTto neglected. . . . When a Want or Failure appears, activity,' there is naught for it but to use Resignation ; . . failures & . will follow. and zealously to aim by Activity for the future, to avoid such Failure. There is then a twofold Ne- cessity inward as well as outward, whereof the former includes the latter that the growing Human-being be early developed to Activity in bodily Work for useful Production.- .... 35. The Nursling's unconscious Activity of Senses and Limbs is the first Germ ; Its earliest conscious bodily Action is the Bud ; the first im- pulse [in the child], to improve his Play, to build, and shape, is the tender young Blossom ; and now [boyhood] is the Period when Man must be fer- Every child, tilised for future Industry, and Activity in Work, ofevery i M i 11 T 17-1 PI rank(N.B.of Every child, and later every Boy or Youth, ol what either sex. ' ,. . in TT ED.) should Rank or Condition soever, should spend an Hour spend a daily hour in use- or two daily in productive Work. Children, and fuiwork. Adults also, are far too much occupied to-day with Much of . -i 3 i i T i -i what is done what is unformed and shapeless, and too little with in schools is, simple bodily Work : yet to learn from Life, and so unmean-' by Work, is far easier, more thorough and in every sense, more improving. Children and Parents, ^S^m," 22 by work that indeed, so undervalue the use of bodily Work in meaning of, itself, and for their Children's future Position, that moreim- schools will have to make it their serious Task to proving I set this right. The existing Home- and School- Training leads Children to Indolence of Body, and Schools win Laziness at Work: so this phase of human Power have to ., introduce remains undeveloped, is wasted, to an immense Amount. In Schools it would be most beneficial to beside their introduce regular Work-hours, beside the lessons of abstract instruction, abstract Instruction ; and this will have to be aprophecyT done. Hitherto, through its being directed solely A"D. isgz to outward and selfish Ends, the true Understanding ingf & c "in r " and Value of Man's bodily Force has been lost. schools.) e n a ED. oo. All-momentous as is early training to e^ven^iine Religion, not less important is early training ious training in Industry, in genuine Work-activity. Early trkin'kigln Labour, conducted according to its inner Meaning, useful bodily coj^mg an( j elevates Eeligion. Religion without Industry, without Labour, may become empty Dreaming, a Shadow without Substance: just so, Toil, Industry, without Religion, makes of Man a Machine, a Beast of burden A third form 37. But human Force is to develop and operate, force'uTem- not only as resting in itself, i.e. Piety, Religion; or control?' e again as working outward, in the form of Labour where these an( j Industry : but likewise as withdrawing into, and three ''dwell imft^'Ts" 1 resting upon, itself; as Self-control, Temperance, Earth en n Frugality. For one not wholly devoid of Self- knowledge, this needs only to be indicated. Wherever these three Piety, Industry, and Self- control, which in their Essence are one work together in Concord : there is Heaven upon Earth ; Peace, Joy, Health, Grace, and Blessing. INTRODUCTION. 23 38. Thus, Man in the Child is to be considered as a Whole ; thus, the Life of Humanity, and of Man in Childhood, is to be viewed as one ; thus the whole future Activity of Man is to be looked upon as having in the Child its Germ But unity can be realized only by particulars, and completeness of realization needs succession in time. Therefore the World and Life unfold to the Child, In sum = the Child is and are developed in It, as Particulars and in Man, in germ ; and Succession. Thus the Powers, Gifts, and Disposi- ail human powers, ac- tions of Man, his Activities of Limb and of Sense, jivitiesof iimbs, sense, are to be developed in Succession, and just as they ^^ u1 ,' ar f make their Appearance in the Child. I. ZTbe 1Rurslin(j, The outer 39. The new-born Human-being, the Infant, is meets the met by the Outer- world ; which human being though itself, really, what it always was, yet as Chaos; world and to the child s perception infant are undistin- comes from Nothingness in a misty shapeless Darkness, a confused Chaos so that Child and Next single Outer-world melt one into the other. By-and-by, emerge from Objects step out of this Mist, and present themselves chiefly by before the Child. This takes place chiefly by help help of words: at of Words, which soon pass from Mother to Child ; first dimly, ' _ by-and-by nrs t to divide, then again to unite, Child and Outer- more defi- ' t ' niteiy. world. They come at first singly, and seldom ; by- beco'mes 1 and-by frequently, then with more definite Mean- frfsln a ing ; till at last the Human-being the Child Toothers, appears to itself an Object distinct from all others. Every child Thus in each Child, in the History of Its spiritual repeats the story of the Unfolding and Growth to human Consciousness, of Creation, till In fh e ds Itsdf -^ S Experiences from Birth, we see repeated the God den f History of the Creation and Development of all Things, as told in the Sacred Books ; up to that Point, when Man finds himself in the Garden of God, in beautiful Nature extended before the Child Man's func- 40. " To make what is Internal, external ; what bring-o'uuhe is External, internal ; and to find a unity of both : " THE NURSLING. 25 this was onr general Formula to express the internal, and Function of Man. Therefore every external Object External: ITT t i T\ ^ t every object meets the Human-being with a Demand to be invites Man ... to know it. known and recognized, in its Nature and Con- By the & . Senses, this nexion : and for this End Man possesses the Senses. cla } m is r ' satisfied. or Organs, by which this Demand can be fulfilled. Each Thing is known by connecting it with its A thing becomes opposite in the same Kind, and by finding the known when . joined to its Union or Agreement between them : and this opposite, and what Knowledge comes to pass more perfectly, the more mediates complete is the Contact with its opposite, and the ^^ is Discovery of the mediating Term. The succeeding section is given as a specimen of F.'s biology : leaving untouched the question whether its Science is quite up to date. 41. The Objects of the external World meet the Senses-for .. i -i n i -n *ke con " Human-being in a solid, a fluid, or a gaseous Form : ditions of accordingly, Man finds himself provided with Senses for objects at ' Rest, or in for the solid, the liquid, the aeriform, State. Motion. Again, every Object comes before Man either in a Condition of Rest, or of Motion. Accordingly, each of these Senses is again distributed to separate Organs, one Set of which deals with Objects at Rest ; another, with Objects in Motion. Thus the Sense Sense- i .... -~. organs also for what is aeriform is assigned to the Organs of distributed 1 . accordingly. Hearing and Sight ; the Sense for the liquid, to the Organs of Taste and Smell ; the Sense for the solid, to the Organs of Touch and Feeling 42. Step by Step, with Unfolding of Senses, is Limbs un - developed the Use of Body and Limbs ; and this abreast U s f again in an Order fixed by the Nature of the Body objects are r\ > e i <~vi at rest or in and the (Dualities or external Objects. motion; are The Objects of the Outer-world are : (1) near and distant. 26 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. resting, and thus invite us to Rest ; or (2) they Thus use are in Motion, increasing their Distance, and thus of Limbs is . developed invite us to seize and hold them fast : or (3) they for resting, . _ \ / J moving, are fixed at distant Places, and invite us to move grasping. toward them, or bring them nearer to us. standing is Thus is unfolded the use of the Limbs for sitting or reclining, for grasping and seizing, for walking and running. Standing is the most perfect Sum of the uses of Body and Limbs : it is the finding of the body's centre of Gravity ..... The infant 43. At this Stage of Development the growing for use of Man is still concerned wholly with the Use, the Limbs, . J exercise of Employment, the Exercise of his Body, Senses, Senses : not r J . J ' at all for Limbs i not at all with what results from, or is results. _ ' produced by, this Use. Of Effects, It is perfectly careless; or, more precisely, It has no Notion. Hence, its Hence the Child's playing with Its limbs, that i/mb^'and begins at this stage ; with its Hands, Lips, Tongue, This U pir y ing -^ eet : but with Eyes too, and Gestures. At first, Bodyhas, at tihiB Pl a y ^ Limbs and Features has no inner me'anlngf er Meaning ; for, Exhibition of the Internal in and by no't'bTolL the External, belongs to a later Stage. But this Play, as being the Child's first Utterance, needs to Such move- be looked to; lest the Child accustom Itself to become meaningless Movements of Limb, and especially of even in-' Pace, as Twistings of the Eyes and Mouth. Without due Care, a Division may thus arise between Gestures and Feelings, between Body and Soul, between the Outer and the Inner; from which Division, one Day, conscious Acting may grow, or the Body contract Movements, Habits, which become involuntary, and may go with us through Life like a Mask. THE NURSLING. 27 44. From early days, therefore, Children infants should not be ought not to 'be left to themselves in Bed or left long to themselves Cradle, without some external Object to occupy when awake. them. This is to avoid weakening of the Body, l^d\T^- which is sure to produce Weakening of the Mind. L^T^bed, To guard, also, against bodily Delicacy the Child's Ughu Couch should from the first, not be too soft. It should be made of Hay, fine Straw, Chaff ; at most of Horsehair not of Feathers ; the Child's Covering too, during Sleep, should be light, and admit fresh Air. At first, F. suggested that a caged bird be hung up in sight of the waking child ; afterwards he substituted a coloured ball swinging freely, as equally efficacious in drawing the child's atten- tion from itself. IL-Cbe Cbilfc. infancy is 45. When Activity of Senses, Body and Limbs ended, when . * J the child, of is so far developed that the Child begins, of Its own its own ' accord,^ Accord, to represent outwardly what is within It, the whatir' Stage of Infancy in human Development is ended, within. an( j the Period of Childhood commences. Up to this of X M r an >S s n Stage, the inner Being of Man is uniform and commences undifferentiated. With Language, begins Ex- pression and Representation of the inner Being of Man : it [the inner being of Man] begins to be specialized as to Means and Ends ; it breaks up into Parts; tries to make itself known, to announce itself. The Human-being endeavours, voluntarily, to express and to shape Its inner Nature, in and by means of Matter, the Concrete with Child- With the Stage of Childhood .... Man's Education tionbeVnsT proper, begins : Care for the Body being lessened, ing wholly" Care of the Mind increases. But the Education of famify. 6 " Man, at this stage is still wholly committed to the Mother, the Father, the Family; to those with whom, by Nature, the child still forms an undivided Whole in stages of 46. Among the Stages of human Development mTnVnone there is no Gradation of Rank, as though one were w below of greater Value than another. All are, each at its THE CHILD. 29 own Time and Place, equally important; except, another - indeed, for the necessary Order of Time, whereby Childhood the earlier ones must be more momentous [simply conn n ectthe because they have more results}. The present stage fh^b*- [Childhood] is of first rate Importance ; because in world- it, that which connects the Child with Its Environ- The question ment: that which first tries to apprehend and memous, ^ i mi whether It interpret this Outer-world, is developed. This stage shall find the T, , - , . environment is of greatest Consequence, because, for the unfolding nobieor . base, bright Human-being, it is most momentous whether the or gloomy. Outer-world appear to It noble, or base ; low, dead, only to be made use of, consumed, enjoyed by others; or as having an End in itself, high and vital; spiritual, divine. It is of the greatest consequence whether the Outer-world appear to It Itright, or gloomy ; ennobling and elevating, or humbling and depressing; whether It sees the world in its true Relations, or in false and distorted Proportions. 47. Therefore, at this Stage the Child is first, The c wid to behold everything aright ; and next to name it every thing i -i y-v-i aright: next aright, distinctly and clearly ; both Objects them- name it selves, and their Nature and Qualities. It should object and name the Relations of Objects, as to Space and Time with right J words, and to one another, correctly ; each one by its right uttered fully. Word, and each Word .... clearly in all its parts ; Tone, Accent, Ending At this Stage, Speech is still one with the Human- At play, the i T /-^i -i-ii Child talks, being that speaks ; and the Child when speaking, and makes every thing does not separate Word and Thing, any more than talk, beiiev- Flesh and Spirit, Body and Soul. This is specially every object r J t- j fee i s ^ CAn shown in Children's Play. When at play, the Child u"er its feel- likes to talk as much as It can. At this stage, Play whether , * stone, plant, and Speech are the Elements in which the Child or animaL 30 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. lives. It believes that everything is able to feel, speak, and hear. Just because the Child is beginning to express outwardly Its own inner Self, It assumes a like Power of Expression in every Thing around It ; Stones, Pieces of Wood, Plants, Flowers, Animals. Thus, at this Stage (1) the Child's own life is developed ; (2) Its life with Parents, Brothers, and Sisters* (3) the Life common to It and them, with an Invisible Being higher than Itself ; and, especially, is developed, (4) Its Life in and with Nature, felt to The child possess a Life similar to Its own. Now, as a chief should have * _, as much Purpose of all Child-life, Parents and Family should association, I/-NIIT i -i as possible, give the Child as much Acquaintance as possible with with Nature. . i r\i_ m Nature, and her bright, calm Objects. This is chiefly to be done by means of Play, by fostering the child's Play ; which at first is just Its natural Life. Play, tiwN 48. Play is the highest Point of human De- simplest and velopment in the Child-stage. for it is the free expression of the child's inner being Play is at once the purest, and most spiritual, Pro- duct of the Human-being at this Stage ; it is a Type and Copy of all human Life ; of the inward natural in play are nfe that is in Man and in all Things ; and it brings sources of all good. forth Joy, Freedom, Contentment, Rest within and plays without, Peace with the World. The Sources of all win grow up good are in Play, and come forth from it ; a Child earnest and capable. that plays with Vigor, quietly active, persevering At this age even to bodily Fatigue, will surely grow up to be more 8 beauti. a quietly capable, persevering Man, who will child" fallen further his own and other's Good, by Self-sacrifice. its e piay. ver What Sight more beautiful can we find in early Childhood, than a Child at Play, a Child wholly highest pro- duct of Childhood. THE CHILD. 31 absorbed in Its Play, a Child fallen asleep over Its Play, because so thoroughly absorbed ? 49. Play, at this Age, is not mere Sport; it Thepiayof possesses high Seriousness and deep Meaning : is not merely foster it, Mother ! shield it, protect it, Father ! inner life is In the self-chosen Games of a little Child, the inner seen in Its play- Life of Its future may be seen by the calm pene- trating Sight of one who has studied Mankind. The Games of Childhood are the Heart-leaves of the future Life ; for in them the whole Man unfolds and shows himself in his most delicate Gifts, in his innjer Being. The Individual's whole life, until he Future life i -c-i -i-fi'-iii ' s r . oote d in leaves it, has its bources in this Period. Allowing childhood's . . habits and for natural Gifts and Dispositions on the Inch- modes ofiiv. ing. vidual'sMode of Life during Childhood, may depend, The Child's whether his future Life shall be clear or turbid, tion to HI i . parents, gentle or rough, active or idle, nch or poor in society, Action; dully brooding or cheerfully toiling ; passed God may d e - in stupid Wonder or intelligent Insight; bringing modes of Concord or Discord, Peace or War. The Child's childhood. future Relation to Father and Mother, Brothers and Kinsfolk ; to civil Society and Mankind ; to Nature and God, may depend on Its Manner of Life at this Age ..... This will seem too absolute an utterance ; but with thought, and with F.'s abundant confir- mations, the substantial and most momentous truth of this oracular saying will appear. S 50. In these Years of Infancy and Childhood, p^ child's 3 J ' food is Food and Nourishment are of special Moment ; not ^ ^ e ^ t alone for the Time, but also for the Child's whole Jh l jj d ' h ^ od future Life. Through Its Diet a child may grow up fj e deter " to be in the business of Life idle or industrious, whether Ir 32 THE STUDENT'S FEOEBBL. shall be, dull or lively, weak or strong : for Impressions, idT e e and r Inclinations, Desires Tendencies of Feeling, ay, bright even of Conduct which the Child has contracted by inclinations ^ s wa y ^ Feeding, are not easily laid aside even tak P en- S b ns> wnen * ne Human-being has come to Years of Choice ; may fnflu- they are become one with Its whole bodily Life, and wfaoiaofiife. thus grown into the Fabric of Its Sensations and Diet should Emotions, perhaps even into Its spiritual Life. be as plain as conditions Therefore let the Child's Pood, after it is weaned, permit : not excessive in ^6 simple and frugal ; as little artificial and refined quantity : th > r t ou er h pting as * s P oss ib^ e ' above all, not tempting or exciting rkhneTs. through prominent Flavor ; not too rich, so as to Parents clog the inner Organs. Parents, and they who have as a U n unfaii- the care of Children, should hold fast as an universal the simpler Truth, out of which each special Rule proceeds, that the food and i i T T all bodily by how much simpler and more moderate, more circum- . .11 TT IT-IT stances in suited to unspoiled Human-nature, are the .r ood and the healthier all bodily Surroundings in which the Man as Child and happier TIT T will be the grows up, by so much the happier and stronger, more properly creative in every Direction, will the Adult become. in over-fed 51. In a Child, that has been over-excited by children low . desires Excess of Food, in Quantity too much, or too highly spring up, not easy to flavored, may be often seen Desires of a low kind be mastered . later. from which It never gets free; Desires, which if they seem to subside, are but slumbering, to return with greater Violence when Opportunity offers ; p^ente an( ^ which threaten to rob Man of his Dignity, and domwti^ 1 tear hi m fr m his Duty. Did Parents but consider, crewel!-" how much not only of future personal Advantage to from s such s their Children, but of domestic Happiness, even the^wo^'id civic Well-being, would flow [from this simplicity] rentiy. e how differently they would act ! But here, the THE CHILD. 33 Mother is foolish, there the Father is weak ; and we see Poison upon Poison given to Children, in all Shapes and Ways, coarse and fine. On the one Here-a hand, it is oppressive Quantity ; continually giving mother, Food, and leaving the Body no Time to digest: we'akfatljer, perhaps, feeding, just to drive away the Ennui msteacfpf which comes of Want of Occupation. On the other, cTogging'the it is food of too luxurious Quality, which arouses starving the physical Life without genuine spiritual Conditions, and thus acts to weaken and wear out the Body. Here, bodily laziness is looked on as need of rest ; there, restlessness, the result of physical over-excitement, is taken for genuine liveliness of spirits. 52. Simpler, far simpler than we think, is the Thefoun- Foundation and Progress of Humanity's true Wei- Humanity's fare and Happiness. We have all the Means isfarsimpki - . than we thereto, easy and near at hand, but we see them think. not ; or if we see, we heed them not ; because, being simplicity so simple, so natural, so easily applied, so near at neglected, Hand, they are too cheap for us, we despise them, win secure ic satisfaction. and we seek arar on: Help that can come only from Children wholly lose ourselves. Thus, by-and-by, the half or the whole what would _ . (of itself) of a considerable Fortune is not enough to procure h , av . e been theirs had for our Children, what, when our Insight is become we spent, not more, clearer, we have to acknowledge is best for them. b , ut . le , ss '? n . their bodies I Now they cannot have at all, or never fully, what would have come to them as it were of itself, if we had not spent more upon them ! no, no ! what would have been theirs if we had but expended much less on the care of their Bodies ! If every Could young Couple could but know one sad Instance [in see, what ,..,.,-, . . -., ., -, Teachersare this kindj, so as vividly to see the small and seem- constantly o 34 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. forced to meet with : the slight ^auses that render train- ing useless. The wrong course is easy to avoid : the food in quality simplest that suits the Child's sta- tion : in quantity fitted to Its bodily and mental ac- tivity. " Eat to live ; not, live to eat." That the Child may remain free, in body and mind. Its clothing must be ca'-y and light Clothing never to seem an end in itself, else Child becomes a Puppet, not a man. A true mother wakens every power, and guides each limb, untaught. ingly unimportant Cause of Eesults which threaten to frustrate all subsequent Education. A Teacher is compelled to make hundreds of such Experiences ; but his Knowledge helps him little to repair in future Life the Consequences [of early errors], for who knows not the terrible Power of Impressions made in Youth ! Yet it is easy to avoid the wrong Course in this matter ; it is easy to find the right : let Pood be always Means of Nourishment, not more, not less ; let Food never be an End in itself, but solely the Means to maintain Activity of Body and Mind. On no account let the Quality of Food, its Flavor or Delicacy, be an Aim in itself, but only Means to the End, that is, to give pure, wholesome Nourishment 53. In order that the Human-being the Child may be unhampered in Body and Mind, free to move about and play, free to grow and develop, Its Clothing must not be tight, or binding: for, such Clothing will in turn confine and fetter the Mind Clothes their Shape, Hue, and Fashion must never appear an End in themselves, else they will soon draw the Child away from Its true Self: make It vain and outward, a Doll instead of a Child, a Puppet in place of a Human-being. Clothing is therefore by no means unimportant, either for the Child or for the Adult 54. Thus, to waken and develop in the Human- being every Power, every Disposition [of mind], to enable each Limb and Organ [of body] to obey these inner Gifts and Powers, is the Aim of Parents' Care THE CHILD. 35 for their Children, in the Home and the Family- she must circle. Without any Teaching, Reminding, or "nd'cioT Learning, the true Mother does all this of herself. But that is not enough : in Addition is needed, that, being herself conscious, and acting upon a Creature that is growing conscious, she do her Part consciously and consistently, as in Duty bound to guide the Human-being [her child] in Its regular development. With an apology for doing with masculine clumsiness, what " the simplest mother " would do better, F. depicts a mother teaching her babe to know, first by touch, then by name, all its limbs and senses ; helping It to perceive their qualities and differences ; arousing Its caution towards things hot, or sharp ; making every little action washing and dressing, enjoying food a lesson, first of things, then of words. 55. While admitting that Mothers may be F.'S protest , , , , . , , j , is against all helped by experience of others to order and Education n i that takes place, F. asserts with much plainness that to account, not quit for artificial, formal teaching, the natural nature, but 1 of parents' and divine beginnings of all human develop- choice and 00 * preference. ' ment in the Mother's arms, at the Mother's knee is to seek Help of human Wisdom and human Wit when we have lost God and Nature. Our artificial, formal Training, is a Card-house wherein a Mother's instinctive Ways find no Place, and divine Workings no Room ; while the slightest Ex- pression of the Child's Joy and Eagerness over- turns it ; for if it is to stand at all the Child must be fettered in Mind if not in Body. 36 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. We are not Where do we find ourselves then ? In the Nur- thatwecan series of word-wise, so-called Educated People, who put in what the child hardly believe that there is already in the little needs : all . J J it can ever Child something, which must be early drawn out if be is in It, . * and must the Child is ever to thrive : who, far more, are quite simply be brought out. unaware that whatever the Child should one Day become, is already in it, in smallest Germs perhaps ; and will become Its own in no other Way than by being unfolded 56. Let us return thither, where the Children's Boom is the Mother's Eoom too ; where Mother and Child are still one ; where the Mother does not like to give up her Child to a Stranger; and see how a Mother shows It Objects with their Motions. " Hark ! the Bird whistles. The Dog says, ' bow- wow.'" It belongs, however, more to the proposed second part of this little work, to give examples of the method whereby a true mother leads her child from sounds to names ; gives ideas of motion place time, which are really germs of abstract thinking; and, what is still more important, wakens feelings of kindness for things that feel, and fosters love for the child's nearest and dearest : and all, by means of artless lessons, on objects that are always present in a healthy child's life. 57. Besides the social Feeling, out of which so much that is precious develops, Mother's Love, the all-comprehending Mother-heart seeks to bring to A mother's the Child's own Consciousness, the Life that is in her child, It. This she effects and the Manner is of great with rhyth- *% mic sounds, Importance by regular rhyt/imw Movement, so THE CHILD. 37 called " dandling " the child on her Arm and Hand, accompanied by regular rhythmic Sounds. Thus, a true Mother gently follows up the Life that is springing everywhere in her Child, strengthens it, and thus wakens and unfolds mere and more the wider Life that still slumbers within It. The rest [formal, artificial child-trainers] assume a Vacuum in the Child, and try to put Life into It; make It as empty as they believe It to be ; and give It Death. And so this [rhythmical movement with rhythmical sound] comes to nothing ; because its Importance being seldom recognized, it is not developed in Agreement with Life and Nature, and joined to further Training. If used as means of Training in Speech and Song, it would simply and naturally help to unfold what is rhythmic, law-abiding, in all Expressions of Human Life .... As Teachers we lose much, but the Child as Pupil and as Human- being, loses more, through Disuse of such rhythmical orderly Movement, from early Training. [Were it retained] the Child would more easily grasp the orderly Proportions of Its life : much of Caprice, Incoherence, Rudeness, would disappear from Con- duct, Action, and Movement ; more Accord and Measure would appear therein, and by-and-by a finer Taste would develop for Nature and Art, Music and Poetry. 58. Sensible, thoughtful Mothers have remarked likewise, that little Children when quiet, especially when going to sleep, often sing to themselves. This should be attended to and developed by those who have charge of Children, as the first Germ of a Sense of Melody and Power of Song. Were this I wakens the sense of Life in It; falls out of use with formal edu- cators, not being de- veloped in order : to the great loss of later training. This rhyth- mic move- ment, ordered and extended, wouldamend caprice and rudeness, would foster, me isuie.and order in the Child's life. Prophetic ! ^o-day, A. p. 1892, Drill is uni- versally adopted sometimes with music for school children. The marches and games of the Child- garden, and [yet more) the wonder- ful fullness ind variety of the " Mutter-u- Kose- Lieder " are F.'s realiza- tion of his own pro- posal. ED.] Children often sing to themselves. This first expression of sense for tune, and power of song, should 38 THE STUDENT'S FEOEBEL. be heeded done, a like Self-activity would soon show itself [in A like " in- music], as does at present, in Speech. Children whose stinct " for J r melody Speech-faculty has been naturally developed and fold, as now improved, come upon Words to express new Notions, for speech. . Children peculiar Relations of hitherto unobserved Qualities, themselves of their own accord. Thus a very little 'Girl, who newquaiitie r s had had a simply childlike Training from her turns! 6 a Mother, after long and carefully feeling and look- ing at some Leaves covered with thick soft Hairs, cried out joyfully to her Mother, "Oh! how woolly ! " The Mother could not recollect having ever pointed out such a Quality to the Child. The same Child, one starlight Night, saw the two brightest Planets very near to one another in the Sky. "Father and Mother stars!" she cried out joyously, in the quiet Night ; yet her Mother could not in the least tell how such an Idea had been awakened in her. infants 59. No artificial Means should be used to get must not be T forced in the Iniant to stand, to walk. The child should standing or walking. stand when It has the Strength, voluntarily and Allowed to act, of their independently, to hold Itself upright ; and It should own will ; but watched, walk as soon as moving of Its own accord It can So they will . raise them- without Help keep Its Balance. The Child is not selves up, stand, walk, to stand, till It can sit, sit upright ; raise Itself by in due order. means of some tall Object near, and thus at last, unaided, support Itself. It is not to walk till It can creep, raise Itself without Help, keep Its own Balance, and thus go forward. At first, having raised Itself Feeling its at some Distance from Its Mother, It will try to walk strength, back to her Lap. Soon It feels Strength in Its own each act Feet, and repeats Its newly-acquired Art of "Walking e ' g '' for the Pleasure of it. as before the Art of Standing. THE CHILD. 89 Again, a little while, and It practises the Art uncon- sciously. 60. Now a colored, round, bright Pebble Some bright catches the Infant's Attention ; or a fluttering shapely Morsel of tinted Paper ; a smooth, regular, three- or the Child's four-cornered piece of Wood; little right-angled Blocks for building ; a Leaf, remarkable in Shape, Hue, or Brightness. Thus attracted, the Child, with its newly acquired Use of Limbs, makes for them ; it grasps tries to make them Its own ; to bring like and pro and like together, and to separate the unlike. Behold gathers here the Child that can only just hold Itself upright, and straw, there . f^, . T stones, as if has to move with the utmost Caution ; it sees a to make a Twig, a Straw, fetches it toilsomely, like a Bird for build a house. its Nest in the Spring; or, there It stoops, with great Exertion, under the Eaves, and moves slowly. The Rain that drops from the Roof has washed little smooth, colored Stones out of the Soil or i s the child Sand, and the Child's all-heeding Sight gathers ^ t Are them like Stones, like Materials for a future bSidlnVup' Building ; and is It wrong ? Surely, is not the Child gathering Materials for Its future Life-build- ing ? .... 61. Our part as parents, trainers, is while let- ting a little child do all It can, by Itself to help It find what It cannot find for Itself: to interpret for It what is left when It has worked out all It can : and this is, mainly to give Things a language. It is a Yearning for this Help and Sympathy That we which drives the Child to us, Its Elders, who supply what . .It cannot sometimes sadly thmk : How can we give find, it brings these Speech to the Objects of the Child's Life, when to treasures to 40 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. us, and wants them to tell what they are. To the Infant every- thing! -new ; It wants the discovery explained. An Infant seeks to learn the secret of each new object ; so, twists it, bites it, breaks it. Grown-up unwisdom scolds : yet the Child is acting on a natural, God-given, impulse. The broken stone or plucked flower is yet silent : but somewhat of its inner make is learned. us they are dumb ? It is with the most earnest Desire that we should do this, that the Babe brings in clasped Hand Its Treasures and lays them in our Lap. It wants them to get warm there, and then tell him all about themselves. To the Child everything is dear that comes within its small Horizon, that widens Its narrow World ; the smallest Thing is to It a new Discovery. But it must not come lifeless into the child's World ; it must not stay there lifeless ; else the small Horizon is darkened, the young World oppressed. 62. So the Child would like to know all the Properties, the inmost Being [of Its newly-found treasure]. It is for this that a little Child twists and turns the Object in all Directions, tears it up, breaks it into Fragments : to this End puts it into his Mouth, bites, or tries to bite it, to Pieces. We blame the child for being naughty and silly; It is wiser than we who find Fault. The Child seeks to know the inmost Nature of everything. It is pressed on to this by an Impulse, assuredly not of its own giving : the Impulse, which rightly under- stood and guided, seeks to know God in all His Works. For this Purpose, God has given it Under- standing, Reason, Speech ; and where can It, or should It, look for the Satisfaction of Its Impulse, but in the Thing itself? True the Thing when pulled to Pieces is still silent : but at least when thus divided, it shows like or unlike Parts, whether it be the smashed Stone or the petal-plucked Flower; and to the Child this is an Extension of Knowledge Froebel points out that this is but the child's THE CHILD. 41 form of that process observation and experi- childish ment whereby adults learn the qualities of vteanswhm objects ; the inner constitution of plant and examination . and experi- mmeral. ment. 63. When the Teacher at his Desk does this and when class m -IT -i teaching calls on our Children ta do it. we see its Meaning 1 begins we see the use and Value, but not till then : we overlook it in the of observa- tion and Child s own Doings. Therefore it is that the best experiment, overlook it Teacher's clearest Words so often miss our Children : * the fittta Child s own for the Pupils have to learn first at School what actions. Childhood's Years with our Help, with a Word of teaching Encouragement and Explanation from us, should SJr children have taught them. It takes very little Trouble for prepared, those around to supply what Childhood asks ; just to name, to put into Words, what the Child does, aims at. beholds, or finds. Rich is the Tinner Life of a Easy to give i -r, -i what Child- Child as It approaches Boyhood, and we see it not; hood asks: T-/ -i -\ i -i speech for intense is its Life, and we feel it not: adapted to what it sees, does, finds. future Claims of Man's Destiny and Vocation, but Misunder- we guess it not. Failing to nurture and develop the thTyoung inner Germs of the child's Life, we let It sink [dis- resuiThf couraged] under the Burden of Its own Endeavor, unnaTuraT and grow dull ; or It breaks loose at some weak g Point, and then we see wrong Inclinations and Impulses in the Child, like morbid Outgrowths of a Plant. We should be glad now to direct the Growth otherwise, but it is too late; the Infant life that would have led naturally on to Boyhood we misunderstood and repressed. 64. With wonderful insight and sympathy, F. Birth and growth of portrays the birth and growth of the drawing Drawing. instinct. A little child has found a colored , a bit of chalk or ruddle, and trying it on 42 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. the nearest. surface, delights first in the colour; next in the lines it draws, straight, twisted, slanting: by-and-by it perceives that objects about it are apparently bounded by lines. * ''^^ky A new World opens to It within and without, for ! doing, " F. F. what Man tries to represent he begins to understand. F. holds that this use and appreciation of the linear soon connects itself with ideas of invisible force, direction, motion : a ball rolling, a stone falling, water running in little channels, make lines. Talking as it draws, we soon hear from the little child, "There runs a brook : here flies a bird : my tree has another branch, and an- other." Give the child a piece of chalk, and a new creation soon appears for it and you. And if papa draws a man or a horse with a few strokes, this man or horse of lines will please it more than the real ones. A watchful 65. In this matter, how should a Mother guide leam from her Child ? The Child will show her the Way. her Infant how to help ghe will see it pass its hand along the edge of table or chair : it is drawing the object on itself, and thereby learning to appreciate form. Objects of manageable size a pill-box, scissors, its own hand, a leaf will be placed on a flat surface, and travelled round with a finger. Without the smallest artistic talent, a heedful mother can help the child to draw straight lines : perpendicular, oblique, horizontal. F. insists that all the child's doing should be connected with word : what it draws should be named: for The Sign stands properly half-way between the Word and the Object THE CHILD. 43 Drawing is just as natural to a Child as Speaking, Drawing and ought to be just as carefully trained. Experi- stinctive a ence shows this in every Child's Impulse to draw seif-utter- -I -ni -r-i ance > ** and .Pleasure in Drawing. Speech; TT1-I1 I'll T 1 ! ailC * l * 3C ^ Helped, he thinks, by drawing, the sense for needfully ' trained. number begins to awake: the child's figures have two legs, two arms ; its table, four legs : sense for i itself possesses two eyes, five fingers, and so on. "wakes', j From the first, the mother should help this deve- D^wing^ lopment, and F. gives many examples, which must be reserved for our Second Part, or Methodic how she should follow the move- ments of her child's mind, giving just the needed word or hint : never forcing aid upon it where it could help itself. 66. When a Child has been rightly led, and By the end truly cared-for, to the End of Its Child-life and wenndinaii Entrance into Boyhood, we find in It a wonderful children 1 " 6 ' Wealth and Freshness of inner and outer Life, ness and variety of There is not an Object of Manhood's Thought or life. Feeling which has not its Root in Childhood ; not Germs of a Subject of future Instruction and Learning but f there plants its Germs. Speech and Nature lie open Manhood? to the Child; the Properties of Number, Form, Size; found.- sub- the Knowledge of Space, the Nature of Force, the future in- -n> i> T n i struction will Effects of different Substances are beginning to open show their to It ; Rhythm, Tone, and Shape appear to It in their Germs as specially noticeable ; the natural and artifi- cial Worlds begin to be clearly discriminated. It meets the Outer-world as certainly distinct from Itself; and the feeling of an Inner-world of Its own arises. Still, we have, so far, over-looked an Yet another entire Region of Child-life before it comes to Boy- c P hii Plaster-of-Paris ; taking the greatest Delight in his graphic^ Work, without the smallest Idea of doing anything blameworthy Another Boy found some deep, round, china Basins in a large Water-vessel, and observed that these Basins, when they fell open-side downwards on the smooth, still Water, made a sharp Sound. This Experiment gave him Pleasure, and he tried it repeatedly, saying to himself that the Basin would not get broken in deep, yielding Water. .... Once, however, he let the Basin fall from so great a Height, and so plumb upon the flat Surface, that the Air inclosed within the Vessel could not escape, and the Basin split into two almost exactly equal Halves ; and the young self-instructing Natu- ral-philosopher stood astonished and pained by this unexpected Catastrophe. In many other Ways, the Boy seems incredibly shortsighted in following his Life-impulse. A Boy throws Stones, perseveringly, THE BOY. 65 at a small Window in a neighboring House, mean- . ing to hit it, yet never dreaming, still less saying to himself, that if the Stone strikes the Window the Glass will be broken. The Stone hits, the Glass shatters, and the Boy stands rooted to the Spot 92. It is certainly a very deep Truth, the Neg- A terrible lect of which is Day by Day severely punished, that *e pare nt or educator it is mostly Man another Person, often the Educator first n >akes J ' . the boy himself who first makes Man the Child or Boy wicked, y , J and this bad. This happens when People ascribe to a wrong sole !y b v r 3 ascribing or evil Motive what the Child does through Ignorance t e vi t 1 h tl h v jj ! or Want of Thought ; even what may have resulted less a cn. from a very acute Sense of Right and Wrong There are, alas! even among Educators, unhappy Beings who see in Conduct of Children and Boys the Work of cunning and malicious Imps, where adventure others see at most a Joke pushed too far, or Merri- chifd as e ment not quite in Order. Such Birds of ill Omen, intention, being Teachers, make the, Child guilty ; when, if not unc^nldoul perfectly blameless, It is yet free from conscious xheyuke Guilt; they do this by ascribing to It Feelings, {J^S* Actions, of which but for them it would know nothing. . .^ Such birds of darkness, F. says, take the boy's innocent life out of him ; and having given him consciousness of sin, as the only way to Heaven, tell him that God will make it good. And this they call making him pious. They are like the good-natured little Boy who said, " See how tame it is ! " when he had handled the poor Fly or Beetle till it could not stir. Thus there are Children very faulty in Conduct through not B 66 THE STUDENT'S FEOEBEL. Thoughtless seeing or heeding Matters of real Life, some of which mischief they cannot know, while they surrender themselves longing wholly to their Impulses who have yet the most good and longing inner Desire to grow up good and useful. useful; and , are finally buch Boys, too otten become really bad; just because being mis at first their inward Endeavor failed to be under- understood. .131 -I -I 1M111 stood, was indeed misunderstood ; while, had they been appreciated at the right Moment, they would have become one Day most valuable Men. Yes; Beware, Parent, Teachers, Adults, very often punish Chil- teachers, of ' , . punishing dren and Boys for Faults and Sins which they children for * sins you taught them. Punishment, especially, above all taught them! " Things, Scolding, puts Faults into Children ; brings to their Knowledge Sins of which they never dreamed (ipsedixit, & 93. As already indicated, a Guessing and Loner- if we will; 3 J ' 6 6 but deserv- j n g 5 a deep significant Feeling in the Boy's Mind at thmi es ht *kis Period, pervades Everything that he does. All his Doing has a social Character ; for he tries to . find the Unity which makes all Things and Beings one, and to find himself in and among all Things. . A Boy of this Age, naturally brought-up, is seek- ing however weak and unconscious the Indications may be is seeking the Unity which makes all Things one, the necessary living Unity the Founda- tion of all Things God. This is what he seeks; not the Cause made and shaped by human Wisdom and human Wit, but that one which is ever nigh to Heart and Mind, nigh to the living Spirit within ; which therefore can only be known in Spirit and in Truth, and only thus be prayed to. The Boy, when matured, finds no Contentment unless he has THE BOY. 67 found Him who was felt after, in vague Yearnings aod Seekings; for only thus has he found him- self. This is the free-acting inner and outer Life of Man, the Boy on the Scholar-stage, as School-boy. What, then, is School I IV.-Scbool The Child entering school, be- gins to rise from the outward sensuous view of things, to the inward spiritual view. School is such, not in virtue of the variety of subjects taught there ; but of its intellec- tual atmos- pliere.j A. PRELIMINAKY. 94. " School " is the Endeavor to bring to the Pupil's Knowledge and Consciousness the Being or inner Life of Objects and of himself; the intimate Relations of Objects, one with another ; with Man the Boy himself; and with the living Basis and con- scious Unity of all Things, God The Boy, when he enters School, leaves behind the merely outward View of Objects, and enters upon a higher intellectual View. This Stepping of the Child from an outward superficial View of Things to the inward View which leads to Knowledge, In- sight, and Consciousness ; from the Home-order into the higher World-order ; makes the Boy into a Scholar, constitutes School. School is not truly such by being an Establishment for the Acquisition of a greater or lesser Quantity of Varieties, that is Externalities ; but by Virtue of the living intellectual Atmosphere which animates the whole, and in which all Things move The Faith and Trust, the Hope and Presentiment, with which the Child enters School work Wonders. For It comes with childlike Faith, and quiet Hope ; SCHOOL. 69 with a dim Presentiment: "Here thou wilt learn Boy's P re- 11 i -i sentiment of what cannot be taught thee outside ; here thou wilt school : get Food for thy Mind and Soul, while outside there is only Food for the Body ; here " it is literally so in the Child's Hope and Anticipation u are Food and Drink which quench Hunger and Thirst." 95. Let not the Wilfulness. the Love of Mis- not contra- 3 ' dieted by chief, which boys show at School, be put forward in wiifuiness of . . * schoolboys. Contradiction of the above. Through the very Effect of School, through that Growth of inward Force which is the Aim and Purpose of School, a Boy feels himself freer, and moves more freely. A School-child J ' . should be genuine Schoolboy ought not to be listless or lazy, |r esb > fu jj [ but fresh and lively, vigorous in Soul and Body ; and down-in-the thus, when following his Instinct, too far, so as even to become [what elders call] mischievous, the School- boy scarcely thinks of any Harm ensuing to Mischief is Others permitted, or excused ; F. does not mean that schoolboy, or schoolgirl but . ex P eri - ence cannot Mischief is to be submitted to as inevitable, or b dispensed with; so, condoned as blameless. His plea is simply, authority r J ' must act " Grey heads do not grow on green shoulders ; " s entl y- experience cannot be forestalled : therefore, bad intent is not to be absolutely inferred from ill effect. Authority, even in needful resistance or punishment, must act considerately, tenderly ; else injustice is done, whence lasting harm will result to temper and character. B. SUBJECTS OF TEACHING. 96. What then is the School to teach? In The boy is what is Man, the Boy, to be instructed ? . . . . Man, outer-world 70 THE STUDENT'S FKOEBEL. of two as Boy at the Beginning of the School-age, perceives as product his own spiritual Nature, guesses at God, and the of human . . , ^ T - ... rr .^ . _ , __. force; and as spiritual JNature of all Things, and shows an Ln- the power deavor to clear his Perception, and to confirm his that works . . within. Cruess .... Man at the Boy-stage is met by the Outer-world, wearing a twofold Expression ; first, as conditioned and produced by human Will and human Force ; secondly, as conditioned and produced by the Force operating within Nature. Man, as boy, is already conscious of two worlds ; the outer-world of body and form nature ; and the world within himself, the soul, i.e., his intellect and heart. Language, belonging at first to both, mediates between these worlds ; first to distinguish ; then to re-unite. School is to 97. Through Language, the School Instruction boy fo a should lead the Boy to a threefold Knowledge, which threefold ' again is one : (1) to the knowledge of himself in all of himself Circumstances, and thus to a Knowledge of Man in God ; of general, in his Being and Relations ; (2) to the Know- to conduct ledge of God, the constant Condition, the eternal answering thereto : Foundation and Source of all Being : and (3) to the from im- v J pulse to self- Ktwwledqe of Nature the material World, as issuing determma- a * tion from from, and conditioned by, the eternally Spiritual. activity to ' J r peise- Instruction, i.e.. School, is to lead Man to a Life and verance. This is the Conduct, in complete Accord with that threefold, yet earthiy'pVr" single, Knowledge. Man as Boy is to be led by School, in the Way of that Knowledge threefold yet one, from Inclination to Choice, from Activity of Will to Perseverance, thus steadily onward till he reach his Destination, his Calling, and attain to earthly Perfection. SCHOOL. 71 I. INSTRUCTION IN RELIGION. 98. The Effort to lift into clear Sight our Pre- Religion is sentiment that our Soul, the human Spirit, is in its deavor to Origin one with God ; the Effort, founded on this ever hold Sight, to be, and live, in Union with God, undis- with God. turbed in every Lot, unweakened by any Event of Existence ; this is Religion. Religion is not Some- thing fixed, but an eternally advancing Endeavor, and therefore Something eternally subsisting. Religious Instruction aims to animate, strengthen, Contents of and clear, our Perceptions of a spiritual Self our Soul, Intellect, and Heart as resting in, and pro- ceeding from, God ; to make known the Faculties of Soul, Intellect, and Heart as depending on God ; to show God's necessary Being and Operation ; to exhibit the Relation of God to Man, as it announces itself in each one's own Heart and Life, and in all Existence ; notably in the Life and History "of Man- kind, as the Sacred Books declare it to us. Religious Religious Instruction applies this Knowledge to all Life ; and applies the n -, , i T /. T Knowledge specially, in and to each ones own Life; applies it of God and to the Development and Improvement of Mankind, life, to 'the . improve to show the Divine in the Human ; and specially ment of _. . . Humanity: to the Knowing and Doing of Man s Duty, that is, to the know- ing and what, being Man, he must care for ; and finally, to dom g of . . man's essen- exhibit Ways of satisfying this Endeavor to live in tial duty : * ^o to ways and Union with God : aud Means of restoring this Union means of , getting, anil when disturbed. restoring, union with 99. Religious Instruction therefore, always pre- God - supposes some degree of Religious Feeling, however Religious weak, however unconscious. Instruction can only someuegiee, instruction. 72 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. be fruitful, touching and workiner-on the Life, in . TO a human so *' dr > as a rea l> however slight and rudimentary, being wholly ^^ Q Religion ig ready for it Were it possible reiigwnTno fc> r a Hu man-being to exist wholly without religious could give Sensibility, no Means could give it. Parents who permit their Children to grow up to School-age without any Endeavor to nourish religious Feel- ing would do well to think on this ......... It is and for ever will be true ; the Divinely human is mirrored in purely human Relations, espe- cially in the parental and spiritual; and in those pure Relations of Man to Man we recognize God's Relation to Man, and Man's Relation to God : we attain to the Sight of them. The ensuing section, on the Religion of Jesus, is given with the cornpletest exactness which this Editor finds possible. It is a confession of faith, made in the zenith of his powers by the teacher, whose dying words, some thirty years later, were ; " I am a Christian man." TheReii- 100. When the Human-being knows, consciously Christ and clearly, that his spiritual Self came forth from to Froebeij. God, was born in and from God, was originally one with God ; knows that he is in constant Dependence on God, and in uninterrupted Communion with God ; when in this eternally necessary Dependence of his Self on God in the Clearness of his Recognition of it, and in the Steadiness and Zeal wherewith he acts on this Knowledge his Conduct grows to be in complete Unison with this Knowledge and Con- viction ; when he knows his Salvation, his Peace, his Joy, his Destiny, his Life, to be in this [con- scious dependence and communion], when, in true SCHOOL. 73 and thoroughly human Language, he knows God to be his Father, himself to be a Child of God, and lives in Accordance with this Knowledge; this is the Christian Religion, the Religion of Jesus The key to Therefore, the only Key to the Knowledge and man'TcTcod Experience of divinely human Relations the Rela- jookedlfcr tion of God to Man, of Man to God is Understand- toman ni ing of spiritually human, true fatherly and childlike child and Relations. Only in so far as we enter into purely spiritual, intimately human, Relations, and live in Accordance with them to the smallest Detail, shall we attain to complete Knowledge of divinely human Relations, and feel them so deeply and vividly that every Longing of our Being will be satisfied, at least recognized, ancWoecome, instead of a never-fulfilled Yearning, a self- rewarding Endeavor. We do not Herein, we yet know, we do not even guess, what is yet so near de\dent" 1!y us ; one with our own Life, with our own Self. We G^ds n fur do not even live up to our own Professions. We a^notmie profess to be Sons of God, and are not yet true o a urown Children of our own Parents. God is said to be our Le noTtLt Father, and we are far from being true Fathers of nourishing our own Children ; we aim to see the Divine, and we hum^ we leave uncared for the Human, which would lead us the Sfvine. to it. , H. STUDY OP NATURE. 101. What Religion says and affirms, that Nature shows and presents ; what is taught by Meditation upon God, is confirmed by Nature ; what follows from the Consideration of the Inward is made known by the Consideration of the Outward ; what 74 THE STUDENTS FROEBEL. Religion asks for, Nature fulfils. For Nature, and all that exists, is God's Annunciation, Revelation, of Himself ; whatever is has its Foundation in the Revelation of God Absolutely Nothing can come to Light, but bears in itself Life and Spirit ; the impress of that Spirit and Life, of that Essence, to which it owes its Existence. As this is true of Man's Work, from the highest Artist to the humblest Handworker; from the most commonplace to the loftiest and most spiritual human Work, from the most lasting to the most transitory human Activity ; so is it true of the Works of God Nature, the Creation, everything that has come to pass As in a work of human Art there dwells no material Part of the human Spirit of its Artist, yet a true Art- work bears in it the whole mind of the Artist in such a Sense, that the Artist lives in it, speaks out of it, so as to inspire others, to awaken, animate, develop, form, his Spirit in them : as the human Spirit is related to the Work which it produces, so God's Spirit is related to Nature, and all that exists. God's Spirit rests in Nature, lives and works in Nature, expresses itself in Nature, communicates itself by Nature; yet Nature is not the Body of God Nature is 102. As Nature is not God's Body, so neither body ; or does God dwell in Nature as in a House ; but God's Spirit lives in Nature, bearing, shielding, unfolding. Does not the Artist's Mind, though but human, dwell AS the spirit in his Work shielding and watching over it ? Does human artist not the Artist's Mind give an earthly Immortality to work ; so, a Block of Marble, or a frail Piece of Linen ; even God's spirit . in Nature, to winged Words which perish almost as soon as SCHOOL. 75 born, or to any other Material, according as he is an Man, less Artist in Forms or in Words ? We take pains to does w^ii to learn the Spirit, Life and Aim of human Works ; we works of study human Works, and we do well. The less fan** developed Man is to grow by studying the Development of maturer Human-beings: how much more should HOW much we exert ourselves to know God's Work Nature : to we study" make ourselves acquainted with Objects of Nature, fro m cai in their Life, according to their Meaning, that is according to the Spirit of God. Moreover, we should Best works of Man are feel ourselves drawn to Mature, because genuine not always within our Works of Art, Works of Man out of which Man's re *<& but ; Nature is pnre Spirit, God's Spirit, speaks purely, are not aiwaysnear always and everywhere within reach, whereas Man everywhere, is everywhere surrounded by pure Works of God ; by Works of Nature out of which the pure Spirit of God speaks 103. Therefore the Human-being, and specially From boy- in Boyhood, should be made intimately acquainted shoufa be . - _ T . T-> i -n brought near with Nature; not in her Particulars, the Jorms of to the spirit her Phenomena only, but in the Spirit of God as it The boy will lives and moves in Nature. The Boy feels this deeply, occupation and desires it ; therefore Nothing so binds together h^ommonT' Educator and Pupils, whose Feelings are unspoiled, endears 1 ' 1 as their being occupied in common with Nature, pTpu. 6 " with natural Obiects. This Parents as well as School- Teachers J should take teachers should look to. At least once a Week, theirschoiars ' weekly to Teachers should go out, with each Division of their * ra . 1 . k in 'j 16 fields and School, into the Country ; not, as may be sometimes Ianes - seen, driving them like a Flock of Sheep, nor leading them like a Company of Soldiers ; but going with them like a Father among his Sons, or a Brother with his Brothers; bringing closer to their -Sight 76 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. and Attention whatever of Nature the Season pre- sents. village 104. School-masters who live in a Village, or in ters should the Country, should not reply: "My School-children not answer : . .... " My pupils are all Day long in the open Air, and run about in it are always J o in the ' whether I help them, or not. True ! they run country. A Not children about, but they do not live in the open Air, they do ofte y n, a kn U ow not live with Nature. Not Children and Boys only, Nature e than but many Adults know no more about Nature than airVhey ordinary People do about the Air they live in. That is, they scarcely know it as a real Thing ; still less do they know the Qualities which render Air adults who indispensable to the Preservation of bodily Life. In country may common Parlance, Air means either a Draught, or feel next to a Temperature. In like Manner, Children and Boys nothing of it Nature's who are continually running about in the open Air, beauty and workings, may yet see, guess, and feel, Nothing of Nature's Beauties and their Operation on the human Mind. Just as happens to those who have grown up in very beautiful Scenery; they often feel Nothing of its Beauty and Influence [till some stranger, perhaps, points them out]. Maybe the 105. But and this is most important it may guesses 5 ' chance that the Boy, with his own inward spiritual Nature's 80 Sight, does behold, or guess, somewhat of the Life he meet' of Nature around him. If, then, he meets with no withnosym- . pathyor Sympathy from grown-up People near him, that ciousseed Seed of Life, just as it springs up, is shut in, sup- life may pressed. The Boy asks from the Adult Confirmation [or correction] of his own inward Perceptions : and he has a right to do so, from a Feeling of what Hence it is his Elders should be ; from Respect for them. When fider and he gets no Response, the Effect is twofold : he loses SCHOOL. 7, Respect for his Elders ; and his original inward younger to walk Feeling and Perception die away. Hence the Value together, in f ~r\ -i*ii 11 i common of Boy and Adult walking together, %n common effort to Endwvor to take-in the Spirit and Life of Nature, spirit of . Nature. and to let it act upon them. Thus, too, much aim- less Running-about of Boys [that is neither play, nor work " Loafing"] would come to an End. Ill STUDY OF FOBMS. 106. Thus the Being and Operation of Nature Nature as a Whole ; Nature, as an Image of God ; as the inner con- ' i- i teraplation Word of God, communicating and wakening the as one: to the outer Spirit of God as a whole ; thus Nature meets, and observation, . . of the senses, has always met, Man s inward Contemplation. But she appears " an infinity of to outward Contemplation she offers herself other- particulars, without wise. To the Senses she appears to be a Multiplicity obvious of Particulars, differing one from another, without clear, intimate, living Connexion ; Items, Details, of which each has its own Form, each its proper Course of Development, its peculiar Destiny and Purpose. To the outward Observation there is no Proof that all these externally separate Details are originally connected Members of a great living Organism ; a Whole intimately and spiritually united : that Nature herself is such a Whole. S 107. This outside view of Nature, resting upon Nature, looked at individual PI enomena natural Obiects looked on from the out- . side, shows as distinct and separate is like looking at a Tree, endless . . particulars or any much-divided [flowering! Plant. Each Leaf w hout J L OJ apparent seems distinct from every other; from Branch to connexion. Branch within the Blossom from Calyx to Corolla, Seen by the from these to Stamens and Pistil, no Bridge, no showsus t8 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. ueep-iying connecting Link, is seen. But, when we look with the Mind's Eye, seeking and finding Connexions for the most obvious Particulars [as of pistils, stamens, petals and cup-leaves in one flower] ; then, from one Link to another [as of all blossoms, leaves, branches in one stem] : at last we discern the Unity of an inner Law working at the Heart of the Plant The Multiplicity of Nature leads the thinking Mind to recognize [in all things, as in the plant] a deep-lying Law Force and 108. Himself holding this law to be the exertion matter are . . . the ultimate oi power, by a conscious, eternal Spirit Grod ground of phenomena; but as though accommodating himself to the and they 3 cannot be difficulties that the last half century of science thought of as " separate. nas no t brought forth but nourished F. is content to pronounce, that Force, when appearing [acting, making itself mani- fest] is the ultimate Ground of all things, of every Phenomena in Nature. [F. admits, too, that] besides Force there is a second necessary condition of Form and Substance ; viz. Stuff matter : and he goes on to assert, as with pro- phetic view of latest scientific ideas : All Individuality and Multiplicity of Forms belong- ing to Nature on this Earth, show that Matter and Force constitute an indivisible Unity. Matter, and spontaneous Force, acting from one Point equally in all Directions, imply one another ; neither exists, or can subsist, without the other; strictly speaking, neither can be thought of without the other. 109. The above may be taken as a specimen of F.'s hausbackene Philosopkie, or " home-spun science." It leaves much to be desired, no doubt, SCHOOL. 79 in depth and completeness. But as F. lived and wrote in the twilight that preceded the rise of C. Darwin ; before, therefore, the great word " evolution " was employed by sciolists, as Sesame by the Forty Thieves, to open closed doors and explain the inespli3ible; his defects may be excused. As a work ng hypothesis or formula, not yet absolutely done with, his theory of Force and Matter may be allowed to stand. The same lenient, if not too-respectful, sentence can hardly be pronounced to-day upon the lengthy 'and minute developments which make up F.'s " Study of Forms" (Formenkunde), the third subject of instruction at school. From the Ball, or Sphere, which F. assumes to be " universally the first, and just so the last, natural form," F. follows the working of Matter and Force as one, through a wide variety of crystalline forms, and seems without conscious difficulty to step across that chasm between the realms of the inorganic and the organic, as also over that dividing inanimate from animated beings, before which Science still halts. " The results of these efforts," says Mr. Hailmann(in a note, p. 173, of his translation of the Menschen- erzichung}, " are not accepted by the mineralo- gical science of the day." Whether or not, F.'s pages on the growth of crystals contain fore- gleams of truth to come, they will afford to the (proposed) Second Part of this little Book "Methodic" rich materials for working out the forms of solid figures. F.'s saying: "In the whole process of the development of 80 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. crystalline form, as it appears in natural objects, there is a most remarkable agreement with the development of the human mind and heart," may be prophetic, or it may illustrate the ease with which rare as well as ordinary intellects accept analogy in the light of proof. In any case, as honest teachers, we must wait until that near or distant day when they who know shall be agreed upon the scientific facts, before we use them with our pupils as bases of spiritual culture. Let parents 110. Let Father and Son, Tutor and Pupil, waikwith. ers Teacher and Scholar, move together in the great dren.in Natural- whole. Do not reply Father, Teacher they know u Of that I my self as yet know nothing." It is not observe : a Question of imparting Knowledge already gained, juniors w b u t of calling-forth new fin which elder and observe. L younger alike share]. " You, Teachers, must ob- serve ; lead your Juniors to observe ; and bring what is observed to your own and to their Con- sciousness." Things In order to perceive the all-pervading Reign of always, first : . . then name*. L aw i n Nature, her Unity, technical Terms are not needed, either for natural Objects or the Qualities of such ; but simple, clear, firm Perception of these Objects and Qualities is needed, with distinct Names for them [however homely] Qualities The Matter is to introduce the Boy to the Objects perticsare themselves : that he may learn the Qualities which to be learnt, by observa- they put forth and express ; that he may know the Object to be that identical Thing which, in its Form and so forth, it declares itself to be The one Thing needful is clear Sight, and Recognition [of the SCHOOL. 81 thing itself]. Give the Object its local Name ; or Give the i i -VT i i local name ; it you know none, then any JName that occurs ; best ora descnp- T -XT 11 i live name; of all. a descriptive JName, even though rather by-and-by ., , , the accepted long, until by-and-by you come upon the accepted name is Name 111. Do not say, country Schoolmaster! "I know nothing of natural Objects ; I do not even know their Names." By faithful Observation of Nature, you can acquire for yourself, however humble has been your Education, far higher and more thorough outward and inward Knowledge, more vivid Acquaintance with the Particular and the Mani- / fold, than any Books at all within your Means could teach you Moreover, the so-called higher The higher Knowledge usually rests on Phenomena and Percep- rests on ge tions which the simplest Person is able to make ; withuTrach ay, on Observations which, if we have but Eyes to see, we can make with little or no Expense, more beautifully than by the most costly Experiment ! The country Teacher must bring himself to this by perse- vering Observation; he must, specially, let himself be led to it by the World of Youth, by the Boys he has about him. 112. Father, Mother, be not afraid: do not say, if you know "I mvself know nothing : how can I teach my child? " follow your * , J children ! That you know nothing, may well be ; that is not They come the greatest 111, if only you are willing to learn : if parents for vou know nothing, do as the Child does : go to Father you to J 9 * Mother and Mother ; be a Child with your Child, a Scholar Nature, and ' * God s spirit with your Scholar; and with him let yourself be in Nature, taught by Mother Nature, and by the Father, God's spirit in Nature : God's Spirit and Nature herself will lead and teach you, if you will let yourself be taught. 82 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. Say not, "I have not studied; I have not learned." Who taught the first ? Go like him to the Fountain- head ! One great Aim of the University indeed is, to give Sight, to open the inward Eye, for what is whenchii- within and without; but it would be sad for the taught etriy Race of Man if none could see but those who have to see and , . _ , T _ . , think, Uni- studied at the University ! And 3 it you, Parents versities will . become and Teachers, tram your Children and Pupils, as what they . x aim to be : early as possible to see and to think, then Universities Schools of . ^ Truth, will become what they ought, and aim to be Schools Schools of Wisdom. for learning the highest spiritual Truths ; Schools for realizing these in one's own Life and Action ; Schools of Wisdom. Every point 113. From every Point of Life, from every Object leads to of Nature, there is a way to God. Only hold fast the Goal, and steadily keep the way The We have a Phenomena of Nature form a fairer Ladder from th'aT ' r Earth to Heaven, and from Heaven to Earth, than not a dream ever Jacob saw ; and not in one Direction only in all ! 'Tis not a Dream thou seest ; it abides ; it is everywhere about thee ; it is beautiful ; Flowers . - enwreathe it, and Angels look from it with the Eyes of Children ; it is solid ; it forms lasting Shapes, and rests upon a crystal World Fear not to 114. Let the Boy's Eye and the Boy's Sense lead lead of a 6 you ; and,know for your Comfort, simple, natural tions S : a" es Boys have no Patience with half Truths and false Pre- i \\'\ ^ h teshaif l tences. Follow, then, quietly and thoughtfully, their Questions; these will teach you and them; for these whenchii- Questions come from the human Spirit, still child- que"tfons like ; and what a Child, a Boy, asks a Parent, this a cannot* l * grown Man will be able to answer. But you say : not to give "Children and Boys ask more than Parents, than SCHOOL. 83 grown Men, can answer," and it is so. When you oneoftwo cannot give the Knowledge they ask for, you stand " ' know either at the Frontier of 'the Earthly, and the Gate cannot be ' f ' known ' : or of the Divine: if so, then speak out simply |"I do "iknow r J L not : others not know, for it cannot be known "1. and the Mind know . an <* J you may. and Heart of Child and Boy will be satisfied ; or you stand only at the Limit of your own Knowledge ; then be not afraid to say so ['/ know not ; others may ; you will, sometime "]. Take care never to speak as though your own Boundaries were also the Limits of possible human Knowledge IV. MATHEMATIC. 115. A few pages back, somewhat dislocated Number we thought, F. says : " Do you seek a firm Point gives lc of Rest, and safe Guide, in all the Variety of point and o -VT t i T- r-t -i sure guide Nature r Number is such a Point and Guide, to this Viewing Number as the simplest form, the Nature. A B of Mathematic, he proceeds, here : Man seeks a firm Point and sure Guide to Know- ledge of the inner Connexion of all Variety in Nature. What can give a surer and more pregnant Commencement for this [study of variety] than Mathematic, ? It stands, bearing, as it were, all Variety in itself ; unfolding all Variety out of itself; yet, as being the visible Expression of Obedience to Law, of Law herself. On account of this comprehen- The ver> name means sive Quality, Mathematic was from the first named science of Theory of Knowing, Science of Knowledge, for that HOW did it acquire, is the true Meaning of the Name . . . keep, and even sur- What, then, is it wherebv Mathematic not only pass, that J high title t first acquired and maintained through long Ages, 84 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. but has even surpassed, that high Rank ? What is Mathematic in its Essence, Growth, Operation ? As Phenomenon of the Inward and of the Outward Proceeding World, she belongs alike to Man and to Nature. herself from . ! & pureintei- Issuing from pure Intellect, from the simple Laws lect, Mathe- . T, matic finds of Thought ; being a visible Expression of these Laws, and of Thought itself; she finds, already Nature, ail existing in the material World outside her, Phe- phenomena, to be nomena, Combinations, Shapes, Forms, that are all governed by r ' her laws. necessarily governed by these Laws ; yet they meet her, in Nature, as wholly independent of her, and Thus Mathe- o f human Intellect and Thought. Man thus, in his mane science of Interior, his Intellect, in the Laws of his Thought, knowing mediates finds that very Nature, with all the Variety of her between man > * theirnier" 1 * 1 Phenomena, which had grown up independently of dHorid. him in the Outer-world. 116. Thus Mathematic stands forth as that which unites, mediates between, Man and Nature, Inner- and Outer-world, Thought and Perception [as no other subject of study does] instruction Education of Man, without Mathematic, without of man, without a t least thorough Knowledge of Number whereto, Mathematic, & at least as necessary Condition, whatever Study of Form and arithmetic, is worthless : gj^g j s practicable, will be added as Occasion serves maim; in- stead of i s no tetter than unsubstantial Patch- and Rag- aiuing true education. W ork, and [instruction, thus essentially defective, far from helping] puts insuperable Obstacles in the Way of the Training and Development whereto Man is destined and called For Human Intellect is as inseparable from Mathematic as Human Heart is from Religion. SCHOOL. 8 V. LANGUAGE. A. PRELIMINARY. 117. What then is Language and in what Re- lation does it stand to the other two cardinal Points of Boy-life that is, human Life? [viz. Religion and Mathematic]. Wherever true inner Connexion, true living Reci- (yet deserv- procity, exists an$ expresses itself, there at once j^^^" 1 appears the Relation of Unity, Individuality, and '<.- ED.) Variety [as of things distinguishable yet really one]. So it is with Religion, Nature, and Lan- guage Religion Life in the Heart, Life after the Heart's Training ft* Claim, finding and feeling the One in everything; nature/and Nature Cognition of Particulars in the Outer- world, equally c . demanded in themselves, and their Relations to one another, b y man. and to the Whole ; and Language, which represents the Oneness of all Variety, the inner living Connexion of all Things, endeavoring to satisfy the Reason: these three are then an indivisible Unity, and the partial, broken, and incoherent Training of one with- out the others, necessarily produces Onesided ness ; and hence, if not Destruction, at least Disturbance of human Nature, which is one 118. Religion, Nature, with Mathematic, which AII these is Nature in Man, and Language, these three, in one" g hate all their various Relations, have one like Aim and Purpose ; to make known, to reveal the Inward, the Inmost : to make the Internal External, and the External Internal; and to show both, Inmost and 86 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. Outmost, in their natural, original, necessary Accord and Connexion. Therefore, what is said of one of these three may likewise, but in its own Way, be said of each of the other two. What, therefore has already been said of Religion, and Nature (Mathematic), if in itself true, will follow concerning Language ; only with a we find, in Difference from the Peculiarities of Language. We fact, false . ' efforts to meet, alas ! in lite with the delusion that one or cherish one without the another of these three Studies may exist alone ; by itself advance and grow to Completeness ; Language, without Religion and Nature .(Mathematic) ; Religion, without Language and Nature (Mathematic) : Study of Nature (Mathematic), without Study of Language and Religion. Now this, F. says, is a sin against humanity one and indivisible, and a great hindrance of man's true development. TO be com. As, however, Man is meant to know surely and see tion must clearly, and to attain complete Consciousness, it is embrace all : ->", T-IT />* -IT not con- evident that Education of Man necessarily demands fusing or dividing just Estimation and Knowledge of Religion, of Nature (Mathematic) and of Language, in their inner, living Reciprocity. Without a Knowledge of the inner Unity of these three, we lose our- selves in limitless Multiplicity. speech 119. F. defines: "Speech is a copy of man's comes from % A * the mind of whole inner and outer world." Again: " As a man : as Nature from product of man, speech comes forth immediately the mind of . * God - from his mind; is representation and expression of the human mind, as Nature is of the divine mind." The question whether language be a simple product of the human mind, or grow from SCHOOL. 87 imitation of Nature, F. disposes of characteris- tically : " The spirit of Nature and that of Man, are one; they have one source God." Admitting that objective proof is yet wanting "Wemust of what he asserts, F. pronounces that "the inVard inner conviction cannot be stifled, that in press them- every language, inwardly-necessary Laws express necessarily themselves in the constituents of words ; in letters," 'etc tones, sounds, endings, also in the letters and their combinations, which are signs for these." ED. admits the above as an entirely probable postulate, but submits that F.'s examples, meant to justify his pronouncement, are all as Hailmann says (p. 215) " more or less fanci- ful illustrations : " and that as the whole question of the genesis of speech is still undecided, it should not be mixed with that of the use of 'anguage in the education of man. We turn from these questions, not yet ripe for answer, to this sentence, than which F. has few more momentous, or of more immediate application : 120. We ourselves, and yet more our Child- ren, would attain to a far deeper InsightTinto Lan- guage, if in learning Languages we connected Words, much, more than we do, with real Sight or Touch of the Things and Objects signified. " Language would then," F. continues, " be to us not only a combination of sounds and words, but a real whole, made up of life and objects." And " our language would again become a life- speech ; born of life, and life-giving ; whereas it threatens, through merely external treatment, to grow more and more lifeless." 88 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. 121. It is a supreme distinction of F. that, like the alchemy of Nature, he turns charcoal into diamonds, dust into pearls. Asserting, what all students of language confirm, that rhythm, measure, belongs to the infancy of all languages, F. would recall to attention and cherishing, that language of infancy which so evidently delights in rhyme; and earlier still in repetition of measured sounds. (Hailmann, p. 220, gives most interesting examples : which many ob- servant nurses and sympathetic grandparents could, doubtless, parallel.) We all know with what genius and sympathy F. himself in his (t Mother- and Petting- Songs " gathers and arranges provision for that appetite of in- fancy, whence is to be fed and strengthened the taste for poetry and song. Here, as else- where, F.'s exhortation would be, " Take what nature, Child's nature, offers you, and guide it, with your wisdom, along its own way : try not to put-in whole, what your grown-up wit judges better: fatal instance of new cloth upon the old garment. Select and purify your nursery- rhymes, not forbid them : tolerate even mean- ingless sing-song if innocent." B. WRITING AND BEADING. 122. F. says: "A naturally-developed Human- being finds itself as child or boy, in the midst of an outer life so rich in objects, facts, &c., that it cannot hold them all. Its inner life, meanwhile* unfolds yet more, and it feels an unconquer- SCHOOL. 89 able impulse and need to snatch from forget- f ulness some flowers and fruits of this meeting of inward and outward life to preserve them, for itself and others, by means of signs. " This is an historical outline of how " writing " arose : first, " picture-writing " of facts and ideas ; much later, " alphabetic-writing. " The picture-writing we see continually in children, when they endeavour to draw the event that struck their minds. Not infre- quently, children have been known to form sign-sounds or letters for themselves. To wait for this original invention would detain us too long. Before giving the instruction, however, it should be most unequivocally asked-for, demanded, by the child's nature. Instruction must always be connected with Noinstruc- a certain Need and Want of the Pupil; and be given* bm this Want must have been previously developed, feimeed, in wakened, led up to, in the Boy, or he cannot be taught with Advantage, with Success. A chief Cause of many Imperfections in our Schools, in our System of Instruction, is that we teach and instruct Never give ' f m answers, till our Children without having first awakened this questions are asked. Need: perhaps when we have already destroyed what was in the Child ! How could such School and Instruction prosper ? 123. Reading, and Learning to Read, sprang Reading necessarily from the Wish to render audible to one- thTwIsht in T i 11-11 i ^ ' -i recall what sell and others what had been before written down ; has been . written. to recall this to one s Memory ; as it were, to revive it. Through the Act of Writing and Reading which must be preceded by a certain Extent of 90 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. living Knowledge of the Language, Man rises above every other known Creature, and approaches the ifise dixit ! Attainment of his Destiny ; Man becomes a Person doubtful!] first by the practice of this Art. Thus [more lch y oia e r c r es credibly] the Endeavor to learn Beading and Writ- wruand ing makes the Boy, the Pupil, into a Scholar ; first renders School possible. The possession of Writing gives Man the Capacity of one day becoming self- conscious ; it first renders possible true Knowledge, which is Self-knowledge ; for it enables Man to By means of contemplate his own Being, placing it as an Object becomes before him. Writing connects Man as Present, with conscious of . his own the Past and the Future; with the Nearest, com- pletely, and with the most Distant, certainly. Thus, Writing gives Man the Possibility of reaching the highest completest earthly Perfection The want 124. Since, then, Reading and Writing are so should be , clearly important to Man, the Boy must be strong enough shown before ^ 1 children are and intelligent enough [properly to use themj. Ine write and Possibility of becoming conscious must be already awake in him ; the Need of Writing and Reading, the Impulse the Necessity for them should have clearly expressed itself, before Children begin to ifthepupu a to write and read. The Boy who is to learn i n a h!m of mg Writing and Reading with true Profit, must him- canbecome self already ~be something [of which he can be con- conscious, '-ill,' 1 -j.1 reading scious] else, he tries to be conscious ot something tryto S b e im . which he not yet is; and all his "Knowledge" wTaTbTis [gained by reading] will be hollow, dead, empty, mechanical. When thus the Foundation is lifeless and mechanical, how can Life-activity, true Life, the highest Prize of all Endeavor, be developed ? How can Man really attain his Destiny, which is, Life ? SCHOOL. 91 VI. ABT. 125. From what has already been said about the AH human " endeavor is Aim, Centre, and Obiect of all human Endeavor, it in one f J three forms : is clearly seen that all human Endeavor is three-fold : striving after 1. Striving after Eest and Life within; 2. Striving RefigionT after knowing and laying hold of the Outward ; 3. ?edg r e oTthc Striving to represent directly the Inward. The 1st Nature;' is the Endeavor of Religion ; the 2nd, of Natural represent the Science; the 3rd, of Self -representation, Self- Art. development, and Self-contemplation Nature (Mathematic) and Language having been already touched on, One thing is still manifestly wanting to the complete One yet Presentment of Man's whole Being ; this is the ourVurvey Presentment of Life inner Life itself, what is immediately experienced the Heart; this third, Presentment of what is within Man, the true Self of Man, is Art. 126. All human ideas, one only excepted, are Art touches relative Therefore, Art has a side where it Mathe- touches Mathematic, or the Understanding ; a second another, Language I where it touches the World of Language, oKReason : on another seems pre- a third where, although pure Presentment OBvthfi s^tmentof r nature: at Internal, it seems to be one with the Representation lastcoinddes . . . wi * re - of Nature ; finally, one where it coincides with ligion. Religion .... If Art is viewed only in its ultimate Unity, as pure Presentment of the Internal, it occurs to us, that Art-presentments of what lives within Man of what forms his proper inner Life will be different according to the Matter, in which they have to be imbodied .... Art, as Presentment by Art-present. pure Sound is Music, especially Sony ; as Present- diffe/bT* 92 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. their ma- terial; sound color, line, mass. As c Tort to draw ap- pears very early; to paint and model soon after; we judge that feeling for Art is a general gift of man ; ought there- fore to be cherished from the first. Taste being nourished, and oppor- tunity for practice given, child becomes able to en- joy true works of Art. Singing, drawing, painting, modelling, must have place in every full scheme of education. Not to breed artists ; to unfold man in every direction. merit for the Sight, by Colors, is Painting ; Art as Presentment in Space, by forming and shaping of mass, is Modelling, or Sculpture. Draining is a link between the two last, and might be taken as presentment by simple Lines, while Painting is pre- sentment by surfaces; and Modelling, by masses. We have seen, the Effort to draw appears at an early Stage of human Development. The Effort too by Modelling, and by Painting, to put forth what is within, appears early ; often in Childhood, distinctly in early Boyhood. We conclude, then, without Hesitation, that Feeling for Art is a general Quality and Gift of Man ; and ought to be cherished from the first ; at latest in Boyhood. 127. When this Feeling is cared for, even though the Individual have no special Gift for Art, so as to grow up an Artist, he will become better able to understand and value Works of Art : and a genuine School Training [in art] will save him from setting up for an Artist without true inner Vocation. Sing- ing, Drawing, Painting, and Modelling must therefore be early taken into Account by any general, compre- hensive Scheme of Human Education and Accom- plishment ; they must be early treated as serious School Matters, not left to Chance or Caprice The Purpose being that every Human-being be enabled to develop f.illy and in all Directions, faithful to his own Nature ; that each may grow up to recognize the all-sided Activity of Man ; and specially, as aforesaid, that every Individual may know how to perceive and to estimate the Productions of genuine Art. Poetic Representation also, as was Drawing in SCHOOL. 93 another Point of View, is a connecting Link with poesy.too, Art. Starting from Language, Poesy is a con- with art densed Representation of the spiritual inner World ; a Presentment of eternally moved and moving Life at Rest. In everything, in Life and in Religion, so Man must also in Art, the last and highest Aim of Representa- highest ob- tion is Man, pure and simple. Christian Art is or toman. ought to be the highest Art ; for she endeavors to display in everything the Constant, the Divine, specially in and by Man : for Man is the highest Object of Art, to Man 0. HOME AND SCHOOL. 128. In the Home the Child grows up to Boy- School-life _ iciiT i t* c*i i i i i 1 r and home- hood and school-age ; therefore bchool should [grow Hfe should ,-,...' , TT m -i be joined, out of andj pin itself on to the Home. To-day, the not divided, first and most indispensable Demand of human Deve- fir n =d of the day. lopment and Training, complete, or tending to Com- [True now, pleteness, is Union of Instruction with Life ; Union w^oTethis: of Home- and School-Life Could we but stepfarf 00 * perceive what a burdensome Mass of accumulated, nghtVay- mechanical, far-fetched Knowledge and Training, Wedono we already possess, and are foolishly striving day by ^h^f our* day to augment ; and on the other hand, how very f^ fetched' little Knowledge we have, that has been developed ^^"f how out of ourselves, that has grown-up in our own ^^th. Souls ; it would be well for our Children, and for the Saving of future Generations, if we would but cease to be proud of our foreign Thinking, foreign Know- ing, even foreign Emotions and Feelings : cease to set the highest Fame and Success of our Schools therein, that they stuff our Children's Minds and 94 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. it were well Hearts with all this far-fetched, veneered, Knowledge we had done -, ., .,-. , with foreign and DKlll ! knowledge, F. alludes here to the old complaint of German raise plants eagerness to borrow and appropriate " culture " of knowledge TXT- i TIT and skill in from strangers. With very little change oi ourselves ! . - 1 a - * name, the story is told ot us. Shall we never begin to raise a Tree of Life in our own Hearts ? A Tree of Knowledge in our own Minds ? To cherish it unto beautiful Unfolding, so Let us cease that it may bloom in Health and Beauty, and give to stamp our . . . 7 _ 1 children like ripe Fruits which here must decay, but mere will coins: but . let them spring up again r bhall we never tire of stamping plants from our Children and Pupils like Coins ; letting them within them, flourish with Image and Superscription not their own, instead of having them move beside us as Growths of the Law aud the Life planted in them by God our Father : with divine Features, and in the Mankind's Image of God ? . . . . The Welfare of Mankind can can be re- be restored only from the quiet private Sanctuary of newed only in the home. Home. At the founding oi each new Family, our c^rnesto" heavenly Father, eternally working for the good of femiiy^and Mankind, speaks to the Parents through the Heaven to unfbkhT He has opened in their Hearts. The same Call goes humanity. forth to all Mankind, to every Individual, to repre- sent Humanity in pure Development, Man in his ideal Form By putting 129. Shall we, then, always choke up afresh the able instruc- Well of Life which God has made to spring up in quench the Man's Soul and spirit ; in every one's Heart ? Shall workings of we rob ourselves, our Children, our Pupils, of this shall we unutterable Joy, that within their hearts shall flow persist in * doing this? the Spring of eternal Life? Will you, Parents and Guardians, continue to compel Educators and Teachers SCHOOL. 95 of your Children to dam up with Rubbish, the Source of Life in them, and to hedge it round with Thicket? Perhaps F. looks for too much from ordinary readers, expecting them to understand that this "damming-up the spring of life with rubbish, and this fencing-in with thicket," is meant as an easily intelligible metaphor for the ordinary school- work, that stupefies in place of brighten- ing the scholar ; makes him hate learning and Science, in place of finding it "more musical than is Apollo's lute." F. only means "that asinine feast of sow thistles and brambles, which is commonly set before .... our choicest and hope fullest wits " ; or was in John Milton's time. Parents reply : " Unless thus equipped, our Sons are good for nothing in the World ; they grow up, and who is to feed them ? Wherewithal shall they YOU answer: be clothed ? " Fools ! You shall not be answered ; are our "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God;" for that you fitted for the would not understand, estranged as you are from God and yourselves. This is the Reply : " Do you win you desire for yo'ir Children, a dull brooding Life, poor children as in Knowledge. Deed, and Work ? " The human them, or as the world Race is to enjoy Wisdom and Intelligence, to demands? possess Energy and Activity, far beyond what we at present guess. For who has said to Humanity, the Child of Humanity is to grow in God, " Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther ? " knowledge and activity, But these new Fruits are to grow-up in Freshness without limit. and Strength of Youth; being, as it were, new- This can be, created Self- productions. unfoidmg e 130. The Boy must not take up his future SJSiduai. 96 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. The boy is Business, which is now his Calling, lazily, slackly, in his call- gloomily. No ! cheerful and merry lie must be ; tented with trusting in God, in Nature, in himself; rejoicing that his Trade will bring forth manifold Blessing and Success. Quiet, Concord, Temperance, all high social Virtues will dwell in himself, and in his Home ; when be- he will be contented with his Sphere and its Activity : fetherfhe and is not this the Prize for which all of us are y " My striving ? [With regard to his own Children's future] not leam he will not say, either; "My Boy shall learn any for it is the Trade rather than mine; for it is the barrenest of Nor win he a ^ >" or > insist that the Trade which he has himself fnto e what s n followed, with Profit and Advantage, because it suited smted him- ki s Tastes and Powers, shall be pursued by his Son He wm see [whose disposition may be wholly different]. He business can will see that the smallest Business can be carried on beconducted . , T _ T , m , , worthily. in a large Way ; that every Trade may be so ennobled, that its Practice is not beneath Man's Dignity. Having He will perceive that the humblest Powers, rightly for his " applied to Work, will procure him Bread, Cloth- Bouis.he" ing, Shelter and in addition, Eespect. Thus he anxious will have no Fear for his Children's future, because about their . . , ' worldly his highest Anxiety has been to cultivate their fortune. boulS ............................ F.'S scheme 131. Here follows an arrangement of " Means of edScltbn? Education, in common," so named by F. ; perhaps more accurately, of the directions which train- ing of children, in numbers, should take in practice. These follow necessarily, he holds, from the development proper to Man when come to the Boy-age ; and answer to the inner and outer claims of the child's nature, School-age begins. SCHOOL. 97 1. To awaken, nourish, and strengthen the i. Cherish religious religious Sentiment, which keeps the human feeling. Heart in Union, and unites it ever more closely, with God. .... In Accord with, and as Means to this: 2. To get by Heart religious Sayings, upon 2. AS means Nature and Man and their Relations to God, to be learning by used in Prayer : as a Mirror, in which the Boy may and sayings behold his original Feelings, Guesses, and Endeavors Nature and after Union with God, and thus hold them fast. 3. Care, Knowledge, and Exercise of the Body 3.- Cultiva- tion of the as Bearer and Instrument of the Mind ; this, by body. means of orderly, graduated Practice, leading to bodily Perfection. 4. Contemplation and Observation of Nature 4 . observa- and the Outer-world ; joined to, and starting from, outer wodd, what is close at hand ; seeking always Knowledge wlfhwhat of the nearer Environment before proceeding to the more distant. 5. Acquirement of short Poems representing 5. Learning Nature and Life; Pieces, namely, which give Life poens r <>n to Objects of Nature near at hand, and to Events human 6 ur"; of Home-life ; and show the Meaning of these, as in wuTsong. a bright Mirror ; especially with help of Singing. 6. Exercises in Language and Speech; setting e. Exercise out from Observation of Nature, and the Outer- world, but passing on to Contemplation of Man's Inner- world : always keeping chiefly in view Language and Speech as audible Means of Eepresentation. 7. Exercises in, and for, material Bepresenta- 7 . Exercises, tion, by Law and Bule, proceeding always from 11 the simple to the complex. Hereto belong Repre- sentations by Materials, already more or less formed ; a 98 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. as Building, and all constructive Handwork : Works in Paper, Pasteboard, Wood, &c. Lastly and specially, Shapes made out of unshaped but shapeable matter [clay, wax, &c.]. 8. Represen 8. Exercises with Lines upon a Surface, in surface'?' constant, express and visible Reference to the hmss ; draw- ver ^ ca ] an( j horizontal Directions That is, Draiving-in the Network, according to Rule. 9. Colors: 9. Perception of Colors, in their Difference, and se^foras^or Likeness : with Representation of them in given Spaces, preserving certain Form : painting of Pictures in Outline, on Paper ruled in Network. 10. Play: 10. lay ; that is, voluntary Exercises and Repre- all voluntary , , r n i J exercises. sentations oi all kinds. u. Telling 11- Narrating of Histories and Legends, Fables fa f bies,"etc. and Fairy-tales, adapted to Events of the Day, the Seasons, real Life, &c. i. Excur- 12. Short Journeys and long Walks. ramt>iL ' 132. His special point being that home-, and school-life should work together, in the boy's train- ing, F. points out that the matters above specified should be shared between domestic and scholastic occupations : he suggests employing the boy in errands or messages which will task his judg- ment, and require concentration of thought ; perhaps, having him directly instructed by craftsmen, or cultivators, in their arts. We see herein foregleams of that beneficent dawn of technical education, handwork, Slo'jd, &c., which in these last years of the nineteenth century permits sanguine persons to foresee something like a national education according to reason, before the end of the twentieth. SCHOOL. 99 The methods and means for these developing processes belong, of course, to the proposed second part of this little book Methodic. Many very important utterances of F., that belong to our present division, Psedagogic, are found among the illustrations of Method. 133. For Boys towards the Close of Boyhood, it Young is most important to spend steadily at least an Hour wlrdsW . . ~ . endofloy- or two daily in some material Occupation ; in Occu- hood, should pation that produces something useful. Weighty hour or two daily in good Results for their future Life would follow : for sme useful occupation. a most hurtful Effect of our present School-arrange- ments, especially of the so-called classical Schools, is, that the Boy when entering them leaves behind all Home-occupations, all useful Work. Do not reply : Averyiii " In this Period of elder Boyhood, the Boy must present apply his whole Force to Word-learning, to intellectual scho^s, is Culture, if he is to reach a certain Proficiency in in g them the Knowledge." Not so: genuine Experience teaches behmcuif the very Reverse of this ; intellectual Occupation, occupation. alternating with bodily Work, with Employment for pro^e's'thtt useful Production, strengthens not the Body alone, alternating but yet more the Intellect, in the various Directions M P s S mind' of mental Activity. After such a refreshing Labour- ^ seful bath I know no better Name the Mind will set ^t^, r u k r . is about its abstract Work with new Force and Live- fresh'bgfor new intel- lectualwork. 134. Referring to his 5th "Means" " Learning by heart of little poems, which express nature and life, especially accompanied by song," F. says : " Nature and Human life speak early, to Voices of - i -n i i i Nature and Man, in their Events : but in so low a tone that life that whisper to the Boy s unpractised ear can scarcely perceive the childish 100 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. ear, should them, still less put them into his own Language. for and Seasons and Day-times come and go : Spring, with her Buds and Blossoms fills Man while yet a Boy with Joy and Life ; Autumn with her falling Leaves gives him Longing and Eegret ; and stern Winter, a sense of Hardship overcome, which he would sadly miss. These dim Feelings, and many like them, native to Childhood, are not to be neglected, but recog- nized and cherished. Life our Adult-life would be far poorer and emptier than it is, but for the Well of Feeling that first opened up, in Childhood and. Youth." Boy wants 135. Nature and Life speak to man, but that is emotions not all. Man himself wants to make known the roused by . . , . Nature, and emotions, the presentiments, thus awakened in inner life. . him, and as he cannot always find words for himself, words should be given him, as his Words heart, and his inner sense, in their unfolding, afforded, not ask for. What binds Man to Man is not precept. External only, nor can it be too easily expressed, moralizing It is full of deep sense and meaning ; and its we"a d ke r ns and soft chords must be early cherished in the Boy, felling. 6 not by direct precept which is apt to fetter and Suggestion, drill, rather than give life. Suggestion, in the as in song or ft free kaves mirror of a song, without pointed moral appli- cation, leaves the boy that freedom of heart and will which is needed to strengthen and develop his affectional and moral nature. Manunfoids, 136. Upon his 7th " Means," practice of material what he s> Representation in space, under Rule and Law, takes in; T < i , i i -n greatly more proceeding irom simple to the complex, F. says, bywhathe F. 6 . . V out. Ins expression beirg somewhat condensed, SCHOOL. 101 Man is developed and formed for the Attainment of his true Destination, in part by what he, as a Boy, re- ceives from without and takesiwfo himself; but, incom- parably more through what he unfolds and represents out of himself. This Truth is, of course, expressed in the very Words, Development and Improvement. Experience and History teach, that the Human- beings who have been most truly and deeply helpful to genuine human Welfare, became so, far more by what they produced out of themselves than by what they took in from without. It is a commonplace, that by faithfully teaching, when we we advance in knowledge and intelligence : and |2m ; W forcc another, which Nature teaches us all ; that by by^e^That every use of strength, strength is both roused action is far ' -, moreeffec- and augmented. tive than As, too, the Perceiving and Grasping of a Truth, take in by by the way of Life and Action, is far more unfold- rw e have ing, forming and strengthening, than the mere g|o!vth e of Reception of it in Word and Idea : so, likewise a a-xiom?* 1 Forming by and in Matter, in Life by Doing, doing.j-^ connected with Thinking and Speaking, is far more helpful for Man's Development and Improvement, than is Representation by Ideas and by Word, with- out Act or Deed. This 7th " Means," or Subject of Instruction [representation by matter, in space! instruction , 'n methods therefore properly succeeds those already treated : of re P re - . senting in Observation of External Nature, and Exercise of and bv , matter, fol- Language. lows <* servation The Boy's life and action have, we know, but one of Nature, and practica aim : his life consists in this external representa- ln u La " tion of his inner nature, his force, specially in and by matter. In that which he shapes, the 102 To utter his inner nature, in matter, is the boy's true life. What can be put in belongs already to Man, and the individual will unfold it " We know not what we shall be." Man's essence, like God's spirit, is eternally unfolding. This would be self- evident, but for preju- dices which make of our (actual) training en- velopment and zwfold- ing. Boy sees not so much, outer forms which should enter into him ; he sees in them his own spirit, the laws and activities of his own mind and rightly so. The function of teaching and instruction is, more and more, to bring out of Man, rather than put into him. 187. That which can be put into Man is properly speaking there already: Man knows it, if the Individual does not : thus it is no more than each one will, by-and-by, through the laws of Humanity, unfold out of himself. But, what is yet to be developed out of Humanity ; what more the Essence of Humanity possesses, and ought to give out that we know not yet ; that is not yet Man's possession ! We only know that Man's essence, like the Spirit of God, is eternally unfold- ing. This, F. continues, would be self-evident, if we only observed the facts of our own and others' life. We are, however, so incrusted with pre- judices and opinions formed from without, in no sense the outcome of ourselves, our natural minds that we have almost lost for our children the meaning of development and enfolding, and ought rather to speak of en- velopment and mfolding : what we really desire is to stamp and shape them to our mind, from without. Better than that, F. says, would be to leave them quite to themselves ; rather not train at all, than train wrong ! This may seem in theory extravagant, as in practice it would be impossible ; but in idea it is true, and full of much-needed warning. SCHOOL. 103 The welfare of the Individual and of the Race consists in the complete natural and reasonable Unfolding of the Human -being and his spiritual Forces, according to the Laws of Nature and of Reason. RETROSPECT. 138. Thus far Man, in the Growth and Develop- Occupations ment, of all Stages and Conditions of his Being, lies not all given before us, sketched in Outline from the Beginning: of practical result. his Existence to Boyhood : the Means, too, which suit both his actual Age, and the future Claims of his Humanity, have been broadly indicated. If we consider what has been found-out and stated hitherto, we see that many Events in the Boy's Life have not a special "measurable " Purpose: thus, Occupa- tion with Colors is not arranged in order to produce Painters ; or Practice in Song, to make a Musician. They aim to These Occupations aim, first, at unfolding in the to realize his nil- i T -VT inner-man, Boy and helping him to realize, his own Nature ; expand his t spirit. they are Food for his Mind ; they are the Ether in which the Spirit breathes and lives, in order to gain Variety from 1 -n rrn without strength and Force; in a word, Expansion. The should meet mental Gifts of God to man, which come forth in all inner gifts. Directions with an irrepressible Necessity, being so various, are to be satisfied by Variety coming to meet Boy. nature J is injured them. Surely we shall one day see that we are when its own * J impulses are hurtfully thwarting Boy-nature, if we repress unduly jjjj; j" 1 ^ these necessarily various Directions of Mind, ens**^ We do nothing but Harm, though we believe our- selves to be doing Service to God and Man, and God does f not graft, or specially to the Boy's own future Good, by cutting bud ; He off some of his natural Tendencies, and trying 104 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. Likeness to graft others in their Place. God does not graft, or Man's ' bud ; the human Soul, which is divine, is not to be our chii- ' grafted or budded. God develops what is least and dren s % m - spiritual most imperfect, in steady Progression, by eternal, truly divine self-evolving Laws. Now, Likeness to God, in and human -must be Thought and Action, is to be Man's highest Goal ; the aim of all . 01 J r especially where he stands in parental Eelations to training. Children, as God to Man. We should consider, in the Education of our Children, that the Kingdom of God is indeed the Kingdom of the Spiritual ; that there- fore what is spiritual in Man, in our Children, is One, thus Part and Parcel of the Kingdom of God. Thus, we truly trained . to be man, ought to ffive our best Heed to the complete will be best & prepared for Development of the spiritual, in our Children ; in every claim L l and need of other Words, to the Development of what is properly Human, of what is Divine, in each Individual. 139. We have good Eight to be fully convinced, that thus each one, having been truly trained to be a Man, has thereby been educated, as well as is The world possible, for every special Duty, for each particular but for pur Need, of civil and social Life. Now we [the world] boys it is too . , late ! Our say : " This is all very true ; but it does not apply sons must be J J . . r J got ready for to our boys. For our bons it is too late; they are civil life, to J . help us in already in the last Quarter of their Boy-age ; what our business, to earn their Good will such abstract and deeply-grounded own bread ! r J Instruction do them ? They must, perforce, get Instruction to prepare for Business. The Time of their Entrance into civil Life, when they must think of earning their own Maintenance, or helping us in Wesi^uid our Business, is close upon them." . True ; our Sons them while are already old for what they have yet to learn ; why what they then did we not give them while younger, what their Minds needed ? Are the Boys to lose true Develop- SCHOOL. 105 ment, and Training altogether ? The World replies : " But what T-ITI i -r> i MI i they miss, "When the .Boys are grown-up, they will have they can leisure to make up Defects." Fools that we are ! Our later." Consciousness contradicts us, would we but listen to what it says. Here and there some small Omission N ' the development may be supplied ; but all-round, human Development, missed in missed and neglected in Boyhood, can never be cannot he " ' retrieved. recovered. Let us all, Fathers and Mothers too, be wefeei.our- candid for once, and confess, that we feel mental wounds, Wounds, which never heal while we live ; hardened in a Lart a'nd Spots in our Hearts, that soften no more; dark wiUnWer Places in our Intellects that will never get bright; ail through and all this because noble human Feelings, and misdirection Thoughts natural to Childhood, were in our Child- hood crushed or lost, chiefly through early Mis- direction. It will be a Blessing to our Children if this Confession be made and acted on ......... 140. If our Sons are already in the latter Part if of their Boy-age, and have not yet learned, not yet old for developed, what properly belongs to the Beginning that belongs of Boyhood, it were better to turn back to that n'Lgofboy"" Beginning, to Childhood even, than finally to miss it not better T-. r-i they came what could yet be recovered. Perhaps our bons iat er -to the would reach the Goal fof fitness for practical life! than earlier .mi tothe a year or two later: but were it not far better to wrong? our sons are a little touch though late the true Goal, than to reach the false one earlier? .... Consider the words of chndren!'" e e Jesus: "Become as little Children." Have they wise enter not the Meaning, "Turn back to your own Youth, Kingdom of and thus warm and revive the eternal Youth of your Soul." This, which was spoken in the Time of Jesus 3 as most specially the Commencement of a new View of Life ; now spoken to us, to all Mankind, that a 106 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. The hopes new and higher Stage of human Development may of our own best mo- be reached ; means " It you provide not ior yourselves promise for and your Children at the Stage of Child and Boy, humanity of J & J ' the noblest whatever Man's Spirit needs, then neither you nor men ; can be * on'f "so b" d * ne y W ^l ever a ^tain what your Souls, in the happiest, proving for hopefullest Moments of your Life, desired ; what has our children * > ' s moved and nll ed the Hearts of the noblest Human- beings, always." Conclusion* 141. If we endeavor to bring to a Focus the Aim The boy has and Amount of Development which Man has acquired, fnhfsmie 1 " by the unfolding method of Education and Instruc- to be awiVe 5 -. _ -in T i i t of his own tion as hitherto described, we distinctly see that the spmtuaUeif: Boy is come to the Knowledge of his independent ceivea spiritual Self ; or, he feels and knows himself to be oneness, and . . . ' . nn /S < its manifold a spiritual Whole. The Capacity has been formed utterance; in him to perceive a Whole, in its Unity and Variety. re ? f H e him ' There has begun to grow in him Ability to represent me ? ns of a Whole in its necessary Parts ; to realize himself material, his Essence in its Unity and in the Manifoldness extent, he of its Being, by means of Variety external to it. destiny: ex. Thus, we recognize the Human-being, at the Begin- divine (the . truly human) ning of Boyhood, as capable of what is highest and in him. most important ; the Fulfilment, viz., of his Destiny, or Function ; which is, to realize the Divine Nature in him. The subsequent Life of Man from Boy- Hissub- ri , sequent life, hood on, is dedicated to making this Capacity grow from boy- "L , hood to into sure Skill into Consciousness into Insight manhood, will be given and Clearness into a freely arranged Life. In Braising ^ _ this ability, showing Ways and Means thereto, and introducing \^ 1 them into practical Life, the Continuation of this ^-ordered Book and of the Author's Life, will be employed. F. F. hoped, in a second part of his Book, 108 THE STUDENT'S FROEBEL. "The Education of Humanity, " to exhibit practical means for the complete realization of this great Idea. In subsequent occasional writ- ings he did much towards this end : but the Book remains a fragment. For witness that he spoke truth, and will henceforward always speak truth, he appeals to the Boy-world that was about him when he wrote it: out of whose Works and Ways, he avers, the Book was built. Boys of the very Age to which this Book belongs fresh in Spirit, cheerful in Mood, joyous in Soul, happy in Life : Boys who entered the teaching Circle while the Book was writing out of whom it really grew who usually surrounded the Writer while at his Task, playing close by, never tired of demanding fresh Satisfaction and Nourishment of their Impulses to Life and Activity : these are Sureties, if outward Pledges were needed, that he has written Truth, and will write Truth still. INDEX. ACTIVITY (of body) to be unfolded for useful production, 18 ADULTS, often strangers to the country to Nature, 76 AGE. Life, Growth not to be divided artificially, 16 AIM of Education, 2; of Educator, Instructor, 9; of religious instruction, 71 ; distant, never to be set before a child, 18 ART of Teaching, defined, 2 ART : representation of Man's true self, 91 ; varies by material : sound, Music ; coloi', Painting ; mass, Sculpture, ib. ; feeling, as general gift of Man. to be cherished, 92 ; highest object of, Man, 93 ; study in boyhood not meant to breed artists, 103 BIBLE history, repeated in Child, 34 BIOLOGY, F.'s, specimen of, 25 BODY, powers of, to be unfolded for useful work, 18 BOY : becomes a scholar, 50 ; wants to make, produce something, 52 ; never shuns a difficulty, 54 ; loves to climb, wander, see distance, 54 ; - if early used to try his strength, comes safe out of danger, 55 ; makes garden, pool, hut of boughs, fort of snow, 56 ; should have space, material, of his own, ib.; asks for stories, legends, fairy-tales : sometimes invents them, 61 ; tries to find the Unity of all, 66 ; as scholar, becomes conscious of two worlds, Inner and Outer, 70 ; sees in the Outer world two phases : Man's work, and Nature, ib. ; asks sympathy and help from elders, 76 ; duly trained as Man, will be fit for each duty of life, 104 ; at end of boyhood, has attained some self-knowledge, 107 BOYHOOD, the season for training Man to work, 21 ; the period of acquisition, instruction, 50 ; 's occupations not intended to train artists or artisans, 103 BOYS, elder, should spend in useful Handwork an hour or two daily, 99 ; life, after boyhood, spent in raising capacity into skill, impulse into power, 108 ; out of whom the book grew, testify that F. has written truth. CHILD, outwardly good, not always so at heart, 4; froward, sometimes really anxious to be good, ib. ; -feels whether a command is arbitrary or imper- sonal, 9 ; to be accounted God's gift : a member of Humanity : from the first, 10 ; to be treated as Man in germ, taught to use all Its powers, 12 : to see everything name everything aright, 29 ; believes all things can feel, speak, hear, 30; should be brought close to Nature, ib. ; Its experi- ments, 40 ; wants to know all about Its treasures, ib. ; brings them to elders, ib. ', approaching Boyhood, is full of various life, 41 ; loves to help Father or Mother, 44 ; wants always to be doing, 52 ; often made bad (because misunderstood), 65 ; enters School with strong faith and hope, 68 shews, there, Self-will and Mischief, 69 CHILDHOOD, specially develops Speech, 48 ; the period of training, 50; by Play, and Home-life, 51 CHILD'S mode of life momentous for Its future, 31 ; clothing to be simple, loose : never an end in itself, 34 COERCION must act under a higher law abstract Right, 8 COMMON, Means of Education, in : i-xii. 97 DESTINATION, of all things, to reveal God, a of Man, to manifest his essence, the divine, 4 110 INDEX. DIET in Childhood of serious moment, 31 ; to be simple, frugal, sufficient, 3 2 DOCTRINE of Education denned, 4 DRAWING, an instinct, its birth and growth, 41 ; opens a new world to Child, ib.; to be always connected with speech, 43; a form of Art uniting sculpture and painting, 92 EDUCATION of Man, defined, 2 ; to be observant, not coercive, 5 ; coercive, needed, where Man's original condition has been spoiled, 6 ; genuine, always two-sided, 8 ; proper, begins with Childhood, 28 ; first point of, teach children to reflect, 45 ; when unnatural stops the natural unfolding, 94; when natural (humane) brings joy to all conditions of life, ennobles every occupation, 96 ; complete, if neglected in youth, cannot be re- trieved, 104 FAULTS of boyhood, their causes : certain sides of Man's nature, unawakened or distorted, 63 ; to be cured only by true unfolding, 64 FOOD in childhood, excessive or too luxurious, is poison, 33 FOUNDATION of man's true welfare and happiness simple, 33 FROEBEL : Biology, specimen, 25 ; paints, in dark colors, boyish faults, 62 ; " Form theory," questionable, 79 ; makes Force, inseparable from Matter, the last ground of Things, 78, 79 GAMES (boys') : to practise, display, measure strength (of body) 58; confirm mental and moral force also, nourish courage, endurance ; even justice and kindness, ib. GARDEN, or plants to tend, of his own, delightful to Boy, 58 GOD, basis of Law, source of Being, i : dwells not in Nature, as His house, 74 ; does not graft or bud, develops, 104 HOME sole renewer of human welfare, 94 HOPE, for Man's future, in what is yet to be unfolded, 102 HUMAN being, to be early taught industry in useful work, ai ; force unfolds in three ways : Religion Toil Self-command, 22 HUMANITY, takes its own form in each human being, n ; best manifested by completest unfolding of the individual, 12 IMPRESSIONS, of infancy youth often indelible, 14 INDIVIDUAL, each, passes through previous development of Man, n INFANCY ends, when Child begins of Itself, to express what is within, 28 ; the period of tendance, 50 INFANT : Its first expression force, 12 ; smiling means well-being, ib. ; crying, not at first wilful : means pain, discomfort ; sometimes to be dis- regarded, 13 ; never permitted to get Its own way, 14 ; called fitly " Suckling " : Its whole being, sensitive to outer impressions, ib. ; Man in germ, 23 ; all powers to be cherished, as they appear, ib. INFANTS sing to themselves, 38 INSTRUCTION, to be given in answer to Pupils' need, 89 ; should always bring- out rather than put-in, 102 ; I. in Religion, 71 ; II. Study of Nature, 73 ; III. Study of Forms, 77 ; IV. Mathematic, 83 ; V. Language : a, preliminary ; b, Writing and. Reading, 85 ; VI. Art, 91 INTERFERENCE with Nature, to be avoided as far as possible, 7 Ipse dixit, 4, 8, 66, 85, 87, 90, 102 JESUS, Religion of Froebel's idea, 72, 3 : says "Turn and become as little children," ios " LABOUR-BATH," F.'s name for bodily work alternating with study, 99 LANGUAGE, our common, lacks the basis of intuition, 46, of Infancy delights in rhythm and rhyme, 88 INDEX. Ill LAW dwells in all things, i ; in Man, Nature, Life, ib. ; so seen by minds of diverse type, ib. " Learn by doing :" F.'s motto, 42, 101, &c. " Let us live for our children " ; or (Hailmann) " with our children," 46 LIFE, wisdom of, defined, 3 MAN (as Infant) tries for what is best for It, 5 ; never to be accounted complete, ii ; always growing, ib. ; should work to manifest his God-given spirit, 20 ; rising to Boyhood, separates Man from Thing ; Thing from Name, 49 ; as Boy, asks to know the past : what old ruins, &c., mean, 60: loves tale, legend, by and by history, ib. ; being free, can do wrong, 63 ; should grow, as boy, from impulse to choice : from self-will to perseverance, 70 ; developed by what he takes in, 101 ; and more by what he gives out, ib. : 's welfare depends on complete unfolding of Body, Mind, and Soul, in agreement with Nature and Reason, 103 ; highest development to be reached alone by perfect training of children, 106 MATHEMATIC, sure guide in the variety of Nature, 83; means " science of knowing," ib. ; belongs alike to Man and the Outerworld, 84 ; (at least, Arithmetic) essential to Education, ib. ; MEANS, to mankind's true welfare, too near, cheap, easy, 33 ; of Education in common, 97 MODE, of life in childhood, momentous for the future, 31 MOTHER, true, lays her babe to rest, and lifts it from sleep, with upward look of prayer, 15 ; , by instinct, teaches her child to know Its limbs, and senses, 34 ; 's training bettered by thought and system, 35 ; super- seded, means loss of God and Nature, ib. NAMES, of early Christians, for children (marg.) 10; for objects, take the easiest, 80 ; exact, technical, can wait, ib. NATURE, not God's body or house, 74 ; from without, shows endless variety of details, 77 ; from within, seen to have unity and law, 78 NURSERY, to be mother's room, too, 36 NURSLING, cares only for exercise, not for results, 26; 's play with Its limbs natural, but needs watching, ib. OBJECT, becomes distinct by means of Word, 24 ; meets child with demand to be understood, 25 ; not distinguished by child from word, 48 OCCUPATIONS, indoor : hand-work, 59 OUTERWORLD meets new-born child, as a chaos, 24 PARENTS should, for Children's welfare, be and do what i 11 ; let child do alone all It can : help, where It can not : give speech to Things, 39 ; encourage their children to help in work : answer questions : shew them how to answer themselves, 44 ; thus train them to real help, 53 ; and children should move together in Nature : observe, learn, together, 80 ; 's example, for good and ill, always potent, 16 : at present undervalue useful work, 22 PLAY and speech, two elements of the Child's life, 29 ; in child's stage, the highest unfolding of Man, 30 ; copy of inward life of Man and things, ib. ; vigorous, of child, promises earnest manhood, it. POESY, linked to Art by Song, 93 PURPOSE of teaching, 9 QUALITIES of objects : found-out first ; then named, 80 QUESTIONS of children, how to answer, 83 RELATION of God to Nature. F.'s view of the, 73 RELIGION, what it is, 71 ; Nature with Mathematic, and Language, essential to Education, 85, 6 ; without work, dreaming, 22 ' 112 INDEX. RELIGIOUSNESS, genuine, springs from feeling of community between Child and parents, 15 ; lasting, how fostered, 16 RELIGIOUS TEACHING what it is, aims to do, 71 ; presupposes some religious feeling, ib. REST, time, space (for growth) given to animals and plants, denied to Man when young, 5 RHYTHMIC MOTION dandling instinctive in Mothers, 37 SCHOOL, is where Man learns objects, their qualities, and laws, 50; not place or person, but discipline, 51; leads from outward to iiw.ird view, 68; through language, leads Boy to threefold knowledge : of himself; of God : of Nature, 70 ; should grow out of, never be divided from. Home, 93 SCHOOLS must take up regular bodily work : have work-hours, 22 SCIENCE of Life, of Education, defined, 2 SEASONS of life, not artificially divided, 16 ; unfolding of each, depends on that which precedes, 17 SENSES, enable Man to know outerworld, 25 SIMPLICITY of life, in children, gives happiness, 39 SPEECH, a copy of Man's whole world, 86 SPIRIT of God, the, speaks in Nature's works, 75 SPIRITUAL, in children, belongs to the Kingdom of God, 104 STAGES, of Man's development, have no higher and lower : or, earliest is most important, 28 SUBJECTS of Teaching, 69 SURROUNDINGS of Child, most momentous, 14 TEACHERS and Pupils, alike, ruled by abstract Right, 9: scold and punish, for faults taught by themselves, 66 TEACHING, subjects of, 69 THINGS, known by their opposites, 25; and properties first : names fter- wards, 80 THOUGHTLESSNESS of Boys : cured only by exercise of thought, 64 ; examples of, 65 TOIL ; not for needs of Life, first, 20 TOWNS should provide play-grounds for Boy-world, 59 TRAINING, that thwarts Nature hurtful, 6; (genuine) can grow only from knowledge of Man, n ; in Work, as needful as in Religion, 22 UNION of School and Home, pressing demand of to-day, 93 UNIVERSITY: what is it? 82; will teach aright, when children rightly trained, ib. UNSPOILED CONDITION in Nature, and Man, most rare, 6 ; to be assumed, while possible, ib. USK, as well as joy, in Song, 99, 100 WAY TO GOD, a, from every object of Nature, 82 WISDOM, highest aim of Man, 2 ; best result of effort, ib.; twofold work, of, 3 WORDS, to be closely bound to Things, 87 WORK, bodily, false notions of its value, 19 ; without Religion, drudgery, 22 WRITING, and Reading, 89 ; picture and alphabet ib. ; 31 ; by them Man rises above every known creature, 90; give the possibility of Man's complete knowledge of Man. EDUCATION. Compayre''S History Of Pedagogy. " The best and most comprehensive history ot Education in English." Dr. G. S. HALL. $1.75. Compayre*'S Lectures On Teaching. " The best book in existence on the theory and practice of education." Supt. MACALISTER, Philadelphia. $1.75. Compayre"'s Psychology Applied to Education. A clear and concise statement of doctrine ar.d application on the science and art of teaching. 90 cts. De Garmo's Essentials Of Method. 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Sanford's Laboratory Course in Physiological Psychology. The course includes experiments upon the Dermal Senses, Static and Kinaesthetic Senses, Taste, Smell, Hearing, Vision, Psychophysic. In Press. Lange's Apperception : A monograph on Psychology and Pedagogy. Trans- lated by the members of the Herbart Club, under the direction of President Charles DeGarmo, of Swarthmore College, ji.oo. Herbart's Science Of Education. Translated by Mr. and Mrs. Felken with a pref- ace by Oscar Browning. Ji.oo. Tracy's Psychology Of Childhood. This is the first general treatise covering in scientific manner the whole field of child psychology. Octavo. Paper. 75 cts. Sent by mail, postpaid, on receipt of price. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON. NEW YORK. CHICAGO. 138 EDUCATION. Lect^lres to Kinder gartners. By ELIZABETH P. PEABODY. Cloth. 233 pages. Retail price, Jli.oo. 'T^HESE lectures were published at the urgency of a large number J- of Kindergartners. The first introduced and interested the Bos- ton public in Kindergarten education. The seven others are those which, for nine or ten successive years, Miss Peabody addressed to the training classes for Kindergartners, in Boston and other cities. They begin with the natural exemplification of Froebel's System in the nursery, followed by two lectures on how the nursery opens up into the Kindergarten through the proper use of language and conver- sation with children, finally developing into equipoise the child's rela- tions to his fellows, to nature, and to God. Miss Peabody draws many illustrations from her own psychological observations of child- life. See special circular, which is sent free on request. A Leading Teacher: The best book outside of the Bible that I ever saw. Col. P. W. Parker, Prin. Cook Co. Normal School, III. : It is an excellent book for all Kindergartners, in fact, for all mothers and teachers. I intend to re- commend it whenever I can. The Academy, London : The writer is well known as an enthusiastic and self-sacrificing apostle of Froebelian- ism, and one to whom the cause of educa- tion in America owes very much. The lectures are well worthy of the author's other labors and will give an explanation of the kindergarten system very welcome to many who have no opportunities of making themselves acquainted with it more formally. Educational Review, St. Johns, N, B. : Not only is it invaluable to the teacher in the kindergarten, but especially to all teachers in our primary schools, as well as to head masters and principals, who should know what kind of training is done in the lower departments. London Journal of Education : It is a significant fact, that ten years ago no such prominence would have been assigned to Froebel. People who are grop- ing after " method," " a scientific basis," or " a wide outlook " for the educator, find in Froebel an unexpected friend and pro- phet, and enforce his teachings after their own fashion. The Critic : The system of education which Miss Peabody was so influential in introducing in this country needs now no further recommendation, as it is almost universally acknowledged to contain the germ of the best possible methods for be- ginning the education of the young child ; but these lectures are still interesting and full of suggestion. Boston Journal : It is full of wise suggestions and helpful hints, adapted to be useful to all who have anything to do with the care and training of children. Wisconsin Journal of Educa- tion: The lectures are very suggestive and contain a most admirable discussion of the Kiadergarten. EDUCATION. 139 The Studenfs Froebel. By WILLIAM H. HERFORD, late member of the Universities of Bonn, Berlin, and Zurich. Cloth. 128 pages. Retail price, 75 cents. THE purpose of this little book, as stated by the editor in his preface, is to give young people, who are seriously preparing themselves to become teachers, a brief yet full account of Froebel's Theory of Education ; his practice or plans of method is reserved for a second part. This book is adapted from Froebel's Education of Humanity (Die Erziehung der Menschheit}, published in 1826. The editor has tried to give what is Froebel's own in English as close as possible to the very words of his author. The book, in addition to an Introduc- tion treating of the subject in general, has chapters on The Nursling, The Child, The Boy, and The School, and summaries of the teachings. The Psychology of Childhood. By FREDERICK TRACY, Lecturer in Philosophy in the University of Toronto, with Introduction by President G. STANLEY HALL of Clark University. Cloth. 183 pages. Retail price, 90 cents. THE author has in this work undertaken to present as concisely, yet as completely, as possible, the results of the systematic study of children, and has included everything of importance that can be found. Some of its special features are thus summarized : (i) It is the first general treatise, covering the whole field of child psychology. (2) It aims to contain a complete summary, up to date, of all work done in this field. (3) The work contains a large amount of material, the re- sults of the author's own observations on children as well as those of perhaps a score of very reliable observers. (4) The subject of child- language has been gone into with especial thoroughness, from an en- tirely new and original standpoint, and with very gratifying results. (5) A very exhaustive bibliography, containing, it is believed, every- thing of value that has ever been written on this subject, is appended. J. Clark Murray, Prof, of Philo- sophy, McGill University, Montreal, Ca- nada: In English we have certainly no original work on the psychology of child hood to compare with it, and even among translations from German and French there is none which shows such a mastery of the whole subject. Earl Barnes, Department of Edu- cation, Leland Stanford Jr. University, Cal. : No book has come from the press during the past year which I have been so glad to see as this one. For all of us who are carrying on courses in the psychol- ogy of children it will prove an invaluable aid. 1 4 o EDUCATION. The Early Training of Children. BY MRS. FRANK MALLESON, England. Cloth. 127 pages. Retail price, 75 cents. AN invaluable guide to mothers, to kindergartners and to primary teachers. The topics treated are: Infant Life; Nursery Management ; The Employment and Occupation of Children; Train- ing in Reverence, in Tritth, in Obedience, and in the other Cardinal Virtues; and finally, the best system of Rewards and Punishments. And every suggestion is practical. Every line tells. No question is treated without a full recogni x: on of the difficulties involved, and no measure recommended which has not stood the test of actual trial, and is not based on sound educational principles. No one can read the book without sharing the author's earnestness and faith. With these " Notes" and Miss Peabody's Lectures to Kindergart- ners, the most inexperienced mother or teacher may be " doubly armed." Comenius' s The School of Infancy. An essay on the education of youth during the first six years. Edited, with an introduction, notes, and a bibliography of the Comenian literature, by WILL S. MONROE. Cloth. 116 pages. Portrait. Retail price, jj>i.oo. '""THE celebration of the three hundredth anniversary of the birth of 1 Comenius has given great impetus to his fame. A man who could decline the presidency of Harvard College, who was invited by Parliament to visit England and remodel her schools, and whose advice was sought by several Continental powers, is entitled to a hear- ing even in these days. Thus far his " School of Infancy," which is in some respects his greatest book, and is at least the most practical and modern in spirit, has been but little known. In it he advocates sense- training, anticipates modern child-study and the kindergarten, cham- pions nature-study and naturalness in method, provides for systematic physical training, and declares that education is a universal right, that knowledge should be fitted to action, and that the school should pre- pare for life. The genial Quick says of it : " ' The School of Infancy ' has not had anything like the circulation it deserves." The book contains a portrait of Comenius, an introduction, notes, and full bibliog- raphy of the Comenian literature ; and at the end of each chapter cross-references to the standard literature of primary education. MUSIC. 163 Motion Songs for Public Schools. A collection of songs adapted to gestures, with descriptions of suitable move- ments. By MABEL L. PRAY, Director of Physical Culture, Public Schools, Toledo, O., Graduate of the Posse Gymnasium, Boston. Boards. Illustrated. Quarto, 65 pages. Introduction price, oo cents. By mail, oo cents. THIS book will be welcomed, not only by teachen^of physical train- ing, but by all teachers from first to seventh grades in public or private schools. It has been the aim of the author to make the work so plain that teachers without previous training can take up the work. The book contains about sixty pleasing songs suited to bring the hands, eye, head the entire carriage, to respond to) the sentiment expressed. The songs are appropriate to the different seasons, and about a third of them are adapted to older grades. The illustrations are from photographs of public-school children, and most of the songs have stood the test of schoolroom trial. This collection will be something to aid in physical-culture work, and something of variety for school celebrations of our national holidays. The Supplementary Third Music Reader. ooo pages. Boards. Introduction price, $0.00. By mail, $0.00. THIS book consists entirely of the songs contained in the Third Music Reader of the Whiting Series, with piano accompaniment. There are a few songs in each key, so that the book may be used for sight-reading lessons, as well as for ensemble singing. It has the advantage also of being equally well adapted to rote and unison singing in the lower grades, or to part singing in the higher grades. None of the songs are trivial or uninteresting, and many are exceedingly beautiful. A number of them can be sung in three and four parts. The accompaniments have been very carefully written, so as to pre- sent as few technical difficulties as possible; and, with slight altera- tions, the bass can be used for boys whose voices have changed. The book is peculiarly adapted to the needs of schools that cannot be well graded. READING. Badlam's Suggestive Lessons in Language and Reading. A manual for pri- mary teachers. Plain and practical ; being a transcript of work actually done in the school- room. $1.50. Badlam's Stepping-Stones to Reading. A Primer. Supplements the 283-page book above. Boards. 30 cts. Badlam's First Reader. New and valuable word-building exercises, designed to follow the above. Boards. 35 cts. Bass's Nature Stories for Young Readers : Plant Life, intended to supple- ment the first and second reading-books. Boards. 30 cts. Bass's Nature Stories for Young Readers : Animal Life. Gives lessons on animals and their habits. To follow second reader. Boards. 40 cts. Fuller's Illustrated Primer. Presents the word-method in a very attractive form to the youngest readers. Boards. 30 cts. Fuller's Charts. Three charts for exercises in the elementary sounds, and for combin- ing them to form syllables and words. The set for $1.25. Mounted, $2.25. Hall's HOW tO Teach Reading. Treats the important question: what children should and should not read. Paper. 25 cts. Miller's My Saturday Bird Class. Designed for use as a supplementary reader in lower grades or as a text-book of elementary ornithology. Boards. 30 cts. Norton's Heart Of Oak Books. This series is of material from the standard imagin- ative literature of the English language. It draws freely upon the treasury of favorite stories, poems, and songs with which every child should become familiar, and which have done most to stimulate the fancy and direct the sentiment of the best men and women of the English-speaking race. Book I, 100 pages, 25 cts.; Book II, 142 pages, 35 cts. ; Book III, 265 pages, 45 cts. ; Book IV, 303 pages, 55 cts. ; Book V, 359 pages, 65 cts. ; Book VI, 367 pages, 75 cts. Smith's Reading and Speaking. Familiar Talks to those who would speak well in public. 70 cts. Spear's Leaves and Flowers. Designed for supplementary reading in lower grades or as a text-book of elementary botany. Boards. 30 cts. Ventura's Mantegazza'S Testa. A book to help boys toward a complete self-develop- ment. $1.00. Wright's Nature Reader, NO. I. Describes crabs, wasps, spiders, bees, and some univalve mollusks. Boards. 30 cts. Wright's Nature Reader, NO. II. Describes ants, flies, earth-worms, beetles, bar- nacles and star-fish. Boards. 40 cts. Wright's Nature Reader, NO. III. Has lessons in plant-life, grasshoppers, butter- flies, and birds. Boards. 60 cts. Wright's Nature Reader, NO. IV. Has lessons in geology, astronomy, world-life, etc. Boards. 70 cts. For advanced supplementary reading see our list of books in English Literature. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON. NEW YORK. CHICAGO. STA UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY Los Angeles This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. DEC 2 9 1958 JAN 5 1959 JUL 6 1959 JUL131S59 DEC 1 7 1959 SUBJECT TO FINE IF NOT RETURNED TO. EDUCATION ILIBRARY ,-FR LOAN NOV 1 1 196P MOV 26 RECEIVr AU E.DU./PSYCH. UBRARY Form L9-32m-8,'57(.C8680s4)444 \PR 4 RECEIVED FEB DU.|P U8R RARY Q-9AM ED/PSlrCH LIB. <-04/v Education Library LB 1153 HU2 UCLA-ED/PSYCH Library LB1153H42 L 005 598 730 9 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY A 000 994 490 1