philosophy, does not generally figure in the lists drawn up by
the historians of education; and yet, in our opinion, there
is no thinker who has exercised a more decisive influence on
the destinies of education. The author of the _Discourse of
Method_ has, properly speaking, no system of pedagogy, having
never directly treated of educational affairs; but through his
philosophical principles he has changed the direction of human
thought, and has introduced into the study of known truths, as
well as into the search for new truths, a method and a taste for
clearness and precision, which have profited instruction in all of
its departments.
“We now find,” says Rollin, “in the discourses from the pulpit
and the bar, and in the dissertations on science, an order, an
exactness, a propriety, and a solidity, which were formerly not
so common. Many believe, and not without reason, that we owe this
manner of thinking and writing to the extraordinary progress which
has been made within a a century in the study of philosophy.”[128]
201. THE DISCOURSE OF METHOD (1637).--Every system of philosophy
contains in germ a special system of education. From the mere fact
that philosophers define, each in his own way, the nature and the
destiny of man, they come to different conclusions as to the aims
and methods of education. Only a few of them have taken pains to
deduce from their principles the consequences that are involved in
them; but all of them, whether they will or no, are educators.
Such is the case of Descartes. In writing, in the first part of his
_Discourse of Method_, his _Considerations Touching the Sciences_,
Descartes has written a chapter on practical pedagogy, and through
the general rules of his logic, he has, in effect, founded a new
theory of education.
202. CRITICISM OF THE CURRENT EDUCATION.--Descartes has given a
long account of the education which he had received among the
Jesuits, at the college of La Flèche, and this account furnished
him occasion, either to criticize the methods in use, or to
indicate his personal views and his educational preferences.
“From my infancy letters have been my intellectual nourishment....
But as soon as I had completed the course of study required for the
doctor’s degree, I found myself embarrassed with so many doubts and
errors that it seemed to me that I had received no other profit
from my efforts at learning than the discovery of my growing
ignorance.”
In other terms, Descartes ascertained that his studies, though
pursued with ardor for eight years in one of the most celebrated
schools of Europe, had not permitted him to acquire “a clear and
sure knowledge of all that is useful for living.” This was to
condemn the barren teaching and the formal instruction of the
Jesuits. Passing in review the different parts of the instruction,
Descartes first remarks that it was wrong to make an abuse of
the reading of ancient books; for, to hold converse with the men
of other centuries “is about the same as travelling; and when we
spend too much time in travelling, we become strangers in our own
country.” Then he complains that he was not made to know “the true
use of mathematics,” since he had been shown their application only
to the mechanic arts. He nearly condemns rhetoric and poetics,
since eloquence and poetry are “intellectual gifts rather than the
fruits of study.” The ancient languages--and in this he gravely
deceives himself--seem to him useful only for the understanding of
authors. He does not admit that the study of Latin or Greek can
contribute to intellectual development.
From these reflections there seems to issue the notion of an
instruction more solid, more positive, more directly useful for
the purposes of life, than that which had been brought into
fashion by the Jesuits. However, Descartes does not eliminate the
ordinary studies, as eloquence, “which has incomparable power and
beauty”; poetry, “which has an enchanting tenderness and melody”;
the reading of the classics, which is “a studied conversation with
the most estimable men of past centuries”; history, “which forms
the judgment”; fables, whose “charm arouses the spirit.” But he
would give to all these exercises a more practical turn, a more
utilitarian character, a more positive application.
203. GREAT PRINCIPLES OF MODERN PEDAGOGY.--Without intending
it, without any other thought than that of modifying the false
direction of the mind in the search for scientific truth, Descartes
has stated some of the great principles of modern pedagogy.
The first is the equal aptitude of minds to know and comprehend.
“Good sense,” says Descartes, “is the thing of all else in this
world that is most equally distributed.[129] ... The latent
ability to judge well, to distinguish the true from the false,
is naturally equal among all men.” What is this but saying that
all men are entitled to instruction? In a certain sense, what are
the innumerable primary schools scattered over the surface of the
civilized globe, but the application and the living commentary of
Descartes’ ideas on the equal distribution of good sense and reason
among men?
But, adds Descartes, “it is not enough to have a sound mind; the
principal thing is to make a good use of it.” In other words,
nature is not sufficient in herself; she needs to be guided and
directed. Method is the essential thing; it has a sovereign
importance. Success will depend less on natural qualities, such
as imagination, memory, quickness of thought, than upon the rules
of intellectual direction imposed on the mind. Education has a
far greater part than nature in the formation and development of
accurate and upright intelligences.
Another Cartesian principle is the substitution of free inquiry and
reflective conviction for blind beliefs founded upon authority.
Descartes promulgated this famous rule of his method: “The first
precept is, never to receive anything for true that I do not know,
upon evidence, to be such; ... and to comprise no more within my
judgments than what is presented so clearly and distinctly to my
mind that I have no occasion to call it in question.” In this
declaration he has not only reformed science and revolutionized
philosophy, but has banished from the school the old routine, the
mechanical processes and exercises of pure memory, and has made a
demand for rational methods that excite the intelligence, awaken
clear and distinct ideas, and provoke judgment and reflection. Of
course, it is not proposed to make a little Descartes out of every
child, despoiling him of received beliefs in order to construct
personal opinions _de novo_; but the rule of evidence, applied
with moderation and discretion, is none the less an excellent
pedagogical precept, which will never be disallowed by those who
wish to make of the child something more than a mere machine.
204. OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE PEDAGOGY.--We have now reached a
place where we may call into notice two different tendencies,
equally legitimate, which we shall find, with exaggerations that
compromise their utility, in the practice of modern teachers.
There are those who wish above all to develop the intelligence;
and there are others who are preoccupied with furnishing the mind
with a stock of positive knowledge. The first conceive instruction
as taking place, as it were, through what is within, through the
development of the internal qualities of precision and measure; the
others are preoccupied only with the instruction that takes place
through what is without, through an extended erudition, through
an accumulation of knowledges. In a word, if I may be allowed
the expression, some affect a subjective pedagogy, and others an
objective pedagogy. Bacon is of the latter number. That which
preoccupies the great English logician above everything else is
the extension of observations and experiments. “To reason without
knowing anything of that which we reason upon,” he says, “is as if
we were to weigh or measure the wind.” Descartes, however, who has
never neglected the study of facts, esteems them less as material
to be accumulated in the mind, than as instruments for training
the mind itself. He would have repudiated those teachers of our
day who seem to think the whole thing is done when there has been
made to pass before the mental vision of the child an interminable
series of object-lessons, without the thought of developing that
intelligence itself.
205. MALEBRANCHE (1638-1715).--We must not expect great pedagogical
wisdom from a mystical dreamer and resolute idealist, who has
imagined the vision of all things in God. Besides, Malebranche has
given only a passing attention to things relating to education.
The member of a teaching congregation, the Oratory, he has not
taught; and the whole effort of his mind was spent in the search
for metaphysical truth. Nevertheless, it is interesting to stop
for a moment this visionary who traverses the earth with eyes fixed
on the heavens, and inquire of him what he thinks of the very
practical question, education.
206. SENSE INSTRUCTION CONDEMNED.--Malebranche will reply to us,
with the prejudices of a metaphysician of the idealist type,
that the first thing to do is to nourish the child on abstract
truths. In his view, souls have no age, so to speak, and the
infant is already capable of ideal contemplation. Then let sense
instruction be abandoned, “for this is the reason why children
leave metaphysical thoughts, to apply themselves to sensations.”
Is it objected that the child does not seem very well adapted
to meditation on abstract truths? It is not so much the fault
of nature, Malebranche will reply, as of the bad habits he has
contracted. There is a means of remedying this ordinary incapacity
of the child.
“If we kept children from fear, from desires, and from hope, if
we did not make them suffer pain, if we removed them as far as
possible from their little pleasures, then we might teach them,
from the moment they knew how to speak, the most difficult and
the most abstract things, or at least the concrete mathematics,
mechanics.”
Does Malebranche hope, then, to suppress, in the life of the child,
pleasure and pain, and triumph over the tendencies which ordinary
education has developed?
“As an ambitious man who had just lost his fortune and his credit
would not be in a condition to resolve questions in metaphysics
or equations in algebra, so children, on whose brains apples and
sugar-plums make as profound impressions as are made on those of
men of forty years by offices and titles, are not in a condition to
hear the abstract truths that are taught them.”
Consequently, we must declare war against the senses, and exclude,
for example, all sorts of sensible rewards. Only, by a singular
contradiction, Malebranche upholds material punishments in the
education of children. The only thing of sense he retains is the
rod.[130]
207. INFLUENCE OF MATERIAL ENVIRONMENT.--Another contradiction more
worthy of note is, that, notwithstanding his idealism, Malebranche
believes in the influence of physical conditions on the development
of the soul. He does not go so far as to say with the materialists
of our time, that “man is what he eats”; but he accords a certain
amount of influence to nourishment. He speaks cheerfully of wine
and of “those wild spirits who do not willingly submit to the
orders of the will.” He never applied himself to work without
having partaken of coffee. The soul, in his view, is not a force
absolutely independent and isolated, which develops through an
internal activity: “we are bound,” he says, “to everything, and
stand in relations to all that surrounds us.”
208. LOCKE (1632-1704).--Locke is above all else a psychologist,
an accomplished master in the art of analyzing the origin of
ideas and the elements of the mental life. He is the head of that
school of empirical psychology that rallies around its standard,
Condillac in France, Herbart in Germany, and in Great Britain Hume
and other Scotchmen, and the most of modern philosophers. But
from psychology to pedagogy the transition is easy, and Locke had
to make no great effort to become an authority in education after
having been an accomplished philosopher.
209. SOME THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION (1693).--The book which he
published towards the close of his life, under the modest title
_Some Thoughts concerning Education_, was the summing up of a
long experience. A studious pupil at Westminster, he conceived
from his early years, as Descartes did at La Flèche, a keen sense
of repugnance for a purely formal classical instruction, and for
language studies in general, in which, nevertheless, he attained
distinction. A model student at the University of Oxford, he there
became an accomplished humanist, notwithstanding the practical and
positive tendency of his mind that was already drawn towards the
natural sciences and researches in physics and in medicine. Made
Bachelor of Arts in 1656, and Master of Arts in 1658, he passed
directly from the student’s bench to the professor’s chair. He was
successively lecturer and tutor in Greek, but this did not prevent
him later from eliminating Hellenism almost completely from his
scheme of liberal education. Then he became lecturer on rhetoric,
and finally on moral philosophy. When, in 1666, he discontinued his
scholastic life to mingle in political and diplomatic affairs, he
at least carried from his studious residence at Oxford, the germs
of the most of his ideas on education. He sought occasion to make
an application of them in the education of private individuals,
of whom he was the inspirer and counsellor, if not the official
director. In the families of friends and hosts that he frequented,
for example, in that of Lord Shaftesbury, he made a close study
of children; and it is in studying them, and in following with
a sagacious eye the successive steps of their improvement in
disposition and mind, that he succeeded in acquiring that
educational experience which has left a trace on each page of the
_Thoughts concerning Education_. This book, in fact, is the issue
of one of Locke’s experiences as an assistant in the education of
the children of his friends. Towards the year 1684-5, he addressed
to his friend Clarke a series of letters which, retouched and
slightly modified, have become a classical work, simple and
familiar in style, a little disconnected, perhaps, and abounding
in repetitions, but the substance of which is excellent, and the
ideas as remarkable, in general, for their originality as for
their justness. Translated into French in 1695 by P. Coste, and
reprinted several times in the lifetime of their author, the
_Thoughts concerning Education_ have had a universal success. They
have exercised an undoubted influence on the educational writings
of Rousseau and Helvetius. They have received the enthusiastic
praise of Leibnitz, who placed this work above that on the _Human
Understanding_. “I am persuaded,” said H. Marion recently, in his
interesting study on Locke, “that if an edition of the _Thoughts_
were to be published to-day in a separate volume, it would have a
marked success.”[131]
210. ANALYSIS OF THE THOUGHTS CONCERNING EDUCATION.--Without
pretending to give in this place a detailed analysis of Locke’s
book, which deserves to be read entire, and which discusses
exhaustively or calls to notice, one after another, almost all
important educational questions, we shall attempt to make known the
essential principles which are to be drawn from it. These are: 1.
in physical education, the _hardening process_; 2. in intellectual
education, practical utility; 3. in moral education, the principle
of honor, set up as a rule for the free self-government of man.
211. PHYSICAL EDUCATION; THE HARDENING PROCESS.--The ideal of
education, according to Locke, is “a sound mind in a sound body.”
A physician like Rabelais, the author of the _Thoughts concerning
Education_ had special competence in questions of physical
education. But a love for the paradoxical, and an excessive
tendency towards the hardening of the body, have marred, on this
point, the reflections of the English philosopher. He has summed up
his precepts on this subject in the following lines:--
“The whole is reduced,” he says, “to a small number of rules, easy
to observe; much air, exercise, and sleep; a simple diet, no wine
or strong liquors; little or no medicine at all; garments that are
neither too tight nor too warm; finally, and above all, the habit
of keeping the head and feet cold, of often bathing the feet in
cold water and exposing them to dampness.”[132] But it is necessary
to enter somewhat into details, and to examine closely some of
these ideas.
Locke is the first educator to write a consecutive and methodical
dissertation on the food, clothing, and sleep of children. It is
he who has stated this principle, afterwards taken up by Rousseau:
“Leave to nature the care of forming the body as she thinks it
ought to be done.” Hence, no close-fitting garments, life in the
open air and in the sun; children brought up like peasants, inured
to heat and cold, playing with head and feet bare. In the matter of
food, Locke forbids sugar, wine, spices, and flesh, up to the age
of three or four. As to fruits, which children often crave with an
inordinate appetite, a fact that is not surprising, he pleasantly
remarks, “since it was for an apple that our first parents lost
paradise,” he makes a singular choice. He authorizes strawberries,
gooseberries, apples, and pears; but he interdicts peaches, plums,
and grapes. To excuse Locke’s prejudice against the grapes, it must
be recollected that he lived in England, a country in which the
vine grows with difficulty, and of which an Italian said, “The only
ripe fruit I have seen in England is a baked apple.” As to meals,
Locke does not think it important to fix them at stated hours.
Fénelon, on the contrary, more judiciously requires that the hour
for repasts be absolutely determined. But this is not the only
instance in which Locke’s wisdom is at fault. What shall be said of
that hygienic fancy which consists in allowing the child “to have
his shoes so thin, that they might leak and let in water, whenever
he comes near it”?
It is certain that Locke treats children with an unheard-of
severity, all the more surprising in the case of one who had an
infirm and delicate constitution that could be kept in repair
only through precaution and management. I do not know whether the
consequences of the treatment which he proposes, applied to the
letter, might not be disastrous. Madame de Sévigné was more nearly
right when she wrote: “If your son is very robust, a rude education
is good; but if he is delicate, I think that in your attempts to
make him robust, you would kill him.” The body, says Locke, may
be accustomed to everything. We may reply to this by quoting an
anecdote of Peter the Great, who one day took it into his head,
it is said, that it would be best for all the sailors to form the
habit of drinking salt water. Immediately he promulgated an edict
which ordered that all naval cadets should henceforth drink only
sea-water. The boys all died, and there the experiment stopped.
Still, without subscribing to Locke’s paradoxes, which have found
no one to approve of them except Rousseau, we should recollect that
in his precepts on physical education as a whole, the author of
the _Thoughts_ deserves our commendation for having recommended a
manly course of discipline, and a frugal diet, for having discarded
fashionable conventionalities and drawn near to nature, and for
having condemned the refinements of an indolent mode of life, and
for being inspired by the simple and manly customs of England.
212. MORAL EDUCATION.--In the thought of Locke, moral education
takes precedence of instruction properly so called:
“That which a gentleman ought to desire for his son, besides the
fortune he leaves him is, 1. virtue; 2. prudence; 3. good manners;
4. instruction.”
Virtue and prudence--that is, moral qualities and practical
qualities--are of first consideration. “Instruction,” says
Locke again, “is but the least part of education.” In the book
of _Thoughts_, where repetitions abound, there is nothing more
frequently repeated than the praise of virtue.
Doubtless it may be thought that Locke, like Herbert Spencer in our
own day, cherishes prejudices with respect to instruction, and that
he does not take sufficient account of the moralizing influence
exercised over the heart and will by intellectual enlightenment;
but, even with this admission, we must thank Locke for having
protested against the teachers who think they have done all when
they have embellished the memory and developed the intelligence.
The grand thing in education is certainly to establish good moral
habits, to cultivate noble sentiments, and, finally, to form
virtuous characters.
213. HONOR, THE PRINCIPLE OF MORAL DISCIPLINE.--But after having
placed moral education in its proper rank, which is the first, it
remains to inquire what shall be the principles and the methods
of this education. Shall it be the maxim of utility, as Rousseau
requires? Must the child, before acting, inquire what is the
good of this? _Cui bono?_ No; utilitarian in instruction and in
intellectual education, as we have just seen, Locke is not so
in moral education. Shall it be fear, shall it be the authority
of the teacher or of parents, founded on punishments, upon the
slavish feeling of terror? Still less. Locke reproves repressive
discipline, and is not inclined to chastisements. Shall it be
affection, the love of parents, the aggregate of tender sentiments?
Locke scarcely speaks of them. Of too little sensibility himself,
he does not seem to think of all that can be done through the
sensibility of the child.
Locke, who perhaps is wrong in treating the child too early, as
though he were a man, who does not take sufficient account of all
the feebleness that is in infant nature, appeals from the first
to the sentiment of honor, and to the fear of shame, that is, to
emotions which, I fear, by their very nobleness, are above the
powers of the child. Honor, which is, in fact, but another name for
duty, and the ordinary synonym of virtue,--honor may assuredly be
the guide of an adult and already trained conscience; but is it not
chimerical to hope that the child, from his earliest years, will
be sensible to the esteem or the contempt of those who surround
him? If it were possible to inspire a child with a regard for his
reputation, I grant with Locke that we might henceforth “make
of him whatever we will, and teach him to love all the forms of
virtue”; but the question is to know whether we can succeed in
this, and I doubt it, notwithstanding the assurances of Locke.
Kant has very justly said:--
“It is labor lost to speak of duty to children. They comprehend it
only as a thing whose transgression is followed by the ferule....
So one ought not to try to call into play with children the feeling
of shame, but to wait for this till the period of youth comes. In
fact, it cannot be developed in them till the idea of honor has
already taken root there.”
Locke is the dupe of the same illusion, both when he expects of the
child enough moral power so that the sense of honor suffices to
govern him, and when he counts enough on his intellectual forces to
desire to reason with him from the moment he knows how to speak.
For forming good habits in the child, and preparing him for a life
of virtue, there is full need of all the resources that nature and
art put at the disposal of the educator,--sensibility under all
its forms, the calculations of self-interest, the lights of the
intelligence. It is only little by little, and with the progress
of age, that an exalted principle, like the sentiment of honor or
the sentiment of duty, will be able to emerge from out the mobile
humors of the child, and dominate his actions like a sovereign law.
The moral pedagogy of Locke is certainly faulty in that it is not
sufficiently addressed to the heart, and to the potency of loving,
which is already so great in the child. I add, that in his haste
to emancipate the child, to treat him as a reasonable creature,
and to develop in him the principles of self-government, Locke was
wrong in proscribing almost absolutely the fear of punishment. It
is good to respect the liberty and the dignity of the man that is
in the child, but it is not necessary that this respect degenerate
into superstition; and it is not sure that to train firm and robust
wills, it is necessary to have them early affranchised from all
fear and all constraint.
214. CONDEMNATION OF CORPORAL PUNISHMENT.--It is undeniable that
Locke has not sufficiently enlarged the bases of his theory of
moral discipline; but if he has rested incomplete in the positive
part of his task, if he has not advised all that should be done,
he has been more successful in the negative part, that which
consists in eliminating all that ought not to be done. The chapters
devoted to punishments in general, and in particular to corporal
punishments, count among the best in the _Thoughts_. Rollin and
Rousseau have often copied from them. It is true that Locke
himself has borrowed the suggestion of them from Montaigne. The
“severe mildness” which is the pedagogical rule of the author
of the _Essays_, is also the rule of Locke. It is in accordance
with this that Locke has brought to bear on the rod the final
judgment of good sense: “The rod is a slavish discipline, which
makes a slavish temper.” He has yielded to the ideas of his time
on only one point, when he admits one exception to the absolute
interdiction of the rod, and tolerates its use in extreme cases
to overcome the obstinate and rebellious resistance of the child.
This is going too far without any doubt; but to do justice to the
boldness of Locke’s views, we must consider how powerful the custom
then was, and still is, in England, in a country where the heads of
institutions think themselves obliged to notify the public, in the
advertisements published in the journals, that the interdiction of
corporal punishment counts among the advantages of their schools.
“It is difficult to conceive the perseverance with which English
teachers cling to the old and degrading customs of corrections by
the rod.... A more astonishing thing is that the scholars seem to
hold to it as much as the teachers.” “In 1818,” relates one of the
former pupils of Charterhouse, “our head master, Doctor Russell,
who had ideas of his own, resolved to abolish corporal punishment
and substitute for it a fine. Everybody resisted the innovation.
The rod seemed to us perfectly consistent with the dignity of a
gentleman; but a fine, for shame! The school rose to the cry: ‘Down
with the fine! Long live the rod!’ The revolt triumphed, and the
rod was solemnly restored. Then we were glad-hearted over the
affair. On the next day after the fine was abolished, we found, on
entering the class-room, a superb forest of birches, and the two
hours of the session were conscientiously employed in making use of
them.”[133][134]
215. INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION.--In what concerns intellectual
education, Locke manifestly belongs to the school, small in his
time, but more and more numerous to-day, of utilitarian teachers.
He would train, not men of letters, or of science, but practical
men, armed for the battle of life, provided with all the knowledge
they will need in order to keep their accounts, administer their
fortune, satisfy the requirements of their profession, and,
finally, to fulfill their duties as men and citizens. In a word, he
wrote for a nation of tradesmen and citizens.
216. UTILITARIAN STUDIES.--An undeniable merit of Locke is that
of having reacted against a purely formal instruction, which
substitutes for the acquisition of positive and real knowledge
a superfluous culture, so to speak, a training in a superficial
rhetoric and an elegant verbiage. Locke disdains and condemns
studies that do not contribute directly to a preparation for
life. Doubtless he goes a little too far in his reaction against
the current formalism and in his predilection for realism. He is
too forgetful of the fact that the old classical studies, if not
useful in the positive sense of the term, and not satisfying the
ordinary needs of existence, have yet a higher utility, in the
sense that they may become, in skillful and discreet hands, an
excellent instrument for intellectual discipline and the education
of the judgment. But Locke spoke to fanatics and pedants, for
whom Latin and Greek were the whole of instruction, and who,
turning letters from their true purpose, wrongly made a knowledge
of the dead languages the sole end, and not, as should be the
case, one of the means of instruction. Locke is by no means a
blind utilitarian, a coarse positivist, who dreams of absolutely
abolishing disinterested studies. He wishes merely to put them in
their place, and to guard against investing them with a sort of
exclusive privilege, and against sacrificing to them other branches
of instruction that are more essential and more immediately useful.
217. PROGRAMME OF STUDIES.--As soon as the child knows how to
read and write, he should be taught to draw. Very disdainful of
painting and of the fine arts in general, whose benign and profound
influence on the souls of children his colder nature has not
sufficiently recognized, Locke, by way of compensation, recommends
drawing, because drawing may be practically useful, and he puts it
on almost the same footing as reading and writing.
These elements once acquired, the child should be drilled in the
mother tongue, first in reading, and afterwards in exercises
in composition, in brief narratives, in familiar letters, etc.
The study of a living language (Locke recommends French to his
countrymen) should immediately follow; and it is only after
this has been acquired that the child shall be put to the study
of Latin. Save the omission of the sciences, Locke’s plan is
singularly like that which for ten years has been in use in the
French lycées.
As to Latin, which follows the living language, Locke requires that
it shall be learned above all through use, through conversation
if a master can be found who speaks it fluently, but if not,
through the reading of authors. As little of grammar as possible,
no memoriter exercises, no Latin composition, either in prose
or verse, but, as soon as possible, the reading of easy Latin
texts,--these are the recommendations of Locke that have been too
little heeded. The purpose is no longer to learn Latin for the
sake of writing it elegantly; the only purpose truly desirable is
to comprehend the authors who have written in that language. The
obstinate partisans of Latin verse and conversation will not read
without chagrin these earnest protests of Locke against exercises
that have been too much abused, and that impose on the learner the
torment of writing in a language which he handles with difficulty,
upon subjects which he but imperfectly understands. As to Greek,
Locke proscribes it absolutely. He does not disparage the beauty
of a language whose masterpieces, he says, are the original source
of our literature and science; but he reserves the knowledge of
it to the learned, to the lettered, to professional scholars, and
he excludes it from secondary instruction, which ought to be but
the school which trains for active life. Thus relieved, classical
instruction will more easily welcome the studies that are of real
use and of practical application,--geography, which Locke places
in the first rank, because it is “an exercise of the eyes and
memory”; arithmetic, which “is of so general use in all parts of
life and business, that scarce anything can be done without it”;
then what he somewhat ambitiously calls astronomy, and which is in
reality an elementary cosmography; the parts of geometry which are
necessary for “a man of business”; chronology and history, “the
most agreeable and the most instructive of studies”; ethics and
common law, which do not yet have a place in French programmes;
finally, natural philosophy, that is, the physical sciences; and,
to crown all, a manual trade and bookkeeping.
218. ATTRACTIVE STUDIES.--Another characteristic of Locke’s
intellectual discipline is, that, utilitarian in its purpose, the
instruction which he organizes shall be attractive in its methods.
After hatred for the pedantry which uselessly spends the powers
of the learner in barren studies, the next strongest antipathy of
Locke is that which is inspired by the rigor of a too didactic
system of instruction, where the methods are repulsive, the
processes painful, and where the teacher appears to his pupils only
as a bugbear and a marplot.
Although he may go to extremes in this, he is partly right in
wishing to bring into favor processes that are inviting and methods
that are attractive. Without hoping, as he does, without desiring
even, that the pupil may come to make no distinction between study
and other diversions, we are disposed to believe that something may
be done to alleviate for him the first difficulties in learning, to
entice and captivate him without constraining him, and, finally, to
spare him the disgust which cannot fail to be inspired by studies
too severely forced upon him, and which are made the subject of
scourges and scoldings. It is especially for reading and the first
exercises of the child that Locke recommends the use of instructive
plays. “They may be taught to read, without perceiving it to be
anything but a sport, and play themselves into that which others
are whipped for.”
Children of every age are jealous of their independence and eager
for pleasure. No one before Locke had so clearly recognized the
need of the activity and liberty which are natural to the child, or
so strongly insisted on the necessity of respecting his independent
disposition and his personal tastes. Here again English pedagogy
of the seventeenth century meets its illustrious successor of the
nineteenth. Herbert Spencer has thoroughly demonstrated the fact
that the mind really appropriates only the knowledge that affords
it pleasure and agreeable exercise. Now, there is pleasure and
agreeable excitation wherever there is the development of a normal
activity corresponding to an instinctive taste and proportioned to
the natural powers of the child; and there is no real instruction
save at the expense of a real display of activity.[135]
219. SHOULD THERE BE LEARNING BY HEART?--To this question, Should
there be learning by heart? Locke gives a resolute reply in the
negative. The conclusion is absolute and false; but the premises
that he assumes to justify his conclusion are, if possible, falser
still. Locke sets out from this psychological idea, that the memory
is not susceptible of progress. He brings into the discussion his
sensualistic prejudices, his peculiar conception of the soul, which
is but a _tabula rasa_, an empty and inert capacity, and not a
congeries of energies and of living forces that are strengthened by
exercise. He does not believe that the faculties, whatever they may
be, can grow and develop, and this for the good reason, according
to his thinking, that the faculties have no existence.
But here let him speak for himself:--
“I hear it is said that children should be employed in getting
things by heart, to exercise and improve their memories. I would
wish this were said with as much authority and reason as it is with
forwardness of assurance, and that this practice were established
upon good observation more than old custom. For it is evident that
strength of memory is owing to an happy constitution, and not to
any habitual improvement got by exercise. ’Tis true what the mind
is intent upon, and, for fear of letting it slip, often imprints
afresh on itself by frequent reflection, that it is apt to retain,
but still according to its own natural strength of retention. An
impression made on beeswax or lead will not last so long as on
brass or steel. Indeed, if it be renewed often, it may last the
longer; but every new reflecting on it is a new impression, and
’tis from thence one is to reckon, if one would know how long the
mind retains it. But the learning pages of Latin by heart no more
fits the memory for retention of anything else, than the graving of
one sentence in lead makes it the more capable of retaining firmly
any other characters.”[136]
If Locke were right, education would become wholly impossible; for,
in case of all the faculties, education supposes the existence of
a natural germ which exercise fertilizes and develops.
220. A TRADE SHOULD BE LEARNED.--Locke, like Rousseau, but for
other reasons, wishes his pupil to learn a trade:
“I can not forbear to say, I would have my gentleman _learn
a trade, a manual trade_; nay, two or three, but one more
particularly.”[137]
Rousseau will say the same: “Recollect that it is not talent that
I require of you; it is a trade, a real trade, a purely mechanical
art, in which the hands work more than the head.”
But Locke, in having his gentleman learn carpentry or agriculture,
especially designed that this physical labor should lend the
mind a diversion, an occasion for relaxation and repose, and
secure to the body a useful exercise. Rousseau is influenced by
totally different ideas. What he wants is, first, that through an
apprenticeship to a trade, Émile may protect himself against need
in case a revolutionary crisis should deprive him of his wealth. In
the second place, Rousseau obeys his social, we might even say his
socialistic, preoccupations. Work, in his view, is a strict duty,
from which no one can exempt himself. “Rich or poor, every idle
citizen is a knave.”
221. WORKING SCHOOLS.--Although Locke is almost exclusively
preoccupied with classical studies and with a gentleman’s
education, nevertheless he has not remained completely a stranger
to questions of primary instruction. In 1697 he addressed to the
English government a remarkable document on the importance of
organizing “working schools” for the children of the poor. All
children over three and under fourteen years of age are to be
collected in homes where they will find labor and food. In this
way Locke thought to contend against immorality and pauperism. He
would find a remedy for the idleness and vagabondage of the child,
and lighten the care of the mother who is absorbed in her work. He
would also, through habits of order and discipline, train up steady
men and industrious workmen. In other terms, he attempted a work
of social regeneration, and the tutor of _gentlemen_ became the
educator of the poor.
222. LOCKE AND ROUSSEAU.--In the _Émile_ we shall frequently find
passages inspired by him whom Rousseau calls “the wise Locke.”
Perhaps we shall admire even more the practical qualities and
the good sense of the English educator when we shall have become
acquainted with the chimeras of his French imitator. In the case
of Locke, we have to do, not with an author who wishes to shine,
but with a man of sense and judgment who expresses his opinions,
and who has no other pretense than to understand himself and to
be comprehended by others. To appreciate the _Thoughts_ at their
full value, they should not be read till after having re-read
the _Émile_, which is so much indebted to them. On coming from
the reading of Rousseau, after the brilliant glare and almost
the giddiness occasioned his reader by a writer of genius whose
imagination is ever on the wing, whose passion urges him on, and
who mingles with so many exalted truths, hasty paradoxes, and noisy
declamations, it is like repose and a delicious unbending to the
spirit to go to the study of Locke, and to find a train of thought
always equable, a style simple and dispassionate, an author always
master of himself, always correct, notwithstanding some errors,
and a book, finally, filled, not with flashes and smoke, but with
a light that is agreeable and pure.
[223. ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.--1. This study illustrates the fact
that the aims and methods of education are determined by
the types of thought, philosophical, political, religious,
scientific, and social, that happen to be in the ascendent; and
also the tendency of the human mind to adopt extreme views.
2. The subjective tendency of human thought is typified by
the Socratic philosophy, and the objective tendency by the
Baconian philosophy; and from these two main sources have issued
two distinctive schools of educators, the formalists and the
realists, the first holding that the main purpose of education
is discipline, training, or formation, and the other, that this
purpose is furnishing instruction or information. This line is
distinctly drawn in the seventeenth century, and the two schools
are typified by Malebranche and Locke.
3. The spirit of reaction is exhibited in the opposition to
classical studies, in the effort to convert study into a
diversion, in the use of milder means of discipline, and in the
importance attached to useful studies. In these particulars the
reaction of the sixteenth century is intensified.]
FOOTNOTES:
[128] Rollin, _Traité des études_, Tome IV. p. 335.
[129] I am in doubt whether M. Compayré intends to sanction this
doctrine or not. This is an anticipation of one of Jacotot’s
paradoxes: “All human beings are equally capable of learning.”
The verdict of actual teachers is undoubtedly to the effect that
there are manifold differences in the ability of pupils to know,
comprehend, and judge. (P.)
[130] Is not the antagonism pointed out by Malebranche more
serious than M. Compayré seems to think? If the current of mental
activity sets strongly towards the feelings, emotions, or senses,
it is thereby diverted from the purely intellectual processes,
such as reflection and judgment. The mind of the savage is an
example of what comes from “following the order of nature” in an
extreme training of the senses. On the nature and extent of this
antagonism, the following authorities may be consulted: Hamilton,
_Metaphysics_, p. 336; Mansel, _Metaphysics_, pp. 68, 70, 77; Bain,
_The Senses and the Intellect_, pp. 392-394; Bain, _Education as a
Science_, pp. 17, 29, 37; Spencer, _Principles of Psychology_, pp.
98-99. (P.)
[131] _John Locke. His Life and his Work._ Paris, 1878.
[132] _Thoughts_, translation by G. Compayré, p. 57.
[133] Demogeot et Montucci, _de l’Enseignement secondaire en
Angleterre_, p. 41.
[134] On the question of corporal punishment in school, is not M.
Compayré too absolute in his assumptions? On what principle does
he base his absolute condemnation of the rod? What is to be done
in those cases of revolt against order and decency that occur from
time to time in most schools? There is no doubt that the very best
teachers can govern without resorting to this hateful expedient;
but what shall be done in extreme cases by the multitude who are
not, and never can be, teachers of this ideal type? Nor does this
question stand alone. Below, it is related to family discipline;
and above, to civil administration. If corporal punishment is
interdicted in the school, should it not be interdicted in the
State? (P.)
[135] It is usually said that a pupil’s distaste for a study
indicates one of two things, either the mode of presenting the
subject is bad, or it is presented at an unseasonable period of
mental development; but this distaste is quite as likely to be due
to the fact that a certain mode of mental activity has not yet been
established; for until fairly established, its exercise cannot be
pleasurable. The assumption that intellectual appetites already
exist and are waiting to be gratified, or that they will invariably
appear at certain periods of mental development, is by no means a
general law of the mental life. In many cases, these appetites must
be created, and it may often be that the studies employed for this
purpose may not at first be relished. And there are cases where,
under the best of skill, this relish may never come; and still, the
knowledge or the discipline is so necessary that the studies may be
enforced contrary to the pupil’s pleasure. (P.)
[136] _Thoughts_, edited by R. H. Quick (Cambridge, 1880), pp.
153-4.
[137] _Thoughts_, p. 177.
CHAPTER X.
THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.--JACQUELINE
PASCAL AND MADAME DE MAINTENON.
THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY; MADAME
DE SÉVIGNÉ; THE ABBÉ FLEURY; EDUCATION IN CONVENTS; PORT
ROYAL AND THE REGULATIONS OF JACQUELINE PASCAL; GENERAL
IMPRESSION; SEVERITY AND AFFECTION; GENERAL CHARACTER OF SAINT
CYR; TWO PERIODS IN THE INSTITUTION OF SAINT CYR; DRAMATIC
REPRESENTATIONS; THE REFORM OF 1692; THE PART PLAYED BY MADAME
DE MAINTENON; HER PEDAGOGICAL WRITINGS; INTERIOR ORGANIZATION OF
SAINT CYR; DISTRUST OF READING; THE STUDY OF HISTORY NEGLECTED;
INSTRUCTION INSUFFICIENT; MANUAL LABOR; MORAL EDUCATION; DISCREET
DEVOTION; SIMPLICITY IN ALL THINGS; FÉNELON AND SAINT CYR;
GENERAL JUDGMENT; ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.
224. THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.--The
_Education of Girls_ of Fénelon has shown us how far the spirit
of the seventeenth century was able to go in what concerns the
education of women, as exhibited in the most liberal theories
on the subject; but in practice, save in brilliant exceptions,
even the modest and imperfect ideal of Fénelon was far from being
attained.
Chrysale was not alone of this opinion, when he said in the
_Learned Ladies_:--
“It is not very proper, and for several reasons, that a woman
should study and know so many things. To train the minds of her
children in good morals and manners, to superintend her household,
by keeping an eye on her servants, and to control the expenditures
with economy, ought to be her study and philosophy.”[138] It is
true that Molière himself did not sympathize with the prejudices
whose expression he put in the mouth of his comic character,
and that he concludes that a woman “may be enlightened on every
subject” (“Je consens qu’une femme ait des clartés de tout”). But
in real fact and in practice, it is the opinion of Chrysale that
prevailed. Even in the higher classes, woman held herself aloof
from instruction, and from things intellectual. Madame Racine had
never seen played, and had probably never read, the tragedies of
her husband.
225. MADAME DE SÉVIGNÉ.--However, the seventeenth century was
not wanting in women of talent or genius, who might have made an
eloquent plea in behalf of their sex; but they were content to
give personal examples of a high order, without any anxiety to be
imitated. Madame de Lafayette made beautiful translations from
Latin; Madame Dacier was a humanist of the first order; and Madame
de Sévigné knew the modern languages as well as the ancient. No one
has better described the advantage of reading. She recommends the
reading of romances in the following terms:--
“I found that a young man became generous and brave in seeing
my heroes, and that a girl became genteel and wise in reading
_Cleopatra_. There are occasionally some who take things somewhat
amiss, _but they would perhaps do scarcely any better if they could
not read_.”[139]
Madame de Sévigné had her daughter read Descartes, and her
granddaughter Pauline, the tragedies of Corneille.
“For my part,” she said, “if I were to bring up my granddaughter,
I would have her read what is good, but not too simple. I would
reason with her.”[140]
226. THE ABBÉ FLEURY.--But Madame de Sévigné and Madame de Grignan
were but brilliant exceptions. If one were to doubt the ignorance
of the women of this period, it would suffice to read this striking
passage from the Abbé Fleury, the assistant of Fénelon in the
education of the Duke of Bourgogne:--
“This, doubtless, will be a great paradox, that women ought to
learn anything else than their catechism, sewing, and different
little pieces of work, singing, dancing, and dressing in the
fashion, and to make a fine courtesy. As things now go, this
constitutes all their education.”[141]
Fleury desires something else for woman. He demands that she
learn to write correctly in French, and that she study logic and
arithmetic. But we need not fear lest the liberalism of a thinker
of the seventeenth century carry him too far. Fleury admits, for
example, that history is absolutely useless to women.
227. EDUCATION IN THE CONVENTS.--It is almost exclusively in
convents that young girls then received what passed for an
education. The religious congregations that devoted themselves to
female education were numberless; we note, for example, among the
most celebrated, the Ursulines, founded in 1537; the Association of
the Angelics, established in Italy in 1536; and the Order of Saint
Elizabeth. But, notwithstanding the diversity of names, all the
convents for girls resemble one another. In all of them woman was
educated for heaven, or for a life of devotion. Spiritual exercises
formed the only occupation of the pupils, and study was scarcely
taken into account.
228. PORT ROYAL AND THE REGULATIONS OF JACQUELINE PASCAL.--The
best means of penetrating into the inner life of the convents of
the seventeenth century is to read the _Regulations for Children_,
written towards 1657 by Jacqueline Pascal, Sister Saint Euphemia.
The education of girls interested the Jansenists not less than
the education of men; but in this respect, Port Royal is far from
deserving the same encomiums in both cases.
229. GENERAL IMPRESSION.--There is nothing so sombre and sad as the
interior of their institution for girls, and nothing so austere as
the rules of Jacqueline Pascal.
“A strange emotion, even at the distance of centuries, is caused by
the sight of those children keeping silent or speaking in a whisper
from rising till retiring, never walking except between two nuns,
one in front and the other behind, in order to make it impossible,
by slackening their pace on the pretext of some indisposition, for
them to hold any communication; working in such a way as never to
be in companies of two or three; passing from meditation to prayer,
and from prayer to instruction; learning, besides the catechism,
nothing but reading and writing; and, on Sunday, ‘a little
arithmetic, the older from one to two o’clock, and the younger
from two to half past two’; the hands always busy to prevent the
mind from wandering; but without being able to become attached to
their work, which would please God as much the more as it pleased
themselves the less; opposing all their natural inclinations, and
despising the attentions due the body ‘destined to serve as food
for worms’; doing nothing, in a word, except in the spirit of
mortification. Imagine those days of fourteen and sixteen hours,
slowly succeeding one another, and weighing down on the heads of
those poor little sisters, for six or eight years in that dreary
solitude, where there was nothing to bring in the stir of life,
save the sound of the bell announcing a change of exercise or
of penance, and you will comprehend Fénelon’s feeling of sadness
when he speaks of the shadows of that deep cavern in which was
imprisoned and, as it were, buried the youth of girls.”[142]
230. SEVERITY AND LOVE.--The severity of the _Regulations_ is such
that the editor, M. de Pontchartrain, also a Jansenist, allows that
it will be impossible to obtain from all children “so complete a
silence and so formal a life”; and requires that the mistresses
shall try to gain their affections. Love must be united with
severity. Jacqueline Pascal does not seem to be entirely of this
opinion, since she declares that only God must be loved. However,
notwithstanding her habitual severity, human tenderness sometimes
asserts its rights in the rules which she established. We feel
that she loves more than she confesses, those young girls whom she
calls “little doves.” On the one hand, the _Regulations_ incite
the pupils to eat of what is placed before them indifferently,
and to begin with what they like the least, through a spirit of
penitence; but, on the other hand, Jacqueline writes: “They must
be exhorted to take sufficient nourishment so as not to allow
themselves to become weakened, and this is why care is taken that
they have eaten enough.” And so there is a touching solicitude that
is almost maternal in this remark: “As soon as they have retired,
each particular bed must be visited, to see whether all proprieties
have been observed, and whether the children are well covered in
winter.” The mystic sister of the ascetic Pascal has moments of
tenderness. “Nevertheless, we must not cease to feel pity for them,
and to accommodate ourselves to them in every way that we can,
but without letting them know that we have thus condescended.”
However, the dominant conception ever reappearing, is the idea that
human nature is evil; that we have to do with rebellious spirits
which must be conquered, and that they deserve no commiseration.
There is a deal of anxiety to make study agreeable! Jacqueline
directs her pupils to work at the very things that are most
repulsive, because the work that will please God the most is that
which will please them the least. The exterior manifestations of
friendship are forbidden, and possibly friendship itself. “Our
pupils shall shun every sort of familiarity one towards another.”
Instruction is reduced to the catechism, to the application of the
Christian virtues, to reading, and to writing. Arithmetic is not
taught save on holidays. It seems that memory is the only faculty
that Jacqueline wishes to have developed. “This opens their minds,
gives them occupation, and keeps them from evil thoughts.” Have we
not reason to say that at Port Royal women have less value than
men! What a distance between the solid instruction of Lancelot’s
and Nicole’s pupils and the ignorance of Jacqueline Pascal’s! Even
when the men of Port Royal speak of the education of women, they
have more liberal ideas than those which are applied at their side.
Nicole declares that books are necessary even in convents for
girls, because it is necessary “to sustain prayer by reading.”
231. GENERAL CHARACTER OF SAINT CYR.--In leaving Port Royal for
Saint Cyr, we seem, on coming out of a profound night, to perceive
a ray of light. Without doubt, Madame de Maintenon has not yet, as
a teacher, all that breadth of view that could be desired. Her work
is far from being faultless, but the founding of Saint Cyr (1686)
was none the less a considerable innovation. “Saint Cyr,” it has
been said, “is not a convent. It is a great establishment devoted
to the lay education of young women of noble birth; it is a bold
and intelligent secularization of the education of women.” There
is some excess of praise in this statement, and the lay character
of Saint Cyr is very questionable. Lavallée, an admirer, could
write: “The instructions of Madame de Maintenon are doubtless too
religious, too monastic.” Let us grant, however, that Madame de
Maintenon, who, after having founded Saint Cyr, was the director
of it, _extra muros_, and even taught there, at stated times, is
personally the first lay teacher of France. Let us grant, also,
that at least in the beginning, and up to 1692, the women entrusted
with the work of instruction were not nuns in the absolute sense of
the term. They were not bound by solemn and absolute vows.
But this character relatively laic, and this rupture with monastic
traditions, were not maintained during the whole life of the
institution.
232. TWO PERIODS IN THE HISTORY OF SAINT CYR.--Saint Cyr, in
fact, passed, within a few years, through two very different
periods, and Madame de Maintenon followed in succession two almost
opposite currents. For the first years, from 1686 to 1692, the
spirit of the institution is broad and liberal; the education is
brilliant, perhaps too much so; literary exercises and dramatic
representations have an honored place. Saint Cyr is an institution
inclining to worldliness, better fitted to train women of intellect
than good economists and housewives. Madame de Maintenon quickly
saw that she had taken a false route, and, from 1692, she reacted,
not without excess, against the tendencies which she had at first
obeyed. She conceived an extreme distrust of literary studies, and
cut off all she could from the instruction, in order to give her
entire thought to the moral and practical qualities of her pupils.
Saint Cyr became a convent, with a little more liberty, doubtless,
than there was in the other monasteries of the time, but it was a
convent still.
233. DRAMATIC REPRESENTATIONS.--It was the notorious success of the
performance of _Andromaque_ and _Esther_ that caused the overthrow
of the original intentions of Madame de Maintenon. _Esther_, in
particular, was the great event of the first years of Saint Cyr.
Racine distributed the parts; Boileau conducted the training in
elocution; and the entire Court, the king at the head, came to
applaud and entertain the pretty actresses, who left nothing
undone to please their spectators. Heads were a little turned
by all this; dissipation crept into the school. The pupils were
no longer willing to sing in church, for fear of spoiling their
voices. Evidently the route was now over a dangerous declivity. The
institution had been turned from its purpose. Matters were in a way
to establish, under another form, another Hôtel de Rambouillet.[143]
234. REFORM OF 1692.--At the first, as we have seen, the ladies of
Saint Louis, charged with the direction of Saint Cyr, did not found
a monastic order properly so-called; but, when Madame de Maintenon
resolved to reform the general spirit of the house, she thought it
necessary to transform Saint Cyr into a monastery, and she founded
the Order of Saint Augustine.
But what she changed in particular was the moral discipline, and
the programme of studies.
Madame de Maintenon has herself recited, in a memorable
letter,[144] the reasons of that reform which modified so
profoundly the character of Saint Cyr:--
“The sorrow I feel for the girls of Saint Cyr,” she said, “can be
cured only by time and by an _entire change_ in the education that
we have given them up to this hour. It is very just that I should
suffer for this, since I have contributed to it more than any one
else.... The whole establishment has been the object of my pride,
and the ground for this feeling has been so real that it has gone
to extremes that I never intended. God knows that I wished to
establish virtue at Saint Cyr, but I have built upon the sand. Not
having, what alone can make a solid foundation, I wished the girls
to be witty, high-spirited, and trained to think; I have succeeded
in this purpose. They have wit, and they use it against us. They
are high-spirited, and are more heady and haughty than would be
becoming in a royal princess. Speaking after the manner of the
world, we have trained their reason, and have made them talkative,
presumptuous, inquisitive, bold ... witty,--such characters as even
we who have trained them cannot abide.... Let us seek a remedy, for
we must not be discouraged.... As many little things form pride,
many little things will destroy it. Our girls have been treated
with too much consideration, have been petted too much, treated
too gently. We must now leave them more to themselves in their
class-rooms, make them observe the daily regulations, and speak
to them of scarcely anything else.... Pray to God, and ask Him to
change their hearts; and that He may give to all of them humility.
There should not be much conversation with them on the subject.
Everything at Saint Cyr is made a matter of discourse. We often
speak of simplicity, and try to define it correctly ... and yet,
in practice, the girls make merry in saying: ‘Through simplicity
I take the best place; through simplicity I am going to commend
myself.’ Our girls must be cured of that jesting turn of mind which
I have given them.... We have wished to shun the pettiness of
certain convents, and God has punished us for this haughty spirit.
There is no house in the world that has more need of humility
within and without than our own. Its situation near the Court; the
air of favor that pervades it; the favors of a great king; the
offices of a person of consideration,--all these snares, so full of
danger, should lead us to take measures directly contrary to those
we have really taken....”
235. THE PART PLAYED BY MADAME DE MAINTENON.--Whatever may be the
opinion respecting the tone of the educational work at Saint Cyr,
there cannot be the least doubt as to the admirable zeal of Madame
de Maintenon, and her indefatigable devotion to the success of her
favorite undertaking. The vocation of the teacher was evidently
hers. For more than thirty years, from 1686 to 1717, she did
not cease to visit Saint Cyr every day, sometimes at six in the
morning. She wrote for the directresses and for the pupils counsels
and regulations that fill several volumes. Nothing which concerns
“her children” is a matter of indifference to her. She devotes her
attention to their meals, their sleep, their toilet, as well as to
their character and their instruction:--
“The affairs we discuss at Court are bagatelles; those at Saint Cyr
are the more important....” “May that establishment last as long as
France, and France as long as the world. Nothing is dearer to me
than my children of Saint Cyr.”
It is not tenderness, it is well known, that characterizes the soul
of Madame de Maintenon; but, at Saint Cyr, from being formal and
cold, which is her usual state, she becomes loving and tender:--
“Forget nothing that may save the souls of our young girls, that
may fortify their health and preserve their form.”
One day, as she had come to the school, as her custom was, to
consult with the nuns, a company of girls passed by raising a cloud
of dust. The nuns, fearing that Madame de Maintenon was annoyed
by it, requested them to withdraw. “Pray, let the dear girls be,”
replied Madame de Maintenon; “I love them even to the dust they
raise.” Conversely, as it were, the pupils of Pestalozzi, consulted
on the question of knowing whether they were willing always to be
beaten and clawed by their old master, replied affirmatively: they
loved him even to his claws!
236. HER PEDAGOGICAL WRITINGS.--It is only in our day that the
works of Madame de Maintenon have been published in the integrity
of their text, thanks to the labors of Théophile Lavallée. For
the most part, these long and interesting letters are devoted to
education and to Saint Cyr. These are, first, the _Letters and
Conversations on the Education of Girls_.[145] These letters were
written from day to day, and are addressed, sometimes to the ladies
of Saint Cyr, and sometimes to the pupils themselves. “We find in
them,” says Lavallée, “for all circumstances and for all times, the
most solid teaching, masterpieces of good sense, of naturalness,
and of truth, and, finally, instructions relative to education
that approach perfection. The _Conversations_ originated in the
consultations that Madame de Maintenon had during the recreations
or the recitations, either with the ladies or with the young
women, who themselves collected and edited the words of their
governess.”
After the _Letters and Conversations_ comes the _Counsels to Young
Women who enter Society_,[146] which contain general advice,
conversations or dialogues, and, finally, proverbs, that is, short
dramatic compositions, designed at once to instruct and amuse the
young ladies of Saint Cyr. These essays are not admirable in all
respects; most often they are lacking in imagination; and Madame
de Maintenon, though an imitation of Fénelon, makes a misuse of
indirect instruction, of artifice, and of amusement, in order to
teach some moral commonplaces by insinuation. Here are the titles
of some of these proverbs: _The occasion makes the rogue_; _Women
make and unmake the home_; _There is no situation more embarrassing
than that of holding the handle of the frying-pan_.
Finally, let us note the third collection, the _Historical and
Instructive Letters addressed to the Ladies of Saint Cyr_.[147]
It is to be regretted that, out of these numerous volumes, where
repetitions abound, there have not been extracted, in a methodical
manner, a few hundred pages which should contain the substance of
Madame de Maintenon’s thinking on educational questions.
237. INTERIOR ORGANIZATION.--The purpose of the founding of Saint
Cyr was to assure to the two hundred and fifty daughters of the
poor nobility, and to the children of officers dead or disabled, an
educational retreat where they would be suitably educated so as to
be prepared for becoming either nuns, if this was their vocation,
or, the more often, good mothers. As M. Gréard has justly observed,
“the very conception of an establishment of this kind, the idea of
making France pay the debt of France, educating the children of
those who had given her their blood, proceeds from a feeling up to
that time unknown.”[148]
Consequently, children of the tenderest years, from six or seven,
were received at Saint Cyr, there to be cared for till the age of
marriage, till eighteen and twenty.
The young girls were divided into four classes,--the reds, the
greens, the yellows, and the blues. The blues were the largest, and
they wore the royal colors. Each class was divided into five or six
_bands_ or _families_, of eight or ten pupils each.
The ladies of Saint Cyr were ordinarily taken from the pupils of
the school. They were forty in number,--the superior, the assistant
who supplied the place of the superior, the mistress of the
novices, the general mistress of the classes, the mistresses of the
classes, etc.
The capital defect of Saint Cyr is, that, as in the colleges of the
Jesuits, the residence is absolute and the sequestration complete.
From her fifth to her twentieth year the young girl belongs
entirely to Saint Cyr. She scarcely knows her parents. It will be
said, perhaps, that in many cases she has lost them, and that in
some cases she could expect only bad examples from them. But no
matter; the general rule, which interrupted family intercourse to
the extent of almost abolishing it, cannot obtain our approbation.
The girl was permitted to see her parents only three or four times
a year, and even then these interviews would last only for a
half an hour each time, and in the presence of a mistress. There
was permission to write family letters from time to time; but as
though she mistrusted the natural impulses of the heart, and the
free outpouring of filial affection, Madame de Maintenon had taken
care to compose some models of these letters. With more of reason
than of feeling, Madame de Maintenon is not exempt from a certain
coldness of heart. It seems that she would impose on her pupils the
extraordinary habits of her own family. She recollected having been
kissed only twice by her mother, on her forehead, and then only
after a long separation.
238. DISTRUST OF READING.--After the reforms of 1692, the
instruction at Saint Cyr became a matter of secondary importance.
Reading, writing, and counting were taught, but scarcely anything
besides. Reading, in general, was viewed with distrust: “Teach
girls to be very sparing as to reading, and always to prefer
manual labor instead.” Books of a secular nature were interdicted;
only works of piety were put in the hands of pupils, such as the
_Introduction to a Devout Life_, by Saint François de Salles,
and the _Confessions_ of Saint Augustine. “Renounce intellectual
culture” is the perpetual injunction of Madame de Maintenon.
“We must educate citizens for citizenship. It is not the question
of giving them intellectual culture. We must preach family duties
to them, obedience to husband, and care for children.... Reading
does more harm than good to young girls.... Books make witlings and
excite an insatiable curiosity.”
239. THE STUDY OF HISTORY NEGLECTED.--To judge of the spirit of
Saint Cyr, from the point of view of intellectual education, it
suffices to note the little importance that was there given to
history. This went so far as to raise the question whether it were
not best to prohibit the study of French history entirely. Madame
de Maintenon consents to have it taught, but only just enough so
that “pupils may not confuse the succession of our kings with the
princes of other countries, and not take a Roman emperor for an
emperor of China or Japan, a king of Spain or of England for a king
of Persia or of Siam.” As to the history of antiquity, it must be
held in mistrust for the very reason--who would believe it?--of
the beautiful examples of virtue that it contains. “I should fear
that those grand examples of generosity and heroism would give
our young girls too much elevation of spirit, and make them vain
and pretentious.” Have we not some right to feel surprised that
Madame de Maintenon is alarmed at the thought of _raising_ the
intelligence of woman? It is true that she doubtless thought of
the romantic exaggerations produced by the reading of the _Cyrus
the Great_ and other writings of Mlle. de Scudéry. Let us add,
besides, to excuse the shortcomings of the programme of Saint Cyr
in the matter of history, that even for boys in the colleges of the
University, the order that introduced the teaching of history into
the classes dates only from 1695.
240. INSUFFICIENT INSTRUCTION.--“Our day,” says Lavallée, “would
not accept that education in which instruction properly so-called
was but a secondary matter, and entirely sacrificed to the manner
of training the heart, the reason, and the character; and an
education, too, that, as a whole and in its details, was wholly
religious.” The error of Madame de Maintenon consists essentially
in the wish to develop the moral virtues in souls scarcely
instructed, scarcely enlightened. There was much moral discoursing
at Saint Cyr. If it did not always bear fruit, it was because the
seed fell into intelligences that were but little cultivated.
“Our young women are not to be made scholarly. Women never know
except by halves, and the little that they know usually makes them
conceited, disdainful, chatty, and disgusted with serious things.”
241. MANUAL LABOR.--If intellectual education was neglected at
Saint Cyr, by way of compensation great attention was paid to
manual education. The girls were there taught to sew, to embroider,
to knit, and to make tapestry; and there was also made there all
the linen for the house, the infirmary, and the chapel, and the
dresses and clothing of the ladies and the pupils:--
“But no exquisite productions,” says Madame de Maintenon, “nor of
very elaborate design; none of those flimsy edgings in embroidery
or tapestry, which are of no use.”
With what good grace Madame de Maintenon ever preaches the gospel
of labor, of which she herself gave the example! In the coaches of
the king, she always had some work in hand. At Saint Cyr, the young
women swept the dormitories, put in order the refectory, and dusted
the class-rooms. “They must be put at every kind of service, and
made to work at what is burdensome, in order to make them robust,
healthy, and intelligent.”
“Manual labor is a moral safeguard, a protection against sin.”
“Work calms the passions, occupies the mind, and does not leave it
time to think of evil.”
242. MORAL EDUCATION.--“The Institute,” said Madame de Maintenon,
“is intended, not for prayer, but for action.” What she wished,
above all else, was to prepare young women for home and family
life. She devoted her thought to the training of wives and mothers.
“What I lack most,” she said, “is sons-in-law!” Hence she was
incessantly preoccupied with moral qualities. One might make a
fine and valuable book of selections out of all the practical
maxims of Madame de Maintenon; as her reflections on talkativeness:
“There is always sin in a multitude of words;” on indolence: “What
can be done in the family of an indolent and fastidious woman?”
on politeness, “which consists, above all else, in giving one’s
thought to others;” on lack of energy, then too common among women
of the world: “The only concern is to eat and to take one’s ease.
Women spend the day in morning-gowns, reclining in easy-chairs,
without any occupation, and without conversation; all is well,
provided one be in a state of repose.”
243. DISCREET DEVOTION.--We must not imagine that Saint Cyr was a
house of prayer, a place of overdone devotion. Madame de Maintenon
held to a reasonable Christianity. Piety, such as was recommended
at Saint Cyr, is a piety that is _steadfast_, _judicious_, and
_simple_; that is, conformed to the state in which one ought to
live, and exempt from refinements.
“The young women are too much at church, considering their
age,” she wrote to Madame de Brinon, the first director of the
institution.... “Consider, I pray you, that this is not to be a
cloister.”[149]
And later, after the reform had begun, this is what she wrote:--
“Let the piety with which our young girls shall be inspired be
cheerful, gentle, and free. Let it consist rather in the innocence
of their lives, and in the simplicity of their occupations, than
in the austerities, the retirements, and the refinements of
devotion.... When a girl comes from a convent, saying that nothing
ought to interfere with vespers, she is laughed at; but when an
educated woman shall say that vespers may be omitted for the sake
of attending her sick husband, everybody will commend her.... When
a girl shall say that a woman does better to educate her children
and instruct her servants than to spend the forenoon in church,
that religion will be heartily accepted, and will make itself
loved and respected.”[150] Excellent advice, perhaps too little
followed! Madame de Maintenon here speaks the language of good
sense, and we are wholly surprised to hear it from the lips of a
politic woman who, not without reason, and for her part in the
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, has the reputation of being an
intolerant fanatic.
244. SIMPLICITY IN ALL THINGS.--The simplicity which she
recommended in religion, Madame de Maintenon demanded in
everything,--in dress and in language: “Young girls,” she says,
“must wear as few ribbons as possible.”
A class-teacher had given a fine lecture, in which she exhorted
her pupils to make an “eternal divorce” with sin. “Very well said,
doubtless,” remarked Madame de Maintenon; “but, pray, who among our
young ladies knows what divorce is?”
245. FÉNELON AND SAINT CYR.--Michelet, speaking of Saint Cyr, which
he does not love, said: “Its cold governess was much more a man
than Fénelon.” The fact is, that the author of the _Education of
Girls_ gives a larger place to sensibility and intelligence. It is
not Madame de Maintenon who said: “As much as possible, tenderness
of heart must be excused in young girls.” It is not at Saint Cyr
that these maxims were practised. “Pray let them have Greek and
Roman histories. They will find in them prodigies of courage and
disinterestedness. Let them not be ignorant of the history of
France, which also has its beauty.... All this serves to give
dignity to the mind, and to lift the soul to noble sentiments.”
Nevertheless, Fénelon’s work was highly esteemed at Saint Cyr.
It appeared in 1687, and Saint Cyr was founded in 1686. A great
number of its precepts were there observed, such as the following:
“Frequent leaves of absence should be avoided;” “Young girls should
not be accustomed to talk much.”
246. GENERAL JUDGMENT.--In a word, if the ideal proposed to the
young women of Saint Cyr by Madame de Maintenon cannot satisfy
those who, in our day, conceive “an education broader in its scheme
and more liberal in its spirit,” at least we must do justice
to an institution which was, as its foundress said, “a kind of
college,” a first attempt at enfranchisement in the education of
women. Without demanding of Madame de Maintenon what was not in
her age to give, let us be inspired by her in what concerns the
changeless education in moral virtues, and in the qualities of
discretion, reserve, goodness, and submission. “However severe that
education may appear,” says Lavallée, “I believe it will suggest
better reflections to those who observe the way in which women are
educated to-day, and the results of that education in luxury and
pleasure, not only on the fireside, but still more on society and
political life, and on the future of the men that it is preparing
for France. I believe they will prefer that manly education, so
to speak, which purified private morals and begot public virtues;
and that they will esteem and regret that work of Madame de
Maintenon, which for a century prevented the corruption of the
Court from extending to the provinces, and maintained in the old
country-seats, from which came the greater part of the nobility,
the substantial virtues and the simple manners of the olden time.”
[247. ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.--1. The education of women in the
seventeenth century reflects the sentiment of the age as to their
relative position in society, their rights, and their destiny.
Woman was still regarded as the inferior of man, in the lower
classes as a drudge, in the higher as an ornament; in her case,
intellectual culture was regarded as either useless or dangerous;
and the education that was given her was to fit her for a life
of devotion or a life of seclusion from society.
2. The rules of Jacqueline Pascal exhibit the effects of an
ascetic belief on education,--human nature is corrupt; all its
likes are to be thwarted, and all its dislikes fostered under
compulsion.
3. The education directed by Madame de Maintenon is the beginning
of a rupture with tradition. It was a movement towards the
secularization of woman’s education, and towards the recognition
of her equality with man, with respect to her grade of
intellectual endowments, her intellectual culture, and to her
participation in the duties of real life.
4. The type of the higher education was still monastic, both for
men and women. No one was able to conceive that both sexes might
be educated together with mutual advantage.]
FOOTNOTES:
[138] _Les Femmes Savantes_, Act II. Scene VII., Van Laun’s
translation.
[139] Letter of Nov. 16, 1689.
[140] Letter of June 1, 1680.
[141] _Traité du choix et de la méthode des études_, Chap. XXXVIII.
[142] Gréard, _Mémoire sur l’enseignement secondaire des filles_,
p. 55.
[143] “The name generally given to a social circle, which for
more than half a century gathered around Catherine de Vivonne,
marquise de Rambouillet, and her daughter, Julie d’Angennes,
duchess de Montausier, and which exercised a very conspicuous
influence on French language, literature, and civilization....
Her house soon became the place where all who had genius, wit,
learning, talent, or taste, assembled, and from these reunions
originated the French Academy, the highest authority of French
literature, and the salons, the most prominent feature of French
civilization.”--Johnson’s _Cyclopædia_.
[144] See the Letter to Madame de Fontaine, general mistress of the
school, Sept. 20, 1691.
[145] Two volumes, 2d edition, 1861.
[146] Two volumes, 1857.
[147] Two volumes, 1860.
[148] M. Gréard, _Mémoire sur l’enseignement secondaire des
filles_, 1882, p. 59.
[149] _Lettres historiques_, Tome I. p. 48.
[150] _Lettres historiques_, Tome I. p. 89.
CHAPTER XI.
ROLLIN.
THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS; STATUTES OF 1598 AND OF 1600;
ORGANIZATION OF THE DIFFERENT FACULTIES; DECADENCE OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF PARIS IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY; THE RESTORATION
OF STUDIES AND ROLLIN (1661-1741); THE TREATISE ON STUDIES;
DIFFERENT OPINIONS; DIVISION OF THE TREATISE ON STUDIES; GENERAL
REFLECTIONS ON EDUCATION; STUDIES FOR THE FIRST YEARS; THE
EDUCATION OF GIRLS; THE STUDY OF FRENCH; GREEK AND LATIN; ROLLIN
THE HISTORIAN; THE TEACHING OF HISTORY; PHILOSOPHY; SCIENTIFIC
INSTRUCTION; EDUCATIONAL CHARACTER OF ROLLIN’S PEDAGOGY; INTERIOR
DISCIPLINE OF COLLEGES; PUBLIC EDUCATION; THE ROD; PUNISHMENTS IN
GENERAL; CONCLUSION; ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.
248. THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS.--Since the thirteenth century, the
University of Paris had been a centre of light and a resort for
students. Ramus could say: “This University is not the university
of one city only, but of the entire world.” But even in the time
of Ramus, in consequence of the civil discords, and by reason
also of the progress in the colleges organized by the Company of
Jesus, the University of Paris declined; she saw the number of her
pupils diminish. She persisted, however, in the full light of the
Renaissance, in following the superannuated regulations which the
Cardinal d’Estouteville had imposed on her in 1452; she fell behind
in the routine of the scholastic methods. A reform was necessary,
and in 1600 it was accomplished by Henry IV.
249. STATUTES OF 1600.--The statutes of the new university were
promulgated “by the order and the will of the most Christian and
most invincible king of France and Navarre, Henry IV.” This was the
first time that the State directly intervened in the control of
education, and that secular power was set up in opposition to the
absolute authority of the Church.
In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries a reform had been made
in the University, by the Popes Innocent III. and Urban V. The
reformer of 1452, the Cardinal d’Estouteville, acted as the legate
of the pontifical power. On the contrary, the statutes of 1600 were
the work of a commission named by the king, and there sat at its
deliberations, by the side of a few ecclesiastics, magistrates, and
even professors.
250. ORGANIZATION OF THE DIFFERENT FACULTIES.--The University of
Paris comprised four Faculties: the Faculties of Theology, of
Law, and of Medicine, which corresponded to what we to-day call
superior instruction, and the Faculty of Arts, which was almost the
equivalent of our secondary instruction.[151]
It would take too long to enumerate in this place the different
innovations introduced by the statutes of 1600. Let us merely say
a word of the Faculty of Arts.
In the Faculty of Arts the door was finally opened to the classical
authors. In a certain degree the tendencies of the Renaissance
were obeyed. Nevertheless, the methods and the general spirit
were scarcely changed. Catholicism was obligatory, and the French
language remained under ban. Frequent exercises in repetition
and declamation were maintained. The liberal arts were always
considered “the foundation of all the sciences.” Instruction in
philosophy was always reduced to the interpretation of the texts of
Aristotle. As to history, and the sciences in general, no account
whatever was taken of them.
251. DECADENCE OF THE UNIVERSITY IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.--The
reform, then, was insufficient, and the results were bad. While the
colleges of the Jesuits attracted pupils in crowds, and while the
Oratorians and the Jansenists reformed secondary instruction, the
colleges of the University[152] remained mediocre and obscure. Save
in rare exceptions, there were no professors of distinction; the
education was formal, in humble imitation of that of the Company
of Jesus; there was an abuse of abstract rules, of grammatical
exercises, of written tasks, and of Latin composition; there was no
disposition to take an advance step; but an obstinate resistance
to the new spirit, which was indicated either by the interdiction
of the philosophy of Descartes, or by the refusal to teach in
the French language; in a word, there was complete isolation in
immovable routine, and in consequence, decadence,--such is a
summary history of the University of Paris up to the last quarter
of the seventeenth century.
252. THE RESTORATION OF STUDIES AND ROLLIN (1661-1741).--We must
go forward to the time when Rollin taught, to observe a revival in
the studies of the University. Several distinguished professors, as
his master Hersan, Pourchot, and still others, had prepared the way
for him. There was then, from 1680 to 1700, a real rejuvenescence
of studies, which was initiated in part by Rollin.
Latin lost a little ground in consequence of a growing recognition
of the rights of the French language and the national literature,
which had just been made illustrious by so many masterpieces. The
spirit of the Jansenist methods penetrated the colleges of the
University. The Cartesian philosophy was taught in them, and a
little more attention was given to the explication of authors, and
a little less to the verbal repetition of lessons. New ideas began
to infiltrate into the old citadel of scholasticism. The question
came to be asked if celibacy was indeed an indispensable condition
of the teaching office. Men began to comprehend that at least
marriage was not a reason for exclusion. Finally, real progress was
made in discipline as well as in methods, and the indubitable proof
of this is the _Treatise on Studies_, by Rollin.
253. THE TREATISE ON STUDIES.--Rollin has summed up his educational
experience, an experience of fifty years, in a book which has
become celebrated under the title of _Treatise on Studies_.
The full title of this work was: _De la manière d’enseigner et
d’étudier les belles-lettres par rapport à l’esprit et au cœur_.
The first two volumes appeared in 1726, and the other two in 1728.
The _Treatise on Studies_ is not like the _Émile_, which was
published twenty years later, a work of venturesome inquiry and
original novelties; but is a faithful exposition of the methods in
use, and a discreet commentary on them. While this treatise belongs
by its date to the eighteenth century, it is the pedagogy of the
seventeenth century, and the traditions of the University under the
reign of Louis XIV. that Rollin has collected, and of which he has
simply wished to be the reporter. In the Latin dedication, which
he addresses to the Rector of the University of Paris, he clearly
defines his intentions and his purpose:--
“My first design was to put in writing and define the method of
teaching which has long been in use among you, and which, up to
this time, has been transmitted only by word of mouth, and through
a sort of tradition; and to erect, so far as I am able to do it, a
durable monument of the rules and practice which you have followed
in the instruction of youth, for the purpose of preserving, in all
its integrity, the taste for _belles-lettres_, and to preserve it,
if possible, from the injuries and the alterations of time.”
254. DIFFERENT OPINIONS.--Rollin has always had warm admirers.
Voltaire called the _Treatise_ a book “forever useful,” and
whatever may be our reservations on the deficiences, and on the
short and narrow views of certain parts of the pedagogy of Rollin,
we must subscribe to this judgment. But we shall not go so far as
to accept the enthusiastic declarations of Villemain, who complains
that the study of the _Treatise_ is neglected in our time, “as
if new methods had been discovered for training the intelligence
and the heart”; and he adds, “Since the _Treatise on Studies, not
a forward step has been taken_.” This is to undervalue all the
earnest efforts that have been made for two centuries by educators
just as profound as was the ever timid and cautious Rollin. When
we compare the precepts of the _Treatise_ with the reforms which
the spirit of progress has already effected, and particularly with
those which it will effect, we are astonished to hear Nisard say:
“In educational matters, the _Treatise on Studies_ is the unique
book, or better still, the book.”
To put such a burden of pompous praise on Rollin is to compromise
his real worth; and without ceasing to do justice to his wise
and judicious spirit, we wish to employ more discretion in our
admiration.
255. DIVISION OF THE TREATISE ON STUDIES.--Before calling attention
to the most interesting parts of the _Treatise on Studies_, let us
briefly state the object of the eight books of which it is composed.
The _Treatise_ opens with a _Preliminary Discourse_ which recites
the advantages of instruction.
The title of the first book is: _Exercises which are proper
for very young children; of the education of girls_. Rollin
acknowledges that he treats only very superficially “this double
subject,” which is foreign to his original plan. In fact, the first
edition of his _Treatise on Studies_ contained but seven books,
and it is only in 1734 that he wrote, “at the urgent requests and
prayers of several persons,” that short essay on the education of
boys and girls which first appeared under the form of a supplement,
and which became the first book of the work only in the subsequent
editions.
The different subjects proper for training the youth in the public
schools, that is, in the colleges,--such is the object of the six
books which follow: Book II. _Of the learning of the languages_;
that is, the study of Greek and Latin; Book III. _Of poetry_; Book
IV. _Of rhetoric_; Book V. _Of the three kinds of eloquence_; Book
VI. _Of history_; Book VII. _Of philosophy_.
Book VIII., the last, entitled _Of the interior government of
schools and colleges_, has a particular character. It does not
treat of studies and intellectual exercises, but of discipline and
moral education. It is, on all accounts, the most original and
interesting part of Rollin’s work, and it opens to us the treasures
of his experience. This eighth book has been justly called the
“Memoirs of Rollin.” That which constitutes its merit and its charm
is that the author here at last decides to be himself. He does not
quote the ancients so much; but he speaks in his own name, and
relates what he has done, or what he has seen done.
256. GENERAL REFLECTIONS ON EDUCATION.--There is little to be
gathered out of the _Preliminary Discourse_ of Rollin. He is but
slightly successful in general reflections. When he ventures
to philosophize, Rollin easily falls into platitudes. He has a
dissertation to prove that “study gives the mind more breadth and
elevation; and that study gives capacity for business.”
On the purpose of education, Rollin, who copies the moderns when he
does not translate from the ancients, is content with reproducing
the preamble of the regulations of Henry IV., which assigned to
studies three purposes: learning, morals and manners, and religion.
“The happiness of kingdoms and peoples, and particularly of a
Christian State, depends on the good education of the youth, where
the purpose is to cultivate and to polish, by the study of the
sciences, the intelligence, still rude, of the young, and thus to
fit them for filling worthily the different vocations to which they
are destined, without which they will be useless to the State;
and finally, to teach them the sincere religious practices which
God requires of them, the inviolable attachment they owe to their
fathers and mothers and to their country, and the respect and
obedience which they are bound to render princes and magistrates.”
257. PRIMARY STUDIES.--Rollin is original when he introduces us to
the classes of the great colleges where he has lived; but is much
less so when he speaks to us of little children, whom he has never
seen near at hand. He has never known family life, and scarcely
ever visited public schools; and it is through his recollections of
Quintilian that he speaks to us of children.
There is, then, but little to note in the few pages that he has
devoted to the studies of the first years, from three to six or
seven.
One of the most interesting things we find here, perhaps, is the
method which he recommends for learning to read,--“the typographic
cabinet of du Mas.” “It is a novelty,” says the wise Rollin, “and
it is quite common and natural that we should be suspicious of this
word _novelty_.” But after the examination, he decides in favor of
the system in question, which consists in making of instruction in
reading, something analogous to the work of an apprentice who is
learning to print. The pupil has before him a table, and on this
table is placed a set of pigeon-holes, “logettes,” which contain
the letters of the alphabet, printed on cards. The pupil is to
arrange on the table the different letters needed to construct
the words required of him. The reasons that Rollin gives for
recommending this method, successful tests of which he had seen
made, prove that he had taken into account the nature of the child
and his need of activity:--
“This method of learning to read, besides several other advantages,
has one which seems to me very considerable,--it is that of being
amusing and agreeable, and of not having the appearance of study.
Nothing is more wearisome or tedious in infancy than severe mental
effort while the body is in a state of repose. With this device,
the mind of the child is not wearied. He need not make a painful
effort at recollection, because the distinction and the name of the
boxes strike his senses. He is not constrained to a posture that is
oppressive by being always tied to the place where he is made to
read. There is free activity for eyes, hands, and feet. The child
looks for his letters, takes them out, arranges them, overturns
them, separates them, and finally replaces them in their boxes.
This movement is very much to his taste, and is exactly adapted to
the active and restless disposition of that age.”
Rollin seems really to believe that there “is no danger in
beginning with the reading of Latin.” However, “for the schools of
the poor, and for those in the country, it is better,” he says, “to
fall in with the opinion of those who believe that it is necessary
to begin with the reading of French.”
It may be thought that Rollin puts a little too much into the
first years of the child’s course of study. Before the age of
six or seven he ought to have learned to read, to write, to be
nourished on the _Historical Catechism_ of Fleury, to know some
of the fables of La Fontaine by heart, and to have studied French
grammar, and geography. At least, Rollin requires that “no thought,
no expression, which is within the child’s range,” shall be allowed
to be passed by. He requires that the teacher speak little, and
that he make the child speak much, “which is one of the most
essential duties and one of those that are the least practised.”
He demands, above all else, clearness of statement, and commends
the use of illustrations and pictures in reading books. “They are
very suitable,” he says, “for striking the attention of children,
and for fixing their memory; this is properly the writing of the
ignorant.”[154]
258. THE EDUCATION OF GIRLS.--The same reasons explain the
shortcomings of Rollin’s views on the education of women, and the
relative mediocrity of his ideas on the education of children.
Living in solitude and in the celibate state, he had no personal
information on these subjects, and so he goes back to Fénelon for
his ideas on the education of women, and to Quintilian in the case
of children.
Is the study of Latin fit for girls? Such is the first question
which he raises; but he has the wisdom to answer it in the
negative, save for “nuns, and also for Christian virgins and
widows.” “There is no difference in minds,” Rollin emphatically
says, “that is due to sex.” But he does not extend the consequences
of this excellent principle very far. He is content to require
of women the four rules of arithmetic; orthography, in which he
is not over exacting, for “their ignorance of orthography should
not be imputed to them as a crime, since it is almost universal
in their sex;” ancient history and the history of France, “which
it is disgraceful to every good Frenchman not to know.”[155] As
to reading, Rollin is quite as severe as Madame de Maintenon:
“The reading of comedies and tragedies may be very dangerous for
young ladies.” He sanctions only _Esther_ and _Athalie_. Music
and dancing are allowed, but without enthusiasm and with endless
precautions:--
“An almost universal experience shows that the study of music is an
extraordinary dissipation.”
“I do not know how the custom of having girls learn to sing and
play on instruments at such great expense has become so common....
I hear it said that as soon as they enter on life’s duties, they
make no farther use of it.”
259. THE STUDY OF FRENCH.--Rollin is chiefly preoccupied with
the study of the ancient languages; but he has the merit,
notwithstanding his predilection for exercises in Latin, of having
followed the example of the Jansenists so far as the importance
accorded to the French language is concerned.
“It is a disgrace,” he says, “that we are ignorant of our own
language; and if we are willing to confess the truth, we will
almost all acknowledge that we have never studied it.”
Rollin admitted that he was “much more proficient in the study of
Latin than in that of French.” In the opening of his _Treatise_,
which he wrote in French only that he might place himself within
the reach of his young readers and their parents, he excuses
himself for making a trial _in a kind of writing which is almost
new to him_. And in congratulating him on his work, d’Aguesseau
wrote, “You speak French as if it were your native tongue.” Such
was the Rector of the University in France at the commencement of
the eighteenth century.
Let us think well of him, therefore, for having so overcome his own
habits of mind as to recommend the study of French. He would have
it learned, not only through use, but also “through principles,”
and would have “the genius of the language understood, and all its
beauties studied.”
Rollin has a high opinion of grammar, but would not encourage a
misuse of it:--
“Long-continued lessons on such dry matter might become very
tedious to pupils. Short questions, regularly proposed each day
after the manner of an ordinary conversation, in which they
themselves would be consulted, and in which the teacher would
employ the art of having them tell what he wished to make them
learn, would teach them in the way of amusement, and, by an
insensible progress, continued for several years, they would
acquire a profound knowledge of the language.”
It is in the _Treatise on Studies_ that we find for the first
time a formal list of classical French authors. Some of these
are now obscure and forgotten, as the _Remarkable Lives_ written
by Marsolier, and the _History of the Academy of Inscriptions
and Belles-Lettres_, by de Boze; but the most of them have held
their place in our programmes, and the judgments of Rollin have
been followed for two centuries, on the _Discourse on Universal
History_, by Bossuet, on the works of Boileau and Racine, and on
the _Logic_ of Port Royal.
Like all his contemporaries, Rollin particularly recommends Latin
composition to his pupils. However, he has spoken a word for French
composition, which should bear, first, on fables and historical
narratives, then on exercises in epistolary style, and finally, on
common things, descriptions, and short speeches.
260. GREEK AND LATIN.--But it is in the teaching of the ancient
languages that Rollin has especially tried the resources of
his pedagogic art. For two centuries, in the colleges of the
University, his recommendations have been followed. In Greek,
he censures the study of themes, and reduces the study of this
language to the understanding of authors. More of a Latinist than
of a Hellenist, of all the arguments he offers to justify the study
of Greek, the best is, that, since the Renaissance, Greek has
always been taught; but, without great success, he admits:--
“Parents,” he says, “are but little inclined in favor of Greek.
They also learned Greek, they claim, in their youth, and they
have retained nothing of it; this is the ordinary language which
indicates that one has not forgotten much of it.”
But Latin, which it does not suffice to learn to read, but which
must be written and spoken, is the object of all Rollin’s care,
who, on this point, gives proof of consummate experience. Like the
teachers of Port Royal, he demands that there shall be no abuse of
themes in the lower classes, and recommends the use of oral themes,
but he holds firmly to version, and to the explication of authors:--
“Authors are like a living dictionary, and a speaking grammar,
whereby we learn, through experience, the very force and the true
use of words, of phrases, and of the rules of syntax.”
This is not the place to analyze the parts of the _Treatise on
Studies_ which relate to poetics and rhetoric, and which are the
code, now somewhat antiquated, of Latin verse and prose. Rollin
brings to bear on this theme great professional sagacity, but
also a spirit of narrowness. He condemns ancient mythology,
and excludes, as dangerous, the French poets, save some rare
exceptions. He claims that the true use of poetry belongs to
religion. He has no conception of the salutary and wholesome
influence which the beauties of poetry and eloquence can exercise
over the spirit.
261. ROLLIN THE HISTORIAN.--Rollin has made a reputation as
an historian. Frederick II. compares him to Thucydides, and
Chateaubriand has emphatically called him the “Fénelon of History.”
Montesquieu himself has pleasantly said: “A noble man has enchanted
the public through his works on history; it is heart which speaks
to heart; we feel a secret satisfaction in hearing virtue speak; he
is the bee of France.”
Modern criticism has dealt justly with these exaggerations. The
thirteen volumes of his _Ancient History_, which Rollin published,
from 1730 to 1738, are scarcely read to-day. His great defect as an
historian is his lack of erudition and of the critical spirit; he
accepts with credulity every fable and every legend.
We are to recollect, however, that as professor of history--and
in truth he pretended to be only this--Rollin has greater worth
than as an historian. He knew how to introduce into the exposition
of facts great simplicity and great facility. And especially he
attempted to draw from events their moral lesson. “We ought not to
forget,” says a German of our time, “that Rollin has never made
any personal claim to be considered an investigator in historical
study, but that the purpose he had chiefly in view was educational.
As he was the first to introduce the study of history into French
colleges (this is true only of the colleges of the University), he
sought to remedy the complete absence of historical reading adapted
to the needs of the young. This is a great educational feat; for
it is undeniable that his works are of a nature to give to the
young of all nations a real taste for the study of history, and at
the same time a vivid conception of the different epochs, and of
the life of nations.”[156]
262. THE TEACHING OF HISTORY.--However, considered simply as a
professor of history, Rollin is far from being irreproachable.
Doubtless it is good to moralize on history, and to make of it, as
he says, “a school of enduring glory and real grandeur.” But is
not historical accuracy necessarily compromised, and is there not
danger of making the subject puerile, when the teacher is guided
exclusively by the idea of moral edification?
Another graver fault in Rollin is that he systematically omits
the history of France, and with it, all modern history. In this
respect, he falls below the Oratory, Port Royal, Bossuet, Fénelon,
and Madame de Maintenon. It is interesting to observe, moreover,
that Rollin recognizes the utility of the study of national
history, but his excuse for omitting it is the lack of time:--
“I do not speak of the history of France.... I do not think it
possible to find time, during the regular course of instruction, to
make a place for this study; but I am far from considering it as of
no importance, and I observe with regret that it is neglected by
many persons to whom, nevertheless, it would be very useful, not
to say necessary. When I say this, it is myself that I criticise
first, for I acknowledge that I have not given sufficient attention
to it, and I am ashamed of being in some sort a stranger in my own
country after having traversed so many others.”
263. PHILOSOPHY.--It is moral edification that Rollin seeks in
philosophical studies, as in historical studies. With but little
competence in these matters, he admits that he has applied himself
only very superficially to the study of philosophy. He knows,
however, the value of ethics and logic, which govern the morals
and perfect the mind; of physics, which furnishes us a mass of
interesting knowledge; and finally, of metaphysics, which fortifies
the religious sentiment. The ethics of antiquity seems to him
worthy of attention; it is, in his view, the introduction to
Christian ethics.
264. SCIENTIFIC INSTRUCTION.--Rollin has given us a compendium
of astronomy, of physics, and of natural history. Without doubt
his essays have but a moderate value. Rollin’s knowledge is often
inexact, and his general ideas are narrow. He is capable of
believing that “nature entire is made for man.” But yet he deserves
some credit for having comprehended the part that the observation
of the sensible world ought to play in education:--
“I call _children’s physics_ a study of nature which requires
scarcely anything but eyes, and which, for this reason, is within
the reach of all sorts of persons, and even of children. It
consists in making ourselves attentive to the objects which nature
presents to us, to consider them with care, and to admire their
different beauties; but without searching into their secret causes,
which comes within the province of the physics of the scientist.
“I say that even children are capable of this, for they have eyes,
and are not wanting in curiosity. They wish to know; they are
inquisitive. It is only necessary to awaken and nourish in them
the desire to learn and to know, which is natural to all men. This
study, moreover, if it may be so called, far from being painful
and tedious, affords only pleasure and amusement; it may take the
place of recreation, and ordinarily ought not to take place save in
playing. It is inconceivable how much knowledge of things children
might gain, if we knew how to take advantage of all the occasions
which they furnish for the purpose.”
265. THE EDUCATIVE CHARACTER OF ROLLIN’S PEDAGOGY.--It should not
be supposed that Rollin’s exclusive purpose was to make Latinists
and literary men. I know very well that he himself has said
that “to form the taste was his principal aim.” Nevertheless,
he has thought of other things,--moral qualities not less than
intellectual endowments. He wished to train at once “the heart
and the intellect.” With him, instruction in all its phases takes
an educative turn. He esteems knowledge only because it leads to
virtue. In the explication of authors, attention should be directed
to the morality of their thoughts, at least as much as to their
literary beauty. The maxims and examples which their writings
contain should be skillfully put in relief, so that these readings
may become moral lessons not less than studies in rhetoric. To sum
up in a word, Rollin follows the tradition of the Jansenists, and
not that of the Company of Jesus.
266. CHRISTIANITY OF ROLLIN.--Rollin, though persecuted for
his Jansenist tendencies, was a fervent Christian. “A Roman
probity” did not suffice for him; he desired a Christian virtue.
Consequently, he requires that religious instruction should form a
part of every lesson. A regulation which dates from his rectorship
required that the scholar in each class should learn and recite
each day one or more maxims drawn from the Holy Scriptures. This
custom has been maintained to this day. Rollin knew, moreover,
that the best means of inspiring piety is to preach by example,
and to be pious one’s self:--
“To make true Christians,--this is the end and purpose of the
education of children; all the rest but fulfills the purpose of
means.... When a teacher has received this spirit, there is nothing
more to say to him....”
The religious spirit of Rollin comes to view on each page of his
book:--
“It remains for me,” he says, in concluding his preface, “to pray
God, in whose hands we all are, we and our discourses, to deign to
bless my good intentions.”
267. INTERIOR DISCIPLINE OF THE COLLEGES.--The part of the
_Treatise on Studies_ which has preserved the most interest, and
which will be studied with the most profit, is certainly that which
treats of _the interior government of schools and colleges_. Here,
though he does not completely divest himself of his method of
borrowings, and references to the authority of others, and though
he is especially under the influence of Locke, whose wise advice
on rewards and punishments he reproduces almost verbatim, Rollin
makes use of a long personal experience. We have charged him with
not knowing the little child. On the other hand, he knows exactly
what scholars a little older are,--children from ten to sixteen
years old. And he not only knows them, but he loves them tenderly.
He gives them this testimony, which affection alone can explain,
that he has always found them reasonable.
268. ENUMERATION OF THE QUESTIONS TREATED BY ROLLIN.--To give an
idea of this part of the _Treatise_, the best way is to reproduce
the titles of the thirteen articles composing the chapter entitled
_General Counsels on the Education of the Young_:--
I. What end should be proposed in education? II. How to study the
character of children in order to become able to instruct them
properly. III. How at once to gain authority over children. IV. How
to become loved and feared. V. Punishments: 1. Difficulties and
dangers in punishments; 2. Rules to be observed in punishments.
VI. Reprimands: 1. Occasion for reprimanding; 2. Time for making
the reprimand; 3. Manner of reprimanding. VII. Reasoning with
children. Stimulating them with the sense of honor. Making use of
commendation, rewards, and caresses. VIII. How to train children
to be truthful. IX. How to train children to politeness, to
cleanliness, and to exactness. X. How to make study attractive.
XI. How to give rest and recreation to children. XII. How to train
the young to goodness by instruction and example. XIII. Piety,
religion, zeal for the salvation of children.
269. PUBLIC EDUCATION.--Rollin does not definitely express himself
on the superiority of public education. He does not dare give
formal advice to parents; but he brings forward the advantages of
the common life of colleges with so much force, that it is very
evident that he prefers it to a private education. Let it be noted,
besides, that he accepts on his own account “the capital maxim of
the ancients, that children belong more to the State than to their
parents.”
270. THE ROD.--In the matter of discipline, Rollin leans rather to
the side of mildness. However, he does not dare pronounce himself
absolutely against the use of the rod. That which in particular
causes him to hesitate, which gives him scruples, which prevents
him from expressing a censure which is at the bottom of his heart,
but which never rises to his lips, is that there are certain
texts of the Bible whose interpretation is favorable to the use
of the rod. It is interesting to notice how, in a strait between
his sentiments as a docile Christian and his instincts towards
mildness, the good and timid Rollin tries to find a less rigorous
meaning in the sacred text, and to convince himself that the Bible
does not say what it seems to say. After many hesitations, he
finally comes to the conclusion that corporal chastisements are
permitted, but that they are not to be employed save in extreme and
desperate cases; and this is also the conclusion of Locke.
271. PUNISHMENTS IN GENERAL.--But how many wise counsels on
punishments, and on the precautions that must be taken when we
punish or reprimand! One should refrain from punishing a child at
the moment he commits his fault, because this might then exasperate
him and provoke him to new breaches of duty. Let the master be
cool when he punishes, and avoid the anger which discredits
his authority. The whole of this excellent code of scholastic
discipline might be quoted with profit. Rollin is reason and good
sense itself when he guides and instructs the teacher as to his
relations with the pupil. Doubtless the most of these precepts are
not new; but when they come from the mouth of Rollin, there is
something added to them which I cannot describe, but which gives to
the most threadbare advice the authority of personal experience.
272. CONCLUSION.--We shall not dwell on the other precepts of
Rollin. The text must be consulted for his reflections on plays,
recreations, the means of making study attractive, and on the
necessity of appealing to the child’s reason betimes, and of
explaining to him why one does this or that. In this last part of
the _Treatise on Studies_ there is a complete infant psychology
which is lacking neither in keenness nor in penetration. In
particular, there is a code of moral discipline which cannot be too
highly commended to educators, and to all those who desire, in the
words of Rollin, “to train at once the heart and the mind” of the
young. Rollin has worked for virtue even more than for science. His
works are less literary productions than works on morals, and the
author himself is the perfect expression of what can be done for
the education of the young by the Christian spirit allied to the
university spirit.
[273. ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.--1. The characteristic fact disclosed
by this study is the very slow rate at which progress in
education takes place. There is also an enforcement of the lesson
which has reappeared from time to time, that education follows in
the wake of new and general movements in human thought.
2. A more specific fact is the extreme conservatism of
universities, or the tenacity with which they hold to traditions.
The question is suggested whether, after all, the conservative
habit of the university does not best befit its judicial
functions.
3. In the elbowing of the classics by history and French, we see
the rise of innovations which have become embodied in the modern
university.
4. A new factor in the higher education is the intervention of
the State, as opposed to the historical domination of the Church.
In the reform of the University of Paris the State became an
educator.
5. There is evidence of some progress in the historical struggle
towards the conception that woman has equal rights with man in
the benefits of education.]
FOOTNOTES:
[151] “Formerly secondary schools were schools in which was given
a more advanced instruction then in the primary schools; and they
were distinguished into communal secondary schools, or communal
colleges, and into private secondary schools or institutions....
To-day, secondary instruction includes the colleges and lycées
in which are taught the ancient languages, modern languages,
history, mathematics, physics, chemistry, and philosophy. Public
instruction is divided into primary, secondary, and superior
instruction.”--LITTRÉ.
[152] This refers to the University of Paris, which must be
distinguished from the Napoleonic University. “The latter was
founded by a decree of Napoleon I., March 17, 1808. It was first
called the Imperial University, and then the University of France.
It comprises: 1. The faculties;[153] 2. the lycées or colleges of
the State; 3. the communal colleges; 4. the primary schools. All
these are under the direction of a central administration.”--LITTRÉ.
[153] There are now five Faculties or institutions for special
instruction,--the Faculties of the Sciences, of Letters, of
Medicine, of Law, and of Theology. (P.)
[154] Save once, Rollin has scarcely made an allusion to primary
instruction proper. We quote this passage on account of its
singularity: “Several years ago there was introduced into most of
the schools for the poor in Paris a method which is very useful
to scholars, and which spares much trouble to the teachers. The
school is divided into several classes. I select only one of
them, that composed of children who already know how to write
syllables; the others must be judged by this one. I suppose that
the subject of the reading lesson is _Dixit Dominus Domino meo:
Sede a dextris meis_. Each child pronounces one syllable, as _Di_.
His competitor, who stands opposite, takes up the next, _xit_,
and so on. The whole class is attentive; for the teacher, without
warning, passes at once from the head of the line to the middle, or
to the foot, and the recitation must continue without interruption.
If a pupil makes a mistake in some syllable, the teacher, without
speaking, raps upon the table with his stick, and the competitor
is obliged to repeat as it should be the syllable that has been
wrongly pronounced. If he fail also, the next, upon a second rap of
the stick, goes back to the same syllable, and so on till it has
been pronounced correctly. More than thirty years ago, I saw with
unusual pleasure this method in successful operation at Orleans,
where it originated through the care and industry of M. Garot, who
presided over the schools of that city.”
[155] Rollin does not require it, however, of young men.
[156] Doctor Wolker, quoted by Cadet, in his edition of Rollin,
Paris, 1882.
CHAPTER XII.
CATHOLICISM AND PRIMARY INSTRUCTION.--LA SALLE AND THE BRETHREN OF
THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS.
STATE OF PRIMARY INSTRUCTION IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY; DÉMIA
AND THE INFANT SCHOOLS OF LYONS; CLAUDE JOLY, DIRECTOR OF THE
PRIMARY SCHOOLS OF PARIS; THE BOOK OF THE PARISH SCHOOL; LA
SALLE (1651-1719) AND THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS; LIFE AND CHARACTER
OF LA SALLE; ASCETIC TENDENCIES; FOUNDATION OF THE INSTITUTE OF
THE BRETHREN (1684); THE IDEA OF NORMAL SCHOOLS; THE IDEA OF
GRATUITOUS AND COMPULSORY INSTRUCTION; PROFESSIONAL INSTRUCTION;
CONDUCT OF THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS; SUCCESSIVE EDITIONS; ABUSE
OF SCHOOL REGULATIONS; DIVISION OF THE CONDUCT; INTERIOR
ORGANIZATION OF THE SCHOOLS; SIMULTANEOUS INSTRUCTION; WHAT
WAS LEARNED IN THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS; METHOD OF TEACHING;
THE CHRISTIAN CIVILITY; CORPORAL CHASTISEMENTS; REPRIMANDS;
PENANCES; THE FERULE; THE ROD; REWARDS; MUTUAL ESPIONAGE; GENERAL
CONCLUSION; ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.
274. THE STATE OF PRIMARY INSTRUCTION IN THE SEVENTEENTH
CENTURY.--It does not form a part of our plan to follow from day to
day the small increments of progress and the slow development of
the primary schools of France; but we must confine ourselves to the
essential facts and to the important dates.
The Catholic Church, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
did not altogether renounce her interest in popular instruction.
She took measures, without doubt, to evangelize the poor
people, and sometimes “even to teach them how to read and
write.” Nevertheless, up to the organization of the Christian
schools, by La Salle, no serious effort was made. Some religious
foundations establish gratuitous schools in many places,--_charity
schools_,--but no comprehensive purpose directs these
establishments. Conflicts of prerogative among certain independent
colleagues, as that between the writing-masters and the masters
of the infant schools placed under the direct authority of the
precentor, or among the rectors and the tutors (_écolâtres_), that
is, the assistants of the bishops charged with the supervision
of the schools,--such dissensions came still further to defeat
the good intentions of individuals, and to embarrass the feeble
movement that was exerted in favor of popular instruction. For
example, towards 1680, the writing-masters attempted to prevent the
masters of the primary schools[157] from giving writing lessons, at
least, _from giving their pupils any copies except monosyllables_;
and a decree of Parliament is necessary to re-establish the
liberty--and then under certain restrictions--of teaching to write.
“Christian instruction was neglected, not to say dishonored,” is
the statement of contemporaries. The children who attended the
schools of the poor were subjected to public contempt. They were
obliged to wear on their caps a distinctive badge. In brief, far
from progressing, primary instruction was rather in a state of
decadence.
275. DÉMIA AND THE PRIMARY SCHOOLS OF LYONS.--Among the progressive
men who struggled against this unhappy state of affairs, and who
tried to develop the Catholic schools, we must mention, before
La Salle, Démia, a priest of Lyons, who, in 1666, founded the
Congregation of the Brethren of Saint Charles, for the instruction
of poor children. The Institute of La Salle was not organized
till eighteen years later, in 1684. In 1668, having addressed to
the provosts of the merchants of the city of Lyons a warm appeal,
his _Proposals for the establishment of Christian schools for the
instruction of the poor_, Démia obtained an annual grant of two
hundred livres. In 1675 he was charged by “express command” of
the archbishop of Lyons “with the management and direction of the
schools of that city and diocese,” and drew up a body of school
regulations which was quoted as a model.[158] For the method
of “teaching to read, of learning the catechism, of correcting
children, and similar things,” Démia conformed to the book known
as the _Parish School_ (_École paroissiale_), of which we shall
presently say a word. He took it upon himself to proceed “to the
examination of the religion, the ability, and the good morals, of
the persons who proposed to teach school.” But, what was of greater
moment, he established, for preparing and training them, a sort of
seminary.
A few quotations will give an idea of Démia’s zeal in the
establishment of Christian schools.
“This establishment is of such importance and of so great utility,
that there is nothing in our political organization which is
more worthy of the care and the watchfulness of the magistrates,
since on it depend our peace and public tranquillity. The poor,
not having the means of educating their children, leave them
in ignorance of their obligations.... Thus we see, with keen
displeasure, that such an education of the children of the poor
is totally neglected, although it is the most important interest
of the State, of which they comprise the largest part; and,
although it is quite as necessary, and even more so, to maintain
public schools for them, as to support colleges for the children of
families in good circumstances....”