Liberation (1813-15), and afterward for a few years, an educational zeal
animated the Government. The schools during this period were free on the
one hand from politics and on the other from minute official regulation.
As one writer well stated: [21]
It was difficult to decide whether the schools derived their
importance from the life which surged around them, or whether their
importance was due to their intrinsic power, very carefully fostered
by the state authorities.... There was spirit and life in Prussia;
there was much activity and liberty in contriving, with little outward
parade. Any foreigner, visiting Prussia, might observe that the
vitalizing breath of government, like the spirit of God, was acting
upon the whole people.
Napoleon was finally vanquished at Waterloo (1815) and sent to Saint
Helena, and the Congress of Vienna (1815) remade the map of Europe. In
doing so it forgot that the people wanted constitutional government,
instead of a return to absolute rulers. It restored old thrones, rights,
and territories, and inaugurated a policy of political reaction which
increased in intensity with time and dominated the governments of
continental Europe until after the middle of the century. Under the lead
of the Austrian minister, Metternich, and by "third-degree" methods, the
so-called Holy Alliance [22] of continental Europe suppressed free speech,
democratic movements, political liberties, university freedom, and
liberalism in government and religion. The governments in this Alliance
redirected and restricted the people's schools, as much as could be done,
to make them conform in purpose to their reactionary ideas. In
consequence, the development of popular education in Germany, as well as
in France and other continental lands, was for a time checked. The great
start obtained by Prussia and the German States before 1820, though, was
such that what had been done there could not be wholly undone. In France,
Spain, the Italian Kingdoms, the Austrian States, and Russia, on the other
hand, what had not been developed to any extent could be prevented from
developing, and in these lands popular education was given back to the
Church to control and direct. In England, also, though for other reasons
there, the Church retained its control over elementary education for half
a century longer.
CHANGE IN THE SPIRIT OF THE SCHOOLS. The King of Prussia, Frederick
William III (1797-1840), though he had given full adherence to the
movement for general education during the dark period of Prussian history,
was after all never fully in sympathy with the liberal aspect of the
movement. After Austria, by the settlement at Vienna, became the leader of
the German States, and Metternich the dominating political personality of
Europe, the King came more and more to favor a restriction of liberties
and the holding of education to certain rather limited lines, fearful that
too much education of the people might prove harmful to the Government.
Accordingly, under the influence of the King and against the desires of
the liberal leaders, Prussia now changed direction and embarked on a
policy of reaction which checked normal educational progress; led to the
unsuccessful revolution of 1848 and the subsequent almost fanatical
governmental opposition to reforms; and was in large part responsible for
the disaster of 1918. It is an interesting speculation as to how different
the future German and world history might have been had Prussia and the
German States held to the liberal ideas of the earlier period, and drawn
their political conceptions from England and the new American nation,
rather than from Austria and Russia.
Accordingly, in November, 1817, the Department of Public Instruction was
replaced by a Ministry for Spiritual, Educational, and Medical Affairs,
and Karl, Baron von Altenstein, was made Minister. He continued in office
until his death, [23] in 1840, and his administration was marked by an
increasing state centralization and limitation of the earlier plans. In
1819 he codified all previous practices into a general school law for the
kingdom. While the King never really approved and issued it, it
nevertheless became a basis for future work and is the law so
enthusiastically described by Cousin, in 1830 (R. 280). Under his
administration the earlier creative enthusiasm and the energy for the
execution of great ideas disappeared, and the earlier "stimulating and
encouraging attitude on the part of the authorities was now replaced by
the timid policy of the drag and the brake." The earlier preparatory work
in the development of Teachers' Seminaries and the establishment of
elementary schools was allowed to continue; Pestalozzian ideas were for a
time not seriously restricted; compulsory attendance was more definitely
ordered enforced, in 1825; the abolition of tuition fees for _Volksschule_
education was begun in 1833, but not completed until 1888; and a more
careful supervision of schools was instituted, in 1834. The great change
was rather in the spirit and direction of the instruction. The early
tendency to emphasize nationalism and religious instruction (p. 571) was
now stressed, and the liberal aspects of Pestalozzianism were increasingly
subordinated to the more formal instruction and to nationalistic ends. The
soldier and the priest joined hands in diverting the schools to the
creation of intelligent, devout, patriotic, and, above all else, obedient
Germans, while the universal military idea, brought in by the successful
work of Scharnhorst (p. 567), and retained after the War of Liberation as
a survival of the old dynastic and predatory conception of the State, was
more and more emphasized in the work of the schools and the life of the
citizen. When Horace Mann reported on his visit to the schools of the
German States, in 1843, he called attention to this element of weakness
(R. 281), as well as to their many elements of strength.
FURTHER INTOLERANCE AND REACTION. The reactionary tendencies which set in
after the settlement of Vienna had, by 1840, produced stagnation in the
life of the Governments of Europe, and the revolutions of 1848, which
broke out in France, Italy, Switzerland, and the different German and
Austrian States, were revolts against the reactionary governmental rule
and an expression of disappointment at the failure to secure
constitutional government. The revolutions were both successful and
unsuccessful--successful in that the greater liberty they sought came
later on, but unsuccessful at the time. In consequence, immediately
following 1848, an even more reactionary educational policy was
instituted. University freedom was markedly restricted; the institutions
lost their earlier vigor; and the number of students suffered a marked
decline in consequence. The secondary schools also felt the new
influences. Latin and Greek were made compulsory; uniform programs for
work were insisted upon; and Latin in particular was reduced to a
grammatical drill that destroyed the spirit of the earlier instruction and
put gymnasial teaching back almost to the type made so popular by Sturm.
The few _Realschulen_, which had continued to exist and were tolerated
before, were now treated with positive dislike. In 1859 they were able to
force their first official recognition, but only when changed from
practical schools for the middle classes to secondary schools, on the same
basis as the _Gymnasien_, and for parallel ends.
It was upon the elementary schools (_Volksschulen_) and the Teachers'
Seminaries that the most severe official displeasure now fell. A number of
_Volksschule_ teachers had been connected with the revolutions of 1848,
and "over-education" was regarded as responsible. The Teachers' Seminary
at Preslau, which had for long given a high grade of training, was closed,
and the head of the Seminary at Berlin, Diesterweg, was dismissed because
of his strong advocacy of Pestalozzian ideas. Anything savoring of
individualism was especially under the ban. Bitter reproaches were heaped
upon the elementary-school teachers, and the new King, Frederick William
IV (1840-61) considered their work as the very root of the political evils
of the State. To a conference of Seminary teachers, held in 1849 in
Berlin, he said: [24]
You and you alone are to blame for all the misery which the last year
has brought upon Prussia! The irreligious pseudo-education of the
masses is to be blamed for it, which you have been spreading under the
name of true wisdom, and by which you have eradicated religious belief
and loyalty from the hearts of my subjects and alienated their
affections from my person. This sham education, strutting about like a
peacock, has always been odious to me. I hated it already from the
bottom of my soul before I came to the throne, and, since my
accession, I have done everything I could to suppress it. I mean to
proceed on this path, without taking heed of any one, and, indeed, no
power on earth shall divert me from it.
Thus easily did an autocratic Hohenzollern cast upon the shoulders of
others the burden of his own failure to grasp the evolution in political
thinking [25] which had taken place in Europe, since 1789. Unfortunately
for the future of the German people he was able to force his will upon
them.
PROGRESS OF ELEMENTARY EDUCATION AS SHOWN
BY THE DECREASE IN ILLITERACY IN PRUSSIA,
BY PROVINCES
(From _Rep. U.S. Com. Educ._, 1890-1900, I, p. 781)
_Provinces_ 1841 1864-65 1881 1894-95
_Per cent. Per cent. Per cent. Per cent._
East Prussia \ / 7.05 .99
15.33 16.54
West Prussia / \ 8.79 1.23
Brandenburg 2.47 .96 .32 .06
Pomerania 1.23 1.47 .43 .12
Posen 41.00 16.90 9.97 .98
Silesia 9.22 3.78 2.33 .43
Saxony 1.19 .49 .28 .09
Westphalia 2.14 1.03 .60 .02
Rhenish Prussia 7.06 1.13 .23 .05
Hohenzollern .00 .00 .00 .00
===== ===== ===== =====
The State 9.30 5.52 2.38 .33
In 1854 new "Regulations" were issued which put the course of instruction
for elementary schools back to the days of Frederick the Great. The one-
class rural elementary school was made the standard. Everything beyond
reading, writing, a little arithmetic, and religious instruction in strict
accordance with the creeds of the Church, was considered as superfluous,
and was to be allowed only by special permit. The elimination of
illiteracy, the creation of obedient citizens, and the nationalizing of
new elements became the aim of the schools.
The instruction in the Teachers' Seminaries was reduced to the merest
necessities, and they were given clearly to understand that they were to
train teachers, and not to prepare educated men. All theory of education,
all didactics, all psychology were eliminated. A return was made to the
subject-matter theory of education, and a limited subject-matter at that,
and it once more became the business of the teacher to see that this was
carefully learned. Religious instruction naturally once more came to hold
a place of first importance. Similar reactionary movements took place in
other German States, all being sensitive to the reactionary spirit of the
time and the leadership of Austria and Prussia.
THE MODERN GERMAN EDUCATIONAL PURPOSE. After about 1860, largely in
response to modern scientific and industrial forces among a people turning
from agriculture toward industrialism, a slight relaxation of the
reactionary legislation began to be evident. This expressed itself chiefly
in a diminution of the time given to memoriter work in religion, and the
introduction in its place of work in German history and geography, with
some work in natural science. In the Teachers' Seminaries instruction in
German literature, formerly rigidly excluded, was now added. It was not,
however, until after the unification of Germany, following the Franco-
Prussian War, and the creation of Imperial Germany under the directive
guidance of Bismarck, that any real change took place. Then the changes
were due to new political, religious, social, industrial, and economic
forces which belong to the later period of German history.
In 1872 a new law gave to the Prussian elementary schools a new course of
study; reasserted the authority of the State in education; extended the
control of the public authorities; and made the State instead of the
Church the authority even for their religious instruction. [26] The
schools were now to be used as of old to build up and strengthen the
nation, but particularly to support the new Prussian idea as to the work
and function of the State. _Realien_ were given a new prominence, because
of new industrial needs, and the instruction in religion was revamped. The
old memoriter work was greatly reduced, and in its place an emotional and
political emphasis was given to the religious instruction. To make the
school of the people an instrument for fighting the growth of social
democracy, and a support for the throne and government, instruction in
religion was "placed in the center of the teacher's work," and teachers
were given to understand that they were "members of an educational army
and expected loyally to follow the flag." The secondary schools also were
redirected. A new emphasis on scientific subjects and modern languages
replaced the earlier emphasis on Greek. The Emperor interfered (R. 368) to
force a revision of the gymnasial programs better to adapt them to modern
needs. In particular were the universities of all the States unified and
nationalized, and great technical universities created. Science, commerce,
technical work, modern languages, and government were stressed in the
instruction of the leaders.
Deciding clearly where the nation was to go and the route it was to
follow, and that education for national ends was one of the important
means to be employed, the different parts of the educational systems in
the States--elementary schools, secondary schools, universities, normal
schools, professional schools, technical schools, continuation schools--
were carefully integrated into a unified state system, thoroughly national
in spirit, and given a definite function to perform in the work which the
Nation set itself to carry through. Nowhere have teachers been so well
trained to play their part in a national plan, and nowhere have teachers
acquitted themselves more worthily, from the point of view of the
Government. As Alexander [27] has well said:
During the nineteenth century the leaders of Germany decided that
Germany should assume leadership in the world in every line of
endeavor, particularly in commerce and world power. They set this as
the very definite goal of their national ambition. The next question
was how that aim could be accomplished. It was to be done through
education. Accordingly school systems were organized with this aim in
view. In a State such as the Germans proposed building there were
be leaders and followers. The followers were to be trained for a
docile, efficient German citizenship; that is, the lower classes were
to be made into God-fearing, patriotic, economically-independent
Germans. This was the task of the _Volksschule_, and it has been
wonderfully well accomplished. This type of German is created to do
the manual labor of the State.
The leaders were to be trained in middle and higher schools and in the
universities. There were to be different grades of leaders; leaders in
the lower walks of life, leaders in the middle walks of life, and
leaders of the nation. The higher schools and the universities were
employed to produce these types of leaders.... The leaders think and
do; the followers merely do. The schools were organized for the
express purpose of producing just these types.
So well was this system and plan working that, had the Imperial Government
not been so impatient of that slower but surer progress by peaceful means,
and staked all on a gambler's throw, in another half-century the German
nation might have held the world largely in fee. As it is, the results
which the Germans attained by reason of definite aims and definite methods
are both an encouragement and a warning to other nations.
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
1. Point out the extent of the educational reorganization which resulted
from the reform work begun at Halle.
2. How do you explain the very early German interest in compulsory school
attendance, when such was unknown elsewhere in Europe?
3. Compare the Prussian Regulations of 1737 with what was common at that
time in practice in the parishes of the American Colonies.
4. Show the wisdom of the early Prussian kings in working at school reform
through the Church. Could they well have worked otherwise? Why?
5. How do you explain such a slow development of a professional teaching
body in Prussia, when all the state influences had for so long been
favorable to educational development?
6. Show that the Oberschulcollegium Board marked the beginnings of a State
Ministry for Education for Prussia.
7. Show that the spirit of the Prussian leaders, after 1806, was a further
expansion of the German national feeling which arose in the Period of
Enlightenment.
8. Show that the reorganization of elementary education, and the creation
of the University of Berlin, were almost equally important events for the
future of German lands.
9. Show that the work of Prussia, in using the schools for national ends,
was: (a) in keeping with the work of the French Revolutionary leaders,
and (b) only a further extension of the organizing work done by
Frederick the Great.
10. Show how the universities of Germany early took the lead of the
universities of the world, and the influence of this fact on national
progress.
11. Enumerate the new nineteenth-century tendencies observable in the
early educational organization in Prussia.
12. Explain the marked mid-nineteenth-century reaction to educational
development which set in.
13. Explain the early and marked welcome accorded science-study in German
lands.
14. Explain in what ways Prussia attained an educational leadership, ahead
of other nations.
SELECTED READINGS
In the accompanying _Book of Readings_ the following selections,
illustrative of the contents of this chapter, are reproduced:
273. Barnard: The Organizing Work of Frederick William I.
274. Prussia: The School Code of 1763.
275. Prussia: The Silesian School Code of 1765.
276. Austria: The School Code of 1774.
277. Fichte: Addresses to the German Nation.
278. Mann: The Prussian Elementary Teacher and his Training.
279. Dinter: Prussian Schools and Teachers as he found them.
280. Cousin: Report on Education in Prussia.
281. Mann: The Military Aspect of Prussian Education.,
QUESTIONS ON THE READINGS
1. Explain the interest of Frederick William I (273) in elementary
education.
2. Characterize, from the Codes of 1763 (274) and 1765 (275), and cite
paragraph to show: (a) The type of instruction ordered provided; (b) the
type of teacher expected; (c) the character of the attendance required;
and (d) the character of the continuation training ordered.
3. Show the similarity in their main lines of the Prussian (274) and
Austrian (276) Codes.
4. Would the reasoning of Fichte (277) apply to any crushed nation?
Illustrate.
5. Do we select teachers for training as carefully in the United States
today as they did in Prussia eighty years ago (278)? Could we?
6. Did such conditions as Dinter describes (279) exist, even later, with
us?
7. Was the Prussian school system, as described by Cousin (280), a
centralized or a decentralized system?
8. Show that Mann's reasoning as to the strength of the Prussian school
system (281) was thoroughly sound.
SELECTED REFERENCES
* Alexander, Thomas. _The Prussian Elementary Schools_.
* Barnard, Henry. "Public Instruction in Prussia"; in _American Journal
of Education_, vol. XX, pp. 333-434.
Barnard, Henry. _German Teachers and Educators_.
* Cassell, Henry. "Adolph Diesterweg"; in _Educational Review_, vol.
I, pp. 345-56. (April, 1891.)
Friedel, V. H. _The German School as a War Nursery_.
Lexis, W. _A General View of the History and Organization of Public
Education in the German Empire_.
* Nohle, E. "History of the German School System"; in _Report U.S.
Commissioner of Education_, 1897-98, vol. I, pp. 3-82. Translated
from Rein's _Encyclopädisches Handbuch der Pädagogik_.
* Paulsen, Fr. _German Education, Past and Present_.
* Paulsen, Fr. _The German Universities_.
* Russell, James. _German Higher Schools_.
Seeley, J. R. _Life and Times of Stein_, vol. I.
CHAPTER XXIII
NATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN FRANCE AND ITALY
I. NATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN FRANCE
LINES OF DEVELOPMENT MARKED OUT BY THE REVOLUTION. The Revolution proved
very disastrous to the old forms of education in France. The old
educational foundations, accumulated through the ages, were swept away,
and the teaching congregations, which had provided the people with
whatever education they had enjoyed, were driven from the soil. The ruin
of educational and religious institutions in Russia under the recent rule
of the Bolshevists is perhaps comparable to what happened in France. Many
plans were proposed by the Revolutionary philosophers and enthusiasts, as
we have seen (chapter xx), to replace what had once been and to provide
better than had once been done for the educational needs of the masses of
the people, but with results that were small in comparison with the
expectations of the legislative assemblies which considered or approved
them. Nevertheless, the directions of future progress in educational
organization were clearly marked out before Napoleon came to power, and
the work which he did was largely an extension, and a reduction to working
order, of what had been proposed or established by the enthusiasts of the
pre-revolutionary and revolutionary periods. At the time of the Revolution
the State definitely took over the control of education from the Church,
and the work of Napoleon and those who came after him was to organize
public instruction into a practical state-controlled system.
In effecting this organization, the preceding discussions of education as
a function of the State and the desirable forms of organization to follow
all bore important fruit, and the forms finally adopted embodied not only
the ideas contained in the legislation of the revolutionary assemblies,
but the earlier theoretical discussion of the subject by Rolland (p. 510),
Diderot (p. 511), and Talleyrand (p. 513) as well. They embodied also the
peculiar administrative genius of France--that desire for uniformity in
organization and administration--and hence stand in contrast to the state
educational organizations worked out about the same time in German lands.
The German States, as we have seen, had for long been working toward state
control of education, but when this was finally attained they still
permitted a large degree of local initiative and control. The French, on
the contrary, made the transition in a few years, and the system of state
control which they established provided for uniformity, and for
centralized supervision and inspection in the hands of the State. The
forms for state control and education adopted in the two countries were
also expressive of age-long tendencies in each. For three centuries German
political organization, as we have seen, had been extremely decentralized
on the one hand, and had been slowly evolving a system of education under
the joint control of the small States and the Church on the other. In
France, on the contrary, centralization of authority and subordination to
a central government had been the tendency for an even longer period. When
the time arrived for the State to take over education from the Church, it
was but natural that France should tend toward a much more highly
centralized control than did the German States, and the differing
political situations of the two countries, at the opening of the
nineteenth century, gave added emphasis to these differing tendencies.
[Illustration: FIG. 174. AN OLD FOUNDATION TRANSFORMED
This was an ancient château in France. In 1604 Henry IV gave it to the
Jesuits for a school. In 1791 it became national property, and was
transformed into a Military College.]
In consequence, Prussia and the other German States early achieved a form
of state educational organization which emphasized local interest and the
spirit of the instruction, whereas France created an administrative
organization which emphasized central control and, for the time, the form
rather than the spirit of instruction. This was well pointed out by Victor
Cousin (R. 280), in contrasting conditions in Prussia with those existing
in France.
NAPOLEON BEGINS THE ORGANIZATION OF EDUCATION. In 1799 Napoleon became
First Consul and master of France, and in 1804 France, by vote, changed
from a Republic to an Empire, with Napoleon as first Emperor. Until his
banishment to Saint Helena (1815) he was master of France. A man of large
executive capacity and an organizing genius of great ability, whether he
turned to army organization, governmental organization, the codification
of the laws, or the organization of education, Napoleon's practical and
constructive mind quickly reduced parts to their proper places in a well-
regulated scheme. Shortly after he became Consul he took up, among other
things, the matter of educational organization.
His first effort was in 1800, when he transformed the old humanistic
College Louis le Grand (founded 1567) and created four military colleges
from its endowment. One of these colleges he later, in characteristic
fashion, transformed into a School of Arts and Trades (R. 282). In 1802 he
signed the famous Concordat with the Pope. This restored the priests to
the churches, with state aid for their stipends, and virtually turned over
primary education again to the Church for care and control. The "Brothers
of the Christian Schools" (p. 515) were recalled the next year and
especially favored, and soon established themselves more firmly than
before the Revolution.
[Illustration: FIG. 175. COUNT DE FOURCROY (1755-1809)]
In 1802 Napoleon first turned his attention to a general organization of
public instruction by directing Count de Fourcroy, a distinguished chemist
who had been a teacher in the Polytechnic School, and whom he appointed
Director of Public Instruction, to draw up, according to his ideas, an
organizing law on the subject. This became the Law of 1802. It was divided
into nine chapters, as follows:
I. Degrees of Instruction.
II. Primary Schools.
III. Secondary Schools.
IV. Lycées.
V. Special Schools.
VI. The Military School.
VII. The National Pupils.
VIII. The _nationales pensions_
IX. General regulations.
1. PRIMARY SCHOOLS. The chapter on primary schools virtually reënacted the
Law of 1795 (R. 258 b). Each commune [1] was required to furnish a
schoolhouse and a home for the teacher. The teacher was to be responsible
to local authorities, while the supervision of the school was placed under
the prefect of the Department. The instruction was to be limited to
reading, writing, and arithmetic, and the legal authorities were enjoined
"to watch that the teachers did not carry their instructions beyond these
limits." The teacher was to be paid entirely from tuition fees, though one
fifth of the pupils were to be provided with free schooling. The State
gave nothing toward the support of the primary schools.
The interest of Napoleon was not in primary or general education, but
rather in training pupils for scientific and technical efficiency, and
youths of superior ability for the professions and for executive work in
the kind of government he had imposed upon France. To this end secondary
and special education were made particular functions of the State, while
primary education was left to the communes to provide as they saw fit.
They could provide schools and the parents could pay for the teacher, or
not, as they might decide. There was no compulsion to enforce the
requirement of a primary school, and no state aid to stimulate local
effort to create one. In consequence not many state primary schools were
established, and primary education remained, for another generation, in
the hands of private teachers and the Church.
2. SECONDARY SCHOOLS. Chapters III and IV of the Law of 1802 made full
provision for two types of secondary schools--the Communal Colleges and
the Lycées [2]--to replace the Central Higher Schools established in 1795
(p. 518). These latter had lacked sadly in internal organization. They
were merely day schools, lacking the dormitory and boarding arrangements
which for over three centuries had characterized the French _collèges_. As
a result they had not prospered. The Law of 1802 now replaced them with
two types of residential secondary schools, in which the youth of the
country, under careful supervision and discipline, might prepare for
entrance to the higher special schools. These fixed the lines of future
French development in secondary schools.
The standard secondary school now became known as the _Lycée_. These
institutions corresponded to the Colleges under the old régime, of which
the College of Guyenne (R. 136) was a type. The instruction was to include
the ancient languages, rhetoric, logic, ethics, belles-lettres,
mathematics, and physical science, with some provision for additional
instruction in modern languages and drawing. Each was to have at least
eight "professors," an administrative head, a supervisor of studies, and a
steward to manage the business affairs of the institution. The State
usually provided the building, often using some former church school which
had been suppressed, and the cities in which the Lycées were located were
required to provide them with furniture and teaching equipment. The funds
for maintenance came from tuition fees, boarding and rooming income, and
state scholarships, of which six thousand four hundred were provided.
Besides the Lycées, every school established by a municipality, or kept by
an individual, which gave instruction in Latin, French, geography,
history, and mathematics was designated as a secondary school, or Communal
College. These institutions usually offered but a partial Lycée course,
and were tuition schools, being patronized by many parents whose tastes
forbade the sending of their children to the lower-class primary schools.
A license from the Government to operate was necessary before masters
could be employed. They were to be maintained by the municipality, without
any state encouragement beyond some grants for capable teachers and
scholarships in the Lycées for meritorious pupils.
Within two years after the enactment of the Law of 1802 there had been
created in France 46 Lycées, 378 secondary schools of various degrees of
completeness, and 361 private schools of secondary grade had been opened.
A number of these disappeared later, in the reorganization of 1808. For
the supervision of all these institutions the Director General of Public
Instruction appointed three Superintendents of Secondary Studies; and for
the work of the schools he outlined the courses of instruction in detail,
laid down the rules of administration, prepared and selected the
textbooks, and appointed the "professors."
SPECIAL OR HIGHER SCHOOLS. The chapter of the Law of 1802 on Special
Schools made provision for the creation of the following special
"faculties" or schools for higher education for France:
3 medical schools, to replace the _Schools of Health_ of 1794 (p.
518).
10 law schools; increased to 12 in 1804 (Date of _Code Napoléon_,
p. 518).
4 schools of natural history, natural philosophy, and chemistry.
2 schools of mechanical and chemical arts,
1 mathematical school,
1 school of geography, history, and political economy.
A fourth school of art and design.
Professors of astronomy for the observatories.
In 1803 the School of Arts and Trades was added (R. 282), and in 1804,
after Napoleon had signed the Concordat with the Pope, thus restoring the
Catholic religion (abolished 1791), schools of theology were added to the
above list.
We have here, clearly outlined, the main paths along which French state
educational organization had been tending and was in future to follow. The
State had definitely dispossessed the Church as the controlling agency in
education, and had definitely taken over the school as an instrument for
its own ends. Though primary education had been temporarily left to the
communes, and was soon to be turned over in large part to be handled by
the Church for a generation longer, the supervision was to remain with the
State. The middle-class elements were well provided for in the new
secondary schools, and these were now subject to complete supervision by
the State. For higher education groups of Special Schools, or Teaching
Faculties, replaced the older universities, which were not re-created
until after the coming of the Third Republic (1871). The dominant
characteristics of the state educational system thus created, aside from
its emphasis on secondary and higher education, were its uniformity and
centralized control. These characteristics were further stressed in the
reorganization of 1808, and have remained prominent in French educational
organization ever since.
CREATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FRANCE. By 1806 Napoleon was ready for a
further and more complete organization of the public instruction of the
State, and to this end the following law was now enacted (May 10, 1806):
Sec. 1. There will be formed, under the name of Imperial University,
a body exclusively commissioned with teaching and public education
throughout the Empire.
Sec. 2. The members of this corporation can contract civil, special,
and temporary obligations.
Sec. 3. The organization of this corps will be given in the form of a
law to the legislative body in the session of 1810.
In 1808, without the formality of further legislation, Napoleon issued an
Imperial Decree creating the University of France. This was not only
Napoleon's most remarkable educational creation, but it was an
administrative and governing organization for education so in harmony with
French spirit and French governmental ideas that it has persisted ever
since, though changed somewhat in form with time.
The Decree began by declaring that "public instruction, in the whole
Empire, is confined exclusively to the University," and that "no school,
nor establishment for instruction, can be formed independent of the
Imperial University, and without the authority of its chief." Unlike the
University of Berlin (p. 574), created a year later, this was not a
teaching university at all, but instead a governing, examining, and
disbursing corporation, [3] presided over by a Grand Master and a Council
of twenty-six members, all appointed by the Emperor. This Council decided
all matters of importance, and exercised supervision and control over
education of all kinds, from the lowest to the highest, throughout France.
[4] To assist the Council, general inspectors for medicine, law, theology,
letters, and science were provided for, to visit and "examine the
condition of instruction and discipline in the faculties, _lycées_, and
colleges; to inform themselves in regard to the fidelity and ability of
professors, regents, and ushers; to examine the students; and to make a
complete survey of those institutions, in their whole administration."
Beneath the Grand Master and Council the State was divided into twenty-
seven "Academies" (administrative districts), each of which had a Rector,
a Council of ten, and Inspectors, all appointed by the Grand Master. These
exercised jurisdiction over teachers and pupils in all schools, and
decided all local matters, subject to appeal to the Grand Master and
Council.
Under this new administrative organization but little change was made in
the schools from that provided for in the law of 1802. Primary education
remained as before, private schools and Church schools supplying most of
the need. All were under the supervision of the University, and all were
instructed to make as a basis of their instruction: (1) the precepts of
the Catholic religion; (2) fidelity to the Emperor, to the imperial
monarchy, the depository of the happiness of the people, and to the
Napoleonic dynasty, the conservator of the unity of France, and of all the
ideas proclaimed by the Constitution.
The _Lycées_ and Communal Colleges continued, much as before, [5] and
during the half-century which followed, experienced a steady and
substantial growth.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE LYCÉES
Year 1809 1811 1813 1829 1847 1866
Lycées 35 36 36 36 54 74
Pupils 9,068 10,926 14,492 15,087 23,207 34,442
Free pupils 4,199 4,008 3,500 1,600
DEVELOPMENT OF THE COMMUNAL COLLEGES
Year 1809 1815 1830 1849 1855 1866
Colleges 273 323 332 306 244 251
Pupils 18,507 19,320 27,308 31,706 32,500 33,038
The Special Higher Schools were also continued, and to the list given (p.
593) Napoleon added (1808) a Superior Normal School (R. 283) to train
graduates of the _Lycées_ for teaching. This opened in 1810, with thirty-
seven students and a two-year course of instruction, and in 1815 a third
year of method and practice work was added. With some varying fortunes,
this institution has continued to the present.
THE NEW INTEREST IN PRIMARY EDUCATION. The period from 1815 to 1830 in
France is known as the Restoration. Louis XVIII was made King and ruled
until his death in 1824, and his brother Charles X who followed until
deposed by the Revolution of 1830. Though a representative of the old
régime was recalled on the abdication of Napoleon, the great social gains
of the Revolution were retained. There was no odious restoration of
privilege and absolute monarchy. Frenchmen continued to be equal before
the law; a form of constitutional government was provided; the right of
petition was recognized; and the system of public instruction as Napoleon
had organized it continued almost unchanged. For a decade at least there
was less political reaction in France than in other continental States.
In matters of education, what had been provided was retained, and there
seems (R. 285) to have been an increasing demand for additions and
improvements, particularly in the matter of primary and middle-class
schools, and a willingness on the part of the communes to provide such
advantages. Some small progress had been made in meeting these demands,
before 1830.
In 1816 a small treasury grant (50,000 francs) was made for school books,
model schools, and deserving teachers in the primary schools, and in 1829
this sum was increased to 300,000 francs. In 1818 the "Brothers of the
Christian Schools" were permitted to be certificated for teaching on
merely presenting their Letter of Obedience from the head of their Order,
and in 1824 the cantonal school committees were remodeled so as to give
the bishops and clergy entire control of all Catholic primary schools.
Monitorial instruction was introduced from England by private teachers, in
an effort to supply the beginnings of education at small expense, and for
a time this had some vogue, but never proved very successful. In 1815 the
_Lycées_ were renamed Royal Colleges, but in 1848 the old name was
restored, and has since been retained. In 1817 there were thirty-six
_Lycées_, receiving an annual state subsidy of 812,000 francs; thirty
years later the fifty-four in existence were receiving 1,500,000 francs.
From 1822 to 1829 the Higher Normal School was suppressed, and twelve
elementary normal schools were created in its stead.
EARLY WORK UNDER THE MONARCHY OF 1830. In July, 1830, Charles X attempted
to suppress constitutional liberty, and the people rose in revolt and
deposed him, and gave the crown to a new King, Louis-Philippe. He ruled
until deposed by the creation of the Second Republic, in 1848. The
"Monarchy of 1830" was supported by the leading thinkers of the time,
prominent among whom were Thiers and Guizot, and one of the first affairs
of State to which they turned their attention was the extension downward
of the system of public instruction. The first steps were an increase of
the state grant for primary schools (1830) to a million francs a year; the
overthrow of the control by the priests of the cantonal school committees
(1830): the abolition (1831) of the exemption of the religious orders from
the examinations for teaching certificates; and the creation (1830-31) of
thirty new normal schools.
[Illustration: FIG. 176 VICTOR COUSIN (1792-1867)]
The next step was to send (1831) M. Victor Cousin--Director of the
restored Higher Normal School of France--on a mission to the German
States, and in particular to Prussia, to study and report on the system of
elementary education, teacher training, and educational organization and
administration which had done so much for its regeneration. So convincing
was Cousin's _Report_ [6] that, despite bitter national antipathies, it
carried conviction throughout France. "It demonstrated to the government
and the people the immense superiority of all the German States, even the
most insignificant duchy, over any and every Department of France, in all
that concerned institutions of primary and secondary education." Cousin
pronounced the school law of Prussia (R. 280) "the most comprehensive and
perfect legislative measure regarding primary education" with which he was
acquainted, and declared his conviction that "in the present state of
things, a law concerning primary education is indispensable in France."
The chief question, he continued, was "how to procure a good one in a
country where there is a total absence of all precedents and experience in
so grave a matter." Cousin then pointed out the bases, derived from
Prussian experience and French historical development, on which a
satisfactory law could be framed (R. 284 a-c); the desirability of local
control and liberty in instruction (R. 284 f-g); and strongly recommended
the organization of higher primary schools (a new creation; first
recommended (1792) by Condorcet, p. 514) as well as primary schools (R.
284 e) to meet the educational needs of the middle classes of the
population of France.
THE LAW OF 1833. On the basis of Cousin's _Report_ a bill, making the
maintenance of primary schools obligatory on every commune; providing for
higher primary schools in the towns and cities; additional normal schools
to train teachers for these schools; a corps of primary-school inspectors,
to represent the State; and normal training and state certification
required to teach in any primary school, was prepared. In an address to
the Chamber of Deputies, in introducing the bill (1832), M. Guizot [7],
the newly appointed Minister for Public Instruction, set forth the history
of primary instruction in France up to 1832 (R. 285 a); described the two
grades of primary instruction to be created (R. 285 b); and, emphasizing
Cousin's maxim that "the schoolmaster makes the school," dwelt on the
necessity for normal training and state certification for all primary
teachers (R. 285 c). In preparing the bill it was decided not to follow
the revolutionary ideas of free instruction, by lay and state teachers, or
to enforce compulsion to attend, and for these omissions M. Guizot, in his
_Mémoires_ (R. 286), gives some very interesting reasons.
[Illustration: FIG. 177. OUTLINE OF THE MAIN FEATURES OF THE FRENCH STATE
SCHOOL SYSTEM]
The bill became a law the following year, and is known officially as the
Law of 1833. This Law forms the foundations upon which the French system
of national elementary education has been developed, as the Napoleonic Law
of 1802 and the Decree of 1808 have formed the basis for secondary
education and French state administrative organization. A primary school
was to be established in every commune, which was to provide the building,
pay a fixed minimum salary to the teacher, and where able maintain the
school. The state reserved the right to fix the pay of the teacher, and
even to approve his appointment. A tuition fee was to be paid for
attendance, but those who could not pay were to be provided with free
places. The primary schools were to give instruction in reading, writing,
arithmetic, the weights and measures, the French language, and morals and
religion. The higher primary schools were to build on these subjects, and
to offer instruction in geometry and its applications, linear drawing,
surveying, physical science, natural history, history, geography, and
music, and were to emphasize instruction in "the history and geography of
France, and in the elements of science, as they apply it every day in the
office, the workshop, and the field." [8] These latter were the
_Bürgerschulen_, recommended by Cousin (R. 284 e) on the basis of his
study of Prussian education. [9]
[Illustration: PLATE 14. FRANÇOIS PIERRE GUILLAUME GUIZOT (1787-1874)
Creator of the French primary school system]
The primary schools were to follow a uniform plan, and as a guide a
_Manual of Primary Instruction_ was issued, giving detailed directions as
to what was to be done. In sending out a copy of the Law to the primary
teachers of France, M. Guizot enclosed a personal letter to each,
informing him as to what the government expected of him in the new work
(R. 287). During the four years that M. Guizot remained Minister of Public
Instruction he rendered a remarkable service, well described by Matthew
Arnold (R. 288), in awakening his countrymen to the new problem of popular
education then before them.
The results under the Law of 1833 were large [10] and the subsequent
legislation under the monarchy of 1830 was important. For the first time
in French history an earnest effort was made to provide education suited
to the needs of the great mass of the people, and the marked development
of schools which ensued showed how eagerly they embraced the opportunities
offered their children, though the schooling was neither compulsory nor
gratuitous. In 1837 Infant Schools, for still younger children, were
authorized, and in 1840 state aid for these was begun. In 1836 classes for
adults, first begun in Paris in 1820, were authorized generally, but it
was not until 1867 that these were formally incorporated into the state
school system. In 1845 state aid for the Communal Colleges, as well as for
the _Lycées_, was begun.
DEVELOPMENT OF INFANT SCHOOLS
Year...... 1827 1837 1840 1843 1846 1850 1863 1886 1897
Schools... 1 251 555 1489 1861 1735 3308 6696 5683
REACTION AFTER 1848. In France, as in Europe generally, the people were
steadily becoming more liberal, as they became better educated, while the
rulers were becoming more autocratic. The result was the series of
revolutions of 1848, which broke out first in France, and finally extended
to most of the countries of continental Europe. In France the King, Louis-
Philippe, was forced to abdicate; a Republic, based on universal manhood
suffrage, was proclaimed; and Louis Napoleon, a nephew of Napoleon I, was
elected President. In 1851 Napoleon established himself as Dictator;
prepared a new constitution providing for an Empire; and, in 1852,
dissolved the Second Republic and assumed the title of Emperor Napoleon
III. This Second Empire lasted until 1870, when France was humiliated by
the Prussians as the latter had been by Napoleon I in 1806. The Emperor
and his armies were taken prisoners (1870) and, in 1871, the Prussians
occupied Paris and crowned the new Emperor of united and Imperial Germany
in the palace of the French Kings at Versailles. A Third Republic now
succeeded, and this has lasted to the present time.
The period from 1848 to 1870 in France was a period of middle-class rule,
and reaction in education as in government. In 1848 a Sub-Commission on
Primary Education reported in opposition to the state primary schools. The
troubles of 1848 had brought to view the political restlessness which had
taken possession of the teachers, as well as other classes in society. The
new schools were naturally suspected of being the source of the popular
discontent. Many teachers had sympathized with, and some had taken part in
the disturbances, and teachers generally were now placed under close
surveillance. Some of the leaders were forced into exile until after 1870.
Religious schools, regarded as more favorable to monarchical needs and
purposes, were now encouraged, and the number of religious schools
increased from 6464 in 1850, to 11,391 by 1864. Private schools, too, were
given full freedom to compete with the state schools, and the pay of the
primary teachers was reduced. The course in the normal schools was
condemned as too ambitious, and, in 1851, was cut down. The course of
instruction in the primary schools, on the other hand, was, unlike in
Prussia, broadened instead of restricted, and in particular emphasis was
placed, in keeping with nearly a century of French tradition, on
scientific and practical subjects. [11] The law of 1850 stated the
requirements for primary schools as follows:
Art. 23. Primary instruction comprises moral and religious
instruction, reading, writing, the elements of the French language,
computation, and the legal system of weights and measures. It may
comprise, in addition, arithmetic applied to practical operations, the
elements of history (a required subject after 1867) and geography,
notions of the physical sciences and of natural history applicable to
the ordinary purposes of life, elementary instruction in agriculture,
trade, and hygiene; and surveying, leveling, linear drawing, singing,
and gymnastics.
Religious instruction prospered under the Second Empire, and the state
primary schools lost in importance. The _Lycées_ continued largely as
classical institutions, though after 1865 the crowding of the rising
sciences began to dispute the supremacy of classical studies. There were,
however, many voices of discontent, particularly from exiled teachers (R.
289), and the way was rapidly being prepared for the creation of a
stronger and better state school system as soon as political conditions
were propitious.
REVOLUTIONARY IDEALS AT LAST REALIZED. With the creation of the Third
Republic, in 1870, a change from the old conditions and old attitudes took
place. Up to about 1879 the new government was in control of those who
were at heart sympathetic with the old conditions, but were forced to
accept the new; from 1879 to 1890 was a transition period; and since 1890
the Republic has grown steadily in strength and regained its position
among the great powers of the world. The first few years of the new
Republic were devoted to paying the Prussian indemnity and clearing the
soil of France of German armies, but, after about 1875, education became a
great national interest among leaders of France. [12] France saw, somewhat
as did Prussia after 1806, the necessity for creating a strong state
system of primary, secondary, and higher schools to train the youth of the
land in the principles of the Republic, strengthen the national spirit,
advance the welfare of the State, and protect it from dangers both within
and without.
PROGRESS OF PRIMARY EDUCATION IN FRANCE, DURING THE NINETEENTH
CENTURY, AS SHOWN BY THE REDUCTION IN THE PERCENTAGE OF ILLITERACY
AMONG ARMY CONSCRIPTS, AND AMONG PERSONS SIGNING THE MARRIAGE RECORDS
Years Army Marriage records
conscripts Men Women
1790 53.0% 73.0%
1827 58.0%
1833 47.8
1840 42.8
1845 37.8
1850 35.7
1855 33.7 32.0 47.0
1860 30.0 30.4 44.8
1865 24.4 27.5 41.0
1870 19.7 26.8 39.4
1875 16.0 20.0 31.0
1880 14.7 16.1 24.5
1885 11.5 13.0 20.2
1890 7.8 8.7 12.8
1896 5.1 5.8 7.8
1901 4.4 4.4 6.3
Millions were put into the building of schoolhouses (1878-88); new normal
schools were established; a normal school for women was created in each of
the eighty-seven departments of France; the academic and superior councils
of public instruction were reorganized to eliminate clerical influences
(1881); religious instruction was replaced by moral and civic instruction
(R. 290); and clerical "Letters of Obedience" were no longer accepted, and
all teachers were required to be certificated by the State. The Law of
1881, eliminating instruction in religion from the elementary schools, was
followed, in 1886, by a law providing for the gradual replacement of
clerical by lay teachers. In 1904, the teaching congregations of France
were suppressed. All elementary education now became public, free,
compulsory, and secular, [13] and teachers were required to be neutral in
religious matters. [14]
Since 1871, also, technical and scientific education has been emphasized;
the primary and superior-primary schools have been made free (1881) and
compulsory (1882); classes for adults have been begun generally; the state
aid for schools has been very greatly increased; _lycées_ and colleges for
women have been created (1880); the _lycées_ modernized in their
instruction [15] and the reorganization and reëstablishment of a series of
fifteen state universities of a modern type, begun in 1885, was completed
in 1896. The reorganization and expansion of education in France since
1875 is a wonderful example of republican interest and energy, and is
along entirely different lines from those followed, since the same date,
in German lands.
After the lapse of nearly a century we now see the French Revolutionary
ideas of gratuity, obligation, and secularization finally put into effect,
and the state system of public instruction outlined by Condorcet (p. 514),
in 1792, at last an accomplished fact.
II. NATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN ITALY
IMPORTANCE OF THE WORK OF NAPOLEON. So much has been written about the
deluge of blood that took place in Paris in the days of the Commune and
the time of the National Conventions, and of the military victories and
autocratic rule of Napoleon Bonaparte, that it is difficult to appraise
the importance of either, from the point of view of the progress of
civilization and of the organization of modern political institutions, at
its true worth. The faults of both are prominent and outstanding, but it
nevertheless was the merit of the Revolution that it enabled France, and
along with France a good portion of western Europe, to rid itself of the
worst survivals of the Middle Ages, while to Napoleon much of western
Europe is indebted for the foundation of its civil institutions, unified
legal procedure, beginnings of state educational organization, and modern
governmental forms. Writing on this subject, Matthew Arnold [16] well
said:
With all his faults, his [Napoleon's] reason was so clear and strong
that he saw, in its general outlines at least, the just and rational
type of civil organization which modern society needs, and wherever
his armies went he instituted it.
[Illustration: FIG. 178. EUROPE IN 1810
Showing the control of France when Napoleon was at the height of his
power.]
That the French Revolution's merit and service was a real one is shown by
all the world, as it improves, getting rid more and more of the Middle
Ages. That Napoleon's merit and service was a real one is shown by the bad
governments which succeeded him having always got rid, when they could, of
his work, and by the progress of improvement, when these governments
became intolerable, and are themselves got rid of, always bringing it
back. Where governments were not wholly bad, and did not get rid of
Napoleon's good work, this work turns out to have the future on its side,
and to be more likely to assimilate the institutions round it to its
pattern than to be itself assimilated by them.
In the Italian States, the Netherlands, some of the French cantons of
Switzerland, the Rhine countries, and the Danish peninsula, in particular,
the rule of Napoleon, imposed by his armies, carried out by rulers of his
selection, and maintained for a long enough period that the legal
organization, civil order, unified government, and taste of educational
opportunities of a new type which his rule brought became attractive to
the people, in time proved deeply influential in their political
development. [17] All these nations still show traces of the French
influence in their state educational organization. We shall take the
Italian States as a type, and examine briefly the influence on the
development of state educational organization there which resulted from
contact with the forward-looking rule of "The Great Emperor."
DECLINE IN IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION IN ITALY. In a preceding chapter (p.
503), we mentioned that the rule of Napoleon in northern Italy awakened
the national spirit from its long lethargy, and caused Italian liberals to
look forward, for the first time since the days of the Revival of
Learning, to the time when the Italian States might be united into one
Italian nation, with Rome as its capital. This became the work of the mid-
nineteenth century (see dates, Fig. 179), though not fully completed until
the World War of 1914-18. Italy stands to-day a great united nation, with
a large future ahead of it, but as such it is entirely a nineteenth-
century creation. From the time of its intellectual decline following the
Renaissance, to the middle of the nineteenth century, Italy remained "a
geographical expression" and split up into a number of little independent
States; up to the time of Napoleon it was a part of the German-ruled "Holy
Roman Empire."
After the great patriotic effort of the period of the Revival of Learning
(p. 264) in Italy, and the rather feeble and unsuccessful attempts at a
reform of religion which followed, the intellectual development of Italy
was checked and turned aside for centuries by the triumph of an
unprogressive and anti-intellectual attitude on the part of the dominant
Church. The persecution of Galileo (p. 388) was but a phase of the
reaction in religion which had by that time set in. Education was turned
over to the religious orders, such as the Jesuits and the Barnabites, and
instruction was turned aside from liberal culture and the promotion of
learning to the support of a religion and the stamping out of heresy.
Though a number of educational foundations were made, and some important
undertakings begun after the days when her universities were crowded and
Florence and Venice vied with one another for the intellectual supremacy
of the western world, the spirit nevertheless was gone, and both education
and government settled down to a tenacious preservation of the existing
order. Scholars ceased to frequent the schools of Italy; the universities
changed from seats of learning to degree-conferring institutions; [18] the
intellectual capitals came to be found north of the Alps; and the history
of educational progress ceased to be traced in this ancient land. In the
early part of the eighteenth century the schools there reached perhaps
their lowest intellectual level.
THE BEGINNINGS OF REFORM IN SAVOY. The first and almost the only attempt
to change this condition, before Napoleon's armies went crashing through
the valley of the Po, was made in the seventeenth century by two Dukes of
Savoy. By decrees of 1729 and 1772 they took the control of the secondary
(Latin) schools in their little duchy from the religious orders, and
established a Council of Public Instruction to reform the university
examinations, see that teachers were prepared for the Latin schools, and
take over in the name of the authorities of the duchy the control of
education. Though inspired by a political interest, the two dukes brought
into their little kingdom the much-needed ideas of honest work, effective
administration, and public spirit, and laid the foundations for the
control of education by the public authorities later on. The only other
attempt to improve conditions came in Lombardy, in 1774, which then was a
part of the Austrian dominions and felt the short-lived reforms of Maria
Theresa (p. 562; R. 276). Elsewhere in Italy conditions remained unchanged
until the time of Napoleon.
NAPOLEON REVIVES THE NATIONAL SPIRIT. In 1796 Napoleon's armies invaded
Sardinia, Lombardy, and the valley of the Po, and he soon extended his
control to almost all the Italian peninsula. For nearly two decades
thereafter this collection of little States felt the unifying,
regenerating influence of the organizing French. Monasteries and convents
and religious schools were transformed into modern teaching institutions,
brigandage was put down, and efficient and honest government was
established. The ideas of the French Law of 1802 as to education were
applied. Every town was ordered to establish a school for boys, to teach
the reading and writing of Italian and the elements of French and Latin;
the secondary schools were modernized; and the universities were
completely reorganized. Some of the universities were reduced to _licei_
(_lycées_; secondary schools), while others were strengthened and their
revenues turned to better purposes. The universities at Naples and Turin
in particular were transformed into strong institutions, with a decided
emphasis on scientific studies. A normal school was founded at Pisa, on
the model of the one at Paris. New standards in education were set up, the
study of the sciences was introduced into the secondary schools, and the
study of medicine and law was regenerated.
With the fall of Napoleon his work was largely undone. The firm, just, and
intelligent government which he had given Italy--something the land had
not known for ages--came to an end. The little States were "handed back to
the reactionary dynasts whose rule was neither benevolent nor intelligent,
while the ever-ready Austrian army crushed out any local movement for
liberal institutions." The laws regarding education were repealed, and the
schools the French had established were closed as revolutionary and
dangerous. The normal school at Pisa ceased to exist; the university at
Naples was dismantled; the one at Turin was closed; and the Jesuits were
allowed to return and reorganize instruction. The result was that a common
discontent with ensuing conditions made Italians conscious of their racial
and historical unity, and this finally expressed itself in the revolutions
of 1848. These failed at the time, and the heel of the Austrian oppressor
came down harder than before. Liberty of the press practically ceased. The
national leaders went into exile for safety. The prisons were filled with
political offenders. The schools were closed or ceased to influence. The
Pope, fearing the end of his earthly kingship approaching, united firmly
with the Austrians to resist liberal movements. Finally, under the
leadership of the enlightened King of Sardinia, Victor Emmanuel (1849-78)
and his Prime Minister, Count of Cavour, the Austrians were driven out
(1859-66) and all Italy was united (1870) under the rule of one king
interested in promoting the welfare of his people.
[Illustration: FIG. 179. THE UNIFICATION OF ITALY, SINCE 1848]
SARDINIA LEADS TO NATIONAL ORGANIZATION AND CONTROL. The movement to free
Italy was essentially a liberal movement. Many hoped to create a republic,
but chose a liberal constitutional monarchy under Victor Emmanuel as the
most feasible plan. Cavour understood the importance of public
instruction, and from the first began to build up schools [19] and put
them under state control. In 1844, a normal school was opened in Turin. In
1847, a Minister of Public Instruction was appointed and a Council of
Public Instruction created, after the plan of France, In 1848, a General
School Law was enacted, and the organization and improvement of schools
was begun with a will. In 1850, a commission was sent to study the school
systems of Europe, and in particular those of France and of the German
States. A Supreme Council of Public Instruction was now formed for
Sardinia, and the process of creating primary schools, higher-primary
schools, classical and technical secondary schools, colleges, and the
reorganization of the universities was begun. In 1859, when the growth of
Italian unity was rapidly extending the rule of Victor Emmanuel, [20] a
new law, providing a still better state organization of public
instruction, was enacted. A Minister of Public Instruction appointed by
the King, a Supreme Council of Public Instruction, and a Department of
Public Instruction as a branch of the government, were all provided for,
after the French plan.
[Illustration: FIG. 180 COUNT OF CAVOUR (1810-61)]
This Law of 1859 was later extended to cover all Italy, and has formed the
basis for all subsequent legislation. It clearly established a state
system of education, though the religious schools were allowed to remain.
It also established control after the French plan, with a high degree of
centralization and uniformity. The schools established, too, were much
after the French type, though much less extensive in scope. The primary
and superior primary at first were but two years each, though since
extended in all the larger communities to a six-year combined course. The
two-class school system was established, as in France and German lands.
The secondary-school system consisted of a five-year _ginnasio_,
established in many places (218 in Italy by 1865; 458 by 1916) with a
three-year _liceo_ following, but found in a smaller number of places.
Parallel with this a seven-year non-classical scientific and technical
secondary school was also created, and these institutions have made marked
headway (461 by 1916) in central and northern Italy. Pupils may pass to
either of these on the completion of the ordinary four-year primary
course, at the age of ten. Above the secondary schools are numerous
universities. The normal-school system created prepared for teaching in
the primary schools, while the university system followed the completion
of the _liceo_ course. [Illustration: FIG. 181. OUTLINE OF THE MAIN
FEATURES OF THE ITALIAN STATE SCHOOL SYSTEM]
The influence of French ideas in Italian educational organization is
clearly evident. Before the French armies brought French governmental
ideas and organization to Italy almost nothing had been done. Then, during
the first six decades of the nineteenth century, the transition from the
church-school idea to the conception of education as an important function
of the State was made, and the resulting system is largely French in
organization and form.
SUBSEQUENT PROGRESS. From this point on educational progress has been
chiefly a problem of increased finances and the slow but gradual extension
of educational opportunities to more and more of the children of the
people. The church schools have been allowed to continue side by side with
the state schools, and the problem of securing satisfactory working
relations has not always been easy of solution.
In 1877 primary education was ordered made compulsory, [21] and religious
instruction was dropped from the state schools, but the slow progress of
the nation in extending literacy indicates that but little had been
accomplished in enforcing the compulsion previous to the new compulsory
law of 1904. This made more stringent provisions regarding schooling, and
provided for three thousand evening and Sunday schools for illiterate
adults. In 1906, an earnest effort was begun to extend educational
advantages in the southern provinces, where illiteracy has always been
highest. In 1911, the state aid for elementary education was materially
increased. In 1912, a new and more modern plan of studies for the
secondary schools was promulgated. Since 1912 many important advances have
been inaugurated, such as elementary schools of agriculture, vocational
schools, continuation schools, the middle-class industrial and commercial
schools. The World War directed new attention to the educational needs of
the nation. Italy, at last thoroughly awakened, seems destined to be a
great world power politically and commercially, and we may look forward to
seeing education used by the Italian State as a great constructive force
for the advancement of its national interests.
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
1. Show how the Revolution marked out the lines of future educational
evolution for France.
2. Explain why France and Italy evolved a school system so much more
centralized than did other European nations.
3. Explain Napoleon's lack of interest in primary education, in view of
the needs of France in his day.
4. Show that Napoleon was right, time and circumstances considered, in
placing the state emphasis on the types of education he favored.
5. Explain why middle-class education should have received such special
attention in Cousin's Report, and in the Law of 1833.
6. Was the course of instruction provided for the primary schools in 1833,
times and needs considered, a liberal one, or otherwise? Why?
7. Compare the 1833 and the 1850 courses.
8. Explain why all forms of education in France should have experienced
such a marked expansion and development after 1875.
9. Explain why great military disasters, for the past 150 years, have
nearly always resulted in national educational reorganization.
10. Appraise the work and the permanent influence of Napoleon.
11. Explain Napoleon's interest in establishing schools and universities,
when the Austrian and Church authorities were so interested in abolishing
what he had created.
12. What did the dropping of religious instruction from the primary
schools of both France and Italy, both strong Catholic countries, indicate
as to national development?
SELECTED READINGS
In the accompanying _Book of Readings_ the following selections are
reproduced:
282. Le Brun: Founding of the School of Arts and Trades.
283. Jourdain: Refounding of the Superior Normal School.
284. Cousin: Recommendations for Education in France.
285. Guizot: Address on the Law of 1833.
286. Guizot: Principles underlying the Law of 1833.
287. Guizot: Letter to the Primary Teachers of France.
288. Arnold: Guizot's Work as Minister of Public Instruction.
289. Quinet: A Lay School for a Lay Society.
290. Ferry: Moral and Civic Instruction replaces the Religious.
QUESTIONS ON THE READINGS
1. Just what attitude toward education did the action of Napoleon in
changing the character of the school at Compiègne (282) express?
2. What type of school (283) was the re-created Superior Normal?
3. Just what did Victor Cousin recommend (284) as to (_a_) schools to be
created; (_b_) control and administration; (_c_) compulsory attendance;
(_d_) schools for the middle classes; and (_e_) education and control of
teachers?
4. Was Guizot's Law of 1833 (285) in harmony with the recommendations of
Cousin (284)?
5. Why have public opinion and legislative action, in France and
elsewhere, so completely reversed the positions taken by Guizot and his
advisers (286) in framing the Law of 1833? 6. From Guizot's letter to the
teachers of France (287), and Arnold's description of his work (288), just
what do you infer to have been the nature of his interest in advancing
primary education in France?
7. Contrast the reasoning of Guizot (286) and Quinet (289) on lay
instruction. Of the reasoning of the two men, which is now accepted in
France and the United States?
8. Contrast the letters of Guizot (287) and Ferry (290) to the primary
teachers of France.
SUPPLEMENTARY REFERENCES
Arnold, Matthew. _Popular Education in France_.
* Arnold, Matthew. _Schools and Universities on the Continent_.
* Barnard, Henry. _National Education in Europe_.
Barnard, Henry. _American Journal of Education_, vol. XX.
Compayré, G. _History of Pedagogy_, chapter XXI.
* Farrington, Fr. E. _The Public Primary School System of France_.
* Farrington, Fr. E. _French Secondary Schools_.
Guizot, F. P. G. _Mémoires_, Extracts from, covering work as
Minister of Public Instruction, 1832-37, in Barnard's _American
Journal of Education_, vol. XI, pp. 254-81, 357-99.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE STRUGGLE FOR NATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN ENGLAND
I. THE CHARITABLE VOLUNTARY BEGINNINGS
ENGLISH PROGRESS A SLOW BUT PEACEFUL EVOLUTION. The beginnings of national
educational organization in England were neither so simple nor so easy as
in the other lands we have described. So far this was in part due to the
long-established idea, on the part of the small ruling class, that
education was no business of the State; in part to the deeply ingrained
conception as to the religious purpose of all instruction; in part to the
fact that the controlling upper classes had for long been in possession of
an educational system which rendered satisfactory service in preparing
leaders for both Church and State; and in part--probably in large part--to
the fact that national evolution in England, since the time of the Civil
War (1642-49) has been a slow and peaceful growth, though accompanied by
much hard thinking and vigorous parliamentary fighting. Since the
Reformation (1534-39) and the Puritan uprising led by Cromwell (1642-49),
no civil strife has convulsed the land, destroyed old institutions, and
forced rapid changes in old established practices. Neither has the country
been in danger from foreign invasion since that memorable week in July,
1588, when Drake destroyed the Spanish Armada and made the future of
England as a world power secure.
English educational evolution has in consequence been slow, and changes
and progress have come only in response to much pressure, and usually as a
reluctant concession to avoid more serious trouble. A strong English
characteristic has been the ability to argue rather than fight out
questions of national policy; to exhibit marked tolerance of the opinions
of others during the discussion; and finally to recognize enough of the
proponents' point of view to be willing to make concessions sufficient to
arrive at an agreement. This has resulted in a slow but a peaceful
evolution, and this slow and peaceful evolution has for long been the
dominant characteristic of the political, social, and educational progress
of the English people. The whole history of the two centuries of evolution
toward a national system of education is a splendid illustration of this
essentially English characteristic.
EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY EDUCATIONAL EFFORTS. England, it will be remembered
(chapter XIX, Section III), had early made marked progress in both
political and religious liberty. Ahead of any other people we find there
the beginnings of democratic liberty, popular enlightenment, freedom of
the press, religious toleration, [1] social reform, and scientific and
industrial progress. All these influences awakened in England, earlier
than in any other European nation, a rather general desire to be able to
read (R. 170), and by the opening of the eighteenth century we find the
beginnings of a charitable and philanthropic movement on the part of the
churches and the upper classes to extend a knowledge of the elements of
learning to the poorer classes of the population.
As a result, as we have seen (chapter XVIII), the eighteenth century in
England, educationally, was characterized by a new attitude toward the
educational problem and a marked extension of educational opportunity.
Even before the beginning of the century the courts had taken a new
attitude toward church control of teaching, [2] and in 1700 had freed the
teacher of the elementary school from control by the bishops through
license. [3] In 1714 an Act of Parliament (13 Anne, c. 7) exempted
elementary schools from the penalties of conformity legislation, and they
were thereafter free to multiply and their teachers to teach. [4] The dame
school (R. 235) now became an established English institution (p. 447).
Private-adventure schools of a number of types arose (p. 451). The
churches here and there began to provide elementary parish-schools for the
children of their poorer members (p. 449), or training-schools for other
children who were to go out to service (R. 241). Workhouse schools and
"schools of industry" also were used to provide for orphans and the
children of paupers (p. 453).
THE CHARITY-SCHOOL SYSTEM. Most important of all was the organization, by
groups of individuals (R. 237) and by Societies (S.P.C.K.; p. 449) formed
for the purpose, and maintained by subscription (R. 240), collections (R.
291), and foundation incomes, of an extensive and well-organized system of
Charity-Schools (p. 449). The "Society for the Promotion of Christian
Knowledge" dates from the year 1699, and the "Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel in Foreign Parts" from 1701. The first worked at home, and
the second in the overseas colonies. [5] Both did much to provide schools
for poor boys and girls, furnishing them with clothing and instruction (R.
292), and training them in reading, writing, spelling, counting,
cleanliness, proper behavior, sewing and knitting (girls), and in "the
Rules and Principles of the Christian Religion as professed and taught in
the Church of England" (R. 238 b). The Charity-School idea was in a sense
an application of the joint-stock-company principle to the organization
and maintenance of an extensive system of schools for the education of the
children of the poor, the stock being subscribed for by humanitarian-
minded people. The upper classes had for long been well provided, through
tutors in the home and grammar schools and colleges, with those means for
education which have for centuries produced an able succession of
gentlemen, statesmen, governors, and scholars for England, and many of the
commercial middle-class had, by the eighteenth century, become able to
purchase similar advantages for their sons. These now united to provide,
as part of a great organized charity and under carefully selected teachers
(R. 238 a), for the more promising children of their poorer neighbors, the
elements of that education which they themselves had enjoyed.
The movement spread rapidly over England (p. 451), and soon developed into
a great national effort to raise the level of intelligence of the masses
of the English people. Thousands of persons gave their services as
directors, organizers, and teachers. Traveling superintendents were
employed. A rudimentary form of teacher-training was begun. The preaching
of a Charity Sermon each year [6] with a special collection, became a
general English practice.
THE VOLUNTARY SYSTEM. The rise of the Methodist movement, [7] after 1730
(p. 489); the earthquake shocks of 1750; the rise of the popular novel and
newspaper; the printing of political news, and cheap scientific pamphlets
(p. 492); and the growing tendency to debate questions and to apply reason
to their solution--all tended to give emphasis in England to these
eighteenth-century charitable means for extending education to the
children of those who could not afford to pay for it. Unlike the German
States, where the State and the Church and the school had all worked
together from the days of the Reformation on, the English had never known
such a conception. The efforts, though, of the educated few, in the
eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, to extend the elements of
learning, order, piety, cleanliness, and proper behavior to the children
of the masses, formed an important substitute for the action by the
Church-State which was so characteristic a feature of Teutonic lands.
We see in these eighteenth-century efforts the origin of what became known
in England as "the voluntary system" and upon this voluntary support of
education--private, parochial, charitable--the English people for long
relied. Of action by the State there was none during the eighteenth
century, aside from an Act of 1767 (7 Geo. III, c. 39) relating to the
education of pauper children. This established the important principle--
unfortunately not followed up--of providing that poor parish children of
London might be maintained and educated "at the cost of the rates."
THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL MOVEMENT. One other voluntary eighteenth-century
movement of importance in the history of English educational development
should be mentioned here, as it formed the connecting link between the
parochial-charity-school movement of the eighteenth century and the
philanthropic period of the educational reformers of the early nineteenth.
This was the Sunday-School movement, first tried by John Wesley in
Savannah, in 1737, but not introduced into England until 1763. The idea
amounted to little, though, until practically worked out anew (1780) by
Robert Raikes, a printer of Gloucester, and described by him (1783) in his
_Gloucester Journal_ (R. 293), after he had experimented with it for three
years. [8] His printed description of the Sunday-School idea gave a
national impulse to the movement, and Sunday Schools were soon established
all over England to take children off the streets on Sunday and provide
them with some form of secular and religious instruction. [9]
The movement coincided with new religious, social, and economic forces
which were at work, and which awakened an interest not only in the
education of the children of the poorer working-classes, but caused the
upper and middle classes in society to feel a new sense of responsibility
for social and educational reform. The cold and unemotional religion of
the English Church in the early eighteenth century had created an
indifference to the simple truths and duties of the Gospels. The great
religious revival under Wesley and Whitefield had challenged such an
attitude, and had done much to infuse a new spirit into religion and
awaken a new sense of responsibility for social welfare. The rapid growth
of population in the towns, following the beginnings of factory life (p.
493), had created new social and economic problems, and the neglect of
children in the manufacturing towns had shocked many thinking persons. The
way in which parents and children, freed from hard labor in the factories
on Sundays, abandoned themselves to vice, drunkenness, and profanity
caused many, among them Raikes himself (R. 293), to inquire if "something
could not be done" to turn into respectable men and women "the little
heathen of the neighborhood." The Sunday School was his answer, and the
answer of many all over England. [10]
In 1785 "The Society for the Support and Encouragement of Sunday Schools
in the different Counties of England" was formed with a view to
establishing a Sunday School in every parish in the kingdom, and the Queen
headed a subscription list, following a general appeal for funds. By 1787
it was estimated that 234,000 children in England and Wales were attending
a Sunday School, and by 1792 the number had increased to half a million.
The Parliamentary return for 1818 showed 5463 Sunday Schools in existence,
and 477,225 scholars; in 1835 the returns showed 1,548,890 scholars, half
of whom attended no other school, and approximately 160,000 voluntary
teachers. [11] In Manchester, then a city scourged with almost universal
child-labor, the schools (1834) were in session five and a half hours on
Sunday and two evenings a week. The moral and religious influence of these
schools was important, and the instruction in reading and writing, meager
as it was, filled a real need of the time.
OTHER VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS; "RAGGED SCHOOLS." The Charity Schools and the
Sunday Schools were the two most conspicuous of the voluntary-organization
type of undertakings for providing the poor children of England with the
elements of secular and religious education. Many other organizations of
an educational and charitable nature, aided also by many individual
efforts, too numerous to mention, were formed with the same charitable and
humanitarian end in view. Others, similar in type, charged a small fee,
and hence were of the private-adventure type. Sunday Schools, day schools,
evening schools, children's churches, bands of hope, clothing clubs,
messenger brigades, shoeblack brigades, orphans' schools, reformatory
schools, industrial schools, ragged schools--these were some of the types
that arose. Only one of these--"Ragged Schools"--will be described.
[Illustration: FIG. 182. A RAGGED SCHOOL PUPIL
(From a photograph of a boy on entering the school; later changed into a
respectable tradesman. From Guthrie)]
[Illustration: PLATE 15. JOHN POUNDS'S RAGGED SCHOOL AT PORTSMOUTH]
[Illustration: PLATE 16. AN ENGLISH VILLAGE VOLUNTARY SCHOOL
(Reproduced from an early nineteenth-century engraving, through the
courtesy of William G. Bruce)]
The originator of the "Ragged Schools"--schools for the education of
destitute children, waifs and strays not reached by other agencies--was a
large-hearted cobbler of Portsmouth, by the name of John Pounds (1766-
1839), who divided his time between cobbling and rescue work among the
poorest and most degraded children of his neighborhood. His school is
shown in the picture facing this page. (Plate 15.) In his shoeshop he
taught such children, free of charge, to read, write, count, cook their
food, and mend their shoes. He was a schoolmaster, doctor, nurse, and
playfellow to them all in one. His workshop was a room of only six by
eighteen feet, yet in it he often had forty children under his
instruction. His work set an example, and "Ragged Schools," or "Schools
for the Destitute," began to be formed in many places by humanitarians.
These took the form of day schools, night schools, Sunday Schools, and the
so-called industrial schools (R. 294). The instruction in most of them was
entirely free, [12] but some charged a small fee, in a few cases as high
as a shilling a month. It was one of these schools that Crabbe described
when he wrote: [13]
Poor Reuben Dixon has the noisiest school
Of ragged lads, who ever bowed to rule;
Low in his price--the men who heave our coals,
And clean our causeways, send him boys in shoals.
To see poor Reuben, with his fry beside-
Their half-check'd rudeness and his half-scorned pride-
Their room, the sty in which th' assembly meet,
In the close lane behind the Northgate street;
T' observe his vain attempts to keep the peace,
Till tolls the bell, and strife and trouble cease,
Calls for our praise; his labours praise deserves,
But not our pity; Reuben has no nerves.
'Mid noise and dirt, and stench, and play, and prate,
He calmly cuts the pen or views the slate.
In 1844 "The Ragged School Union" was formed in London, and maintained
there many of the types of schools mentioned above. The "Constitution and
Rules of the Association for the Establishment of Ragged Industrial
Schools for Destitute Children in Edinburgh" (R. 294) gives a good idea as
to the nature, support, and instruction in such schools. As late as 1870,
when national education was first begun in England, there were about two
hundred of these Ragged Schools in London alone, with about 23,000
children in them. Upon many such forms of irregular schools England
depended before the days of national organization.
OTHER EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY INFLUENCES. During the latter half of the
eighteenth century French Revolutionary thought [14] and American
political action began to exert some influence on public opinion in
England. The small upper ruling class, alarmed at the developments in
France, became confirmed in its opposition to any general popular
education aside from a little reading, writing, counting, and careful
religious training, while on the other hand men of more liberal outlook
felt that popular enlightenment was a necessity to prevent the masses from
becoming stirred by inflammatory writings and speeches. The increasing
distress in the agricultural regions, due to the rapid change of England
from an agricultural to a manufacturing nation; the crowding of great
numbers of working people into the manufacturing towns; and the social
misery and political unrest following the Napoleonic wars all alike
contributed to a feeling of need for any form of philanthropic effort that
gave promise of alleviating the ills of society. There now grew up a small
but influential body of thinkers who favored the maintenance of a system
of general and compulsory education by the State, and the separation of
the school from the Church. The most notable proponents of this new theory
were Adam Smith, the Reverend T. R. Malthus, and the Anglo-American Thomas
Paine. The first approached the question from an economic point of view,
the second from an economic and biologic, and the third from the
political. In 1776 Adam Smith's _Wealth of Nations_ appeared. This was
one of the great books of all time. Among other matters he dealt with the
question of education. He pointed out that English society was now
becoming highly organized; that the new manufacturing life had completely
changed the simple conditions of an earlier agricultural society; that in
the narrow round of manufacturing duties and town life people tended to
lose their inventiveness and to stagnate; and that the individual
degeneracy which set in in a more highly organized type of society became
a social danger of large magnitude. Hence, he argued (R. 295), it was a
matter of state interest that "the inferior ranks of the people" be
instructed to make them socially useful and to render them "less apt to be
misled into any wanton or unnecessary opposition to measures of
government." Accordingly, he held, the State had every right, not only to
take over elementary education as a state function and a public charge,
but also to make it free and compulsory.
[Illustration: FIG. 183. ADAM SMITH (1723-90)]
In 1798 the Reverend T. R. Malthus's _Essay on Population_ appeared. This
was a precursor of the work of Darwin, and another of the great books of
all time. He pointed out that population everywhere tended to outrun the
means of subsistence, and that it was only prevented from doing so by
preventive checks which involved much misery and vice and pauperism. To
prevent pauperism each individual must exercise moral restraint and
foresight, and to enable all to do this a widespread system of public
instruction was a necessity (R. 296). The money England had spent in poor-
relief he regarded as largely wasted, because it afforded no cure. In the
general education of a people the real solution lay. He said:
We have lavished immense sums on the poor, which we have every reason
to think have constantly tended to aggravate their misery,... It is
surely a great national disgrace that the education of the lowest
classes in England should be left to a few Sunday Schools, supported
by a subscription from individuals, who can give to the course of
instruction in them any kind of bias which they may please. (R 296.)
[Illustration: FIG. 184 REV. T. R. MALTHUS (1766-1834)]
Agreeing thoroughly with Adam Smith that a general diffusion of knowledge
was a safeguard to society, he urged the teaching of the elements of
political economy in the common schools to enable people to live better in
the new type of competitive society. [15]
In 1791-92 Thomas Paine published his widely read _Rights of Man_. He
expressed the French Revolutionary political theory, holding that
government, while capable of great good were its powers only properly
exercised, was, as organized, an evil. In a well-governed nation none
would be permitted to go uninstructed, he held, and he would cut off poor-
relief and make a state grant of £4 a year for every child under fourteen
for its education, and would compel parents to send all children to school
to learn reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Each of these three books had a long and a slowly cumulative influence,
and a small number of young and powerful champions of the idea of popular
education as a public charge began, early in the nineteenth century, to
urge action and to influence public opinion.
II. THE PERIOD OF PHILANTHROPIC EFFORT (1800-33)
CONDITIONS AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. This second period
in the history of the organization of English education begins with the
publication, in 1797, of Dr. Andrew Bell's _An Experiment in Education_,
describing his work in educating large numbers of children by means of the
so-called mutual system, at the Male Asylum at Madras, India. The period
properly ends with the first Parliamentary grant for education, in 1833.
In its main characteristics it belongs to the eighteenth rather than to
the nineteenth century, as the prominent educational movements of the
eighteenth (charity-schools, Sunday Schools, schools of industry) continue
strong throughout the period, and many new undertakings of a similar
charitable nature ("Ragged Schools"; associations for the improvement of
the condition of the poor, etc.) were begun.
The period--during and after the Napoleonic wars--was one of marked social
and political unrest, and of corresponding emphasis on social and
philanthropic service. The masses were discontented with their lot, and
were beginning to be with their lack of political privileges. Numerous
plans to quiet the unrest and improve conditions were proposed, of which
schemes to increase employment (industrial schools; evening schools), to
encourage thrift (savings banks; children's brigades), and to spread an
elementary and religious education (mutual schools; infant schools) that
would train the poor in self-help were the most prominent. "The Society
for Bettering the Condition and Increasing the Comforts of the Poor."
founded in 1796, became a very important early-nineteenth-century
institution. Branches were established all over England. Soup-kitchens,
clothing-stations, savings banks, and schools were among the chief lines
of activity. In particular it extended and improved Sunday Schools,
encouraged the formation of charity-schools and schools of industry, and
later gave much aid in establishing the new monitorial schools.
Educational interest steadily strengthened during the period, though as
yet along lines that were deemed relatively harmless, were inexpensive,
and were largely religious in character.
The eighteenth-century conception of education as a charity, designed
where given to train the poor to "an honest, upright, grateful, and
industrious poverty," still prevailed; there was as yet little thought of
education as designed to train the poor to think for and help themselves.
The eighteenth-century conception of the educational process, too, which
regarded education as something external and determined by adult standards
and needs, and to be imposed on the child from without, also continued.
The purpose of the school was to manufacture the standard man, and the
business of the teacher was to so organize and methodize instruction that
the necessary knowledge could be acquired as economically, from a
financial point of view, as possible. The Pestalozzian conception of
education as a development of the individual, according to the law of his
own nature, found but slow acceptance in England. Mental development,
scientific instruction, the habit of thinking, the exercise of judgment,
and free and enlightened opinion were ideas that found little favor there,
and hence had to be handled carefully by those who had caught the new
conception of the educational process.
In the political reaction following the end of Napoleon's rule the upper
and ruling classes of England, in common with those of continental lands,
became exceedingly suspicious of much education for the masses. To secure
contributions for schools it became necessary "to avow and plead how
little it was that the schools pretended or presumed to teach." [16]
England now experienced a great development of manufacturing and commerce,
a great material prosperity ensued, and the growing demand for education
was met by a counter-demand that the education provided should be
systematized, economical, and should not teach too much. Such a system of
training was now discovered and applied, in the form of mutual or
monitorial instruction, and was hailed as "a new expedient, parallel and
rival to the modern inventions in the mechanical departments."
[Illustration: FIG. 185. THE CREATORS OF THE MONITORIAL SYSTEM
REV. ANDREW BELL (1753-1832)
JOSEPH LANCASTER (1778-1838)]
ORIGIN OF MUTUAL OR MONITORIAL INSTRUCTION. In 1797 Dr. Andrew Bell, a
clergyman in the Established Church, published the results of his
experiment in the use of monitors in India. [17] The idea attracted
attention, and the plan was successfully introduced into a number of
charity-schools. About the same time (1798) a young Quaker schoolmaster,
Joseph Lancaster by name, was led independently to a similar discovery of
the advantages of using monitors, by reason of his needing assistance in
his school and being too poor to pay for additional teachers. In 1803 he
published an account of his plan. [18] The two plans were quite similar,
attracted attention from the first, and schools formed after one or the
other of the plans were soon organized all over England.
Increased attention was attracted to the new plans by a bitter church
quarrel which broke out as to who was the real originator of the idea,
[19] Bell being upheld by Church-of-England supporters, and Lancaster by
the Dissenters. In 1808 "The Royal Lancastrian Institution" was formed,
which in 1814 became "The British and Foreign School Society," to promote
Lancastrian schools. This society had the close support of King George
III, the Whigs, and the _Edinburgh Review_, while such liberals as
Brougham, Whitbread, and James Mill were on its board of directors. This
Society sent out Lancaster to expound his "truly British" system, and by
1810 as many as ninety-five Lancastrian schools had been established in
England. His model school in Borough Road, Southwark, which became a
training-school for teachers, is shown on the following page. Lancaster
was a poor manager; became involved in financial difficulties; and in 1818
left for the United States, where he spent the remainder of his life in
organizing such schools and expounding his system. For a time this
attracted wide attention, as we shall point out in the following chapter.
Lancaster's work stimulated the Church of England into activity, and in
1811 "The National Society for Promoting the Education of the Poor in the
Principles of the Established Church throughout England and Wales" was
formed by prominent S.P.C.K. (p. 449) members and Churchmen, with the
Archbishop of Canterbury as president. This Society was supported by the
Tories, the Established Church, and the _Quarterly Review_, and was formed
to promote the Bell system, [20] "which made religious instruction an
essential and necessary part of the plan." Within a month £15,000 had been
subscribed to establish schools. Among many other contributions were £500
each from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. A training-school for
teachers was organized; district societies were formed over England to
establish schools; and a system of organized aid was extended for both
buildings and maintenance. By 1831 there were 900,412 children receiving
instruction in the monitorial schools of the National Society alone.
[Illustration: Fig. 186. THE LANCASTRIAN MODEL SCHOOL IN BOROUGH ROAD,
SOUTHWARK, LONDON
This shows 365 pupils, seated for writing. The room was 40 x 90 feet in
size and contained 20 desks, each 25 feet long. The boys of each row were
divided into two "drafts" of from eight to ten, each in charge of a
monitor. Around the wall were 31 "stations," indicated by the semicircles
on the floor.]
The mutual-instruction idea spread to other lands--France, Belgium,
Holland, Denmark--and seems to have been tried even in German lands. In
France and Belgium it was experimented with for a time because of its
cheapness, but was soon discarded because of its defects. In Teutonic
lands, where the much better Pestalozzian ideas had become established,
the monitorial system made practically no headway. It was in the United
States, of all countries outside of England, that the idea met with most
ready acceptance.
[Illustration: FIG. 187. MONITORS TEACHING READING AT "STATIONS"
Three "drafts" of ten each, with their toes to the semicircles painted on
the floor, are being taught by monitors from lessons suspended on the
wall.]
THE SYSTEM OF MUTUAL OR MONITORIAL INSTRUCTION. The great merit, aside
from being cheap, of the mutual or monitorial system of instruction lay in
that it represented a marked advance in school organization over the older
individual method of instruction, with its accompanying waste of time and
schoolroom disorder. Under the individual method only a small number of
pupils could be placed under the control of one teacher, and the expense
for such instruction made general education almost prohibitive.
Pestalozzi, to be sure, had worked out in Switzerland the modern class-
system of instruction, and following developmental lines in teaching, but
of this the English were not only ignorant, but it called for a degree of
pedagogical skill which their teachers did not then possess. Bell and
Lancaster now evolved a plan whereby one teacher, assisted by a number of
the brighter pupils whom they designated as monitors, could teach from two
hundred to a thousand pupils in one school (R. 297). The picture of
Lancaster's London school (Figure 186) shows 365 pupils seated. [21] The
pupils were sorted into rows, and to each row was assigned a clever boy
(monitor) to act as an assistant teacher. A common number for each monitor
to look after was ten. The teacher first taught these monitors a lesson
from a printed card, and then each monitor took his row to a "station"
about the wall and proceeded to teach the other boys what he had just
learned. At first used only for teaching reading and the Catechism, the
plan was soon extended to the teaching of writing, arithmetic, and
spelling, and later on to instruction in higher branches. The system was
very popular from about 1810 to 1830, but by 1840 its popularity had
waned.
[Illustration: FIG. 188. PROPER MONITORIAL-SCHOOL POSITIONS
(From an engraved plate of 30 positions, in a Manual of the British and
Foreign School Society, London, 1831)]
Such schools were naturally highly organized, the organization being
largely mechanical (R. 298). Lancaster, in particular, was an organizing
genius. The _Manuals of Instruction_ gave complete directions for the
organization and management of monitorial schools, the details of
recitation work, use of apparatus, order, position of pupils at their
work, and classification being minutely laid down. By carefully studying
and following these directions any reasonably intelligent person could
soon learn to become a successful teacher in a monitorial school.
The schools, mechanical as they now seem, marked a great improvement over
the individual method upon which schoolmasters for centuries had wasted so
much of their own and their pupils' time. In place of earlier idleness,
inattention, and disorder, Bell and Lancaster introduced activity,
emulation, order, and a kind of military discipline which was of much
value to the type of children attending these schools. Lancaster's
biographer, Salmon, has written of the system that so thoroughly was the
instruction worked out that the teacher had only to organize, oversee,
reward, punish, and inspire:
When a child was admitted a monitor assigned him his class; while he
remained, a monitor taught him (with nine other pupils); when he was
absent, one monitor ascertained the fact, and another found out the
reason; a monitor examined him periodically, and, when he made progress, a
monitor promoted him; a monitor ruled the writing paper; a monitor had
charge of slates and books; and a monitor-general looked after all the
other monitors. Every monitor wore a leather ticket, gilded and lettered,
"Monitor of the First Class," "Reading Monitor of the Second Class," etc.
VALUE OF THE SYSTEM IN AWAKENING INTEREST. The monitorial system of
instruction, coming at the time it did, exerted a very important influence
in awakening interest in and a sentiment for schools. It increased the
number of people who possessed the elements of an education; made schools
much more talked about; and aroused thought and provoked discussion on the
question of education. It did much toward making people see the advantages
of a certain amount of schooling, and be willing to contribute to its
support. Under the plans previously in use education had been a slow and
an expensive process, because it had to be carried on by the individual
method of instruction, and in quite small groups. Under this new plan it
was now possible for one teacher to instruct 300, 400, 500, or more pupils
in a single room, and to do it with much better results in both learning
and discipline than the old type of schoolmaster had achieved.
All at once, comparatively, a new system had been introduced which not
only improved and popularized, but tremendously cheapened education. [22]
Lancaster, in his _Improvements in Education_, gave the annual cost of
schooling under his system as only seven shillings sixpence ($1.80) per
pupil, and this was later decreased to four shillings fivepence ($1.06) as
the school was increased to accommodate a thousand pupils. Under the Bell
system the yearly cost per pupil, in a school of five hundred, was only
four shillings twopence ($1.00), in 1814. In the United States,
Lancastrian schools cost from $1.22 per pupil in New York, in 1822, up to
$3.00 and $4.00 later on. At first begun as free schools, [23] the
expansion of effort was more rapid than the income from contributions, and
a small tuition fee was in time charged. Pupils were admitted at about the
age of seven, and might remain until thirteen or fourteen, though an
attendance of two years was considered "abundantly sufficient for any
boy." To prepare skilled masters and mistresses for the schools, girls
were provided for in many places--training or model schools were organized
by both the national societies, and these represent the beginnings of
normal-school training in England.
INFANT SCHOOLS. Another type of school which became of much importance in
England, and spread to other lands, was the Infant School. This owed its
origin to Robert Owen, proprietor of the cotton mills at New Lanark,
Scotland. Being of a philanthropic turn of mind, and believing that man
was entirely the product of circumstance and environment, he held that it
was not possible to begin too early in implanting right habits and forming
character. Poverty and crime, he believed, were results of errors in the
various systems of education and government. So plastic was child nature,
that society would be able to mould itself "into the very image of
rational wishes and desires." That "the infants of any one class in the
world may be readily formed into men of any other class," was a
fundamental belief of his.
[Illustration: FIG. 189 ROBERT OWEN (1771-1858)]
When he took charge of the mills at New Lanark (1799) he found the usual
wretched social conditions of the time. Children of five, six, and seven
years were bound out to the factory as apprentices (R. 242) for a period
of nine years. They worked as apprentices and helpers in the factories
twelve to thirteen hours a day, and at early manhood were turned free to
join the ignorant mass of the population. Owen sought to remedy this
condition. He accordingly opened schools which children might enter at
three years of age, receiving them into the schools almost as soon as they
were able to walk, and caring for them while their parents were at work.
Children under ten he forbade to work in the mills, and for these he
provided schools. The instruction for the children younger than six was to
be "whatever might be supposed useful that they could understand," and
much was made of singing, dancing, and play. Moral instruction was made a
prominent feature. By 1814 his work and his schools had become famous. In
1817 he published a plan for the organization of such industrial
communities as he conducted. In 1818 he visited Switzerland, and saw
Pestalozzi and Fellenberg.
In 1818 a number of Liberals--Brougham, James Mill, and others--combined
to establish an Infant School in London, importing a teacher from New
Lanark. The idea took root, was popularized, and the Infant School was
soon adopted as an integral part of their schools by both the British and
Foreign School Society (Lancastrians) and the National Society (Bell). In
1836 the "Home and Colonial Infant School Society" was formed to train
teachers for and to establish Infant Schools. One of the organizers of
this society was Charles Mayo who had worked with Pestalozzi at Yverdon
(R. 270), and through his influence much of the bookishness which had
crept in was removed and the better Pestalozzian procedure put in its
place.
Unlike the monitorial schools, the Infant Schools were based on the idea
of small-group work, and were usually conducted in harmony with the new
psychological conceptions of instruction which had been worked out by
Pestalozzi, and had by that time begun to be introduced into England. The
Infant-School idea came at an opportune time, as the defects of the
mechanical Lancastrian instruction were becoming evident and its
popularity was waning. It gave a new and a somewhat deeper philosophical
interpretation of the educational process, created a stronger demand than
had before been known for trained teachers, established a preference for
women teachers for primary work, and tended to give a new dignity to
teaching and school work by revealing something of a psychological basis
for the instruction of little children. It also contributed its share
toward awakening a sentiment for national action.
WORK OF THE EDUCATIONAL SOCIETIES. The work of the voluntary and
philanthropic educational societies in establishing schools and providing
teachers and instruction before the days of national schools was enormous.
[24] Though the State did nothing before 1833, and little before 1870, the
work of the educational societies was large and important. What was done
by the church societies alone may be seen from the following table:
STATISTICS AS TO 10,595 ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS FOUNDED BY THE RELIGIOUS
SOCIETIES (BRITISH CENSUS RETURNS, 1851)
The National
Society,
or British
Church and For- Indepen- Other
Total num- of eign dents, or Wesleyan Roman rel-
ber of England Schools Congrega- Method-Cathol- Bapt- gious
Date schools schools Society tionalists ists ics ists bodies
Before 1801 766 709 16 8 7 10
1801-1811 410 350 28 9 4 10
1811-1821 879 756 77 12 17 14
1821-1831 1,021 897 45 21 17 28
1831-1841 2,417 2,002 191 95 62 69
1841-1851 4,604 3,448 449 269 239 166
Not stated 498 409 46 17 17 14 131 331
Totals 10,595 8,571 852 431 363 311 131 331
After about 1820-25 the rising interest in elementary education expressed
itself in the formation of a number of additional societies, the more
important of which were:
1824. "London Infant School Society" founded by Brougham.
1826. "Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge" founded by
Brougham. The _Journal of Education_ begun.
1836. "Central Society of Education" founded.
1836. "Home and Colonial Infant Society" founded. Beginning of a
Pestalozzian Training College.
1837. "Educational Committee of the Wesleyan Conference" established.
1843. "Congregational Board of Education" formed.
1844. "Ragged School Union" founded.
1845. "Catholic Institute."
1847. The "Catholic Poor-School Committee."
1847. "Lancashire Public School Association" formed.
1850. The "National Public School Association."
1867. "Birmingham Education Aid Society."
1868. The Manchester Conference.
1869. Formation of "The League."
Some of these were formed to found and support schools, and some engaged
primarily in the work of propaganda in an effort to secure some national
action.
III. THE STRUGGLE FOR NATIONAL EDUCATION
THE PARLIAMENTARY STRUGGLE. During the whole of the eighteenth century
Parliament had enacted no legislation relating to elementary education,
aside from the one Act of 1767 for the education of pauper children in
London, and the freeing of elementary schools, Dissenters, and Catholics,
from inhibitions as to teaching. In the nineteenth century this attitude
was to be changed, though slowly, and after three quarters of a century of
struggle the beginnings of national education were finally to be made for
England, as they had by then for every other great nation. In 1870 the
"no-business-of-the-State" attitude toward the education of the people,
which had persisted from the days of the great Elizabeth, was finally and
permanently changed. The legislative battle began with the first Factory
Act [25] of 1802, Whitbread's Parochial Schools Bill [26] of 1807, and
Brougham's first Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry of 1816 (R. 291); it
finally culminated with the reform of the old endowed Grammar Schools by
the Act of 1869, the enactment of the Elementary Education Act of 1870 (R.
304), and the Act of 1871 freeing instruction in the universities from
religious restrictions (R. 305). The first of these enactments declared
clearly the right of the State to inquire into, reorganize, and redirect
the age-old educational foundations for secondary education; the second
made the definite though tardy beginnings of a national system of
elementary education for England; and the third opened up a university
career to the whole nation. The agitation and conflict of ideas was long
drawn out, and need not be traced in detail. The following tabulated
summary will give the main outlines of the struggle, and the selection on
"The Educational Traditions of England" (R. 306) gives a good brief
history of the long conflict.
THE PARLIAMENTARY STRUGGLE FOR NATIONAL EDUCATION IN ENGLAND
Dates Proposals, Reports, etc., and Results
1802 First Factory Act for regulating employment of children.
Adopted.
1807 Whitbread's Parochial Schools' Bill introduced.
Rejected by the House of Lords
1816 Brougham secured a Parliamentary Committee to enquire into the
state of education of the lower classes in London,
Westminster, and Southwark.
Report--130,000 children without school accommodations
[1818]. (R. 291.)
1818 Brougham secured a Committee of Inquiry on Educational
Charities.
No report until 1837.
1820 Bill introduced proposing a tax for schools and the granting
of Government aid in building schoolhouses.
Opposed by Dissenters and Catholics. Withdrawn. Brougham's
first Educational Bill.
1833 Government aid for building schoolhouses re-proposed.
£20,000 a year granted. (R. 299.) Distributed through the
two great Educational Societies
1834 Committee of Inquiry appointed.
No result beyond statistics.
1835 | Brougham introduced bills to organize a system of elementary
1837 | education. Bills failed of passage. Educational Inquiry
Committee appointed [1837].
1838 Committee report: the deplorable conditions existing Bill of
1839. Education Department created.
1839 Bill to increase the government grant to £30,000 and to allow
all Societies to share. Inspectors to be appointed.
Committee of Privy Council on Education established.
Bitter opposition. Carried. Much discussion as to
"undenominational education."
1841 Annual grant to establish schools of design in manufacturing
districts.
Voted.
1843 Sir Jas. Graham's Factory Bill.
Opposed by the Dissenters and defeated.
1843 Address to the Crown on condition of the working classes.
No parliamentary action.
1846 Yearly grant extended to the maintenance of schools.
Gradual increase in the yearly grants.
1846 Minute and Regulations on annual grants and pupil teachers.
Foundations of a system laid.
Pupil-teacher system definitely established. Certificates to
teach. Annual grant extended to maintenance.
1847 Government proposals for nationalizing education.
Carried despite violent religious opposition.
1850 Fox's Bill to make education free and compulsory.
Defeated.
1853 The Government proposed a small local rate in aid of schools.
Bill dropped after the first reading.
1853 Department of Science and Art created, and National Art
Training Schools established.
Promotion of elementary education in art and science,
particularly after 1859.
1855 Three educational Bills introduced. Local rate proposed.
Failure to agree. All withdrawn.
1856 Commons asked to declare in favor of rate aid and local
Boards. Two Educational Bills introduced.
First bill tabled. Second bill withdrawn. Education
Department formed.
1858 A Royal Commission to inquire into the state of popular
education in England asked for.
The Duke of Newcastle's Commission created. Its Report
published in 1861. (R. 303.)
1861 No acceptable scheme reported. Code of 1861 proposed.
No advance. "Payment by results" began [1862]. Code adopted.
1864 Schools Inquiry Commission appointed on endowed schools.
Report of the Schools Inquiry Commission in 1867.
1866 Report of a Select Committee of the House of Commons on
Education.
1867 The Government introduced proposals as to education.
Voted down.
1868 Government Bill proposing changes in distribution and larger
grants.
Parliament adjourned without action.
1869 Endowed Schools' Act passed.
1869 Two Educational Bills introduced.
Withdrawn at the request of the Government.
1870 The Elementary Education Act of 1870 introduced.
Much amended and passed. (R. 304.) Beginning of a National
system of education.
1871 Religious Tests at universities withdrawn (R. 305).