development of my mind; and I will therefore pass quickly forward, just
mentioning that from this time for six years onwards, during which I
thrice completely changed the conditions of my life,[96] I held most
earnestly by this same temper of mind and this same endeavour; and
although I still always lived in isolation as to my personal inner life,
yet I was at many points in full contact with the brisk mental effort
and activity of that stirring time (1805 to 1810), as regards teaching,
philosophy, history, politics, and natural science.[97]
But the nobler, the more varied, the more animating was the life
surrounding me, and the more I found all without me, as also all within
me, striving and tending towards harmony and unity, by so much the less
could I longer be restrained from seeking out this unity, even should it
be at the sacrifice of all that was dear to me, if need were for that. I
was impelled to seek to develop this unity all bright and living within
my own soul, and to contemplate it in definite, clear, and independent
form, so that finally I might be able to set it forth in my actual life
with sureness and certainty.
After nine years' interval I visited the university a second time; first
(spring of 1810) at Göttingen, and then a year and a half later (autumn
of 1811) at Berlin.[98]
I now began to pursue the study of languages. The linguistic treasures
which recent discoveries had brought us from Asia excited my deepest
interest wherever I came into contact with them.
But in general the means of acquiring languages were too lifeless, too
wanting in connection to be of any use to me; and the effort to work
them out afresh in my own way, soon led me to a renewed study of Nature.
Nature held me henceforth so fast that for years I was chained
uninterruptedly to her study, though truly languages went on as a
side-study during the time. Yet it was not as separate entities that I
considered the phenomena I was working at; rather was it as parts of the
great whole of natural life, and this also I regarded as reposing in one
supreme unity together with all mankind; Nature and man, the two
opposite mutually casting light upon each other and mirroring each
other.
After the German war of the spring of 1813 had interrupted my studies at
Berlin, and I had made acquaintance with a soldier's life, its need, and
its habits in Lützow's corps, I returned in 1814 to my studies and to a
scientific public post in Berlin. The care, the arrangement, and in part
the investigation and explanation of crystals were the duties of my
office. Thus I reached at last the central point of my life and
life-aim, where productiveness and law, life, nature, and mathematics
united all of them in the fixed crystalline form, where a world of
symbols offered itself to the inner eye of the mind; for I was
appointed assistant to Weiss at the mineralogical museum of the Berlin
University.[99]
For a long time it was my endeavour and my dearest wish to devote myself
entirely to an academical career, which then appeared to me as my true
vocation and the only solution of the riddle of my life; but the
opportunities I had of observing the natural history students of that
time, their very slight knowledge of their subject, their deficiency of
perceptive power, their still greater want of the true scientific
spirit, warned me back from this plan. On the other hand, the need of
man for a life worthy of his manhood and of his species pressed upon me
with all the more force, and, therefore, teaching and education again
asserted themselves vigorously as the chief subjects occupying my
thoughts. Consequently I was only able to keep my mind contented with
the duties of my post for two years; and, meanwhile, the stones in my
hand and under my eyes turned to living, speaking forms. The
crystal-world, in symbolic fashion, bare unimpeachable witness to me,
through its brilliant unvarying shapes, of life and of the laws of human
life, and spake to me with silent yet true and readable speech of the
real life of the world of mankind.
Leaving everything else, sacrificing everything else,[100] I was driven
back upon the education of man, driven also to my refuge in Nature,
wherein as in a mirror I saw reflected the laws of the development of
being, which laws I was now to turn to account for the education of my
race. My task was to educate man in his true humanity, to educate man
in his absolute being, according to the universal laws of all
development.[101] Therefore, leaving Berlin, and laying down my office,
I began late in the autumn of 1816 that educational work which, though
it still takes its impulse from me and exists under my leadership, yet
in its deepest nature is self-sufficient and self-conditioned.
Although I was not perhaps then capable of putting my convictions into
words, I at once realised this work in my own mind as comprehensive and
world-embracing in its nature, as an everlasting work to be evermore
performed for the benefit of the whole human race; yet I nevertheless
linked it, and for this very reason, to my own personal life; that is,
since I had no children of my own, I took to me my dear nephews whom I
most deeply loved, in order through them and with them to work out
blessings for my home and my native land, for Schwarzburg and Thuringia,
and so for the whole wide Fatherland itself.[102] The eternal
principles of development, as I recognised them within me, would have
it thus and not otherwise.
Timidly, very timidly, did I venture to call my work by the title of
"German," or "Universal German" education; and, indeed, I struck that
out from one of my manuscripts, although it was precisely the name
required to start with as it expressed the broad nature of my proposed
institution. An appeal to the general public to become thorough _men_
seemed to me too grandiose, too liable to be misunderstood, as, indeed,
in the event, it only too truly proved; but to become thorough Germans,
so I thought, would seem to them something in earnest, something worth
the striving for, especially after such hard and special trials as had
recently been endured by the German nation.
With your penetrating judgment you quarrelled with that term "German
education;" but, after all, even the appeal to be made thorough Germans
proved to be too grandiose and liable to be misunderstood. For every one
said "German? Well, I _am_ German, and have been so from my birth, just
as a mushroom is a mushroom;[103] what, then, do I want with education
to teach me to be a thorough German?" What would these worthy people
have said, had I asked them to train themselves to become thorough men?
Now had I planned my educational institute altogether differently, had I
offered to train a special class, body-servants, footmen or housemaids,
shoemakers or tailors, tradesmen or merchants, soldiers or even
noblemen, then should I have gained fame and glory for the great
usefulness and practical nature of my institution, for certain; and
surely all men would have hastened to acknowledge it as an important
matter, and as a thing to be adequately supported by the State. I should
have been held as the right man in the right place by the State and by
the world; and so much the more because as a State-machine I should have
been engaged in cutting out and modelling other State-machines. But I--I
only wanted to train up free, thinking, independent men! Now who wants
to be, or who cares to suffer another to be, a free-thinking,
independent man? If it was folly to talk about educating persons as
Germans, what was it to talk about educating them as men? The education
of Germans was felt to be something extraordinary and farfetched; the
education of men was a mere shadow, a deceitful image, a blind
enthusiasm.[104]
From this digression I now return, to continue my attempt at making
myself known to you, as far as is possible, in a letter; by which I mean
my real inner self, as manifested in my endeavours and my hopes.
Permit me, therefore, to go a step nearer towards what lies deepest in
my soul, at least that of it which is communicable to another person. I
have started by stating my position from the side of knowledge, now let
me state it also from another side. My experience, especially that
gained by repeated residences at the university, had taught me beyond a
doubt that the method of education hitherto in use, especially where it
involved learning by rote, and where it looked at subjects simply from
the outside or historically, and considered then capable of
apprehension by mere exercise work, dulled the edge of all high true
attainment, of all real mental insight, of all genuine progress in
scientific culture, of self-contemplation, and thus of all real
knowledge, and of the acquisition of truth through knowledge. I might
almost go further, and say that its tendency was towards rendering all
these worthy objects impossible.
Therefore, I was firmly convinced, as of course I still am, that the
whole former educational system, even that which had received
improvement, ought to be exactly reversed, and regarded from a
diametrically opposite point of view--namely, that of a system of
development. I answered those who kept asking what it was that I really
did want after all, with this sentence: "I want the exact opposite of
what now serves as educational method and as teaching-system in
general." I was, and am, completely convinced, that after this fashion
alone genuine knowledge and absolute truth, by right the universal
possessions of mankind, shall find once again, not alone single students
here and there, but the vast majority of all our true-hearted young men
and of our professors spreading far and wide the elements of a noble
humanised life. To bring this into a practical scheme I held to be my
highest duty, a duty which I could never evade, and one which I could
never shake off, since a man cannot shake off his own nature.
Our greatest teachers, even Pestalozzi himself not excepted, seemed to
me too bare, too empirical,[105] and arbitrary, and therefore not
sufficiently scientific in their principles--that is, not sufficiently
led by the laws of our being; they seemed to me in no wise to recognise
the Divine element in science, to feel its worth, and to cherish it.
Therefore I thought and hoped, with the courage and inexperience of
youth, that all scientific and learned men, that the universities, in
one word, would immediately recognise the purport of my efforts, and
would strive with all their might to encourage me by word and deed.
In this I was egregiously mistaken; nevertheless I am not ashamed of the
error. But few persons raised their voices for me or against me; and,
indeed, your article in the _Isis_ is the single sun-ray which really
generously warmed and enlightened my life and lifework. Enough! the
Universities paid no heed to the simple schoolmaster.[106] As to the
"able editors," they, in their reviews, thought very differently from
me; but why should I trouble myself further with remembering their
performances, which were written simply with the object of degrading me
and my work? They never succeeded in shaking my convictions in the
least.
I regard the simple course of development, proceeding from analysis to
synthesis, which characterises pure reasoned thought, as also the
natural course of the development of every human being. Such a course of
development, exactly opposite to the path taken by the old-fashioned
methods of education, I now see mankind about to enter upon; nay, it has
been actually entered upon already in a few single cases, though these
cases are almost unknown and therefore unregarded; and with this new
course of development a new period is to begin, a new age for all
mankind, and therefore in the higher inner sense a new world; a world,
perceiving and understanding, perceived and understood; a world of
crystal clearness, creating an altogether new life for science, and
carrying onward therefore the true science, that is, the science of
being, and all that is founded upon this and conditioned by this.[107]
I may image forth the position of my educational establishment with
regard to the universities, under the figure of family life.
In a healthily constituted family it is the mother who first cares for,
watches over, and develops the child, teaches him to "read, mark, learn,
and inwardly digest," deriving everything she teaches from its central
unity, and gathering up her teaching into that unity again.
The father receives his son from the hand and the heart of the mother;
with his soul already full of true active life, of desire for the
knowledge of causes and effects, for the understanding of the whole and
its ramifications; with his mind open to the truth and his eyes to the
light, and with a perpetually nourished yearning for creative activity,
able to observe while building up, and to recognise while taking apart;
such in himself and his surroundings, always active, creative, full of
thought and endeavour, does the father receive his son in his home, to
train and teach him for the wider life outside. Thus should it be with
my educational institute and the universities; as regards the growth and
development of man I only desire to take the place of the silently
working, tenderly cherishing mother.
The life, the will, the understanding, these three must form the common
chord or triad of the harmony of human life, now one tone, now another,
now two of the three, rising powerfully above the rest. But where these
tones are separate and inharmonious there they work to discord, as we
see but too clearly in daily life:--
"Wrestling with life and with death, suspended between them we
hang."
In whatever family this chord is from the first set sweetly in tune, its
pure concords uniting to form the fundamental harmony of existence,
there all the hobgoblins of ordinary life, which even yet often unite to
annoy us, will be driven far away, there will joy and peace perpetually
inhabit, there will heaven descend to earth and earth rise up to heaven;
to a heaven, moreover, as full of contentment, as responsive to every
yearning of the soul as ever the Church has painted.
But since all true and earnest life must arise from and return to the
ideal life, to life in itself, so must a school of development, which is
to lead men, by means of their ordinary life, towards that higher life,
be itself a true school of religious training in the most comprehensive
sense of the word.
Man ought not to be contented with teaching merely directed to satisfy
his needs as a child of earth, but must demand and receive from
education a true foundation, a creative, satisfying preparation for all
the grades of development of nature and the world which mankind
encounters, and for the everlasting here and beyond of each new moment
of existence, for the everlasting rest, the everlasting activity, the
everlasting life in God.
As, however, it is only as a Christian, be he consciously or
unconsciously so, baptised or unbaptised, taking the Christian name or
rejecting it, that he can think and act after this fashion, you can see
at once the reason why my system of education feels itself to be, and in
fact claims to be, an education after the true spirit, and following the
precepts of Jesus Christ.
Through love, mutual faith, and a common aim towards acquiring,
manifesting, and acting out knowledge, there has grown up round me a
little company of men bound together by beautiful human bonds, the like
of which you would with difficulty find elsewhere. In your last letter
you desired to have some account of these friends and members of my
household. I will describe them for you.
But if my account is to be anything more than a lifeless list of names,
and if, though it cannot be the closely-branched tree of life which
actually exists, it is at least to come as near it as a garland or a
nosegay to the tree, you must permit me to go back a little into my past
life; for out of the self-same spirit, whence arose my own endeavours
and which gave its direction to my own life, arose also the circle of
those friends who are now so closely united with me.
The German war of 1813, in which so much seed-corn was sowed that
perhaps only the smaller part of it has yet sprung up, to say nothing of
blossoming and fruitage, sowed also the seed whence sprang the first
beginnings of our association, and of our harmonious circle. In April
1813 Jahn led me and other Berlin students to meet my future comrades in
arms, Lützow's "Black Troop;" we went from Berlin to Dresden, and thence
for the most part to Leipzig. On this march Jahn made me acquainted
before we reached Meissen with another Berlin student, Heinrich
Langethal, of Erfurt, as a fellow-countryman of mine; and Langethal
introduced me to his friend and fellow-student in theology, Middendorff,
of Brechten, near Dortmund.[108]
A wonderfully lovely spring evening spent together by the friendly
shores of Elbe, and a visit to the magnificent Cathedral of Meissen,
brought me nearer to these and other comrades; but it was the pleasant
banks of Havel at Havelberg, the charming situation of the grand
cathedral, the "Rhine Travels" of Georg Forster, a common love for
nature, and above all a common eager yearning for higher culture that
bound us three for ever together.[109]
The war in all its exhilaration and depression, its privation and
pleasure, its transient and its permanent aspects, flowed on; sometimes
nearer to us, sometimes further away. In August 1814 I was released from
service, and returned to Berlin, there to enter upon the post[110] at
the University Museum, which I have already mentioned.
Soon after, quite unexpectedly, I ran against my friends again, who had
come back to Berlin to finish their studies. After being somewhat
separated by the nature of our work, they as eagerly studying theology
as I did natural science, our common need and inner aspiration brought
us once more together. They had taken some private teaching, and were
frequently driven to seek my counsel and instruction by the difficulties
of their new position. When the war broke out afresh in 1815,
Middendorff had been living for several months previously with me as
room companion. Thus had life thrown us closely together, so that I
could see each one exactly as he was, in all his individuality, with his
qualities and his deficiencies, with what he could contribute, and what
he would have to receive from others.
In October 1816 I left my post, and quitted Berlin, without as yet
confiding to any one exactly what outward aim I had in view, simply
saying that I would write and give some account of myself as soon as I
had found what I set out to seek. In November of the same year my dearly
loved brother,[111] the eldest now living, whom I made my confidant so
far as that was possible, and who was at that time a manufacturer at
Osterode in the Harz district, gave me his two sons to educate. They
were his only sons, though not his only children; two boys of six and
eight years old respectively. With these boys I set out for a village on
the Urn called Griesheim, and there I added to my little family, first
two, then a third, that is, altogether three other nephews, the orphan
sons of my late dearest brother,[112] he who had always best sympathised
with me through life. He had been minister at Griesheim, and his widow
still lived there. He had died of hospital fever in 1813, just after the
cessation of the war. I reckon, therefore, the duration of my present
educational work from November 16th, 1816.
Already I had written from Osterode to Middendorff at Berlin, inviting
him and Langethal to join me and help in working out a system of life
and education worthy of _man_. It was only possible for Middendorff to
reach me by April 1817, and Langethal could not arrive until even the
following September. The latter, however, sent me, by Middendorff, his
brother, a boy of eleven years old;[113] so that I now had six pupils.
In June of the same year (1817) family reasons caused me to move from
Griesheim to this place, Keilhau.[114] Next came other pupils also, with
Langethal's arrival in September. My household was growing fast, and yet
I had no house of my own. In a way only comprehensible to Him Who knows
the workings of the mind, I managed by November to get the school that I
now occupy built as a frame-house, but without being in possession of
the ground it stood on.
I pass over the space of a year, which was nevertheless so rich in
experiences of trouble and joy, of times when we were cast down, and
other times when we were lifted up, that its description would easily
fill many times the space even of this long letter. In June of the
following year I became in the most remarkable way possessor of the
little farm which I still hold, in Keilhau, and thus for the first time
possessor also of the land upon which the schoolhouse had already been
erected.[115] As yet there were no other buildings there.
In September 1818 I brought to the household, still further increased,
and now so rich with children and brothers, its _housewife_, in the
person of a lady whom a like love of Nature and of childhood with my
own, and a like high and earnest conception of education, as the
preparation for a life worthy of man, had drawn towards me. She was
accompanied by a young girl whom she had some time before adopted as a
daughter, and who now came with her to assist her in the duties of the
household.[116]
We had now a severe struggle for existence for the whole time up to
1820. With all our efforts we never could get the school house enlarged;
other still more necessary buildings had to be erected first, under
pressing need for them.[117] In the year 1820, on Ascension Day, my
brother from Osterode, whose two sons were already my pupils, came to
join me with his whole family and all his possessions; urged by his
love for his boys, and a wish to help in the advancement of my life's
purpose. As my brother, beyond the two sons I have mentioned, had three
daughters, my family was increased by five persons through his
arrival.[118]
The completion of the school-house was now pushed on with zeal; but it
was 1822 before we got it finished. Our life from this point becomes so
complex that it is impossible to do more than just mention what applies
to the Association formed by our still united members.
In 1823, Middendorff's sister's son Barop, till then a divinity
student in Halle, visited us; and he was so impressed by the whole
work that he was irresistibly driven soon afterwards to join us in our
life-task.[119] Since 1823, with the exception of such breaks as his
work in life demanded, he has been uninterruptedly one of our community,
sharing in our work. At this moment[120] he is in Berlin, serving his
one year with the colours as a volunteer, and devoting what time he has
to spare, to earnest study, especially that of natural science. We hope
to have him back with us next spring. In the autumn of 1825 Langethal
became engaged to my wife's adopted daughter, who had come with her from
Berlin; and Middendorff became engaged to my brother's eldest daughter.
Ascension Day 1826 was the wedding-day for both couples. Heaven blessed
each marriage with a daughter, but took back to itself the little one of
Langethal.