§ 85. Perception, as the beginning of intellectual culture, is the free
grasping of a content immediately present to the spirit. Education can
do nothing directly toward the performance of this act; it can only
assist in making it easy:--(1) it can isolate the subject of
consideration; (2) it can give facility in the transition to another;
(3) it can promote the many-sidedness of the interest, by which means
the return to a perception already obtained has always a fresh charm.
§ 86. The immediate perception of many things is impossible, and yet
the necessity for it is obvious. We must then have recourse to a
mediated perception, and supply the lack of actual seeing by
representations. But here the difficulty presents itself, that there are
many objects which we are not able to represent of the same size as they
really are, and we must have a reduced scale; and there follows a
difficulty in making the representation, as neither too large nor too
small. An explanation is then also necessary as a judicious supplement
to the picture.
§ 87. Pictures are extremely valuable aids to instruction when they are
correct and characteristic. Correctness must be demanded in these
substitutes for natural objects, historical persons and scenes. Without
this correctness, the picture, if not an impediment, is, to say the
least, useless.
--It is only since the last half of the seventeenth century, i.e. since
the disappearance of real painting, that the picture-book has appeared
as an educational means; first of all, coming from miniature painting.
Up to that time, public life had plenty of pictures of arms, furniture,
houses, and churches; and men, from their fondness for constantly moving
about, were more weary of immediate perception. It was only afterwards
when, in the excitement of the thirty-years' war, the arts of Sculpture
and Painting and Christian and Pagan Mythology became extinct, that
there arose a greater necessity for pictured representations. The _Orbis
Rerum Sensualium Pictus_, which was also to be _janua linguarum
reserata_, of Amos Comenius, appeared first in 1658, and was reprinted
in 1805. Many valuable illustrated books followed. Since that time
innumerable illustrated Bibles and histories have appeared, but many of
them look only to the pecuniary profit of the author or the publisher.
It is revolting to see the daubs that are given to children. They are
highly colored, but as to correctness, to say nothing of character, they
are good for nothing. With a little conscientiousness and scientific
knowledge very different results could be obtained with the same outlay
of money and of strength. The uniformity which exists in the stock of
books which German book-selling has set in circulation is really
disgraceful. Everywhere we find the same types, even in ethnographical
pictures. In natural history, the illustrations were often drawn from
the imagination or copied from miserable models. This has changed very
much for the better. The same is true of architectural drawings and
landscapes, for which we have now better copies.--
§ 88. Children have naturally a desire to collect things, and this may
be so guided that they shall collect and arrange plants, butterflies,
beetles, shells, skeletons, &c., and thus gain exactness and reality in
their perception. Especially should they practise drawing, which leads
them to form exact images of objects. But drawing, as children practise
it, does not have the educational significance of cultivating in them an
appreciation of art, but rather that of educating the eye, as this must
be exercised in estimating distances, sizes, and colors. It is,
moreover, a great gain in many ways, if, through a suitable course of
lessons in drawing, the child is advanced to a knowledge of the
elementary forms of nature.
--That pictures should affect children as works of art is not to be
desired. They confine themselves at first to distinguishing the outlines
and colors, and do not yet appreciate the execution. If the children
have access to real works of art, we may safely trust in their power,
and quietly await their moral or æsthetic effect.--
§ 89. In order that looking at pictures shall not degenerate into mere
diversion, explanations should accompany them. Only when the thought
embodied in the illustration is pointed out, can they be useful as a
means of instruction. Simply looking at them is of as little value
towards this end as is water for baptism without the Holy Spirit. Our
age inclines at present to the superstition that man is able, by means
of simple intuition, to attain a knowledge of the essence of things, and
thereby dispense with the trouble of thinking. Illustrations are the
order of the day, and, in the place of enjoyable descriptions, we find
miserable pictures. It is in vain to try to get behind things, or to
comprehend them, except by thinking.
§ 90. The ear as well as the eye must be cultivated. Music must be
considered the first educational means to this end, but it should be
music inspired by ethical purity. Hearing is the most internal of all
the senses, and should on this account be treated with the greatest
delicacy. Especially should the child be taught that he is not to look
upon speech as merely a vehicle for communication and for gaining
information; it should also give pleasure, and therefore he should be
taught to speak distinctly and with a good style, and this he can do
only when he carefully considers what he is going to say.
--Among the Greeks, extraordinary care was given to musical cultivation,
especially in its ethical relation. Sufficient proof of this is found in
the admirable detailed statements on this point in the "Republic" of
Plato and in the last book of the "Politics" of Aristotle. Among modern
nations, also, music holds a high place, and makes its appearance as a
constant element of education. Piano-playing has become general, and
singing is also taught. But the ethical significance of music is too
little considered. Instruction in music often aims only to train pupils
for display in society, and the tendency of the melodies which are
played is restricted more and more to orchestral pieces of an exciting
or bacchanalian character. The railroad-gallop-style only makes the
nerves of youth vibrate with stimulating excitement. Oral speech, the
highest form of the personal manifestation of mind, was also treated
with great reverence by the ancients. Among us, communication is so
generally carried on by writing and reading, that the art of speaking
distinctly, correctly, and agreeably, has become very much neglected.
Practice in declamation accomplishes, as a general thing, very little in
this direction. But we may expect that the increase of public speaking
occasioned by our political and religious assemblies may have a
favorable influence in this particular.--