§ 122. Now that we have learned something of the relation of the teacher
to the taught, and of the process of learning itself, we must examine
the mode and manner of instruction. This may have (1) the character of
contingency: the way in which our immediate existence in the world, our
life, teaches us; or it may be given (2) by the printed page; or (3) it
may take the shape of formal oral instruction.
§ 123. (1) For the most, the best, and the mightiest things that we know
we are indebted to Life itself. The sum of perceptions which a human
being absorbs into himself up to the fourth or fifth year of his life is
incalculable; and after this time we involuntarily gain by immediate
contact with the world countless ideas. But especially we understand by
the phrase "the School of Life," the ethical knowledge which we gain by
what happens in our own lives.
--If one says, _Vitæ non scholæ discendum est_, one can also say, _Vita
docet_. Without the power exercised by the immediate world our
intelligence would remain abstract and lifeless.--
§ 124. (2) What we learn through books is the opposite of that which we
learn through living. Life _forces_ upon us the knowledge it has to
give; the book, on the contrary, is entirely passive. It is locked up in
itself; it cannot be altered; but it waits by us till we wish to use it.
We can read it rapidly or slowly; we can simply turn over its
leaves--what in modern times one calls reading;--we can read it from
beginning to end or from end to beginning; we can stop, begin again,
skip over passages, or cut them short, as we like. To this extent the
book is the most _convenient_ means for instruction. If we are indebted
to Life for our perceptions, we must chiefly thank books for our
understanding of our perceptions. We call book-instruction "dead" when
it lacks, for the exposition which it gives, a foundation in our
perceptions, or when we do not add to the printed description the
perceptions which it implies; and the two are quite different.
§ 125. Books, as well as life, teach us many things which we did not
previously intend to learn directly from them. From foreign romances
e.g. we learn, first of all, while we read them for entertainment, the
foreign language, history or geography, &c. We must distinguish from
such books as those which bring to us, as it were accidentally, a
knowledge for which we were not seeking, the books which are expressly
intended to instruct. These must (_a_) in their consideration of the
subject give us the principal results of any department of knowledge,
and denote the points from which the next advance must be made, because
every science arises at certain results which are themselves again new
problems; (_b_) in the consideration of the particulars it must be
exhaustive, i.e. no essential elements of a science must be omitted. But
this exhaustiveness of execution has different meanings according to the
stand-points of those for whom it is made. How far we shall pass from
the universality of the principal determinations into the multiplicity
of the Particular, into the fulness of detail, cannot be definitely
determined, and must vary, according to the aim of the book, as to
whether it is intended for the apprentice, the journeyman, or the
master; (_c_) the expression must be precise, i.e. the maximum of
clearness must be combined with the maximum of brevity.
--The writing of a text-book is on this account one of the most
difficult tasks, and it can be successfully accomplished only by those
who are masters in a science or art, and who combine with great culture
and talent great experience as teachers. Unfortunately many dabblers in
knowledge undervalue the difficulty of writing text-books because they
think that they are called upon to aid in the spread of science, and
because the writing of compendiums has thus come to be an avocation, so
that authors and publishers have made out of text-books a profitable
business and good incomes. In all sciences and arts there exists a
quantity of material which is common property, which is disposed of now
in one way, now in another. The majority of compendiums can be
distinguished from each other only by the kind of paper, printing, the
name of the publisher or bookseller, or by arbitrary changes in the
arrangement and execution. The want of principle with which this work is
carried on is incredible. Many governments have on this account fixed
prices for text-books, and commissioners to select them. This in itself
is right and proper, but the use of any book should be left optional, so
that the one-sidedness of a science patronized by government as it were
patented, may not be created through the pressure of such introduction.
A state may through its censorship oppose poor text-books, and recommend
good ones; but it may not establish as it were a state-science, a
state-art, in which only the ideas, laws and forms sanctioned by it
shall be allowed. The Germans are fortunate, in consequence of their
philosophical criticism, in the production of better and better
text-books, among which may be mentioned Koberstein's, Gervinus', and
Vilmar's Histories of Literature, Ellendt's General History,
Blumenbach's and Burmeister's Natural History, Marheineke's text-book on
Religion, Schwegler's History of Philosophy, &c. So much the more
unaccountable is it that, with such excellent books, the evil of such
characterless books, partly inadequate and partly in poor style, should
still exist when there is no necessity for it. The common style of
paragraph-writing has become obnoxious, under the name of
Compendium-style, as the most stiff and affected style of writing.--
§ 126. A text-book must be differently written according as it is
intended for a book for private study or for purposes of general
circulation. If the first, it must give more, and must develop more
clearly the internal relations; if the second, it should be shorter, and
proceed from axiomatic and clear postulates to their signification, and
these must have an epigrammatic pureness which should leave something to
be guessed. Because for these a commentary is needed which it is the
teacher's duty to supply, such a sketch is usually accompanied by the
fuller text-book which was arranged for private study.
--It is the custom to call the proper text-book the "small" one, and
that which explains and illustrates, the "large" one. Thus we have the
Small and the Large Gervinus, &c.--
§ 127. (3) The text-book which presupposes oral explanation forms the
transition to Oral instruction itself. Since speech is the natural and
original form in which mind manifests itself, no book can rival it. The
living word is the most powerful agent of instruction. However common
and cheap printing may have rendered books as the most convenient means
of education--however possible may have become, through the
multiplication of facilities for intercourse and the rapidity of
transportation, the immediate viewing of human life, the most forcible
educational means, nevertheless the living word still asserts its
supremacy. In two cases especially is it indispensable: one is when some
knowledge is to be communicated which as yet is found in no compendium,
and the other when a living language is to be taught, for in this case
the printed page is entirely inadequate. One can learn from books to
understand Spanish, French, English, Danish, &c., but not to speak them;
to do this he must hear them, partly that his ear may become accustomed
to the sounds, partly that his vocal organs may learn correctly to
imitate them.
§ 128. Life surprises and overpowers us with the knowledge which it
gains; the book, impassive, waits our convenience; the teacher, superior
to us, perfectly prepared in comparison with us, consults our necessity,
and with his living speech uses a gentle force to which we can yield
without losing our freedom. Listening is easier than reading.
--Sovereigns e.g. seldom read themselves, but have servants who read to
them.--
§ 129. Oral instruction may (1) give the subject, which is to
be learned, in a connected statement, or (2) it may unfold it by means
of question and answer. The first decidedly presupposes the theoretical
inequality of the teacher and the taught. Because one can speak while
many can listen, this is especially adapted to the instruction of large
numbers. The second method is either that of the catechism or the
dialogue. The catechetical is connected with the first kind of oral
instruction above designated because it makes demand upon the memory of
the learner only for the answer to one question at a time, and is hence
very often and very absurdly called the Socratic method. In teaching by
means of the dialogue, we try, by means of a reciprocal interchange of
thought, to solve in common some problem, proceeding according to the
necessary forms of reason. But in this we can make a distinction. One
speaker may be superior to the rest, may hold in his own hand the thread
of the conversation and may guide it himself; or, those who mingle in it
may be perfectly equal in intellect and culture, and may each take part
in the development with equal independence. In this latter case, this
true reciprocity gives us the proper dramatic dialogue, which contains
in itself all forms of exposition, and may pass from narration,
description, and analysis, through satire and irony, to veritable humor.
When it does this, the dialogue is the loftiest result of intelligence
and the means of its purest enjoyment.
--This alternate teaching, in which the one who has been taught takes
the teacher's place, can be used only where there is a content which
admits of a mechanical treatment. The Hindoos made use of it in very
ancient times. Bell and Lancaster have transplanted it for the teaching
of poor children in Europe and America. For the teaching of the
conventionalities--reading, writing, and arithmetic--as well as for the
learning by heart of names, sentences, &c., it suffices, but not for any
scientific culture. Where we have large numbers to instruct, the giving
of the fully developed statement (the first form) is necessary, since
the dialogue, though it may be elsewhere suitable, allows only a few to
take part in it. And if we take the second form, we must, if we have a
large number of pupils, make use of the catechetical method only. What
is known as the conversational method has been sometimes suggested for
our university instruction. Diesterweg in Berlin insists upon it. Here
and there the attempt has been made, but without any result. In the
university, the lecture of the teacher as a self-developing whole is
contrasted with the scientific discussion of the students, in which they
as equals work over with perfect freedom what they have heard.
Diesterweg was wrong in considering the lecture-system as the principal
cause of the lack of scientific interest which he thought he perceived
in our universities. Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Schleiermacher, Wolf,
Niebuhr, &c., taught by lectures and awakened the liveliest enthusiasm.
But Diesterweg is quite right in saying that the students should not be
degraded to writing-machines. But this is generally conceded, and a
pedantic amount of copying more and more begins to be considered as out
of date at our universities. Nevertheless, a new pedantry, that of the
wholly extempore lecture, should not be introduced; but a brief summary
of the extempore unfolding of the lecture may be dictated and serve a
very important purpose, or the lecture may be copied. The great efficacy
of the oral exposition does not so much consist in the fact that it is
perfectly free, as that it presents to immediate view a person who has
made himself the bearer of a science or an art, and has found what
constitutes its essence. Its power springs, above all, from the
genuineness of the lecture, the originality of its content, and the
elegance of its form: whether it is written or extemporized, is a matter
of little moment. Niebuhr e.g. read, word for word, from his manuscript,
and what a teacher was he!--The catechetical way of teaching is not
demanded at the university except in special examinations; it belongs to
the private work of the student, who must learn to be industrious of his
own free impulse. The private tutor can best conduct reviews.--The
institution which presupposing the lecture-system combines in itself
original production with criticism, and the connected exposition with
the conversation, is the _seminary_. It pursues a well-defined path, and
confines itself to a small circle of associates whose grades of culture
are very nearly the same. Here, therefore, can the dialogue be strongly
developed because it has a fixed foundation, and each one can take part
in the conversation; whereas, from the variety of opinions among a great
number, it is easily perverted into an aimless talk, and the majority of
the hearers, who have no chance to speak, become weary.--
§ 130. As to the way in which the lecture is carried out, it may be so
arranged as to give the whole stock of information acquired, or, without
being so exact and so complete, it may bring to its elucidation only a
relatively inexact and general information. The ancients called the
first method the esoteric and the second the exoteric, as we give to
such lectures now, respectively, the names _scholastic_ and _popular_.
The first makes use of terms which have become technical in science or
art, and proceeds syllogistically to combine the isolated ideas; the
second endeavors to substitute for technicalities generally understood
signs, and conceals the exactness of the formal conclusion by means of a
conversational style. It is possible to conceive of a perfectly
methodical treatment of a science which at the same time shall be
generally comprehensible if it strives to attain the transparency of
real beauty. A scientific work of art may be correctly said to be
popular, as e.g. has happened to Herder's _Ideas on the Philosophy of
the History of Mankind_.
--Beauty is the element which is comprehended by all, and as we declare
our enmity to the distorted picture-books, books of amusement, and to
the mischievous character of "Compendiums," so we must also oppose the
popular publications which style themselves _Science made Easy_, &c., in
order to attract more purchasers by this alluring title. Kant in his
_Logic_ calls the extreme of explanation Pedantry and Gallantry. This
last expression would be very characteristic in our times, since one
attains the height of popularity now if he makes himself easily
intelligible to ladies--a didactic triumph which one attains only by
omitting everything that is profound or complicated, and saying only
what exists already in the consciousness of every one, by depriving the
subject dealt with of all seriousness, and sparing neither pictures,
anecdotes, jokes, nor pretty formalities of speech. Elsewhere Kant says:
"In the effort to produce in our knowledge the completeness of scholarly
thoroughness, and at the same time a popular character, without in the
effort falling into the above-mentioned errors of an affected
thoroughness or an affected popularity, we must, first of all, look out
for the scholarly completeness of our scientific knowledge, the
methodical form of thoroughness, and first ask how we can make really
popular the knowledge methodically acquired at school, i.e. how we can
make it easy and generally communicable, and yet at the same time not
supplant thoroughness by popularity. For scholarly completeness must not
be sacrificed to popularity to please the people, unless science is to
become a plaything or trifling." It is perfectly plain that all that was
said before of the psychological and the logical methods must be taken
into account in the manner of the statement.--
§ 131. It has been already remarked (§ 21), in speaking of the nature
of education, that the office of the instructor must necessarily vary
with the growing culture. But attention must here again be called to the
fact, that education, in whatever stage of culture, must conform to the
law which, as the internal logic of Being, determines all objective
developments of nature and of history. The Family gives the child his
first instruction; between this and the school comes the teaching of the
tutor; the school stands independently as the antithesis of the family,
and presents three essentially different forms according as it imparts a
general preparatory instruction, or special teaching for different
callings, or a universal scientific cultivation. Universality passes
over through particularizing into individuality, which contains both the
general and the particular freely in itself. All citizens of a state
should have (1) a general education which (_a_) makes them familiar with
reading, writing, and arithmetic, these being the means of all
theoretical culture; then (_b_) hands over to them a picture of the
world in its principal phases, so that they as citizens of the world can
find their proper status on our planet; and, finally, it must (_c_)
instruct him in the history of his own state, so that he may see that
the circumstances in which he lives are the result of a determined past
in its connection with the history of the rest of the world, and so may
learn rightly to estimate the interests of his own country in view of
their necessary relation to the future. This work the elementary schools
have to perform. From this, through the _Realschule_ (our scientific
High School course) they pass into the school where some particular
branch of science is taught, and through the Gymnasium (classical course
of a High School or College) to the University. From its general basis
develop (2) the educational institutions that work towards some special
education which leads over to the exercise of some art. These we call
Technological schools, where one may learn farming, mining, a craft, a
trade, navigation, war, &c. This kind of education may be specialized
indefinitely with the growth of culture, because any one branch is
capable in its negative aspect of such educational separation, as e.g.
in foundling hospitals and orphan asylums, in blind and deaf and dumb
institutions. The abstract universality of the Elementary school and the
one-sided particularity of the Technological school, however, is
subsumed under a concrete universality, which, without aiming directly
at utility, treats science and art on all sides as their own end and
aim. _Scientia est potentia_, said Lord Bacon. Practical utility results
indirectly through the progress which Scientific Cognition makes in this
free attitude, because it collects itself out of the dissipation through
manifold details into a universal idea and attains a profounder insight
thereby. This organism for the purpose of instruction is properly called
a University. By it the educational organization is perfected.
--It is essentially seen that no more than these three types of schools
can exist, and that they must all exist in a perfectly organized
civilization. Their titles and the plan of their special teaching may be
very different among different nations and at different times, but this
need not prevent the recognition in them of the ideas which determine
them. Still less should the imperfect ways in which they manifest
themselves induce us to condemn them. It is the modern tendency to
undervalue the University as an institution which we had inherited from
the middle ages, and with which we could at present dispense. This is an
error. The university presents just as necessary a form of instruction
as the elementary school or the technological school. Not the abolition
of the university, but a reform which shall adapt it to the spirit of
the age, is the advance which we have to make. That there are to be
found outside of the university men of the most thorough and elegant
culture, who can give the most excellent instruction in a science or an
art, is most certain. But it is a characteristic of the university in
its teaching to do away with contingency which is unavoidable in case of
private voluntary efforts. The university presents an organic,
self-conscious, encyclopædic representation of all the sciences, and
thus is created to a greater or less degree an intellectual atmosphere
which no other place can give. Through this, all sciences and their aims
are seen as of equal authority--a personal stress is laid upon the
connection of the sciences. The imperfections of a university, which
arise through the rivalry of external ambition, through the necessity of
financial success, through the jealousy of different parties, through
scholarships, &c., are finitudes which it has in common with all human
institutions, and on whose account they are not all to be thrown
away.--Art academies are for Art what universities are for Science. They
are inferior to them in so far as they appear more under the form of
special schools, as schools of architecture, of painting, and
conservatories of music; while really it may well be supposed that
Architecture, Sculpture, Painting, Music, the Orchestra, and the Drama,
are, like the Sciences, bound together in a _Universitas artium_, and
that by means of their internal reciprocal action new results would
follow.--Academies, as isolated master-schools, which follow no
particular line of teaching, are entirely superfluous, and serve only as
a _Prytaneum_ for meritorious scholars, and to reward industry through
the prizes which they offer. In their idea they belong with the
university, this appearing externally in the fact that most of their
members are university professors. But as institutions for ostentation
by which the ambition of the learned was flattered, and to surround
princes with scientific glory as scientific societies attached to a
court, they have lost all significance. They ceased to flourish with the
Ptolemies and the Egyptian caliphs, and with absolute monarchical
governments.--In modern times we have passed beyond the abstract
jealousy of the so-called Humanities and the Natural Sciences, because
we comprehend that each part of the totality can be realized in a proper
sense only by its development as relatively independent. Thus the
_gymnasium_ has its place as that elementary school which through a
general culture, by means of the knowledge of the language and history
of the Greeks and Romans, prepares for the university; while, on the
other hand, the _Realschule_, by special attention to Natural Science
and the living languages, constitutes the transition to the
technological schools. Nevertheless, because the university embraces the
Science of Nature, of Technology, of Trade, of Finance, and of
Statistics, the pupils who have graduated from the so-called high
schools (_höhern Bürgerschulen_) and from the _Realschulen_ will be
brought together at the university.--
§ 132. The technique of the school will be determined in its details by
the peculiarity of its aim. But in general every school, no matter what
it teaches, ought to have some system of rules and regulations by which
the relation of the pupil to the institution, of the pupils to each
other, their relation to the teacher, and that of the teachers to each
other as well as to the supervisory authority, the programme of lessons,
the apparatus, of the changes of work and recreation, shall be clearly
set forth. The course of study must be arranged so as to avoid two
extremes: on the one hand, it has to keep in view the special aim of the
school, and according to this it tends to contract itself. But, on the
other hand, it must consider the relative dependence of one specialty to
other specialties and to general culture. It must leave the transition
free, and in this it tends to expand itself. The difficulty is here so
to assign the limits that the special task of the school shall not be
sacrificed and deprived of the means of performance which it (since it
is also always only a part of the whole culture) receives by means of
its reciprocal action with other departments. The programme must assign
the exact amount of time which can be appropriated to every study. It
must prescribe the order in which they shall follow each other; it must,
as far as possible, unite kindred subjects, so as to avoid the useless
repetition which dulls the charm of study; it must, in determining the
order, bear in mind at the same time the necessity imposed by the
subject itself and the psychological progression of intelligence from
perception, through conception, to the thinking activity which grasps
all. It must periodically be submitted to revision, so that all matter
which has, through the changed state of general culture, become out of
date, may be rejected, and that that which has proved itself inimitable
may be appropriated; in general, so that it may be kept up to the
requirements of the times. And, finally, the school must, by
examinations and reports, aid the pupil in the acquirement of a
knowledge of his real standing. The examination lets him know what he
has really learned, and what he is able to do: the report gives him an
account of his culture, exhibits to him in what he has made improvement
and in what he has fallen behind, what defects he has shown, what
talents he has displayed, what errors committed, and in what relation
stands his theoretical development to his ethical status.
--The opposition of the _Gymnasia_ to the demands of the agricultural
communities is a very interesting phase of educational history. They
were asked to widen their course so as to embrace Mathematics, Physics,
Natural History, Geography, and the modern languages. At first they
stoutly resisted; then they made some concessions; finally, the more
they made the more they found themselves in contradiction with their
true work, and so they produced as an independent correlate the
_Realschule_. After this was founded, the gymnasium returned to its old
plan, and is now again able to place in the foreground the pursuit of
classical literature and history. It was thus set free from demands made
upon it which were entirely foreign to its nature.--The examination is,
on one side, so adapted to the pupil as to make him conscious of his own
condition. As to its external side, it determines whether the pupil
shall pass from one class to another or from one school to another, or
it decides whether the school as a whole shall give a public
exhibition--an exhibition which ought to have no trace of ostentation,
but which in fact is often tinctured with pedagogical charlatanism.--
§ 133. The Direction of the school on the side of science must be held
by the school itself, for the process of the intellect in acquiring
science, the progress of the method, the determinations of the subject
matter and the order of its development, have their own laws, to which
Instruction must submit itself if it would attain its end. The school is
only one part of the whole of culture. In itself it divides into
manifold departments, together constituting a great organism which in
manifold ways comes into contact with the organism of the state. So long
as teaching is of a private character, so long as it is the reciprocal
relation of one individual to another, or so long as it is shut up
within the circle of the family and belongs to it alone, so long it has
no objective character. It receives this first when it grows to a
school. As in history, its first form must have a religious character;
but this first form, in time, disappears. Religion is the absolute
relation of man to God which subsumes all other relations. In so far as
Religion exists in the form of a church, those who are members of the
same church may have instruction given on the nature of religion among
themselves. Instruction on the subject is proper, and it is even
enjoined upon them as a law--as a duty. But further than their own
society they may not extend their rule. The church may exert itself to
make a religious spirit felt in the school and to make it penetrate all
the teaching; but it may not presume, because it has for its subject the
absolute interest of men, the interest which is superior to all others,
to determine also the other objects of Education or the method of
treating them. The technical acquisitions of Reading, Writing and
Arithmetic, Drawing and Music, the Natural Sciences, Mathematics, Logic,
Anthropology and Psychology, the practical sciences of finance and the
municipal regulations, have no direct relation to religion. If we
attempt to establish one, there inevitably appears in them a morbid
state which destroys them; not only so, but piety itself disappears, for
these accomplishments and this knowledge are not included in its idea.
--Such treatment of Art and Science may be well-meant, but it is always
an error. It may even make a ludicrous impression, which is a very
dangerous thing for the authority of religion. If a church has
established schools, it must see to it that all which is there taught
outside of the religious instruction, i.e. all of science and art, shall
have no direct connection with it as a religious institution.--
§ 134. The Church, as the external manifestation of religion, is
concerned with the absolute relation of man, the relation to God,
special in itself as opposed to his other relations; the State, on the
contrary, seizes the life of a nation according to its _explicit
totality_. The State should conduct the education of all its citizens.
To it, then, the church can appear only as a school, for the church
instructs its own people concerning the nature of religion, partly by
teaching proper, that of the catechism, partly in quite as edifying a
way, by preaching. From this point of view, the State can look upon the
church only as one of those schools which prepare for a special
avocation. The church appears to the State as that school which assumes
the task of educating the religious element. Just as little as the
church should the state attempt to exercise any influence over Science
and Art. In this they are exactly alike, and must acknowledge the
necessity which both Science and Art contain within themselves and by
which they determine themselves. The laws of Logic, Mathematics,
Astronomy, Morals, Æsthetics, Physiology, &c., are entirely independent
of the state. It can decree neither discoveries nor inventions. The
state in its relations to science occupies the same ground as it should
do with relation to the freedom of self-consciousness. It is true that
the church teaches man, but it demands from him at the same time belief
in the truth of its dogmas. It rests, as the real church, on presupposed
authority, and sinks finally all contradictions which may be found in
the absolute mystery of the existence of God. The state, on the
contrary, elaborates its idea into the form of laws, i.e. into general
determinations, of whose necessity it convinces itself. It seeks to give
to these laws the clearest possible form, so that every one may
understand them. It concedes validity only to that which can be proved,
and sentences the individual according to the external side of the
_deed_ (overt act) not, as the church does, on its internal side--that
of _intention_. Finally, it demands in him consciousness of his deed,
because it makes each one responsible for his own deed. It has,
therefore, the same principle with science, for the proof of necessity
and the unity of consciousness with its object constitute the essence of
science. Since the state embraces the school as one of its educational
organisms, it is from its very nature especially called upon to guide
its regulation in accordance with the manifestation of consciousness.
[Sidenote: _The Modality of the Process of Teaching._]
--The church calls this "profanation." One might say that the church,
with its mystery of Faith, always represents the absolute problem of
science, while the state, as to its form, coincides with science.
Whenever the state abandons the strictness of proof--when it begins to
measure the individual citizen by his intention and not by his deed,
and, in place of the clear insight of the comprehending consciousness,
sets up the psychological compulsion of a hollow mechanical authority,
it destroys itself.--
§ 135. Neither the church nor the state should attempt to control the
school in its internal management. Still less can the school constitute
itself into a state within the state; for, while it is only one of the
means which are necessary for developing citizens, the state and the
church lay claim to the whole man his whole life long. The independence
of the school can then only consist in this, that it raises within the
state an organ which works under its control, and which as school
authority endeavors within itself to befriend the needs of the school,
while externally it acts on the church and state indirectly by means of
ethical powers. The emancipation of the school can never reasonably mean
its abstract isolation, or the absorption of the ecclesiastical and
political life into the school; it can signify only the free reciprocal
action of the school with state and church. It must never be forgotten
that what makes the school a school is not the total process of
education, for this falls also within the family, the state, and the
church; but that the proper work of the school is the process of
instruction, knowledge, and the acquirement, by practice, of skill.
--The confusion of the idea of Instruction with that of Education in
general is a common defect in superficial treatises on these themes. The
Radicals among those who are in favor of so-called "Emancipation," often
erroneously appeal to "free Greece" which generally for this fond
ignorance is made to stand as authority for a thousand things of which
it never dreamed. In this fictitious Hellas of "free, beautiful
humanity," they say the limits against which we strive to-day did not
exist. The histories of Anaxagoras, Protagoras, Diagoras, Socrates,
Aristotle, Theophrastus, and of others, who were all condemned on
account of their "impiety," tell quite another story.--
§ 136. The inspection of the school may be carried out in different
ways, but it must be required that its special institutions shall be
embraced and cared for as organized and related wholes, framed in
accordance with the idea of the state, and that one division of the
ministry shall occupy itself exclusively with it. The division of labor
will specially affect the schools for teaching particular avocations.
The prescription of the subjects to be studied in each school as
appropriate to it, of the course of study, and of the object thereof,
properly falls to this department of government, is its immediate work,
and its theory must be changed according to the progress and needs of
the time. Niemeyer, Schwarz, and others, have made out such plans for
schools. Scheinert has fully painted the _Volkschule_, Mager the
_Bürgerschule_, Deinhard and Kapp the _Gymnasium_. But such
delineations, however correct they may be, depend upon the actual sum of
culture of a people and a time, and must therefore continually modify
their fundamental Ideal. The same is true of the methods of instruction
in the special arts and sciences. Niemeyer, Schwarz, Herbart, in their
sketches of Pedagogics, Beneke in his _Doctrine of Education_, and
others, have set forth in detail the method of teaching Reading, Writing
and Arithmetic, Languages, Natural Science, Geography, History, &c. Such
directions are, however, ephemeral in value, and only relatively useful,
and must, in order to be truly practical, be always newly laid out in
accordance with universal educational principles, and with the progress
of science and art.
--The idea that the State has the right to oversee the school lies in
the very idea of the State, which is authorized, and under obligation,
to secure the education of its citizens, and cannot leave their
fashioning to chance. The emancipation of the school from the State, the
abstracting of it, would lead to the destruction of the school. There is
no difficulty in Protestant States in the free inter-action of school
and church, for Protestantism has consciously accepted as its peculiar
principle individual freedom as Christianity has presented it. For
Catholic States, however, a difficulty exists. The Protestant clergyman
can with propriety oversee the _Volkschule_, for here he works as
teacher, not as priest. In the Protestant church there are really no
Laity according to the original meaning of the term. On the contrary,
Catholic clergymen are essentially priests, and as such, on account of
the unconditional obedience which, according to their church, they have
to demand, they usurp the authority of the State. From this circumstance
arise, at present, numberless collisions in the department of school
supervision.--