which to cheat their hunger, and they passed
whole days without thought of food. Your learned teachers may
have read this passage time after time without seeing how it might
be applied to children. One of these teachers will probably tell
me that a child does not like to leave his dinner for his lessons.
You are right, sir--I was not thinking of that sort of sport.
The sense of smell is to taste what sight is to touch; it goes
before it and gives it warning that it will be affected by this
or that substance; and it inclines it to seek or shun this experience
according to the impressions received beforehand. I have been
told that savages receive impressions quite different from ours,
and that they have quite different ideas with regard to pleasant
or unpleasant odours. I can well believe it. Odours alone are
slight sensations; they affect the imagination rather than the
senses, and they work mainly through the anticipations they arouse.
This being so, and the tastes of savages being so unlike the taste
of civilised men, they should lead them to form very different
ideas with regard to flavours and therefore with regard to the
odours which announce them. A Tartar must enjoy the smell of a
haunch of putrid horseflesh, much as a sportsman enjoys a very
high partridge. Our idle sensations, such as the scents wafted
from the flower beds, must pass unnoticed among men who walk too
much to care for strolling in a garden, and do not work enough
to find pleasure in repose. Hungry men would find little pleasure
in scents which did not proclaim the approach of food.
Smell is the sense of the imagination; as it gives tone to the
nerves it must have a great effect on the brain; that is why it
revives us for the time, but eventually causes exhaustion. Its
effects on love are pretty generally recognised. The sweet perfumes
of a dressing-room are not so slight a snare as you may fancy
them, and I hardly know whether to congratulate or condole with
that wise and somewhat insensible person whose senses are never
stirred by the scent of the flowers his mistress wears in her
bosom.
Hence the sense of smell should not be over-active in early childhood;
the imagination, as yet unstirred by changing passions, is scarcely
susceptible of emotion, and we have not enough experience to discern
beforehand from one sense the promise of another. This view is
confirmed by observation, and it is certain that the sense of
smell is dull and almost blunted in most children. Not that their
sensations are less acute than those of grown-up people, but that
there is no idea associated with them; they do not easily experience
pleasure or pain, and are not flattered or hurt as we are. Without
going beyond my system, and without recourse to comparative anatomy,
I think we can easily see why women are generally fonder of perfumes
than men.
It is said that from early childhood the Redskins of Canada, train
their sense of smell to such a degree of subtlety that, although
they have dogs, they do not condescend to use them in hunting--they
are their own dogs. Indeed I believe that if children were trained
to scent their dinner as a dog scents game, their sense of smell
might be nearly as perfect; but I see no very real advantage to
be derived from this sense, except by teaching the child to observe
the relation between smell and taste. Nature has taken care to.
compel us to learn these relations. She has made the exercise
of the latter sense practically inseparable from that of the former,
by placing their organs close together, and by providing, in the
mouth, a direct pathway between them, so that we taste nothing
without smelling it too. Only I would not have these natural relations
disturbed in order to deceive the child, e.g.; to conceal the
taste of medicine with an aromatic odour, for the discord between
the senses is too great for deception, the more active sense overpowers.
the other, the medicine is just as distasteful, and this disagreeable
association extends to every sensation experienced at the time;
so the slightest of these sensations recalls the rest to his imagination
and a very pleasant perfume is for him only a nasty smell; thus
our foolish precautions increase the sum total of his unpleasant
sensations at the cost of his pleasant sensations.
In the following books I have still to speak of the training of
a sort of sixth sense, called common-sense, not so much because
it is common to all men, but because it results from the well-regulated
use of the other five, and teaches the nature of things by the
sum-total of their external aspects. So this sixth sense has no
special organ, it has its seat in the brain, and its sensations
which are purely internal are called percepts or ideas. The number
of these ideas is the measure of our knowledge; exactness of thought
depends on their clearness and precision; the art of comparing
them one with another is called human reason. Thus what I call
the reasoning of the senses, or the reasoning of the child, consists
in the formation of simple ideas through the associated experience
of several sensations; what I call the reasoning of the intellect,
consists in the formation, of complex ideas through the association
of several simple ideas.
If my method is indeed that of nature, and if I am not mistaken
in the application of that method, we have led our pupil through
the region of sensation to the bounds of the child's reasoning;
the first step we take beyond these bounds must be the step of
a man. But before we make this fresh advance, let us glance back
for a moment at the path we have hitherto followed. Every age,
every station in life, has a perfection, a ripeness, of its own.
We have often heard the phrase "a grown man;" but we
will consider "a grown child." This will be a new experience
and none the less pleasing.
The life of finite creatures is so poor and narrow that the mere
sight of what is arouses no emotion. It is fancy which decks reality,
and if imagination does not lend its charm to that which touches
our senses, our barren pleasure is confined to the senses alone,
while the heart remains cold. The earth adorned with the treasures
of autumn displays a wealth of colour which the eye admires; but
this admiration fails to move us, it springs rather from thought
than from feeling. In spring the country is almost bare and leafless,
the trees give no shade, the grass has hardly begun to grow, yet
the heart is touched by the sight. In this new birth of nature,
we feel the revival of our own life; the memories of past pleasures
surround us; tears of delight, those companions of pleasure ever
ready to accompany a pleasing sentiment, tremble on our eyelids.
Animated, lively, and delightful though the vintage may be, we
behold it without a tear.
And why is this? Because imagination adds to the sight of spring
the image of the seasons which are yet to come; the eye sees the
tender shoot, the mind's eye beholds its flowers, fruit, and foliage,
and even the mysteries they may conceal. It blends successive
stages into one moment's experience; we see things, not so much
as they will be, but as we would have them be, for imagination
has only to take her choice. In autumn, on the other hand, we
only behold the present; if we wish to look forward to spring,
winter bars the way, and our shivering imagination dies away among
its frost and snow.
This is the source of the charm we find in beholding the beauties
of childhood, rather than the perfection of manhood. When do we
really delight in beholding a man? When the memory of his deeds
leads us to look back over his life and his youth is renewed in
our eyes. If we are reduced to viewing him as he is, or to picturing
him as he will be in old age, the thought of declining years destroys
all our pleasure. There is no pleasure in seeing a man hastening
to his grave; the image of death makes all hideous.
But when I think of a child of ten or twelve, strong, healthy,
well-grown for his age, only pleasant thoughts are called up,
whether of the present or the future. I see him keen, eager, and
full of life, free from gnawing cares and painful forebodings,
absorbed in this present state, and delighting in a fullness of
life which seems to extend beyond himself. I look forward to a
time when he will use his daily increasing sense, intelligence
and vigour, those growing powers of which he continually gives
fresh proof. I watch the child with delight, I picture to myself
the man with even greater pleasure. His eager life seems to stir
my own pulses, I seem to live his life and in his vigour I renew
my own.
The hour strikes, the scene is changed. All of a sudden his eye
grows dim, his mirth has fled. Farewell mirth, farewell untrammelled
sports in which he delighted. A stern, angry man takes him by
the hand, saying gravely, "Come with me, sir," and he
is led away. As they are entering the room, I catch a glimpse
of books. Books, what dull food for a child of his age! The poor
child allows himself to be dragged away; he casts a sorrowful
look on all about him, and departs in silence, his eyes swollen
with the tears he dare not shed, and his heart bursting with the
sighs he dare not utter.
You who have no such cause for fear, you for whom no period of
life is a time of weariness and tedium, you who welcome days without
care and nights without impatience, you who only reckon time by
your pleasures, come, my happy kindly pupil, and console us for
the departure of that miserable creature. Come! Here he is and
at his approach I feel a thrill of delight which I see he shares.
It is his friend, his comrade, who meets him; when he sees me
he knows very well that he will not be long without amusement;
we are never dependent on each other, but we are always on good
terms, and we are never so happy as when together.
His face, his bearing, his expression, speak of confidence and
contentment; health shines in his countenance, his firm step speaks
of strength; his colour, delicate but not sickly, has nothing
of softness or effeminacy. Sun and wind have already set the honourable
stamp of manhood on his countenance; his rounded muscles already
begin to show some signs of growing individuality; his eyes, as
yet unlighted by the flame of feeling, have at least all their
native calm; They have not been darkened by prolonged sorrow,
nor are his cheeks furrowed by ceaseless tears. Behold in his
quick and certain movements the natural vigour of his age and
the confidence of independence. His manner is free and open, but
without a trace of insolence or vanity; his head which has not
been bent over books does not fall upon his breast; there is no
need to say, "Hold your head up," he will neither hang
his head for shame or fear.
Make room for him, gentlemen, in your midst; question him boldly;
have no fear of importunity, chatter, or impertinent questions.
You need not be afraid that he will take possession of you and
expect you to devote yourself entirely to him, so that you cannot
get rid of him.
Neither need you look for compliments from him; nor will he tell
you what I have taught him to say; expect nothing from him but
the plain, simple truth, without addition or ornament and without
vanity. He will tell you the wrong things he has done and thought
as readily as the right, without troubling himself in the least
as to the effect of his words upon you; he will use speech with
all the simplicity of its first beginnings.
We love to augur well of our children, and we are continually
regretting the flood of folly which overwhelms the hopes we would
fain have rested on some chance phrase. If my scholar rarely gives
me cause for such prophecies, neither will he give me cause for
such regrets, for he never says a useless word, and does not exhaust
himself by chattering when he knows there is no one to listen
to him. His ideas are few but precise, he knows nothing by rote
but much by experience. If he reads our books worse than other
children, he reads far better in the book of nature; his thoughts
are not in his tongue but in his brain; he has less memory and
more judgment; he can only speak one language, but he understands
what he is saying, and if his speech is not so good as that of
other children his deeds are better.
He does not know the meaning of habit, routine, and custom; what
he did yesterday has no control over what he is doing to-day;
he follows no rule, submits to no authority, copies no pattern,
and only acts or speaks as he pleases. So do not expect set speeches
or studied manners from him, but just the faithful expression
of his thoughts and the conduct that springs from his inclinations.
[Footnote: Habit owes its charm to man's natural idleness, and
this idleness grows upon us if indulged; it is easier to do what
we have already done, there is a beaten path which is easily followed.
Thus we may observe that habit is very strong in the aged and
in the indolent, and very weak in the young and active. The rule
of habit is only good for feeble hearts, and it makes them more
and more feeble day by day. The only useful habit for children
is to be accustomed to submit without difficulty to necessity,
and the only useful habit for man is to submit without difficulty
to the rule of reason. Every other habit is a vice.]
You will find he has a few moral ideas concerning his present
state and none concerning manhood; what use could he make of them,
for the child is not, as yet, an active member of society. Speak
to him of freedom, of property, or even of what is usually done;
he may understand you so far; he knows why his things are his
own, and why other things are not his, and nothing more. Speak
to him of duty or obedience; he will not know what you are talking
about; bid him do something and he will pay no attention; but
say to him, "If you will give me this pleasure, I will repay
it when required," and he will hasten to give you satisfaction,
for he asks nothing better than to extend his domain, to acquire
rights over you, which will, he knows, be respected. Maybe he
is not sorry to have a place of his own, to be reckoned of some
account; but if he has formed this latter idea, he has already
left the realms of nature, and you have failed to bar the gates
of vanity.
For his own part, should he need help, he will ask it readily
of the first person he meets. He will ask it of a king as readily
as of his servant; all men are equals in his eyes. From his way
of asking you will see he knows you owe him nothing, that he is
asking a favour. He knows too that humanity moves you to grant
this favour; his words are few and simple. His voice, his look,
his gesture are those of a being equally familiar with compliance
and refusal. It is neither the crawling, servile submission of
the slave, nor the imperious tone of the master, it is a modest
confidence in mankind; it is the noble and touching gentleness
of a creature, free, yet sensitive and feeble, who asks aid of
a being, free, but strong and kindly. If you grant his request
he will not thank you, but he will feel he has incurred a debt.
If you refuse he will neither complain nor insist; he knows it
is useless; he will not say, "They refused to help me,"
but "It was impossible," and as I have already said,
we do not rebel against necessity when once we have perceived
it.
Leave him to himself and watch his actions without speaking, consider
what he is doing and how he sets about it. He does not require
to convince himself that he is free, so he never acts thoughtlessly
and merely to show that he can do what he likes; does he not know
that he is always his own master? He is quick, alert, and ready;
his movements are eager as befits his age, but you will not find
one which has no end in view. Whatever he wants, he will never
attempt what is beyond his powers, for he has learnt by experience
what those powers are; his means will always be adapted to the
end in view, and he will rarely attempt anything without the certainty
of success; his eye is keen and true; he will not be so stupid
as to go and ask other people about what he sees; he will examine
it on his own account, and before he asks he will try every means
at his disposal to discover what he wants to know for himself.
If he lights upon some unexpected difficulty, he will be less
upset than others; if there is danger he will be less afraid.
His imagination is still asleep and nothing has been done to arouse
it; he only sees what is really there, and rates the danger at
its true worth; so he never loses his head. He does not rebel
against necessity, her hand is too heavy upon him; he has borne
her yoke all his life long, he is well used to it; he is always
ready for anything.
Work or play are all one to him, his games are his work; he knows
no difference. He brings to everything the cheerfulness of interest,
the charm of freedom, and he snows the bent of his own mind and
the extent of his knowledge. Is there anything better worth seeing,
anything more touching or more delightful, than a pretty child,
with merry, cheerful glance, easy contented manner, open smiling
countenance, playing at the most important things, or working
at the lightest amusements?
Would you now judge him by comparison? Set him among other children
and leave him to himself. You will soon see which has made most
progress, which comes nearer to the perfection of childhood. Among
all the children in the town there is none more skilful and none
so strong. Among young peasants he is their equal in strength
and their superior in skill. In everything within a child's grasp
he judges, reasons, and shows a forethought beyond the rest. Is
it a matter of action, running, jumping, or shifting things, raising
weights or estimating distance, inventing games, carrying off
prizes; you might say, "Nature obeys his word," so easily
does he bend all things to his will. He is made to lead, to rule
his fellows; talent and experience take the place of right and
authority. In any garb, under any name, he will still be first;
everywhere he will rule the rest, they will always feel his superiority,
he will be master without knowing it, and they will serve him
unawares.
He has reached the perfection of childhood; he has lived the life
of a child; his progress has not been bought at the price of his
happiness, he has gained both. While he has acquired all the wisdom
of a child, he has been as free and happy as his health permits.
If the Reaper Death should cut him off and rob us of our hopes,
we need not bewail alike his life and death, we shall not have
the added grief of knowing that we caused him pain; we will say,
"His childhood, at least, was happy; we have robbed him of
nothing that nature gave him."
The chief drawback to this early education is that it is only
appreciated by the wise; to vulgar eyes the child so carefully
educated is nothing but a rough little boy. A tutor thinks rather
of the advantage to himself than to his pupil; he makes a point
of showing that there has been no time wasted; he provides his
pupil with goods which can be readily displayed in the shop window,
accomplishments which can be shown off at will; no matter whether
they are useful, provided they are easily seen. Without choice
or discrimination he loads his memory with a pack of rubbish.
If the child is to be examined he is set to display his wares;
he spreads them out, satisfies those who behold them, packs up
his bundle and goes his way. My pupil is poorer, he has no bundle
to display, he has only himself to show. Now neither child nor
man can be read at a glance. Where are the observers who can at
once discern the characteristics of this child? There are such
people, but they are few and far between; among a thousand fathers
you will scarcely find one.
Too many questions are tedious and revolting to most of us and
especially to children. After a few minutes their attention flags,
they cease to listen to your everlasting questions and reply at
random. This way of testing them is pedantic and useless; a chance
word will often show their sense and intelligence better than
much talking, but take care that the answer is neither a matter
of chance nor yet learnt by heart. A man must needs have a good
judgment if he is to estimate the judgment of a child.
I heard the late Lord Hyde tell the following story about one
of his friends. He had returned from Italy after a three years'
absence, and was anxious to test the progress of his son, a child
of nine or ten. One evening he took a walk with the child and
his tutor across a level space where the schoolboys were flying
their kites. As they went, the father said to his son, "Where
is the kite that casts this shadow?" Without hesitating and
without glancing upwards the child replied, "Over the high
road." "And indeed," said Lord Hyde, "the
high road was between us and the sun." At these words, the
father kissed his child, and having finished his examination he
departed. The next day he sent the tutor the papers settling an
annuity on him in addition to his salary.
What a father! and what a promising child! The question is exactly
adapted to the child's age, the answer is perfectly simple; but
see what precision it implies in the child's judgment. Thus did
the pupil of Aristotle master the famous steed which no squire
had ever been able to tame.
BOOK III
The whole course of man's life up to adolescence is a period of
weakness; yet there comes a time during these early years when
the child's strength overtakes the demands upon it, when the growing
creature, though absolutely weak, is relatively strong. His needs
are not fully developed and his present strength is more than
enough for them. He would be a very feeble man, but he is a strong
child.
What is the cause of man's weakness? It is to be found in the
disproportion between his strength and his desires. It is our
passions that make us weak, for our natural strength is not enough
for their satisfaction. To limit our desires comes to the same
thing, therefore, as to increase our strength. When we can do
more than we want, we have strength enough and to spare, we are
really strong. This is the third stage of childhood, the stage
with which I am about to deal. I still speak of childhood for
want of a better word; for our scholar is approaching adolescence,
though he has not yet reached the age of puberty.
About twelve or thirteen the child's strength increases far more
rapidly than his needs. The strongest and fiercest of the passions
is still unknown, his physical development is still imperfect
and seems to await the call of the will. He is scarcely aware
of extremes of heat and cold and braves them with impunity. He
needs no coat, his blood is warm; no spices, hunger is his sauce,
no food comes amiss at this age; if he is sleepy he stretches
himself on the ground and goes to sleep; he finds all he needs
within his reach; he is not tormented by any imaginary wants;
he cares nothing what others think; his desires are not beyond
his grasp; not only is he self-sufficing, but for the first and
last time in his life he has more strength than he needs.
I know beforehand what you will say. You will not assert that
the child has more needs than I attribute to him, but you will
deny his strength. You forget that I am speaking of my own pupil,
not of those puppets who walk with difficulty from one room to
another, who toil indoors and carry bundles of paper. Manly strength,
you say, appears only with manhood; the vital spirits, distilled
in their proper vessels and spreading through the whole body,
can alone make the muscles firm, sensitive, tense, and springy,
can alone cause real strength. This is the philosophy of the study;
I appeal to that of experience. In the country districts, I see
big lads hoeing, digging, guiding the plough, filling the wine-cask,
driving the cart, like their fathers; you would take them for
grown men if their voices did not betray them. Even in our towns,
iron-workers', tool makers', and blacksmiths' lads are almost
as strong as their masters and would be scarcely less skilful
had their training begun earlier. If there is a difference, and
I do not deny that there is, it is, I repeat, much less than the
difference between the stormy passions of the man and the few
wants of the child. Moreover, it is not merely a question of bodily
strength, but more especially of strength of mind, which reinforces
and directs the bodily strength.
This interval in which the strength of the individual is in excess
of his wants is, as I have said, relatively though not absolutely
the time of greatest strength. It is the most precious time in
his life; it comes but once; it is very short, all too short,
as you will see when you consider the importance of using it aright.
He has, therefore, a surplus of strength and capacity which he
will never have again. What use shall he make of it? He will strive
to use it in tasks which will help at need. He will, so to speak,
cast his present surplus into the storehouse of the future; the
vigorous child will make provision for the feeble man; but he
will not store his goods where thieves may break in, nor in barns
which are not his own. To store them aright, they must be in the
hands and the head, they must be stored within himself. This is
the time for work, instruction, and inquiry. And note that this
is no arbitrary choice of mine, it is the way of nature herself.
Human intelligence is finite, and not only can no man know everything,
he cannot even acquire all the scanty knowledge of others. Since
the contrary of every false proposition is a truth, there are
as many truths as falsehoods. We must, therefore, choose what
to teach as well as when to teach it. Some of the information
within our reach is false, some is useless, some merely serves
to puff up its possessor. The small store which really contributes
to our welfare alone deserves the study of a wise man, and therefore
of a child whom one would have wise. He must know not merely what
is, but what is useful.
From this small stock we must also deduct those truths which require
a full grown mind for their understanding, those which suppose
a knowledge of man's relations to his fellow-men--a knowledge
which no child can acquire; these things, although in themselves
true, lead an inexperienced mind into mistakes with regard to
other matters.
We are now confined to a circle, small indeed compared with the
whole of human thought, but this circle is still a vast sphere
when measured by the child's mind. Dark places of the human understanding,
what rash hand shall dare to raise your veil? What pitfalls does
our so-called science prepare for the miserable child. Would you
guide him along this dangerous path and draw the veil from the
face of nature? Stay your hand. First make sure that neither he
nor you will become dizzy. Beware of the specious charms of error
and the intoxicating fumes of pride. Keep this truth ever before
you--Ignorance never did any one any harm, error alone is fatal,
and we do not lose our way through ignorance but through self-confidence.
His progress in geometry may serve as a test and a true measure
of the growth of his intelligence, but as soon as he can distinguish
between what is useful and what is useless, much skill and discretion
are required to lead him towards theoretical studies. For example,
would you have him find a mean proportional between two lines,
contrive that he should require to find a square equal to a given
rectangle; if two mean proportionals are required, you must first
contrive to interest him in the doubling of the cube. See how
we are gradually approaching the moral ideas which distinguish
between good and evil. Hitherto we have known no law but necessity,
now we are considering what is useful; we shall soon come to what
is fitting and right.
Man's diverse powers are stirred by the same instinct. The bodily
activity, which seeks an outlet for its energies, is succeeded
by the mental activity which seeks for knowledge. Children are
first restless, then curious; and this curiosity, rightly directed,
is the means of development for the age with which we are dealing.
Always distinguish between natural and acquired tendencies. There
is a zeal for learning which has no other foundation than a wish
to appear learned, and there is another which springs from man's
natural curiosity about all things far or near which may affect
himself. The innate desire for comfort and the impossibility of
its complete satisfaction impel him to the endless search for
fresh means of contributing to its satisfaction. This is the first
principle of curiosity; a principle natural to the human heart,
though its growth is proportional to the development of our feeling
and knowledge. If a man of science were left on a desert island
with his books and instruments and knowing that he must spend
the rest of his life there, he would scarcely trouble himself
about the solar system, the laws of attraction, or the differential
calculus. He might never even open a book again; but he would
never rest till he had explored the furthest corner of his island,
however large it might be. Let us therefore omit from our early
studies such knowledge as has no natural attraction for us, and
confine ourselves to such things as instinct impels us to study.
Our island is this earth; and the most striking object we behold
is the sun. As soon as we pass beyond our immediate surroundings,
one or both of these must meet our eye. Thus the philosophy of
most savage races is mainly directed to imaginary divisions of
the earth or to the divinity of the sun.
What a sudden change you will say. Just now we were concerned
with what touches ourselves, with our immediate environment, and
all at once we are exploring the round world and leaping to the
bounds of the universe. This change is the result of our growing
strength and of the natural bent of the mind. While we were weak
and feeble, self-preservation concentrated our attention on ourselves;
now that we are strong and powerful, the desire for a wider sphere
carries us beyond ourselves as far as our eyes can reach. But
as the intellectual world is still unknown to us, our thoughts
are bounded by the visible horizon, and our understanding only
develops within the limits of our vision.
Let us transform our sensations into ideas, but do not let us
jump all at once from the objects of sense to objects of thought.
The latter are attained by means of the former. Let the senses
be the only guide for the first workings of reason. No book but
the world, no teaching but that of fact. The child who reads ceases
to think, he only reads. He is acquiring words not knowledge.
Teach your scholar to observe the phenomena of nature; you will
soon rouse his curiosity, but if you would have it grow, do not
be in too great a hurry to satisfy this curiosity. Put the problems
before him and let him solve them himself. Let him know nothing
because you have told him, but because he has learnt it for himself.
Let him not be taught science, let him discover it. If ever you
substitute authority for reason he will cease to reason; he will
be a mere plaything of other people's thoughts.
You wish to teach this child geography and you provide him with
globes, spheres, and maps. What elaborate preparations! What is
the use of all these symbols; why not begin by showing him the
real thing so that he may at least know what you are talking about?
One fine evening we are walking in a suitable place where the
wide horizon gives us a full view of the setting sun, and we note
the objects which mark the place where it sets. Next morning we
return to the same place for a breath of fresh air before sun-rise.
We see the rays of light which announce the sun's approach; the
glow increases, the east seems afire, and long before the sun
appears the light leads us to expect its return. Every moment
you expect to see it. There it is at last! A shining point appears
like a flash of lightning and soon fills the whole space; the
veil of darkness rolls away, man perceives his dwelling place
in fresh beauty. During the night the grass has assumed a fresher
green; in the light of early dawn, and gilded by the first rays
of the sun, it seems covered with a shining network of dew reflecting
the light and colour. The birds raise their chorus of praise to
greet the Father of life, not one of them is mute; their gentle
warbling is softer than by day, it expresses the langour of a
peaceful waking. All these produce an impression of freshness
which seems to reach the very soul. It is a brief hour of enchantment
which no man can resist; a sight so grand, so fair, so delicious,
that none can behold it unmoved.
Fired with this enthusiasm, the master wishes to impart it to
the child. He expects to rouse his emotion by drawing attention
to his own. Mere folly! The splendour of nature lives in man's
heart; to be seen, it must be felt. The child sees the objects
themselves, but does not perceive their relations, and cannot
hear their harmony. It needs knowledge he has not yet acquired,
feelings he has not yet experienced, to receive the complex impression
which results from all these separate sensations. If he has not
wandered over arid plains, if his feet have not been scorched
by the burning sands of the desert, if he has not breathed the
hot and oppressive air reflected from the glowing rocks, how shall
he delight in the fresh air of a fine morning. The scent of flowers,
the beauty of foliage, the moistness of the dew, the soft turf
beneath his feet, how shall all these delight his senses. How
shall the song of the birds arouse voluptuous emotion if love
and pleasure are still unknown to him? How shall he behold with
rapture the birth of this fair day, if his imagination cannot
paint the joys it may bring in its track? How can he feel the
beauty of nature, while the hand that formed it is unknown?
Never tell the child what he cannot understand: no descriptions,
no eloquence, no figures of speech, no poetry. The time has not
come for feeling or taste. Continue to be clear and cold; the
time will come only too soon when you must adopt another tone.
Brought up in the spirit of our maxims, accustomed to make his
own tools and not to appeal to others until he has tried and failed,
he will examine everything he sees carefully and in silence. He
thinks rather than questions. Be content, therefore, to show him
things at a fit season; then, when you see that his curiosity
is thoroughly aroused, put some brief question which will set
him trying to discover the answer.
On the present occasion when you and he have carefully observed
the rising sun, when you have called his attention to the mountains
and other objects visible from the same spot, after he has chattered
freely about them, keep quiet for a few minutes as if lost in
thought and then say, "I think the sun set over there last
night; it rose here this morning. How can that be?" Say no
more; if he asks questions, do not answer them; talk of something
else. Let him alone, and be sure he will think about it.
To train a child to be really attentive so that he may be really
impressed by any truth of experience, he must spend anxious days
before he discovers that truth. If he does not learn enough in
this way, there is another way of drawing his attention to the
matter. Turn the question about. If he does not know how the sun
gets from the place where it sets to where it rises, he knows
at least how it travels from sunrise to sunset, his eyes teach
him that. Use the second question to throw light on the first;
either your pupil is a regular dunce or the analogy is too clear
to be missed. This is his first lesson in cosmography.
As we always advance slowly from one sensible idea to another,
and as we give time enough to each for him to become really familiar
with it before we go on to another, and lastly as we never force
our scholar's attention, we are still a long way from a knowledge
of the course of the sun or the shape of the earth; but as all
the apparent movements of the celestial bodies depend on the same
principle, and the first observation leads on to all the rest,
less effort is needed, though more time, to proceed from the diurnal
revolution to the calculation of eclipses, than to get a thorough
understanding of day and night.
Since the sun revolves round the earth it describes a circle,
and every circle must have a centre; that we know already. This
centre is invisible, it is in the middle of the earth, but we
can mark out two opposite points on the earth's surface which
correspond to it. A skewer passed through the three points and
prolonged to the sky at either end would represent the earth's
axis and the sun's daily course. A round teetotum revolving on
its point represents the sky turning on its axis, the two points
of the teetotum are the two poles; the child will be delighted
to find one of them, and I show him the tail of the Little bear.
Here is a another game for the dark. Little by little we get to
know the stars, and from this comes a wish to know the planets
and observe the constellations.
We saw the sun rise at midsummer, we shall see it rise at Christmas
or some other fine winter's day; for you know we are no lie-a-beds
and we enjoy the cold. I take care to make this second observation
in the same place as the first, and if skilfully lead up to, one
or other will certainly exclaim, "What a funny thing! The
sun is not rising in the same place; here are our landmarks, but
it is rising over there. So there is the summer east and the winter
east, etc." Young teacher, you are on the right track. These
examples should show you how to teach the sphere without any difficulty,
taking the earth for the earth and the sun for the sun.
As a general rule--never substitute the symbol for the thing signified,
unless it is impossible to show the thing itself; for the child's
attention is so taken up with the symbol that he will forget what
it signifies.
I consider the armillary sphere a clumsy disproportioned bit of
apparatus. The confused circles and the strange figures described
on it suggest witchcraft and frighten the child. The earth is
too small, the circles too large and too numerous, some of them,
the colures, for instance, are quite useless, and the thickness
of the pasteboard gives them an appearance of solidity so that
they are taken for circular masses having a real existence, and
when you tell the child that these are imaginary circles, he does
not know what he is looking at and is none the wiser.
We are unable to put ourselves in the child's place, we fail to
enter into his thoughts, we invest him with our own ideas, and
while we are following our own chain of reasoning, we merely fill
his head with errors and absurdities.
Should the method of studying science be analytic or synthetic?
People dispute over this question, but it is not always necessary
to choose between them. Sometimes the same experiments allow one
to use both analysis and synthesis, and thus to guide the child
by the method of instruction when he fancies he is only analysing.
Then, by using both at once, each method confirms the results
of the other. Starting from opposite ends, without thinking of
following the same road, he will unexpectedly reach their meeting
place and this will be a delightful surprise. For example, I would
begin geography at both ends and add to the study of the earth's
revolution the measurement of its divisions, beginning at home.
While the child is studying the sphere and is thus transported
to the heavens, bring him back to the divisions of the globe and
show him his own home.
His geography will begin with the town he lives in and his father's
country house, then the places between them, the rivers near them,
and then the sun's aspect and how to find one's way by its aid.
This is the meeting place. Let him make his own map, a very simple
map, at first containing only two places; others may be added
from time to time, as he is able to estimate their distance and
position. You see at once what a good start we have given him
by making his eye his compass.
No doubt he will require some guidance in spite of this, but very
little, and that little without his knowing it. If he goes wrong
let him alone, do not correct his mistakes; hold your tongue till
he finds them out for himself and corrects them, or at most arrange
something, as opportunity offers, which may show him his mistakes.
If he never makes mistakes he will never learn anything thoroughly.
Moreover, what he needs is not an exact knowledge of local topography,
but how to find out for himself. No matter whether he carries
maps in his head provided he understands what they mean, and has
a clear idea of the art of making them. See what a difference
there is already between the knowledge of your scholars and the
ignorance of mine. They learn maps, he makes them. Here are fresh
ornaments for his room.
Remember that this is the essential point in my method--Do not
teach the child many things, but never to let him form inaccurate
or confused ideas. I care not if he knows nothing provided he
is not mistaken, and I only acquaint him with truths to guard
him against the errors he might put in their place. Reason and
judgment come slowly, prejudices flock to us in crowds, and from
these he must be protected. But if you make science itself your
object, you embark on an unfathomable and shoreless ocean, an
ocean strewn with reefs from which you will never return. When
I see a man in love with knowledge, yielding to its charms and
flitting from one branch to another unable to stay his steps,
he seems to me like a child gathering shells on the sea-shore,
now picking them up, then throwing them aside for others which
he sees beyond them, then taking them again, till overwhelmed
by their number and unable to choose between them, he flings them
all away and returns empty handed.
Time was long during early childhood; we only tried to pass our
time for fear of using it ill; now it is the other way; we have
not time enough for all that would be of use. The passions, remember,
are drawing near, and when they knock at the door your scholar
will have no ear for anything else. The peaceful age of intelligence
is so short, it flies so swiftly, there is so much to be done,
that it is madness to try to make your child learned. It is not
your business to teach him the various sciences, but to give him
a taste for them and methods of learning them when this taste
is more mature. That is assuredly a fundamental principle of all
good education.
This is also the time to train him gradually to prolonged attention
to a given object; but this attention should never be the result
of constraint, but of interest or desire; you must be very careful
that it is not too much for his strength, and that it is not carried
to the point of tedium. Watch him, therefore, and whatever happens,
stop before he is tired, for it matters little what he learns;
it does matter that he should do nothing against his will.
If he asks questions let your answers be enough to whet his curiosity
but not enough to satisfy it; above all, when you find him talking
at random and overwhelming you with silly questions instead of
asking for information, at once refuse to answer; for it is clear
that he no longer cares about the matter in hand, but wants to
make you a slave to his questions. Consider his motives rather
than his words. This warning, which was scarcely needed before,
becomes of supreme importance when the child begins to reason.
There is a series of abstract truths by means of which all the
sciences are related to common principles and are developed each
in its turn. This relationship is the method of the philosophers.
We are not concerned with it at present. There is quite another
method by which every concrete example suggests another and always
points to the next in the series. This succession, which stimulates
the curiosity and so arouses the attention required by every object
in turn, is the order followed by most men, and it is the right
order for all children. To take our bearings so as to make our
maps we must find meridians. Two points of intersection between
the equal shadows morning and evening supply an excellent meridian
for a thirteen-year-old astronomer. But these meridians disappear,
it takes time to trace them, and you are obliged to work in one
place. So much trouble and attention will at last become irksome.
We foresaw this and are ready for it.
Again I must enter into minute and detailed explanations. I hear
my readers murmur, but I am prepared to meet their disapproval;
I will not sacrifice the most important part of this book to your
impatience. You may think me as long-winded as you please; I have
my own opinion as to your complaints.
Long ago my pupil and I remarked that some substances such as
amber, glass, and wax, when well rubbed, attracted straws, while
others did not. We accidentally discover a substance which has
a more unusual property, that of attracting filings or other small
particles of iron from a distance and without rubbing. How much
time do we devote to this game to the exclusion of everything
else! At last we discover that this property is communicated to
the iron itself, which is, so to speak, endowed with life. We
go to the fair one day [Footnote: I could not help laughing when
I read an elaborate criticism of this little tale by M. de Formy.
"This conjuror," says he, "who is afraid of a child's
competition and preaches to his tutor is the sort of person we
meet with in the world in which Emile and such as he are living."
This witty M. de Formy could not guess that this little scene
was arranged beforehand, and that the juggler was taught his part
in it; indeed I did not state this fact. But I have said again
and again that I was not writing for people who expected to be
told everything.] and a conjuror has a wax duck floating in a
basin of water, and he makes it follow a bit of bread. We are
greatly surprised, but we do not call him a wizard, never having
heard of such persons. As we are continually observing effects
whose causes are unknown to us, we are in no hurry to make up
our minds, and we remain in ignorance till we find an opportunity
of learning.
When we get home we discuss the duck till we try to imitate it.
We take a needle thoroughly magnetised, we imbed it in white wax,
shaped as far as possible like a duck, with the needle running
through the body, so that its eye forms the beak. We put the duck
in water and put the end of a key near its beak, and you will
readily understand our delight when we find that our duck follows
the key just as the duck at the fair followed the bit of bread.
Another time we may note the direction assumed by the duck when
left in the basin; for the present we are wholly occupied with
our work and we want nothing more.
The same evening we return to the fair with some bread specially
prepared in our pockets, and as soon as the conjuror has performed
his trick, my little doctor, who can scarcely sit still, exclaims,
"The trick is quite easy; I can do it myself." "Do
it then." He at once takes the bread with a bit of iron hidden
in it from his pocket; his heart throbs as he approaches the table
and holds out the bread, his hand trembles with excitement. The
duck approaches and follows his hand. The child cries out and
jumps for joy. The applause, the shouts of the crowd, are too
much for him, he is beside himself. The conjuror, though disappointed,
embraces him, congratulates him, begs the honour of his company
on the following day, and promises to collect a still greater
crowd to applaud his skill. My young scientist is very proud of
himself and is beginning to chatter, but I check him at once and
take him home overwhelmed with praise.
The child counts the minutes till to-morrow with absurd anxiety.
He invites every one he meets, he wants all mankind to behold
his glory; he can scarcely wait till the appointed hour. He hurries
to the place; the hall is full already; as he enters his young
heart swells with pride. Other tricks are to come first. The conjuror
surpasses himself and does the most surprising things. The child
sees none of these; he wriggles, perspires, and hardly breathes;
the time is spent in fingering with a trembling hand the bit of
bread in his pocket. His turn comes at last; the master announces
it to the audience with all ceremony; he goes up looking somewhat
shamefaced and takes out his bit of bread. Oh fleeting joys of
human life! the duck, so tame yesterday, is quite wild to-day;
instead of offering its beak it turns tail and swims away; it
avoids the bread and the hand that holds it as carefully as it
followed them yesterday. After many vain attempts accompanied
by derisive shouts from the audience the child complains that
he is being cheated, that is not the same duck, and he defies
the conjuror to attract it.
The conjuror, without further words, takes a bit of bread and
offers it to the duck, which at once follows it and comes to the
hand which holds it. The child takes the same bit of bread with
no better success; the duck mocks his efforts and swims round
the basin. Overwhelmed with confusion he abandons the attempt,
ashamed to face the crowd any longer. Then the conjuror takes
the bit of bread the child brought with him and uses it as successfully
as his own. He takes out the bit of iron before the audience--another
laugh at our expense--then with this same bread he attracts the
duck as before. He repeats the experiment with a piece of bread
cut by a third person in full view of the audience. He does it
with his glove, with his finger-tip. Finally he goes into the
middle of the room and in the emphatic tones used by such persons
he declares that his duck will obey his voice as readily as his
hand; he speaks and the duck obeys; he bids him go to the right
and he goes, to come back again and he comes. The movement is
as ready as the command. The growing applause completes our discomfiture.
We slip away unnoticed and shut ourselves up in our room, without
relating our successes to everybody as we had expected.
Next day there is a knock at the door. When I open it there is
the conjuror, who makes a modest complaint with regard to our
conduct. What had he done that we should try to discredit his
tricks and deprive him of his livelihood? What is there so wonderful
in attracting a duck that we should purchase this honour at the
price of an honest man's living? "My word, gentlemen! had
I any other trade by which I could earn a living I would not pride
myself on this. You may well believe that a man who has spent
his life at this miserable trade knows more about it than you
who only give your spare time to it. If I did not show you my
best tricks at first, it was because one must not be so foolish
as to display all one knows at once. I always take care to keep
my best tricks for emergencies; and I have plenty more to prevent
young folks from meddling. However, I have come, gentlemen, in
all kindness, to show you the trick that gave you so much trouble;
I only beg you not to use it to my hurt, and to be more discreet
in future." He then shows us his apparatus, and to our great
surprise we find it is merely a strong magnet in the hand of a
boy concealed under the table. The man puts up his things, and
after we have offered our thanks and apologies, we try to give
him something. He refuses it. "No, gentlemen," says
he, "I owe you no gratitude and I will not accept your gift.
I leave you in my debt in spite of all, and that is my only revenge.
Generosity may be found among all sorts of people, and I earn
my pay by doing my tricks not by teaching them."
As he is going he blames me out-right. "I can make excuses
for the child," he says, "he sinned in ignorance. But
you, sir, should know better. Why did you let him do it? As you
are living together and you are older than he, you should look
after him and give him good advice. Your experience should be
his guide. When he is grown up he will reproach, not only himself,
but you, for the faults of his youth."
When he is gone we are greatly downcast. I blame myself for my
easy-going ways. I promise the child that another time I will
put his interests first and warn him against faults before he
falls into them, for the time is coming when our relations will
be changed, when the severity of the master must give way to the
friendliness of the comrade; this change must come gradually,
you must look ahead, and very far ahead.
We go to the fair again the next day to see the trick whose secret
we know. We approach our Socrates, the conjuror, with profound
respect, we scarcely dare to look him in the face. He overwhelms
us with politeness, gives us the best places, and heaps coals
of fire on our heads. He goes through his performance as usual,
but he lingers affectionately over the duck, and often glances
proudly in our direction. We are in the secret, but we do not
tell. If my pupil did but open his mouth he would be worthy of
death.
There is more meaning than you suspect in this detailed illustration.
How many lessons in one! How mortifying are the results of a first
impulse towards vanity! Young tutor, watch this first impulse
carefully. If you can use it to bring about shame and disgrace,
you may be sure it will not recur for many a day. What a fuss
you will say. Just so; and all to provide a compass which will
enable us to dispense with a meridian!
Having learnt that a magnet acts through other bodies, our next
business is to construct a bit of apparatus similar to that shown
us. A bare table, a shallow bowl placed on it and filled with
water, a duck rather better finished than the first, and so on.
We often watch the thing and at last we notice that the duck,
when at rest. always turns the same way. We follow up this observation;
we examine the direction, we find that it is from south to north.
Enough! we have found our compass or its equivalent; the study
of physics is begun.
There are various regions of the earth, and these regions differ
in temperature. The variation is more evident as we approach the
poles; all bodies expand with heat and contract with cold; this
is best measured in liquids and best of all in spirits; hence
the thermometer. The wind strikes the face, then the air is a
body, a fluid; we feel it though we cannot see it. I invert a
glass in water; the water will not fill it unless you leave a
passage for the escape of the air; so air is capable of resistance.
Plunge the glass further in the water; the water will encroach
on the air-space without filling it entirely; so air yields somewhat
to pressure. A ball filled with compressed air bounces better
than one filled with anything else; so air is elastic. Raise your
arm horizontally from the water when you are lying in your bath;
you will feel a terrible weight on it; so air is a heavy body.
By establishing an equilibrium between air and other fluids its
weight can be measured, hence the barometer, the siphon, the air-gun,
and the air-pump. All the laws of statics and hydrostatics are
discovered by such rough experiments. For none of these would
I take the child into a physical cabinet; I dislike that array
of instruments and apparatus. The scientific atmosphere destroys
science. Either the child is frightened by these instruments or
his attention, which should be fixed on their effects, is distracted
by their appearance.
We shall make all our apparatus ourselves, and I would not make
it beforehand, but having caught a glimpse of the experiment by
chance we mean to invent step by step an instrument for its verification.
I would rather our apparatus was somewhat clumsy and imperfect,
but our ideas clear as to what the apparatus ought to be, and
the results to be obtained by means of it. For my first lesson
in statics, instead of fetching a balance, I lay a stick across
the back of a chair, I measure the two parts when it is balanced;
add equal or unequal weights to either end; by pulling or pushing
it as required, I find at last that equilibrium is the result
of a reciprocal proportion between the amount of the weights and
the length of the levers. Thus my little physicist is ready to
rectify a balance before ever he sees one.
Undoubtedly the notions of things thus acquired for oneself are
clearer and much more convincing than those acquired from the
teaching of others; and not only is our reason not accustomed
to a slavish submission to authority, but we develop greater ingenuity
in discovering relations, connecting ideas and inventing apparatus,
than when we merely accept what is given us and allow our minds
to be enfeebled by indifference, like the body of a man whose
servants always wait on him, dress him and put on his shoes, whose
horse carries him, till he loses the use of his limbs. Boileau
used to boast that he had taught Racine the art of rhyming with
difficulty. Among the many short cuts to science, we badly need
some one to teach us the art of learning with difficulty.
The most obvious advantage of these slow and laborious inquiries
is this: the scholar, while engaged in speculative studies, is
actively using his body, gaining suppleness of limb, and training
his hands to labour so that he will be able to make them useful
when he is a man. Too much apparatus, designed to guide us in
our experiments and to supplement the exactness of our senses,
makes us neglect to use those senses. The theodolite makes it
unnecessary to estimate the size of angles; the eye which used
to judge distances with much precision, trusts to the chain for
its measurements; the steel yard dispenses with the need of judging
weight by the hand as I used to do. The more ingenious our apparatus,
the coarser and more unskilful are our senses. We surround ourselves
with tools and fail to use those with which nature has provided
every one of us.
But when we devote to the making of these instruments the skill
which did instead of them, when for their construction we use
the intelligence which enabled us to dispense with them, this
is gain not loss, we add art to nature, we gain ingenuity without
loss of skill. If instead of making a child stick to his books
I employ him in a workshop, his hands work for the development
of his mind. While he fancies himself a workman he is becoming
a philosopher. Moreover, this exercise has other advantages of
which I shall speak later; and you will see how, through philosophy
in sport, one may rise to the real duties of man.
I have said already that purely theoretical science is hardly
suitable for children, even for children approaching adolescence;
but without going far into theoretical physics, take care that
all their experiments are connected together by some chain of
reasoning, so that they may follow an orderly sequence in the
mind, and may be recalled at need; for it is very difficult to
remember isolated facts or arguments, when there is no cue for
their recall.
In your inquiry into the laws of nature always begin with the
commonest and most conspicuous phenomena, and train your scholar
not to accept these phenomena as causes but as facts. I take a
stone and pretend to place it in the air; I open my hand, the
stone falls. I see Emile watching my action and I say, "Why
does this stone fall?"
What child will hesitate over this question? None, not even Emile,
unless I have taken great pains to teach him not to answer. Every
one will say, "The stone falls because it is heavy."
"And what do you mean by heavy?" "That which falls."
"So the stone falls because it falls?" Here is a poser
for my little philosopher. This is his first lesson in systematic
physics, and whether he learns physics or no it is a good lesson
in common-sense.
As the child develops in intelligence other important considerations
require us to be still more careful in our choice of his occupations.
As soon as he has sufficient self-knowledge to understand what
constitutes his well-being, as soon as he can grasp such far-reaching
relations as to judge what is good for him and what is not, then
he is able to discern the difference between work and play, and
to consider the latter merely as relaxation. The objects of real
utility may be introduced into his studies and may lead him to
more prolonged attention than he gave to his games. The ever-recurring
law of necessity soon teaches a man to do what he does not like,
so as to avert evils which he would dislike still more. Such is
the use of foresight, and this foresight, well or ill used, is
the source of all the wisdom or the wretchedness of mankind.
Every one desires happiness, but to secure it he must know what
happiness is. For the natural man happiness is as simple as his
life; it consists in the absence of pain; health, freedom, the
necessaries of life are its elements. The happiness of the moral
man is another matter, but it does not concern us at present.
I cannot repeat too often that it is only objects which can be
perceived by the senses which can have any interest for children,
especially children whose vanity has not been stimulated nor their
minds corrupted by social conventions.
As soon as they foresee their needs before they feel them, their
intelligence has made a great step forward, they are beginning
to know the value of time. They must then be trained to devote
this time to useful purposes, but this usefulness should be such
as they can readily perceive and should be within the reach of
their age and experience. What concerns the moral order and the
customs of society should not yet be given them, for they are
not in a condition to understand it. It is folly to expect them
to attend to things vaguely described as good for them, when they
do not know what this good is, things which they are assured will
be to their advantage when they are grown up, though for the present
they take no interest in this so-called advantage, which they
are unable to understand.
Let the child do nothing because he is told; nothing is good for
him but what he recognises as good. When you are always urging
him beyond his present understanding, you think you are exercising
a foresight which you really lack. To provide him with useless
tools which he may never require, you deprive him of man's most
useful tool--common-sense. You would have him docile as a child;
he will be a credulous dupe when he grows up. You are always saying,
"What I ask is for your good, though you cannot understand
it. What does it matter to me whether you do it or not; my efforts
are entirely on your account." All these fine speeches with
which you hope to make him good, are preparing the way, so that
the visionary, the tempter, the charlatan, the rascal, and every
kind of fool may catch him in his snare or draw him into his folly.
A man must know many things which seem useless to a child, but
need the child learn, or can he indeed learn, all that the man
must know? Try to teach the child what is of use to a child and
you will find that it takes all his time. Why urge him to the
studies of an age he may never reach, to the neglect of those
studies which meet his present needs? "But," you ask,
"will it not be too late to learn what he ought to know when
the time comes to use it?" I cannot tell; but this I do know,
it is impossible to teach it sooner, for our real teachers are
experience and emotion, and man will never learn what befits a
man except under its own conditions. A child knows he must become
a man; all the ideas he may have as to man's estate are so many
opportunities for his instruction, but he should remain in complete
ignorance of those ideas which are beyond his grasp. My whole
book is one continued argument in support of this fundamental
principle of education.
As soon as we have contrived to give our pupil an idea of the
word "Useful," we have got an additional means of controlling
him, for this word makes a great impression on him, provided that
its meaning for him is a meaning relative to his own age, and
provided he clearly sees its relation to his own well-being. This
word makes no impression on your scholars because you have taken
no pains to give it a meaning they can understand, and because
other people always undertake to supply their needs so that they
never require to think for themselves, and do not know what utility
is.
"What is the use of that?" In future this is the sacred
formula, the formula by which he and I test every action of our
lives. This is the question with which I invariably answer all
his questions; it serves to check the stream of foolish and tiresome
questions with which children weary those about them. These incessant
questions produce no result, and their object is rather to get
a hold over you than to gain any real advantage. A pupil, who
has been really taught only to want to know what is useful, questions
like Socrates; he never asks a question without a reason for it,
for he knows he will be required to give his reason before he
gets an answer.
See what a powerful instrument I have put into your hands for
use with your pupil. As he does not know the reason for anything
you can reduce him to silence almost at will; and what advantages
do your knowledge and experience give you to show him the usefulness
of what you suggest. For, make no mistake about it, when you put
this question to him, you are teaching him to put it to you, and
you must expect that whatever you suggest to him in the future
he will follow your own example and ask, "What is the use
of this?"
Perhaps this is the greatest of the tutor's difficulties. If you
merely try to put the child off when he asks a question, and if
you give him a single reason he is not able to understand, if
he finds that you reason according to your own ideas, not his,
he will think what you tell him is good for you but not for him;
you will lose his confidence and all your labour is thrown away.
But what master will stop short and confess his faults to his
pupil? We all make it a rule never to own to the faults we really
have. Now I would make it a rule to admit even the faults I have
not, if I could not make my reasons clear to him; as my conduct
will always be intelligible to him, he will never doubt me and
I shall gain more credit by confessing my imaginary faults than
those who conceal their real defects.
In the first place do not forget that it is rarely your business
to suggest what he ought to learn; it is for him to want to learn,
to seek and to find it. You should put it within his reach, you
should skilfully awaken the desire and supply him with means for
its satisfaction. So your questions should be few and well-chosen,
and as he will always have more questions to put to you than you
to him, you will always have the advantage and will be able to
ask all the oftener, "What is the use of that question?"
Moreover, as it matters little what he learns provided he understands
it and knows how to use it, as soon as you cannot give him a suitable
explanation give him none at all. Do not hesitate to say, "I
have no good answer to give you; I was wrong, let us drop the
subject." If your teaching was really ill-chosen there is
no harm in dropping it altogether; if it was not, with a little
care you will soon find an opportunity of making its use apparent
to him.
I do not like verbal explanations. Young people pay little heed
to them, nor do they remember them. Things! Things! I cannot repeat
it too often. We lay too much stress upon words; we teachers babble,
and our scholars follow our example.
Suppose we are studying the course of the sun and the way to find
our bearings, when all at once Emile interrupts me with the question,
"What is the use of that?" what a fine lecture I might
give, how many things I might take occasion to teach him in reply
to his question, especially if there is any one there. I might
speak of the advantages of travel, the value of commerce, the
special products of different lands and the peculiar customs of
different nations, the use of the calendar, the way to reckon
the seasons for agriculture, the art of navigation, how to steer
our course at sea, how to find our way without knowing exactly
where we are. Politics, natural history, astronomy, even morals
and international law are involved in my explanation, so as to
give my pupil some idea of all these sciences and a great wish
to learn them. When I have finished I shall have shown myself
a regular pedant, I shall have made a great display of learning,
and not one single idea has he understood. He is longing to ask
me again, "What is the use of taking one's bearings?"
but he dare not for fear of vexing me. He finds it pays best to
pretend to listen to what he is forced to hear. This is the practical
result of our fine systems of education.
But Emile is educated in a simpler fashion. We take so much pains
to teach him a difficult idea that he will have heard nothing
of all this. At the first word he does not understand, he will
run away, he will prance about the room, and leave me to speechify
by myself. Let us seek a more commonplace explanation; my scientific
learning is of no use to him.
We were observing the position of the forest to the north of Montmorency
when he interrupted me with the usual question, "What is
the use of that?" "You are right," I said. "Let
us take time to think it over, and if we find it is no use we
will drop it, for we only want useful games." We find something
else to do and geography is put aside for the day.
Next morning I suggest a walk before breakfast; there is nothing
he would like better; children are always ready to run about,
and he is a good walker. We climb up to the forest, we wander
through its clearings and lose ourselves; we have no idea where
we are, and when we want to retrace our steps we cannot find the
way. Time passes, we are hot and hungry; hurrying vainly this
way and that we find nothing but woods, quarries, plains, not
a landmark to guide us. Very hot, very tired, very hungry, we
only get further astray. At last we sit down to rest and to consider
our position. I assume that Emile has been educated like an ordinary
child. He does not think, he begins to cry; he has no idea we
are close to Montmorency, which is hidden from our view by a mere
thicket; but this thicket is a forest to him, a man of his size
is buried among bushes. After a few minutes' silence I begin anxiously----
JEAN JACQUES. My dear Emile, what shall we do get out?
EMILE. I am sure I do not know. I am tired, I am hungry, I am
thirsty. I cannot go any further.
JEAN JACQUES. Do you suppose I am any better off? I would cry
too if I could make my breakfast off tears. Crying is no use,
we must look about us. Let us see your watch; what time is it?
EMILE. It is noon and I am so hungry!
JEAN JACQUES. Just so; it is noon and I am so hungry too.
EMILE. You must be very hungry indeed.
JEAN JACQUES. Unluckily my dinner won't come to find me. It is
twelve o'clock. This time yesterday we were observing the position
of the forest from Montmorency. If only we could see the position
of Montmorency from the forest.
EMILE. But yesterday we could see the forest, and here we cannot
see the town.
JEAN JACQUES. That is just it. If we could only find it without
seeing it.
EMILE. Oh! my dear friend!
JEAN JACQUES. Did not we say the forest was...
EMILE. North of Montmorency.
JEAN JACQUES. Then Montmorency must lie...
EMILE. South of the forest.
JEAN JACQUES. We know how to find the north at midday.
EMILE. Yes, by the direction of the shadows.
JEAN JACQUES. But the south?
EMILE. What shall we do?
JEAN JACQUES. The south is opposite the north.
EMILE. That is true; we need only find the opposite of the shadows.
That is the south! That is the south! Montmorency must be over
there! Let us look for it there!
JEAN JACQUES. Perhaps you are right; let us follow this path through
the wood.
EMILE. (Clapping his hands.) Oh, I can see Montmorency! there
it is, quite plain, just in front of us! Come to luncheon, come
to dinner, make haste! Astronomy is some use after all.
Be sure that he thinks this if he does not say it; no matter which,
provided I do not say it myself. He will certainly never forget
this day's lesson as long as he lives, while if I had only led
him to think of all this at home, my lecture would have been forgotten
the next day. Teach by doing whenever you can, and only fall back
upon words when doing is out of the question.
The reader will not expect me to have such a poor opinion of him
as to supply him with an example of every kind of study; but,
whatever is taught, I cannot too strongly urge the tutor to adapt
his instances to the capacity of his scholar; for once more I
repeat the risk is not in what he does not know, but in what he
thinks he knows.
I remember how I once tried to give a child a taste for chemistry.
After showing him several metallic precipitates, I explained how
ink was made. I told him how its blackness was merely the result
of fine particles of iron separated from the vitriol and precipitated
by an alkaline solution. In the midst of my learned explanation
the little rascal pulled me up short with the question I myself
had taught him. I was greatly puzzled. After a few moments' thought
I decided what to do. I sent for some wine from the cellar of
our landlord, and some very cheap wine from a wine-merchant. I
took a small [Footnote: Before giving any explanation to a child
a little bit of apparatus serves to fix his attention.] flask
of an alkaline solution, and placing two glasses before me filled
with the two sorts of wine, I said.
Food and drink are adulterated to make them seem better than they
really are. These adulterations deceive both the eye and the palate,
but they are unwholesome and make the adulterated article even
worse than before in spite of its fine appearance.
All sorts of drinks are adulterated, and wine more than others;
for the fraud is more difficult to detect, and more profitable
to the fraudulent person.
Sour wine is adulterated with litharge; litharge is a preparation
of lead. Lead in combination with acids forms a sweet salt which
corrects the harsh taste of the sour wine, but it is poisonous.
So before we drink wine of doubtful quality we should be able
to tell if there is lead in it. This is how I should do it.
Wine contains not merely an inflammable spirit as you have seen
from the brandy made from it; it also contains an acid as you
know from the vinegar made from it.
This acid has an affinity for metals, it combines with them and
forms salts, such as iron-rust, which is only iron dissolved by
the acid in air or water, or such as verdegris, which is only
copper dissolved in vinegar.
But this acid has a still greater affinity for alkalis than for
metals, so that when we add alkalis to the above-mentioned salts,
the acid sets free the metal with which it had combined, and combines
with the alkali.
Then the metal, set free by the acid which held it in solution,
is precipitated and the liquid becomes opaque.
If then there is litharge in either of these glasses of wine,
the acid holds the litharge in solution. When I pour into it an
alkaline solution, the acid will be forced to set the lead free
in order to combine with the alkali. The lead, no longer held
in solution, will reappear, the liquor will become thick, and
after a time the lead will be deposited at the bottom of the glass.
If there is no lead [Footnote: The wine sold by retail dealers
in Paris is rarely free from lead, though some of it does not
contain litharge, for the counters are covered with lead and when
the wine is poured into the measures and some of it spilt upon
the counter and the measures left standing on the counter, some
of the lead is always dissolved. It is strange that so obvious
and dangerous an abuse should be tolerated by the police. But
indeed well-to-do people, who rarely drink these wines, are not
likely to be poisoned by them.] nor other metal in the wine the
alkali will slowly [Footnote: The vegetable acid is very gentle
in its action. If it were a mineral acid and less diluted, the
combination would not take place without effervescence.] combine
with the acid, all will remain clear and there will be no precipitate.
Then I poured my alkaline solution first into one glass and then
into the other. The wine from our own house remained clear and
unclouded, the other at once became turbid, and an hour later
the lead might be plainly seen, precipitated at the bottom of
the glass.
"This," said I, "is a pure natural wine and fit
to drink; the other is adulterated and poisonous. You wanted to
know the use of knowing how to make ink. If you can make ink you
can find out what wines are adulterated."
I was very well pleased with my illustration, but I found it made
little impression on my pupil. When I had time to think about
it I saw I had been a fool, for not only was it impossible for
a child of twelve to follow my explanations, but the usefulness
of the experiment did not appeal to him; he had tasted both glasses
of wine and found them both good, so he attached no meaning to
the word "adulterated" which I thought I had explained
so nicely. Indeed, the other words, "unwholesome" and
"poison," had no meaning whatever for him; he was in
the same condition as the boy who told the story of Philip and
his doctor. It is the condition of all children.
The relation of causes and effects whose connection is unknown
to us, good and ill of which we have no idea, the needs we have
never felt, have no existence for us. It is impossible to interest
ourselves in them sufficiently to make us do anything connected
with them. At fifteen we become aware of the happiness of a good
man, as at thirty we become aware of the glory of Paradise. If
we had no clear idea of either we should make no effort for their
attainment; and even if we had a clear idea of them, we should
make little or no effort unless we desired them and unless we
felt we were made for them. It is easy to convince a child that
what you wish to teach him is useful, but it is useless to convince
if you cannot also persuade. Pure reason may lead us to approve
or censure, but it is feeling which leads to action, and how shall
we care about that which does not concern us?
Never show a child what he cannot see. Since mankind is almost
unknown to him, and since you cannot make a man of him, bring
the man down to the level of the child. While you are thinking
what will be useful to him when he is older, talk to him of what
he knows he can use now. Moreover, as soon as he begins to reason
let there be no comparison with other children, no rivalry, no
competition, not even in running races. I would far rather he
did not learn anything than have him learn it through jealousy
or self-conceit. Year by year I shall just note the progress he
had made, I shall compare the results with those of the following
year, I shall say, "You have grown so much; that is the ditch
you jumped, the weight you carried, the distance you flung a pebble,
the race you ran without stopping to take breath, etc.; let us
see what you can do now."
In this way he is stimulated to further effort without jealousy.
He wants to excel himself as he ought to do; I see no reason why
he should not emulate his own performances.
I hate books; they only teach us to talk about things we know
nothing about. Hermes, they say, engraved the elements of science
on pillars lest a deluge should destroy them. Had he imprinted
them on men's hearts they would have been preserved by tradition.
Well-trained minds are the pillars on which human knowledge is
most deeply engraved.
Is there no way of correlating so many lessons scattered through
so many books, no way of focussing them on some common object,
easy to see, interesting to follow, and stimulating even to a
child? Could we but discover a state in which all man's needs
appear in such a way as to appeal to the child's mind, a state
in which the ways of providing for these needs are as easily developed,
the simple and stirring portrayal of this state should form the
earliest training of the child's imagination.
Eager philosopher, I see your own imagination at work. Spare yourself
the trouble; this state is already known, it is described, with
due respect to you, far better than you could describe it, at
least with greater truth and simplicity. Since we must have books,
there is one book which, to my thinking, supplies the best treatise
on an education according to nature. This is the first book Emile
will read; for a long time it will form his whole library, and
it will always retain an honoured place. It will be the text to
which all our talks about natural science are but the commentary.
It will serve to test our progress towards a right judgment, and
it will always be read with delight, so long as our taste is unspoilt.
What is this wonderful book? Is it Aristotle? Pliny? Buffon? No;
it is Robinson Crusoe.
Robinson Crusoe on his island, deprived of the help of his fellow-men,
without the means of carrying on the various arts, yet finding
food, preserving his life, and procuring a certain amount of comfort;
this is the thing to interest people of all ages, and it can be
made attractive to children in all sorts of ways. We shall thus
make a reality of that desert island which formerly served as
an illustration. The condition, I confess, is not that of a social
being, nor is it in all probability Emile's own condition, but
he should use it as a standard of comparison for all other conditions.
The surest way to raise him above prejudice and to base his judgments
on the true relations of things, is to put him in the place of
a solitary man, and to judge all things as they would be judged
by such a man in relation to their own utility.
This novel, stripped of irrelevant matter, begins with Robinson's
shipwreck on his island, and ends with the coming of the ship
which bears him from it, and it will furnish Emile with material,
both for work and play, during the whole period we are considering.
His head should be full of it, he should always be busy with his
castle, his goats, his plantations. Let him learn in detail, not
from books but from things, all that is necessary in such a case.
Let him think he is Robinson himself; let him see himself clad
in skins, wearing a tall cap, a great cutlass, all the grotesque
get-up of Robinson Crusoe, even to the umbrella which he will
scarcely need. He should anxiously consider what steps to take;
will this or that be wanting. He should examine his hero's conduct;
has he omitted nothing; is there nothing he could have done better?
He should carefully note his mistakes, so as not to fall into
them himself in similar circumstances, for you may be sure he
will plan out just such a settlement for himself. This is the
genuine castle in the air of this happy age, when the child knows
no other happiness but food and freedom.
What a motive will this infatuation supply in the hands of a skilful
teacher who has aroused it for the purpose of using it. The child
who wants to build a storehouse on his desert island will be more
eager to learn than the master to teach. He will want to know
all sorts of useful things and nothing else; you will need the
curb as well as the spur. Make haste, therefore, to establish
him on his island while this is all he needs to make him happy;
for the day is at hand, when, if he must still live on his island,
he will not be content to live alone, when even the companionship
of Man Friday, who is almost disregarded now, will not long suffice.
The exercise of the natural arts, which may be carried on by one
man alone, leads on to the industrial arts which call for the
cooperation of many hands. The former may be carried on by hermits,
by savages, but the others can only arise in a society, and they
make society necessary. So long as only bodily needs are recognised
man is self-sufficing; with superfluity comes the need for division
and distribution of labour, for though one man working alone can
earn a man's living, one hundred men working together can earn
the living of two hundred. As soon as some men are idle, others
must work to make up for their idleness.
Your main object should be to keep out of your scholar's way all
idea of such social relations as he cannot understand, but when
the development of knowledge compels you to show him the mutual
dependence of mankind, instead of showing him its moral side,
turn all his attention at first towards industry and the mechanical
arts which make men useful to one another. While you take him
from one workshop to another, let him try his hand at every trade
you show him, and do not let him leave it till he has thoroughly
learnt why everything is done, or at least everything that has
attracted his attention. With this aim you should take a share
in his work and set him an example. Be yourself the apprentice
that he may become a master; you may expect him to learn more
in one hour's work than he would retain after a whole day's explanation.
The value set by the general public on the various arts is in
inverse ratio to their real utility. They are even valued directly
according to their uselessness. This might be expected. The most
useful arts are the worst paid, for the number of workmen is regulated
by the demand, and the work which everybody requires must necessarily
be paid at a rate which puts it within the reach of the poor.
On the other hand, those great people who are called artists,
not artisans, who labour only for the rich and idle, put a fancy
price on their trifles; and as the real value of this vain labour
is purely imaginary, the price itself adds to their market value,
and they are valued according to their costliness. The rich think
so much of these things, not because they are useful, but because
they are beyond the reach of the poor. Nolo habere bona, nisi
quibus populus inviderit.
What will become of your pupils if you let them acquire this foolish
prejudice, if you share it yourself? If, for instance, they see
you show more politeness in a jeweller's shop than in a locksmith's.
What idea will they form of the true worth of the arts and the
real value of things when they see, on the one hand, a fancy price
and, on the other, the price of real utility, and that the more
a thing costs the less it is worth? As soon as you let them get
hold of these ideas, you may give up all attempt at further education;
in spite of you they will be like all the other scholars--you
have wasted fourteen years.
Emile, bent on furnishing his island, will look at things from
another point of view. Robinson would have thought more of a toolmaker's
shop than all Saide's trifles put together. He would have reckoned
the toolmaker a very worthy man, and Saide little more than a
charlatan.
"My son will have to take the world as he finds it, he will
not live among the wise but among fools; he must therefore be
acquainted with their follies, since they must be led by this
means. A real knowledge of things may be a good thing in itself,
but the knowledge of men and their opinions is better, for in
human society man is the chief tool of man, and the wisest man
is he who best knows the use of this tool. What is the good of
teaching children an imaginary system, just the opposite of the
established order of things, among which they will have to live?
First teach them wisdom, then show them the follies of mankind."
These are the specious maxims by which fathers, who mistake them
for prudence, strive to make their children the slaves of the
prejudices in which they are educated, and the puppets of the
senseless crowd, which they hope to make subservient to their
passions. How much must be known before we attain to a knowledge
of man. This is the final study of the philosopher, and you expect
to make it the first lesson of the child! Before teaching him
our sentiments, first teach him to judge of their worth. Do you
perceive folly when you mistake it for wisdom? To be wise we must
discern between good and evil. How can your child know men, when
he can neither judge of their judgments nor unravel their mistakes?
It is a misfortune to know what they think, without knowing whether
their thoughts are true or false. First teach him things as they
really are, afterwards you will teach him how they appear to us.
He will then be able to make a comparison between popular ideas
and truth, and be able to rise above the vulgar crowd; for you
are unaware of the prejudices you adopt, and you do not lead a
nation when you are like it. But if you begin to teach the opinions
of other people before you teach how to judge of their worth,
of one thing you may be sure, your pupil will adopt those opinions
whatever you may do, and you will not succeed in uprooting them.
I am therefore convinced that to make a young man judge rightly,
you must form his judgment rather than teach him your own.
So far you see I have not spoken to my pupil about men; he would
have too much sense to listen to me. His relations to other people
are as yet not sufficiently apparent to him to enable him to judge
others by himself. The only person he knows is himself, and his
knowledge of himself is very imperfect. But if he forms few opinions
about others, those opinions are correct. He knows nothing of
another's place, but he knows his own and keeps to it. I have
bound him with the strong cord of necessity, instead of social
laws, which are beyond his knowledge. He is still little more
than a body; let us treat him as such.
Every substance in nature and every work of man must be judged
in relation to his own use, his own safety, his own preservation,
his own comfort. Thus he should value iron far more than gold,
and glass than diamonds; in the same way he has far more respect
for a shoemaker or a mason than for a Lempereur, a Le Blanc, or
all the jewellers in Europe. In his eyes a confectioner is a really
great man, and he would give the whole academy of sciences for
the smallest pastrycook in Lombard Street. Goldsmiths, engravers,
gilders, and embroiderers, he considers lazy people, who play
at quite useless games. He does not even think much of a clockmaker.
The happy child enjoys Time without being a slave to it; he uses
it, but he does not know its value. The freedom from passion which
makes every day alike to him, makes any means of measuring time
unnecessary. When I assumed that Emile had a watch, [Footnote:
When our hearts are abandoned to the sway of passion, then it
is that we need a measure of time. The wise man's watch is his
equable temper and his peaceful heart. He is always punctual,
and he always knows the time.] just as I assumed that he cried,
it was a commonplace Emile that I chose to serve my purpose and
make myself understood. The real Emile, a child so different from
the rest, would not serve as an illustration for anything.
There is an order no less natural and even more accurate, by which
the arts are valued according to bonds of necessity which connect
them; the highest class consists of the most independent, the
lowest of those most dependent on others. This classification,
which suggests important considerations on the order of society
in general, is like the preceding one in that it is subject to
the same inversion in popular estimation, so that the use of raw
material is the work of the lowest and worst paid trades, while
the oftener the material changes hands, the more the work rises
in price and in honour. I do not ask whether industry is really
greater and more deserving of reward when engaged in the delicate
arts which give the final shape to these materials, than in the
labour which first ........Continua
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