Holland,
As a result of the Dutch Reformed movement, Holland also made early provision for instruction in religion, reading, and writing. The Church at various synods, and civic authorities in many statutes, recognized the need of universal training, and finally the great Synod of Dort, by a combination with the civil government, in 1618 required every parish to furnish elementaryScotland,education for all. Similarly, through Knox, Scotland established elementary schools under the control of the parishes. Preliminary steps in this direction were taken by the Privy Council and the Scotch Parliament early in the seventeenth century, and in 1646 the parliament further enacted that there be “a Schoole founded, and a Schoole master appointed in every Parish,” and provided that if a parish should fail in this duty, the presbytery should have power to establish the school and compel the parish to maintain it. Half a century later this school system was given over more fully to the control of the State, but even then much of the old connection with the Church was apparent. These schools gave instruction in reading, writing, and religion, with the Bible as text, and have done a wonderful work in raising the level of intelligence and affording an opportunity to the children of the lower classes in Scotland. England herself continued to hold to aristocratic and ‘selective’education, and gave little heed to the establishment ofand the American colonies.elementary schools; but the American colonies, as far as they were founded by Calvinists or Lutherans, provided early for elementary education (see p. 189). The Puritan towns of the Massachusetts colony established schools almost as soon as they were settled, and in 1647 the legislature enacted that all towns with fifty families should provide an elementary school. Connecticut followed the example three years later, and before the close of the century, similar action was taken by New Hampshire and Vermont (seepp. 197and 199). Likewise, New Amsterdam and the villages of New Netherlands followed the example of the Mother Country and provided public schools in connection with each church through the support of the Dutch West India Company or of the civil and ecclesiastical bodies jointly (seepp. 193f).
Fig. 19.—A school of the Christian Brothers. (Visit of James II and the Archbishop of Paris to the school at Rouen.)
Fig. 19.—A school of the Christian Brothers. (Visit of James II and the Archbishop of Paris to the school at Rouen.)
Fig. 20.—A Protestant school in a German village of the sixteenth century. (Visit of the school committee and catechising by the pastor.)
Fig. 20.—A Protestant school in a German village of the sixteenth century. (Visit of the school committee and catechising by the pastor.)
Effect of the Reformation upon the Secondary Schools.—While the development of elementary instruction and state systems of education was the most important educational outcome of the Reformation, the movement had a somewhat similar effect upon the humanistic secondary education of the time. In Protestant Germany theCivic control among Protestants,Latin schools and gymnasia came under the control of the princes and the State rather than the Church, and gradually became the backbone of the state school systems. But they stressed the religious element in theirthough direct management through the Church.curriculum, and the direct management of education was simply transferred to Protestant ministers or leaders. The schools were still taught and inspected by representatives of the Church, but the form of the organization and administration of education was radically changed. In England there was a similar transfer of managementto the Protestant clergy. The existence of the schools had to be authorized and their teachers licensed by the bishop, and they were at all times liable to visitation from ecclesiastical authority. The grammar schools, however, were never organized like the gymnasia, but each school remained independent of the rest and of any national combination. Nor were the Calvinistic colleges united into a national system, except where they came into Germany, when they were absorbed into the system of the gymnasia. The state system of education established by the Scotch parliament in the parishes, often gave secondary training, as well as elementary. And in America the establishment and control of the ‘grammar’ schools, inherited from the mother country, were vested in the authorities of the state and the severalCatholic education largely in hands of Jesuits.towns. On the other hand, the Catholic education in all countries found its secondary schools largely in the colleges of the Jesuits, and the subordination of the individual to authority and the Church was insisted upon.
Influence of the Reformation upon the Universities.—InMany universities adhered to Catholic authority.the case of the universities, many remained loyal to Catholicism and a few new Catholic foundations grew out of the Reformation. All these adhered to the principle of submission to ecclesiastical authority. But the majority of the universities in the Protestant states of Germany followed their princes when they changed fromOthers changed to Protestantism with their princes.the old creed to the new. Wittenberg, through its connection with Luther and Melanchthon, was the first German university to become Protestant, but others, like Marburg, Königsberg, Jena, Helmstadt, and Dorpat followed rapidly. Altdorf and Strassburg were developed out of gymnasia. The English universities, Oxford andCambridge, went over to Protestantism with the national Church. In America, too, Harvard and other early colleges were closely connected with the various commonwealths and with the Calvinistic or the Anglican communion, according to the colony.
The Lapse into Formalism.—There came to be both in Catholic and Protestant institutions a tendency to regard the subjects taught as materials for discipline rather than as valuable for their content. The studies largely became an end in themselves and were deprived of almost all their vitality. The curriculum of the institutions became fixed and stereotyped in nature, and education lapsed into a formalism but little superior to that of the mediæval scholastics. The methods of teachingMemory stressed, rather than reason; authority emphasized; and individuality repressed.came to stress memory more than reason. The Protestants had claimed to depend less upon uncritical and obedient acceptance of dogma than upon the constant application of reason to the Scriptures, but they soon tended to emphasize the importance of authority and the repression of the individual quite as clearly as the Catholics, who definitely held that reason is out of place and unreliable as a final guide in education and life. Hence, except for launching the great conception of state support and control of education, the Reformation accomplished but little directly making for individualism and progress, either through the Catholic awakening or the Protestant revolts. Education fell back before long into the grooves of formalism, repression, and distrust of reason. There resulted a tendency to test life and the educational preparation for living by a formulation of belief almost as much as in the days of scholasticism.
Graves,During the Transition(Macmillan, 1910), chap. XV-XVI; Monroe,Text-book(Macmillan, 1905), chap. VII. An excellent interpretative account of the Reformation is that in Adams, G. B.,Civilization during the Middle Ages(Scribner, 1894), chaps. XVI and XVII. Painter, F. V. N., furnishes a good translation ofLuther on Education(Lutheran Publication Society, Philadelphia). Richard, J. W., gives a good account ofMelanchthon, the Protestant Preceptor of Germany(Putnam, 1898), especially chaps. II-IV and VII; Watson, F., ofMaturinus Corderius, the Schoolmaster of Calvin(School Review, vol. XII, nos. 4, 7, and 9); Graves, F. P.,Ramus and the Educational Reformation of the Sixteenth Century(Macmillan, 1912) of conditions in France; and Leach, A. F., of the dissolution acts of Henry VIII and Edward VI inEnglish Schools at the Reformation(Constable, London, 1896), pp. 58-122. On the side of Catholic education, one should read Schwickerath, R.,Jesuit Education(Herder, St. Louis), chaps. III-VIII and XV-XVIII; Cadet, F.,Port Royal Education(Bardeen, Syracuse, 1899; George Allen and Co., London) pp. 9-119; and Wilson, Mrs. R. F.,Christian Brothers(London, 1883), which gives an epitome of Ravelet, A.,Life of La Salle. The influence of the Reformation upon the German schools and universities, both Protestant and Catholic, is shown in Nohle E.,History of the German School System(Report of the United States Commissioner of Education, 1897-98, vol. I), pp. 30-40; and Paulsen, F.,German Education(Scribner, 1908), pp. 79-85.
The intellectual awakening that appeared in the Renaissance and the Reformation found another avenue for expression in early realism.This movement had two phases: (1) humanistic realism, which emphasized the content of classical literature; and (2) social realism, which strove to adapt education to actual life. But the two phases generally occurred together, and the classification of a treatise under one head or the other is largely a matter of emphasis.The influence of the two phases was mostly indirect, but through social realism a special training arose in theRitterakademienin Germany, while Milton’s humanistic realism was embodied in the ‘academies’ of England, and afterward of America.
The intellectual awakening that appeared in the Renaissance and the Reformation found another avenue for expression in early realism.
This movement had two phases: (1) humanistic realism, which emphasized the content of classical literature; and (2) social realism, which strove to adapt education to actual life. But the two phases generally occurred together, and the classification of a treatise under one head or the other is largely a matter of emphasis.
The influence of the two phases was mostly indirect, but through social realism a special training arose in theRitterakademienin Germany, while Milton’s humanistic realism was embodied in the ‘academies’ of England, and afterward of America.
The Rise and Nature of Realism.—By the seventeenth century it is obvious that humanism was everywhere losing its vitality and declining into a narrow ‘Ciceronianism,’ and that the Reformation was hardening once more into fixed concepts and a dogmatic formalism.A new channel for the emancipation of the individual.The awakened intellect of Europe, however, was tending to find still another mode of expression in the educational movement that is usually known as ‘realism.’ The process of emancipating the individual from tradition and repressive authority had not altogether ceased, but it was manifesting itself mainlythrough a rather different channel. The movement ofA method by which ‘real things’ may be known.realism implied a search for a method by which ‘real things’ may be known. In its most distinct and latest form,—‘sense realism,’ it held that real knowledge comes‘Sense realism’through the senses and reason rather than through memory and reliance on tradition, and in this way it interpreted the ‘real things’ as being individual objects. Educational realism, therefore, concerned itself ultimately with investigation in the natural sciences; and it might well be denominated ‘the beginnings of the scientific movement,’ were it not that such a descriptionand the earlier realism.neglects the earlier phases of the realistic development.
Humanistic Realism.—For, even before objects were regarded as the true realities, there seems to have been an effort among some later humanists to seek for the‘Real things’ in ideas, rather than words.‘real things’ in the ideas that were represented by the written words. This broader type of humanism, in consequence, tended to break from a restriction to words and set forms and return to the interest in the content of classical literature that marked the Renaissance before its decline into formalism. It may, therefore, properly be called ‘humanistic realism.’ With its emphasis upon content usually went a study of social and physical phenomena, in order to throw light upon the passages under consideration. Illustrations of this humanistic realism are found in many writers of the sixteenth andMilton’sTractateas an illustration.seventeenth centuries. Milton (1608-1674), for example, while a remarkable classicist himself, in hisTractate of Educationobjects to the usual humanistic education with “its grammatic flats and shallows where they stuck unreasonably to learn a few words with lamentable construction”; and says of the pupil, “if he have notstudied the solid things in them as well as the words and lexicons, he were nothing so much to be esteemed as any yeoman or tradesman competently wise in his mother dialect only.” And he would teach the Latin writers on agriculture, and the Greek writers on natural history, geography, and medicine for the sake of the subject-matter.
Social Realism.—But there was another phase of early realism, which often appeared in conjunction with humanistic education, and may be called ‘social realism.’ Its adherents strove to adapt education to actual livingPreparation for living in a real world.in a real world, and to afford direct practical preparation for the opportunities and duties of life. It was generally recommended as the means of education for all members of the upper social class. It sought to combine with the literary elements taught the clergy in the Middle Ages and the scholar in the Renaissance, certain remnants of the old chivalric education as the proper training for gentlemen. It held schools to be of less value as an agency for educating the young aristocrats than training through a tutor and travel. Hence an education inIts content.social realism usually included a study of heraldry, genealogy, riding, fencing, and gymnastics, and involved a study of modern languages and the customs and institutions of neighboring countries.
A good illustration of this type of education is found in the educational essays of Montaigne (1533-1592).Montaigne’sEducation of Childrenas an example.In theEducation of Childrenhe holds that virtue comes from experience and breadth of vision rather than from reading, and declares: “I would have travel the book my young gentleman should study with most attention; for so many humors, so many sects, so many judgments,opinions, laws, and customs, teach us to judge aright of our own, and inform our understanding to discover its imperfection and natural infirmity.” This training, too, he feels, should be under the care of a tutor, who is to be a man of the world, one “whose head is well tempered, rather than well filled.” While a gentleman has need of Latin and Greek, Montaigne maintains that one should first study his own language and those of his neighbors. He also stresses physical exercise, and fears the training of boys near their mothers, who “will not endure to see them mount an unruly horse, nor take a foil in hand against a rude fencer.”
An educational work based on social realism that has been studied even more than theEssaysof Montaigne isLocke’sThoughtsbetter known.Some Thoughts concerning Educationby John Locke (1632-1704). Locke states the aims of education inAim of education.the order of their value as ‘Virtue,Wisdom(i. e., worldly wisdom),Breeding, andLearning’; and holds that such a training can be secured by the young gentleman only through a tutor, who “should himself be well-bred, understanding the Ways of Carriage and Measures of Civility in all the Variety of Persons, Times and Places, and keep his Pupil, as much as his Age requires, constantly to the Observation of them.” In considering the subject-matter of the training, he maintains that “besides what is to be had from Study and Books, there are other‘Accomplishments’ as part of its content.Accomplishmentsnecessary for a Gentleman,—dancing, horseback riding, fencing and wrestling.”
The Relations of Humanistic to Social Realism.—Humanistic and social realism, however, constantly appear together in the works of the same author, and it is often difficult to distinguish a writer as advocatingone type or the other. The differentiation seems to beDifficult to distinguish an author as of one type or the other, as can be seen in Milton.largely a matter of emphasis. While one element or the other may seem to be more prominent in the treatise of a certain author, the two phases of education are largely bound up in each other. While Milton, for instance, is in the main a humanistic realist and advises an education in languages and books, he recommends that considerable time be given, toward the end of the course, to the social sciences—history, ethics, politics, economics, theology—and to such practical training as would bring one in touch with life. He also specifically advocates the experience and knowledge that would come from travel in England and abroad; and defines education as “that which fits a man to perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously all the offices both private and public of peace and war.” On the otherMontaigne,hand, Montaigne, the social realist, seems quite as strenuous in urging a more realistic humanism. In his essay,On Pedantry, he launches most vigorous ridicule against the prevailing narrow humanistic education, with its memorizing of words and forms, and insists: “Let the master not only examine him about the words of his lesson, but also as to the sense and meaning of them, and let him judge of the profit he has made, not by the testimony of his memory, but that of his understanding.”
And it is equally difficult to state whether humanisticand others.or social elements prevail in Locke’sThoughts, theGargantuaof Rabelais (1495-1553), thePositionsof Mulcaster (1530-1611), and other treatises of the period. It is true, of course, that in certain other works written upon the training of the aristocracy, social realism ismore exclusively stressed. The titles of most of these reveal their content, as can easily be seen in the case of such productions as Castiglione’sThe Courtier(1528),Distinctive social realists.Elyot’sThe Governour(1531), Peacham’sThe Compleat Gentleman(1622), and Brathwaite’sThe English Gentleman(1630). But, in most of the early realistic works, humanistic and social elements are inextricably interwoven; and humanistic and social realism, taken together, seem to constitute a natural bridge from humanism over to sense realism.
The Influence of the Innovators upon Education.—There is, however, a variety of other brilliant educationalOther suggestions in the early realists.suggestions in each of these early realists. All of them hold to a broader and better rounded training and more natural and informal methods than those in vogue. Mulcaster even advocates universal elementary education, the professional training of teachers, and the education of girls, and undertakes to make a naïve analysis of the mind as the basis of a philosophy of education. So suggestive have the recommendations of the early realists proved to modern education that these authors are often known as the ‘innovators.’ Yet their theories do not seem to have affected greatly the educational practice of the times. They did tend to disrupt traditionalism and the formal humanism, to bringBut their influence was indirect.education into touch with society and preparation for real life, and to popularize a wider content and a more informal procedure, but their influence appeared through their successors and later education rather than directly in the schools of the period. Locke, for instance, in addition to the influence he had upon Rousseau, Pestalozzi, and other reformers, must in some measure havebeen responsible for the great development of the physical and ethical sides of education in the public and grammar schools of England, together with the tendency of these institutions to consider such aspects of rather more importance than the purely intellectual. His plea for a tutor as the means of shaping manners and morals has also probably had its effect upon the education of the English aristocracy.
The Ritterakademien.—In the German states, on the other hand, there arose at the courts during the seventeenth century an actually new type of educational institution as the outgrowth of social realism. Here, in place of the old humanistic education, there was developedTraining for the nobility in modern languages, chivalric arts, and the sciences.a special training for the young nobles in French, Italian, Spanish, and English, in such accomplishments as courtly conduct, dancing, fencing, and riding, and in philosophy, mathematics, physics, geography, statistics, law, genealogy, and heraldry. The educational institutions in which this training was embodied were known asRitterakademienor ‘academies for the nobles.’ Such academies were founded at Colberg, Luneberg, Vienna, Wolffenbüttel, and many other centers before the close of the century. They originally covered the work of the gymnasia, although substituting the modern languages, sciences, and the knightly arts that have been mentioned for the Greek and Hebrew, and adding a little from the course of the university. Gradually,Absorbed into secondary system.however, they became part of the regular secondary system.
The Academies in England.—Milton’s suggestions were ultimately materialized in an even more influential type of school. In theTractatehe had recommendedthat his ideal education be carried out in an institution to be known as an ‘academy.’ Such a school was to be erected ‘in every city throughout this land.’ It should train boys from the age of twelve to twenty-one, and should provide both secondary and higher education. ‘Academies,’ based very closely upon this plan, were about a generation later actually organized in a numberMilton’s suggestions adopted by Puritans after the Act of Uniformity.of places by the Puritans. Under the harsh Act of Uniformity (1662) two thousand non-conforming clergymen were driven from their parishes, and in many instances found school-teaching a congenial means of earning a livelihood, and at the same time of furnishing higher education to the young dissenters, who were excluded from the universities and grammar schools.The first academies.The first of these academies was that established by Richard Frankland at Rathmill in 1665, and this was followed by the institutions of John Woodhouse at Sheriffhales, of Charles Morton at Newington Green, and of some thirty other educators of whom we have record at other places. These academies were largely humanistic in their realism, and, since their chief function was to fit for the ministry, they included Latin, Greek, and Hebrew in their course, but they were also rich in mathematics,Their content.natural and social sciences, modern languages, and the vernacular. The new tendency was also broadened and amplified by Locke’sThoughts(1693), which became the great guide for the managers of the Puritan academies. In 1689, when the Act of Toleration put non-conformity upon a legal footing, the academies were allowed to be regularly incorporated.
The Academies in America.—Academies arose also in America. When the number of religious denominationshad greatly increased and the demands upon secondary education had expanded, the ‘grammar schools’ (seepp. 120f.), with their narrow denominational ideals and their limitation to a classical training and college preparation, proved inadequate, and effortsTheir rise as a supplement to the narrow ‘grammar schools’.were made to organize academies as a supplement. There may have been earlier academies in America, but the first well-known suggestion of an academy was made in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin. He wished to inaugurate an education that would prepare for life, and not merely for college. Accordingly, he proposed for the youth of Pennsylvania a course in which English grammar and composition, penmanship, arithmetic, drawing, geography, history, the natural sciences, oratory, civics, and logic were to be emphasized. He would gladly have excluded Latin and other languages altogether, but for politic reasons these courses were allowed to be elective. Through the efforts of a number of leadingThe early academies.citizens, such an academy was opened at Philadelphia (Fig. 32), in January, 1750 (although not chartered until July, 1753). During the next generation a number of similar institutions sprang up, especially in the middle and southern colonies. A great impulse was given the movement by the foundation of the two Phillips academies,—one in 1780 at Andover, Massachusetts, and the other the next year at Exeter, New Hampshire. The Dummer Grammar School was reorganized as an academy in 1782, and the movement spread rapidly throughout New England during the last two decades of the eighteenth century.
Shortly after the Revolution, owing in part to theAfter the Revolution the prevailing type of secondary education.inability or unwillingness of the towns to maintaingrammar schools, and in part to the wider appeal and greater usefulness of the academies, the latter institutions quite eclipsed the former, and became for about half a century the prevailing type of secondary school in the United States. They were usually endowed institutions managed by a close corporation, but were often largely supported by subscriptions from the neighborhood, and sometimes subsidized by the state. LocatedSupport, location, and functions.in small towns or villages, they served a wide constituency and made provision for boarding, as well as day pupils. Unlike the grammar schools, they were not originally intended to prepare for the learned professions exclusively, but, as time passed, they tended more and more to become preparatory schools for the colleges, instead of finishing schools for the middle classes of society. The academies were also the first institutions of secondary education to offer opportunities to women. Many of them were co-educational, and others, frequently burdened with the name of ‘female seminary,’ were for girls exclusively. Academies for some time likewise furnished the only means of training teachers for the elementary schools, and have generally played an important part in education in the United States.
Graves,During the Transition(Macmillan, 1910), chap. XVII; andGreat Educators of Three Centuries(Macmillan, 1912), chaps. I and V; Monroe,Text-book(Macmillan, 1905), pp. 442-460. An excellent edition of Milton’sTractate of Educationis that by Morris, E. E. (Macmillan, 1895); of Montaigne’sEducation of Childrenthat by Rector, L. E. (Appleton, 1899); of Locke’sThoughts concerning Education, and of Mulcaster’sPositions,those by Quick, R. H. (Cambridge University Press, 1895, and Longmans, 1888, respectively); and of Rabelais’Gargantua, that by Besant, W. (Lippincott, Foreign Classics for English Readers). The works of Castiglione, Elyot, Peacham, Brathwaite, etc., are also extant. For an account of theRitterakademien, see Nohle, E.,History of the German School System(Report of the U. S. Commissioner of Education, 1897-98), pp. 41 f., and Paulsen, F.,German Education(Scribner, 1908), pp. 112-116; and of the academies, Brown, E. E.,The Making of Our Middle Schools(Longmans, Green, 1902), chaps. VIII and IX.
In the seventeenth century scientific investigation developed rapidly, and led theorists to introduce science into the curriculum and to advocate a study of ‘real things.’Bacon undertook to formulate induction, and while he did not understand the importance of an hypothesis, he did much to rid the times ofa priorireasoning.On the basis of sense realism, Ratich anticipated many principles of modern pedagogy, but he was unsuccessful in applying his ideas.Comenius (1) produced texts for teaching Latin objectively, (2) crystallized his educational principles in theGreat Didactic, and (3) attempted an encyclopædic organization of knowledge. He wished to make this knowledge part of the course at every stage of education, and, while he was not consistently inductive, he made a great advance in the use of this method.Through sense realism, rudimentary science was introduced into the elementary schools; theRitterakademienand the pietist schools stressed the subject; and professorships of science were founded in the universities.
In the seventeenth century scientific investigation developed rapidly, and led theorists to introduce science into the curriculum and to advocate a study of ‘real things.’
Bacon undertook to formulate induction, and while he did not understand the importance of an hypothesis, he did much to rid the times ofa priorireasoning.
On the basis of sense realism, Ratich anticipated many principles of modern pedagogy, but he was unsuccessful in applying his ideas.
Comenius (1) produced texts for teaching Latin objectively, (2) crystallized his educational principles in theGreat Didactic, and (3) attempted an encyclopædic organization of knowledge. He wished to make this knowledge part of the course at every stage of education, and, while he was not consistently inductive, he made a great advance in the use of this method.
Through sense realism, rudimentary science was introduced into the elementary schools; theRitterakademienand the pietist schools stressed the subject; and professorships of science were founded in the universities.
The Development of the Sciences and Realism.—The realistic tendency did not pause with reviving the ideas represented by the words nor with the endeavor to bringEarlier realism a transition to sense realism.the pupil into touch with the life he was to lead. The earlier realism seems to have been simply a stage in the process of transition from the narrow and formal humanismto a realism obtained through the senses, which may be regarded as the beginning of the modern movement to develop the natural sciences. Science had started to develop as early as the time of the schoolman, Roger Bacon (1214-1294), but for three centuries it was not kindly received. Even during the Renaissance the Church hadOpposition to the sciences.continued to oppose it bitterly, because it tended to conflict with religious dogma, although this age did not object to the revival of the classics. Accordingly, the latter subject became strongly intrenched in educational tradition, and its advocates offered the most obstinate opposition to the sciences. Its numerous representatives struggled hard to keep the sciences out of education.
However, concomitant with the growth of reason and the partial removal of the theological ban, there was developed a remarkable scientific movement, with a variety of discoveries and inventions. For more than aDevelopment of physics and astronomy in the seventeenth century.millennium the Greek developments in astronomy and physics had been accepted as final, but toward the close of the sixteenth and during the seventeenth century thesedictawere completely upset. The hypothesis of a solar system, which replaced the Ptolemaic interpretation, was published by Copernicus (1473-1543); Kepler (1571-1630) explained the motion of the planets by three simple laws; and, through the construction of a telescope, Galileo (1564-1642) revealed new celestial phenomena. Galileo also demonstrated that all bodies, allowing for the resistance of the air, fall at the same rate; by means of the barometer, Torricelli (1608-1647) and Boyle (1627-1691) proved the existing theories of a vacuum incorrect, and formulated important laws concerning the pressure of gases; and Guericke (1602-1686), inspired by theirdiscoveries, succeeded in constructing an air-pump. Investigations of this kind paved the way for the formulation of the law of universal gravitation and the laws of motion by Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), which united the universe into a single comprehensive system and completed the foundations for modern mechanics.
Development of anatomy and physiology.
Likewise, about the same time, the other great development in science among the Greeks,—anatomy and physiology, was completely revolutionized. Through the discovery of valves in the veins by means of dissection and vivisection, the hypothesis of the double circulation of the blood by Harvey (1578-1657), and the microscopic demonstrations by Malpighi (1628-1694) of the existence of capillaries connecting the veins and the arteries, the old theory of the motion of the blood through suction, which had been promulgated by Galen, was completely shattered, and a great impetus was given to investigations in anatomy and physiology. In consequence of this scientific progress, the educational theorists began to introduce science and a knowledge of real things into the curriculum. It came to be widely felt that humanism gave a knowledge only of words, books, and opinions, and did not even at its best lead to a study of real things. Hence, new methods and new books were produced, to shorten and improve the study of the classical languages, and new content was imported into the courses of study. The movement also included an attempt at a formulation of scientific principles in education and an adaptation to the nature of the child.
Bacon and His Inductive Method.—The new tendency, however, did not appear in education until after the time of Francis Bacon (1561-1626). The use of theBacon rejected the deductive method of the day,scientific method by the various discoverers was largely unconscious, and it remained for Bacon to formulate what he called the method of ‘induction’ and by advocating its use, to point the way to its development as a scientific method in education. He is, therefore, ordinarily known as the first sense realist. He reacted from deductive logic, which was currently supposed to be the sole method of Aristotle, and took his cue in formulating a new method of reasoning from the many scientific workers of his time. He made a great advance in his rejection of the contemporary method of attempting to establish the first principles of a science, and then deducing from them by means of the syllogism all the propositions which that science could contain. However, hisNovum Organum, or ‘new instrument’ as he called his treatise, in endeavoring to create a method whereby anyone could attain all the knowledge of which the human mind was capable, undertook far too much, and resultedbut created a mechanical procedure.in a merely mechanical procedure. Briefly stated, his plan was, after ridding the mind of individual prejudices, to observe and carefully tabulate lists of all the facts of nature, and from these discover the underlying law by comparing the cases where a certain phenomenon appears and where it does not.
But by this method neither Bacon himself nor anyone else has ever made any real contribution to science. It does not follow that, because all observed cases under certain conditions produce a particular effect, every otherHe failed to formulate the true inductive method,instance not yet observed will necessarily have the same effect. The true method of induction, which was evident even in the work of Kepler, and came to be more so in the discoveries of Harvey and Newton, stresses rather thepart played by scientific imagination, as it is manifested by men of genius in the forming of an hypothesis. The modern procedure is as follows:—When certain effects are observed, of which the cause or law is unknown, the scientist frames an hypothesis (i. e., makes a conjecture) to account for them; then he tests this hypothesis, by collecting facts and comparing with these facts the conclusions to which his hypothesis would lead; and, if they correspond or agree, he holds that his hypothesis has been confirmed or verified, and maintains that he has discovered the cause or law. Nevertheless, while Bacon did not formulate the inductive method of modern science, he largely helped to rid the times of an unwisethough he rid the times ofa priorireasoning.dependence upona priorireasoning, and he did call attention to the necessity of careful observation and experimentation, and thus opened the way for real inductive procedure. Probably no book ever made a greater revolution in modes of thinking or overthrew more prejudices than Bacon’sNovum Organum.
Bacon’s Educational Suggestions and Influence.—Bacon was not a teacher, and his treatment of educational problems appears in brief and scattered passages. While he offers isolated suggestions concerning the mental and moral training of the young, he plans no serious modification in the existing organization of schools. He does,Bacon was not especially interested in education,however, in hisNew Atlantisimply an interest in promoting scientific research and higher education. In the ideal society depicted in that work, he describes an organization of scholars called ‘Salomon’s House,’ whose members in their investigations anticipate much that scientists and inventors have to-day only just begun to realize. Among these anticipations were the variation ofspecies, the infusion of serums, vivisection, telescopes, telephones, flying-machines, submarine boats, and steam-engines. From this description Bacon would seem to believe that education should be organized upon the basis of society’s gradually accumulating a knowledge of nature and imparting it to all pupils at every stage. At any rate, in hisAdvancement of Learning, he definitely suggests a wider course of study, more complete equipment for scientific investigation, a closer coöperation among institutions of learning, and a forwarding of ‘unfinished sciences.’ And such a plan ofpansophia, or ‘universal knowledge,’ was specified in the educational creed of the later sense realists, who worked out the Baconian theory of education. Hence, while not skilled or greatly interested in education himself, Bacon influencedbut his suggestions influenced Ratich and Comenius.profoundly the writing of many who were, and has done much to shape the spirit of modern practice. His method was first applied directly to education by a German known as Ratich, and, in a more effective way, by Comenius, a Moravian.
Ratich’s Methods.—Ratich (1571-1635) probably became acquainted with the sense realism of Bacon while studying in England, and, when about forty years of age, undertook to found a system of education upon it. In linguistic training, like all realists, he insisted that one “should first study the vernacular” as an introduction toLinguistic training.other languages. He also held to the principle of “one thing at a time and often repeated.” By this he meant that, in studying a language, one should master a single book before taking up another. In his teaching at Köthen, as soon as his pupils knew their letters, they were required to learnGenesisthoroughly for the sake of theirGerman. Each chapter was read twice by the teacher, while the pupil followed the text with his finger. When the pupils could read the book perfectly, they were taught grammar from it as a text. The teacher pointed out the various parts of speech and made the boys find other examples, and had them decline, conjugate, and parse. In taking up Latin, a play of Terence wasOther realistic principles.treated in similar fashion. Others of the principles that he used in teaching language and grammar, and especially those which applied to education in general, were even more distinctly realistic. Such, for example, were his precepts,—“follow the order of nature” and “everything by experiment and induction,” and his additional recommendation that “nothing is to be learned by rote.” Thus Ratich not only helped shape some of the best methods for teaching languages, but anticipated the main principles of modern pedagogy. While, owing to obtrusive failings in character and experience, he was uniformly unsuccessful in his practice, he, nevertheless,Influence.stirred up considerable thought and stimulated many treatises of others. Thus, through Comenius, who carried out his principles more fully, this German innovator, impractical as he was, became a spiritual ancestor to Pestalozzi, Froebel, and Herbart.
Comenius: His Training and Work.—John Amos Comenius (1592-1670) was born at Nivnitz, Moravia, and was by religious inheritance a staunch adherent of the Moravian Church. After a course in a Latin school,Education,he spent a couple of years in higher education at the Lutheran College of Herborn and at the University ofwanderings,Heidelberg. In consequence of many vicissitudes in life, he lived and wrote in a number of places, and becameacquainted with the work of a variety of men engaged in educational reform and advancement. While the problems with which they were dealing were similar to his own and largely influenced his educational positions, he far surpassed them all in scope of work and greatness of repute. His educational achievements were the outgrowth of sense realism, and appear in threeand achievements.directions:—(1) the series of texts for learning Latin; (2) hisGreat Didactic; and (3) his attempts to create an encyclopædic organization of knowledge (pansophia).
His Series of Latin Texts.—The first of the famous texts that Comenius produced to facilitate the study of Latin was issued in 1631, and has generally been knownThe plan of theJanua.by the name ofJanua Linguarum Reserata(The Gate of Languages Unlocked). It was intended as an introductory book to the study of Latin, and consisted of an arrangement into sentences of several thousand Latin words for the most familiar objects and ideas. The Latin was printed on the right-hand side of the page, and on the left was given a translation in the vernacular. By this means the pupil obtained a grasp of all ordinary scientific knowledge and at the same time a start in his Latin vocabulary. In writing this text, Comenius may have been somewhat influenced by Ratich, a review of whose methods he had read at Herborn, but he seems to have been more specifically indebted both for his method and the felicitous name of his book to a Jesuit known as Bateus, who had written a similar work.
It was soon apparent that theJanuawould be too difficult for beginners, and two years later ComeniusTheVestibulum,issued hisVestibulum(Vestibule), as an introduction to it. While theJanuacontained all the ordinary words ofthe language,—some eight thousand, there were but a few hundred of the most common in theVestibulum. Later both of the works were several times revised, modified, and enlarged; and grammars, lexicons, and treatises were written to accompany them. He alsoAtrium,published a third Latin reader, theAtrium(Entrance Hall), which took the pupil one stage beyond theJanua. We know, too, that he intended also to write a still morePalatium,advanced work, to be calledSapientiae Palatium(Palace of Wisdom). This fourth book was to consist of selections from the best Latin authors, but it was never completed. He did, however, produce as a supplementary text-book a simpler and more extensive edition of theJanua, accompanied with pictures. Each object in the illustrations of this book was marked with a number corresponding to one in the text. This work, which heandOrbis Pictus.calledOrbis Sensualium Pictus(The World of Sense Objects Pictured), is the first illustrated reading book on record (Fig. 21).
The Great Didactic.—But these books on teaching Latin realistically were only part of the work that Comenius contemplated. During his whole career he had in mind a definite idea of the aim of education, and of what, in consequence, he wished the organization, subject-matter, and methods to be. His ideas on theIndebtedness to others.whole question of education were formulated in hisGreat Didacticeven before theJanuaappeared, but the work was not published until 1657. In it he strove toHis aim and organization of education.assimilate all that was good in the realistic movement and use it as a foundation. He developed many of the principles and methods of Ratich, Bateus, and others, but he owed a greater debt for the suggestions he took fromBacon’sAdvancement of Learning, and even more from theEncyclopædiaof Alsted, one of his teachers at Herborn. In theGreat DidacticComenius formulated an educational aim and constructed an educational organization of his own. Probably, as an outgrowth of his religious attitude, he held to ‘knowledge, morality, and piety’ as the ideals of education, and advocated universal education for ‘boys and girls, both noble and ignoble, rich and poor.’ His organization of education consisted of four periods of six years each. The first period of instruction was that through infancy, or up to the age of six. It was to be given in the school of ‘the mother’s lap,’ which should exist in every house. For childhood, or from six to twelve, was to be organized the ‘vernacular school,’ which should appear in every hamlet and village. From that time up to eighteen comes the ‘Latin school,’ to be maintained in every city; and, finally, for youth from eighteen to twenty-four, there should be a university in every kingdom or province. Such an organization would have made education universal, and would tend to bring about the custom of education according to ability, rather than social status, which was a suggestion some three centuries in advance of the times.
The Shoemaker.LXIII.Sutor.
The Shoemaker.LXIII.Sutor.
Fig. 21.—A page from theOrbis Pictusof Comenius, illustrating a lesson on a trade.
(Reproduced from the edition published by C. W. Bardeen, 1887.)
His Encyclopædic Arrangement of Knowledge.—The rest of the works of Comenius may be regarded as amplifications of various parts of thisGreat Didactic. Besides the Janual series, which he seems to have written for the Latin school, he produced a set of texts for the vernacular school, which soon disappeared, and a handbook for the lowest work, calledThe School of Infancy.Pansophic training at every stage of education.But the phase of theGreat Didacticmost often elaborated was the realistic one ofpansophiaor ‘universal knowledge.’This principle was not only exemplified in such works as theJanuaandOrbis Pictusand in treatises he wrote upon astronomy and physics, but in various educational institutions that he undertook to found, and it remained the ruling passion throughout his life. In theGreat Didactiche went so far as to hold that an encyclopædic training should be given at every stage of education,—mother school, vernacular school, Latin school, and university.
But, while even in the mother school the infant was to make a beginning with geography, history, and various sciences, grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic, music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy, and the rudiments of economics, politics, ethics, metaphysics, and religion, his attainment was not expected to be as formidable as the names of the subjects sound. It was to consist merelyEach succeeding stage to enlarge the body of knowledge.in understanding simple causal, temporal, spatial, and numerical relations; in distinguishing sun, moon, and stars, hills, valleys, lakes, and rivers, and animals and plants; in learning to express oneself; and in acquiring proper habits. It was, in fact, not unlike the training of the modern kindergarten. In a similar way each succeeding stage is to enlarge the body of knowledge along all these lines. “The different schools are not to deal with different subjects, but should treat the same subjects in different ways; throughout graduating the instruction to the age of the pupil and the knowledge that he already possesses. In the earlier schools everything is taught in a general and undefined manner, while in those which follow the information is particularized and exact.” Moreover, beyond the university, which, like the lower schools, was to make teaching its chief function, Comeniusheld it to be important that somewhere in the worldThe ‘didactic college’ for all nations.there should be a ‘didactic college’ devoted to scientific investigation, in which learned men from all nations should coöperate. Such an institution would form a logical climax to his system of schools, bearing the same relation to them that the stomach does to the other members of the body by “supplying blood, life, and strength to all.”
The Method of Nature.—The way in which this pansophic instruction should be given, Comenius also intended to have in full accord with sense realism. He insists that the ‘method of nature’ must be observed and followed, and then shows how nature accomplishes all things ‘with certainty, ease, and thoroughness,’ in what respects schools have deviated from the principles of nature, and how they can be rectified only by following her plans. These principles concerning the working of nature were laid downa priori, but it is probable that they had been previously worked out inductively from his schoolroom experience. At times, though, theyOften fanciful analogies,were put in the form of fanciful analogies. For example, he declares that because a bird by nature hatches her young in the spring or early part of the year, schools have erred (1) in not requiring education to begin in the springtime of life, or boyhood, and (2) in not selecting the springtime of the day, or the morning hours, for study.
But it is not remarkable that, with all his realistic tendencies, Comenius did not consistently employ induction. The natural sciences were young in his day, so that he did not altogether grasp their content and method, and he had partially inherited the scholastic notion that truth cannot be fully secured through thesenses or by reason. It is sufficient merit that Comenius, for the first time in history, applied anything like inductionbut more fully inductive elsewhere.to teaching. Moreover, in the application of his general method to the specific teaching of various lines,—sciences, reading, writing, singing, languages, morality, and piety, he utilized more fully the induction of Bacon. For example, after showing the necessity for careful observation in obtaining a knowledge of the sciences, he gives nine useful precepts for their study that are clearly the inductive result of his own experience as a teacher. Likewise, he insists that, in teaching the sciences, in order to make a genuine impression upon the mind, one must deal with realities rather than books. The objects themselves, or where this is not possible, such representations of them as can be conveyed by copies, models, and pictures, must be studied. After the same principle he formulates inductive rules and methods for instruction in the other subjects.
The Influence of Comenius upon Education.—Thus the work of Comenius was based primarily upon sense realism, but he added many modifications and new elements of his own. He may in the fullest sense be considered the great educational theorist and practical reformer of the seventeenth century. His practical abilityPopularity of his Latin text-books,is especially shown in the series of Latin text-books, which far excelled the works of several contemporaries on similar lines. TheJanuawas translated into a dozen European, and at least three Asiatic languages; theOrbis Pictusproved even more popular, and went through an almost unlimited number of editions in various tongues; and the whole series became for many generations the favorite means of introducing young peopleto the study of Latin. But the remarkable theoretical work of Comenius had little effect upon the schools ofbut ignorance of theGreat Didactic,the period, and until about the middle of the nineteenth century theGreat Didacticwas scarcely known. At that time, when this treatise of Comenius was brought to light by German investigators, it was discovered that the old realist of the seventeenth century had been the first to deal with education in a scientific spirit, and work out its problems practically in the schools. And the principles of Comenius were at the time unconsciously taken up by others and indirectly became the basis ofwhich was the indirect basis of modern education.modern education. His spirit appeared not only in the ideas of subsequent theorists—Francke, Rousseau, Basedow, Pestalozzi, Herbart, Froebel—but even in the actual curricula and methods of educational institutions.
Realistic Tendencies in Elementary Schools.—While the effect of sense realism upon the schools seems to have been slow and indirect, the movement was obvious even in the seventeenth century. In Germany there came a decided tendency throughout the elementary schools toSlow and indirect, but the vernacular and elementary science introduced.increase instruction in the vernacular, as recommended by Ratich and Comenius, and to learn first the German grammar rather than the Latin. With this movement was joined the increase in universal and compulsory education urged by the reformers, and an introduction of elementary science, in addition to reading, writing, arithmetic, religion, and singing. At Weimar in 1619, through a pupil of Ratich, a new school system was organized; and in 1642, under the order of Duke Ernst, Andreas Reyher prepared a new course for Gotha, which afforded elementary instruction in the natural sciences, as well as the rudiments and religion. This work included teachingthe children to measure with the hour-glass and sun-dial, to observe the ordinary plants and animals, and to carry on other objective studies of a simple character. Many other attempts at instruction in science were made elsewhere in the German states, both in private and public education, and the same tendency appeared in the states of Italy, and in France, Holland, and England.
Secondary Schools.—But the new realistic tendencies appeared also in secondary education. While in Germany it was not until the eighteenth century that there were any evidences of sense realism in the gymnasia, languages of neighboring countries and considerableScience in theRitterakademien,science appeared in theRitterakademien(see p. 157) by the middle of the seventeenth, and toward the end of the century in the schools of Francke and other ‘pietists’ at Halle were embodied all the realistic elements of Comenius. While the pietists adopted these ideas largely for their religious side, as a protest and reaction to the rationalisticRitterakademien, they did not hesitate also to stress the science content and the study of the vernacular. In the secondary school known as thePädagogium,Pädagogium, which he had started for well-to-do boys, Francke included training in the vernacular, mathematics, geography, natural science, astronomy, anatomy,andRealschule,and materia medica; and theRealschule, established by his colleague, Semler, went even more fully into the vernacular, mathematics, and the sciences, pure and applied. This realistic instruction of the pietists was brought by Hecker to Berlin, where he started his famousRealschulein 1747, and similar institutions soon spreadand in grammar schools and academies.throughout Prussia. In England, while very few of the grammar and public schools (see p. 120) as yet introducedeven the elements of science into their course, the academies (see p. 157) were rich in sciences, mathematics, and the vernacular. This was also true of the academies that sprang up in America (see p. 158).
The Universities.—The universities were slower in responding to the movement of sense realism. As the result of its pietistic origin, however, the University ofSciences in Halle, Göttingen, and other universities,Halle was realistic almost from its beginning in 1692. Göttingen, the next institution to become hospitable to the tendency, did not start it until 1737. But soon afterward the movement became general, and by the end of the eighteenth century all the German universities—at least, all under Protestant auspices—had created professorships in the sciences. While the English universities,and in Oxford and Cambridge.Oxford and Cambridge, were much slower than those of Germany in adopting the new subjects, and it was a century and a half before these institutions became known for their science, during the professorship of Isaac Newton (1669-1702) considerable was done toward making Cambridge mathematical and scientific, and in the course of the eighteenth century several chairs in the sciences were established. Besides formulatingGreat work of Newton.the law of gravitation, Newton lectured and wrote at Cambridge upon calculus, astronomy, optics, and the spectrum. He became one of the greatest mathematicians and physicists the world has known, and he did much to create a scientific atmosphere in other educational institutions, as well as Cambridge. America also felt the scientific impulse in its higher institutions. SomeScience in American colleges.study of astronomy, botany, and physics was possible at Harvard even in the seventeenth century, and during the eighteenth Yale, Princeton, King’s (afterward Columbia),Dartmouth, Union, and Pennsylvania all came to offer a little work in physics, and at times in chemistry, geology, astronomy, and biology. In his proposals for the prospective ‘seminary’ in New York (1753), which was destined to become Columbia University, and in the actual course of the academy at Philadelphia (later the University of Pennsylvania), over which he presided, Dr. William Smith put a most progressive program of sciences, including the rudiments of mechanics, physics, chemistry, geology, astronomy, botany, zoölogy, and physiology. But for half a century after this American institutions did little with the sciences as laboratory studies.
Graves,During the Transition(Macmillan, 1910), chap. XVIII; andGreat Educators of Three Centuries(Macmillan, 1912), chaps. II, IV, and VI; Monroe,Text-book(Macmillan, 1905), pp. 461-501. The following works are standard for the authors mentioned: Adamson, J. W.,Pioneers of Modern Education(Macmillan, 1905), chap. III (Bacon); Barnard, H.,German Teachers and Educators, pp. 343-370 (Ratich); Fowler, T., Bacon’sNovum Organum(Oxford, Clarendon Press); Laurie, S. S.,John Amos Comenius(Bardeen, Syracuse, 1892); Monroe, W. S.,Comenius(Scribner, 1900); and Quick, R. H.,Educational Reformers(Appleton, 1896), chap. IX (Ratich) and X (Comenius). An account of sense realism is afforded by Adamson,op. cit., chap. I, and of its effect upon the schools by Barnard,op. cit., pp. 302-317, and by Paulsen, F.,German Education(Scribner, 1908), pp. 117-133.
Locke is often classed with the advocates of realism or of naturalism, but the keynote to his thought is ‘discipline.’ This is to be obtained in intellectual training through mathematics; in moral training, through the control of desires by reason; and in physical training, through a ‘hardening process.’Locke has, therefore, often been viewed as the great advocate of the theory of formal discipline, according to which certain subjects yield a general power that may be applied in any direction, and should be studied by all.This doctrine has greatly influenced education, but in the late nineteenth century there was a decided reaction from it. Recently this extreme reaction has been modified, and a position taken with which Locke’s real attitude would seem to be in harmony.
Locke is often classed with the advocates of realism or of naturalism, but the keynote to his thought is ‘discipline.’ This is to be obtained in intellectual training through mathematics; in moral training, through the control of desires by reason; and in physical training, through a ‘hardening process.’
Locke has, therefore, often been viewed as the great advocate of the theory of formal discipline, according to which certain subjects yield a general power that may be applied in any direction, and should be studied by all.
This doctrine has greatly influenced education, but in the late nineteenth century there was a decided reaction from it. Recently this extreme reaction has been modified, and a position taken with which Locke’s real attitude would seem to be in harmony.
Locke’s Work and Its Various Classifications.—Because of their relation to an important topic in modern education, the theories of John Locke (1632-1704) should receive further attention than they have yet been given.Often classed as an early realist, a sense realist, or a naturalist.No writer on education has been more variously classified than he. We have already seen (p. 154) that the general tenor of hisThoughts concerning Educationwould lead us to group him with the early realistic movement. There are also elements in this work that would seem to place him with the sense realists, and many of his ideas proved so similar and suggestive to Rousseau’sthought (see p. 213), that he has sometimes been classed among the advocates of naturalism. But Locke’sThoughts, by which his educational position is often exclusively judged, were simply a set of practical suggestions for the education of a gentleman, written for a friend as advice in bringing up his son. They make clear his general sympathy with the current educational reform, but do not bring out his main point of view. His central thought appears more definitely through the philosophical principles in his famousEssay concerning the Human Understanding, and through the intellectual training suggested in his other educational work,Conduct of the Understanding, which was originally an additional book and application of theEssay.
Locke’s Disciplinary Theory in Intellectual Education.—Probably Locke’s underlying thought as to the proper method of intellectual, moral, and physical trainingBut his underlying thought is ‘discipline’.may best be summed up in the word ‘discipline.’ This educational attitude is a natural corollary of his philosophic position. In hisEssayhe holds that ideas are not born in one, but that all knowledge comes from experience. The mind, he declares, is like ‘white paper, or wax,’ upon which impressions from the outside world are made through our senses. When the ideas are once in mind, it is necessary to determine what they tell us in the way of truth. Hence, to train the mind to make proper discriminations, he declares in theConduct of the Understandingthat practice and discipline are necessary.To train the mind, mathematics and a range of sciences should be studied.“Would you have a man reason well, you must use him to it betimes, exercise his mind in observing the connection of ideas and following them in train.” As to the means of effecting this mental discipline, Locke holds:“Nothing does this better than mathematics, which therefore I think should be taught all those who have the time and opportunity, not so much to make them mathematicians as to make them reasonable creatures, that having got the way of reasoning, which that study necessarily brings the mind to, they might be able to transfer it to other parts of knowledge as they shall have occasion.” Similarly, he advises a wide range of sciences, “to accustom our minds to all sorts of ideas and the proper ways of examining their habitudes and relations; not to make them perfect in any one of the sciences, but so to open and dispose their minds as may best make them capable of any, when they shall apply themselves to it.”
Disciplinary Attitude in Moral and Physical Training.—The same disciplinary conception of educationFor moral training, the desires should be guided by reason.underlies Locke’s ideals of moral training: “That a man is able to deny himself his own desires, cross his own inclinations, and purely follow what reason directs as best, tho’ the appetite lean the other way. This power is to be got and improved by custom, made easy and familiar by an early practice.” And even more definitely disciplinary is the well-known ‘hardening process,’For physical training, the ‘hardening process’ should be used.which he recommends in physical training: “The first thing to be taken care of is that children be not too warmly clad or covered, winter or summer. The face, when we are born, is no less tender than any other part of the body. It is use alone hardens it, and makes it more able to endure the cold.” He likewise advises that a boy’s “feet be washed every day in cold water,” that he “have his shoes so thin that they might leak and let in water,” that he “play in the wind and sun without a hat,” and that “his bed be hard.”
Origin, Significance, and Influence of the Theory of Formal Discipline.—This emphasis upon discipline in training of every sort—intellectual, moral, physical—has often caused Locke to be regarded as the first great exponent of the educational doctrine of ‘formal discipline.’ That theory has been so widespread and important during the past two centuries as to require consideration here. During the Middle Ages and the early period of humanism Latin was not only of cultural, but of practical utilitarian value. It was the language of theEvolved through the disappearance of the utilitarian argument.Church and of diplomacy, and in it was locked up all the learning of the times. All guidance in science, literature, philosophy, and politics that received any consideration was couched in its terms. But with the decline of ecclesiastical influence, the development of vernacular languages, and the scientific awakening in the seventeenth century (seepp. 163f.), this utilitarian argument for the study of Latin was largely swept away. Appeal was then made in behalf of the subject to the doctrine of ‘formal discipline,’ which was supported by theA general power afforded.‘faculty’ psychology of Aristotle. It was held that the study of Latin yields results out of all proportion to the effort expended, and gives a general power that may be applied in any direction. A similar claim was before long made for Greek and mathematics. Mathematics was declared to sharpen the ‘faculty of reason,’ while the classic languages were believed to improve the ‘faculty of memory.’ Consequently, it gradually came to be argued by formal disciplinarians that every oneEvery one should take certain studies, regardless of interest.should take these all-important studies, regardless of his interest, ability, or purpose in life, since he would thus best prepare himself for any field of labor. All whoproved unfitted for these particular subjects have, therefore, been supposed to be not qualified for the higher duties and responsibilities, and to be unworthy of consideration in higher education.
This doctrine of formal discipline has had a tremendous effect upon each stage of education in practically every country and during every period until recently.Used by scientists.Even the scientists and advocates of a variety of other subjects, instead of arguing for content value and particular training, have made strenuous efforts to meet this argument by pointing out the formal discipline in their own studies (seepp. 404f.). Excellent examples ofEffect upon institutions of various countries.the effect of this theory upon educational institutions are found in the formal classicism of the English grammar and public schools and universities and of the German gymnasiums. While in the United States a newer and more flexible society has enabled changes to be more readily made, as late as the last decade of the nineteenth century, Greek, Latin, and mathematics largely made up the staples in many high schools, colleges, and universities, and the husks of formal grammar were often defended in elementary education upon the score of formal discipline.
Opposition to the Disciplinary Theory and More Recent Modification.—At the beginning of the twentieth century, however, with the abandonment of the ‘faculty psychology’ and the development of educational theory, a decided reaction from the doctrines of formal discipline began among psychologists and common sense educators.Specific, not general, power.It is now almost universally conceded that specific, rather than general, power is developed by the various studies, and no student is held to be unworthy of educationor impervious to culture, simply because he is not adapted to the classics or mathematics. In consequence,Content, rather than form, stressed.the content of studies, rather than the process of acquisition, has come to be emphasized, the curriculum has everywhere been broadened, and the principle of the election of subjects largely recognized. It has, however, been felt within the last half dozen years that in reacting from the old theory of formal discipline, educators went too far. While it is still held that emphasis must be laid upon the specific character of mental training,But some generalized powers possible.there are some generalized powers and values to be obtained. It is realized that “a general benefit can be derived from specific training in so far as the person trained has consciously wrought out in connection with the specific training a general concept of method, based upon the specific methods used in that training” (F. A. Hodge). Thus a student who has once realized the value of close reasoning through mathematical demonstrations is likely to develop a general concept of method, and can hardly be satisfied any longer with slovenly thinking in other fields; and the fine discriminations discovered in the classical authors, the balanced judgment used in historical method, and the accuracy required in the study of the sciences, may well be abstracted and tend to furnish a generalized ideal for other lines of endeavor.