ance. Too much restraint would have a disheartening effect, and joys coming more rarely would no longer have the same happy influence. The character is formed by the strongest and most frequent impressions, all others are comparatively powerless. That is why it is possible for education to correct defects, and why the maxim is no less false than discouraging which says that a few chance impressions suffice to undo the work of the most careful educator.

"Jacobli has been self-willed and violent; I have been bliged to punish him several times to-day."

"February 16th and 17th.-To cure his stubbornness and void the daily renewal of the same rebukes, which, unfortunately, is beginning to be necessary, I must be more careful to alternate his lessons with his games, and not curtail his liberty unnecessarily; I must also decide definitely exactly how much time is to be set apart for actual Study, so that nothing he learns at other times may seem like work.

"I have taught him to hold his pencil. Although this is a very small matter, I will never let him hold it badly again."

"February 18th.-To-day I have been walking with him a great deal. How little I am yet able to take advantage of circumstances which might help to teach some useful lesson!

"My wife met the carpenter and asked for the payment of a debt. 'Mamma,' cried Jacobli, 'don't vex the carpenter.""

"February 19th.-I find myself sometimes embarrassed through having given up, with all other pedantries, the master's tone of authority. Where shall I draw the line between liberty and obedience, that social life so soon compels us to draw?

"REASONS FOR LIBERTY.

"It is impossible to curtail a child's liberty without, to some extent, incurring his dislike.

"Experience proves that children who have been too much under restraint, make up for it later by excesses in the opposite direction.

"Restraint excites various passions.

"A wise liberty induces the child to keep his eyes and ears open, and makes him contented, happy, and eventempered.

"But this complete liberty supposes a preliminary education, which has taught the child submission to the nature of things, though not to the will of man.

“REASONS FOR OBEDIENCE.

"Without it there is no education possible. There are crises, indeed, when the child would be ruined by being allowed his liberty. Even under the most favourable circumstances it is impossible not to thwart his will occasionally.

"Liberty does not stifle the passions, it only delays their development. It is vanity, for instance, that makes Emile tremble in his desire to excel the juggler. And does not Rousseau himself recognise the state of dependence in which society places us, when he says that there are some men of such passionate natures that they would certainly have to be subjected to restraint in their youth, if their childhood had been left entirely free.

"Social life demands such talents and habits as it is not possible to form without restraining the child's liberty.

"Which of these is the true position and which the false? Liberty is good, and so is obedience. We must reconcile what Rousseau separated when, struck by the evils of the unwise restraint that only tends to degrade humanity, he advocated unbounded liberty.

"Let us endeavour to see how far he was right, and profit by his wisdom.

"I would say to the teacher: Be thoroughly convinced of the immense value of liberty; do not let vanity make you anxious to see your efforts producing premature fruit; let your child be as free as possible, and seek diligently for every means of ensuring his liberty, peace of mind, and good humour. Teach him absolutely nothing by words that you can teach him by the things themselves; let him see for himself, hear, find out, fall, pick himself up, make mistakes; no word, in short, when action is possible. What he can do for himself, let him do it; let him be always occupied, always active, and let the time you leave him to

himself represent by far the greatest part of his childhood. You will then see that Nature teaches him better than men. "But when you see the necessity of accustoming him to obedience, prepare yourself with the greatest care for this duty, the most difficult of all in such an education as we are considering. Remember that if restraint robs you of your pupil's confidence, all your labour is lost. Make sure, then, of his heart, and let him feel that you are necessary to him. Be merrier and pleasanter than any of his companions; in his games let him prefer you to all the rest.

"He must trust you. If he often asks for something you do not think good, tell him what the consequences will be, and leave him his liberty. But you must take care that the consequences are such as he will not easily forget, Always show him the right way. Should he leave it and fall into the mire, go to his rescue, but do not shield him from the unpleasant results of having enjoyed complete liberty, and of not having listened to your warnings. In this way his trust in you will be so great that it will not be shaken even when you have to thwart him. He must obey the wise teacher or the father he has learned to respect; but only in cases of necessity must an order be given."

We have quoted from the journal at this length, because it has such direct bearing on the history of that great educational reform which began a hundred years ago, and which, partly in accordance with Rousseau's ideas, partly in opposition to them, is still going on.

In the extracts we have given, we see Pestalozzi not only finding out the defects of Rousseau's system, but discovering some of the principles which he was afterwards to develop for the good of humanity.

And yet this gentle and clear-sighted father, always under the charm of the eloquent author of Emile, often forgets his own principles and falls back into the very errors he condemns.

The poor child, who was the subject of all these experiments, and to whom we perhaps owe the Pestalozzian method, paid dearly for them. The system of the Genevan Philosopher continued to predominate in his education till the year 1775, but after that time his teaching became subordinate to the needs of a new enterprise which absorbed all his

father's time and strength, and for the next five years he was simply the companion of the little ragged children, of whom we shall read in the next chapter.

In 1782, in a periodical he was then editing, Pestalozzi wrote as follows:

"My son is more than eleven years old and cannot yet read or write; but this does not at all trouble me.

"The other day when he was playing alone near his mother, she said to him: 'To-morrow is papa's birthday; wouldn't you like to do something for him?' 'Yes, if I could write,' answered the child. 'If you will say something, I will write it for you,' said his mother. Whereupon he began to think, running up and down the room and muttering, almost singing, to himself what he wanted to say. Before very long he came and smiled at his mother. What do you want, my dear child?' 'Ah, you know very well.' 'Have you something to say to me for papa?' 'Yes, if you will write it down.'

His mother then wrote down word for word the following lines, which the child dictated in a chanting voice, explaining that it was poetry:

My wish, dear papa, for your birthday to-day,

Is that you may live a long, long time;

I thank you a thousand times for all your kindnesses,

I thank you for having brought me up tenderly and happily,

I thank you again a thousand times for the kindnesses

Which I have received from you all the days of my life.

Thank you a thousand, thousand times!

I don't know how often I should like to thank you!
Now I will tell you what is in my heart:

I shall rejoice, I shall rejoice terribly

When you can say: I have brought up my son in happiness;
I shall rejoice, I shall rejoice with my whole heart

When I can say: I am his joy and his happiness.

Then only shall I be able to thank you

For all you have done for me during my life.
You will be glad as well as I,

The day I can say it.

Then we will be happy together all our lives,

Then we will pray to God together,

And dear mamma will also pray with us.

Then we will work together like lambs,

That we may live with God and with honour,

And that we may be content with what God gives us.

Now dear papa is coming;

We shall love and kiss each other,

And mamma too.

I want to put my arms round their two necks at once.

This child, whose emotional side, in spite of Rousseau, was so highly developed, but who had received so little preparation for practical life, was, at the age of fourteen, placed in a school at Colmar. His father's first letter to him, dated January 16th, 1784, runs as follows:

"We now send you, my dear Jacobli, what we had ready; you shall have more in a few days. We are not troubled by your going away, for both mamma and I pray God that you may become worthy of all the goodness and affection that have been shown to you.

"In God's name, Jacobli, pray and work. Be diligent, thoughtful, quiet, clean, and obedient. Forget the coarse manners of the peasants, and learn to do everything properly. You have the opportunity now, and you must take advantage of it, for it will never return. But I hope God will not let you sadden by your disobedience those to whom you owe so much.

"My child, you are all I have in the world; it is for you alone that I care to live; it is for you that I have suffered more, so to speak, than I could bear. It is in your hands now either to reward me with the deepest joy, or to render my life for ever unhappy. For that is what will certainly happen if you do not diligently and zealously prepare for some suitable career, if you do not show the good effects of the kindness and consideration with which I have always treated you, if you are not better than boys brought up with restraint and severity."

Jacobli was afterwards apprenticed to a commercial firm in Basle, the head of the firm being Felix Battier, who was a friend of Pestalozzi's, and to whom, in 1787, he dedicated the fourth part of Leonard and Gertrude. But the boy did not succeed either in his studies or his apprenticeship. At Basle, moreover, symptoms of ill-health began to show themselves, and in 1790 he returned to Neuhof, where, in 1791, he married Anna Madeline Froehlich, of Brugg, the daughter of the owner of Muligen. Their three first child.