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tion and

and afterward clearly formed a basis for much of the legislation concerning the universal, free, and secular organization of educational institutions. In England, since there was no national system of schools, little direct impression was made upon educational practice, but in America this revolutionary thought would seem to have and the had much to do with causing the unrest that resulted secularizain secularizing and universalizing the public system and in producing the foundation for the first public 'high' schools. The first definite attempt, however, to put into actual practice the naturalistic education of Rousseau occurred in Germany through the writings of Basedow and the foundation of the 'Philanthropinum,' and is of sufficient importance to demand separate discussion in another chapter.

The Revolutionary Nature of Rousseau's Doctrines

univer

salizing of

education.

doctrines

made the reaction to

the Middle

Ages logically com

plete.

It should, however, be noted here that the work of Rousseau's Rousseau was bound up in a revolution from the society, traditions, and education of the past. His theories involved a destruction of the old social and moral sanctions, but did not directly supply much to take their place. A new social order, philosophy, and education were needed to bring about truth and freedom and a reconstructed view of the world. The individual had demanded free sway, and it was now necessary to adjust

1 See Brown, Making of Our Middle Schools, Chaps. X and XIII-XIV.

him to his environment without repressing his development. The transition from mediævalism thus became logically complete. It appeared about the middle of the fourteenth century, and, proceeding through a series of interconnected and overlapping advances followed by retrogressions Renaissance, Reformation, Realism, Puritanism, Pietism, and Rationalism, reached a genuinely destructive stage in Rousselianism toward the end of the eighteenth century. Evolution had failed, and revolution resulted, but through this was opened the vista of reconstruction on the modern basis.

SUPPLEMENTARY READING

I. SOURCES

*ROUSSEAU, J. J. Confessions, Letters, and Reveries; Discourse on the Sciences and Arts, and Discourse on Inequality; The New Heloise, Social Contract, and Emile.

II. AUTHORITIES

BARNARD, H. American Journal of Education. Vol. V, pp. 459– 486. Or German Teachers and Educators. Pp. 459–486. BROUGHAM, H. Rousseau (Lives of Men of Letters).

BROWNING, O. An Introduction to the History of Educational Theories. Chap. IX.

BRUNETIÈRE, F. Manual of the History of French Literature. (Translated by Derechif.) Pp. 333-414.

CAIRD, C. Literature and Philosophy. Vol. I, pp. 105-146. COMPAYRÉ, G. History of Pedagogy. (Translated by Payne.) Chap. XIII.

COMPAYRÉ, G. Jean Jacques Rousseau and Education from Nature. (Translated by Jago.)

*DAVIDSON, T. Rousseau and Education according to Nature. FRANCKE, K. Social Forces in German Literature. Chaps. VII

VIII.

GIRALDIN, ST. M.

*HUDSON, W. H.

J. J. Rousseau, sa vie et ses ouvrages.

Rousseau and Naturalism in Life and Thought.

LANG, O. H. Rousseau and his Emile.

LINCOLN, C. H. Rousseau and the French Revolution (Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, X, pp. 54-72).

*MACDONALD, F. Studies in the France of Voltaire and Rousseau. Chaps. II and VII.

MONROE, P. Textbook in the History of Education. Chap. X. MORIN, S. H. Life and Character of Rousseau (Littell's Living Age, XXXVIII, pp. 259-264).

*MORLEY, J. Rousseau.

*MUNROE, J. P. The Educational Ideal. Chap. VII.

PARKER, S. C. Our Inherited Practice in Elementary Schools. II and III (Elementary School Teacher, November, 1909, and January, 1910).

QUICK, R. H. Educational Reformers. Chap. XIV.

SCHLOSSER, F. C. History of the Eighteenth Century. Vols. I and II.

TEXTE, J. Rousseau and the Cosmopolitan Spirit. (Translated by Matthews.) Bk. I.

WEIR, S. The Key to Rousseau's Emile (Educational Review, V, pp. 278-290).,

Basedow proved unorthodox in

CHAPTER VIII

BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPINUM

Johann Bernhard Basedow (1723-1790) was by nature the very sort of person to be captivated by Rousseau's doctrines. He was talented but erratic, unorthodox, profession of tactless, and irregular in life. He was the son of a

theology and

turned to the

teaching.

Hamburg wigmaker, but refused to follow his father's business and ran away. A gentleman with whom he took service discovered his remarkable ability and persuaded the lad's father to educate him. After due preparation at home, Basedow was sent to the University of Leipzig for a theological training, but soon proved heretical and again rejected the vocation chosen for him. He then (1749) became a tutor in Holstein to a Herr von Quaalen's children, and with these aristocratic pupils first developed his famous methods of teaching through conversation and play connected with surrounding objects. Within four years his patron secured for him a professorship at the Ritterakademie 1 of Soroe, Denmark, but by 1761 he had given such serious offense by his unorthodox utterances that the government felt obliged to transfer him to the Gymnasium at Altona.

1

1 For the nature and development of Ritterakademien, see Graves, History of Education during the Transition, pp. 290 f.

From his position here he flooded Germany with a variety of heretical essays, and was eventually refused the sacrament by the Church.

Basedow's Educational Reforms and Writings About this time, however, Basedow fell under the spell of Rousseau's Emile, which was most congenial to his methods of thinking and teaching, and turned to educational reform. The schools of the day were sadly in need of just such an antidote as naturalism was calculated to furnish. The rooms were dismal and the work unpleasant, physical training was neglected, and the discipline was severe. Children were regarded as adults in miniature, and were so treated both in their dress and their education. The boys had their hair curled, powdered, and smeared with pomade, and wore embroidered coats, dainty knee breeches, silk stockings, and swords. A boy standing by his father would have seemed to differ only in size. Little girls were bound up in whalebone waists, donned enormous hoop skirts, and wore upon their heads "a combination of false curls, puffs, and knots fastened with pins and crowned with plumes." Education was largely a matter of instruction in artificial deportment.1 The study of classics com

1 For a more complete description of the children's dress of these times and of this 'dancing-master' education, see Parker, Our Inherited Practice in Elementary Schools (Elementary School Teacher, November, 1909).

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