Part 2 — Chapter III. (These four articles abrogated by the four articles following them, 118-122.) Article 118. The Federal Constitution may at any time be amended. (continued 9)

R. Craik, The State in its Relation to Education.

The schools to which the provisions of the Act of 1870 extends, and the regulations under which such schools are to be conducted, are defined in the Act as follows: "Every elementary school which is conducted in accordance with the following regulations shall be a public elementary school within the meaning of this Act; and every public elementary school shall be conducted in accordance with the following regulations (a copy of which regulations shall be conspicuously put up in every such school); namely

(1.) It shall not be required, as a condition of any child being admitted into or continuing in the school, that he shall attend or abstain from attending any Sunday school, or any place of religious worship, or that he shall attend any religious observance or any instruction in religious subjects in the school or elsewhere, from which observance or instruction he may be withdrawn by his parent, or that he shall, if withdrawn by his parent, attend the school on any day exclusively set apart for religious observance by the religious body to which his parent belongs:

(2.) The time or times during which any religious observance is practised or instruction in religious subjects is given at any meeting of the school shall be either at the beginning or at the end or at the beginning and the end of such meeting, and shall be inserted in a time-table to be approved by the Education Department, and to be kept permanently and conspicuously affixed in every school-room; and any scholar may be withdrawn by his parent from such observance or instruction without forfeiting any of the other benefits of the school:

(3.) The school shall be open at all times to the inspection of any of Her Majesty's inspectors, so, however, that it shall be no part of the duties of such inspector to inquire into any instruction in religious subjects given at such school, or to examine any scholar therein in religious knowledge or in any religious subject or book:

(4.) The school shall be conducted in accordance with the conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary school in order to obtain an annual parliamentary grant."

J. R. Rigg, National Education, appendix A.

"The new Act retained existing inspected schools, … it also did away with all denominational classifications of schools and with denominational inspection, treating all inspected schools as equally belonging to a national system of schools and under national inspection, the distinctions as to inspectors and their provinces being henceforth purely geographical. But the new Act no longer required that public elementary schools established by voluntary agency and under voluntary management should have in them any religious character or element whatever, whether as belonging to a Christian Church or denomination, or as connected with a Christian philanthropic society, or as providing for the reading of the Scriptures in the school. It was left open to any party or any person to establish purely voluntary schools if they thought fit. But, furthermore, the Act made provision for an entirely new class of schools, to be established and (in part) supported out of local rates, to be governed by locally-elected School Boards, and to have just such and so much religious instruction given in them as the governing boards might think proper, at times preceding or following the prescribed secular school hours, and under the protection of a time-table Conscience Clause, as in the case of voluntary schools, with this restriction only, that in these schools no catechism or denominational religious formulary of any sort was to be taught. The mode of electing members to the School Boards was to be by what is called the cumulative vote—that is, each elector was to have as many votes as there were candidates, and these votes he could give all to one, or else distribute among the candidates as he liked; and all ratepayers were to be electors. … The new law … made a clear separation, in one respect, between voluntary and Board schools. Both were to stand equally in relation to the National Education Department, under the Privy Council; but the voluntary schools were to have nothing to do with local rates or rate aid, nor Local Boards to have any control over voluntary schools."

J. H. Rigg, National Education, chapter 10.

"To sum up … in few words what may be set down as the chief characteristics of our English system of Elementary Education, I should say

(1) first, that whilst about 30 per cent. of our school accommodation is under the control of school boards, the cost of maintenance being borne in part by local rates as well as by the Parliamentary grant, fully 70 per cent. is still in the hands of voluntary school-managers, whose subscriptions take the place of the rates levied by school boards.

(2) In case a deficiency in school accommodation is reported in any school district, the Education Department have the power to require that due provision shall be made for the same within a limited time; the 'screw' to be applied to wilful defaulters in a voluntary school district being the threat of a board, and in a school board district the supercession of the existing board by a new board, nominated by the Department, and remunerated out of the local rates.

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(3) Attendance is enforced everywhere by bye-laws, worked either by the school board or by the School Attendance Committee: and although these local authorities are often very remiss in discharging their duties, and the magistrates not seldom culpably lenient in dealing with cases brought before them, there are plenty of districts in which regularity of school attendance has been improved fully 10 per cent. in the past two or three years. …

(4) The present provision for teachers, and the means in existence for keeping up the supply, are eminently satisfactory. Besides a large but somewhat diminishing body of apprenticed pupil teachers, there is a very considerable and rapidly increasing number of duly qualified assistants, and at their head a large array of certificated teachers, whose ranks are being replenished, chiefly from the Training Colleges, at the rate of about 2,000 a year.

(5) The whole of the work done is examined and judged every year by inspectors and inspectors' assistants organised in districts each superintended by a senior inspector—the total cost of this inspection for the present year being estimated at about £150,000."

Reverend H. Roe, The English System of Elementary Education (International Health Exhibition, London, 1884: Conference on Education, section A).

"The result of the work of the Education Department is causing a social revolution in England. If the character of the teaching is too mechanical, if the chief aim of the teacher is to earn as much money as possible for his managers, it must be remembered that this cannot be done without at least giving the pupil the ability to read and write. Of course the schools are not nearly so good as the friends of true education wish. Much remains to be done. … Free education will shortly be an accomplished fact; the partial absorption of the voluntary schools by the School Boards will necessarily follow, and further facilitate the abolition of what have been the cause of so much evil—result examinations, and 'grant payments.' 'Write "Grant factory" on three-fourths of our schools,' said an educator to me. … The schools are known as

(1) Voluntary Schools, which have been built, and are partly supported by voluntary subscriptions. These are under denominational control.

(2) Board Schools: viz., schools built and supported by money raised by local taxation, and controlled by elected School Boards.

Out of 4,688,000 pupils in the elementary schools, 2,154,000 are in the schools known as Voluntary, provided by, and under the control of the Church of England; 1,780,000 are in Board Schools; 330,000 attend schools under the British School Society, or other undenominational control; 248,000 are in Roman Catholic schools; and 174,000 belong to Wesleyan schools. The schools here spoken of correspond more nearly than any other in England to the Public School of the United States and Australia; but are in many respects very different, chiefly from the fact that they are provided expressly for the poor, and in many cases are attended by no other class."

W. C. Grasby, Teaching in Three Continents, chapter 2.

EDUCATION: England: A. D. 1891. Attainment of Free Education.

In 1891, a bill passed Parliament which aims at making the elementary schools of the country free from the payment of fees. The bill as explained in the House of Commons, "proposed to give a grant of 10s. per head to each scholar in average attendance between five and fourteen years of age, and as regarded such children schools would either become wholly free, or would continue to charge a fee reduced by the amount of the grant, according as the fee at present charged did or did not exceed 10s. When a school had become free it would remain free, or when a fee was charged, the fee would remain unaltered unless a change was required for the educational benefit of the locality; and under this arrangement he believed that two-thirds of the elementary schools in England and Wales would become free. There would be no standard limitations, but the grant would be restricted to schools where the compulsory power came in, and as to the younger children, it was proposed that in no case should the fee charged exceed 2d." In a speech made at Birmingham on the free education bill, Mr. Chamberlain discussed the opposition to it made by those who wished to destroy the denominational schools, and who objected to their participation in the proposed extension of public support. "To destroy denominational schools," he said, "was now an impossibility, and nothing was more astonishing than the progress they had made since the Education Act of 1870. He had thought, he said, they would die out with the establishment of Board schools, but he had been mistaken, for in the last twenty-three years they had doubled their accommodation, and more than doubled their subscription list. At the present time they supplied accommodation for two-thirds of the children of England and Wales. That being the case, to destroy voluntary schools—to supply their places with Board schools, as the Daily News cheerfully suggested—would be to involve a capital expenditure of £50,000,000, and £5,000,000 extra yearly in rates, But whether voluntary or denominational schools were good or bad, their continued existence had nothing to do with the question of free education, and ought to be kept quite distinct from it. To make schools free was not to give one penny extra to any denominational endowment. At the present time the fee was a tax, and if the parents did not pay fees they were brought before the magistrates, and if they still did not pay they might be sent to gaol. The only thing the Government proposed to do was not to alter the tax but to alter the incidence. The same amount would be collected; it would be paid by the same people, but it would be collected from the whole nation out of the general taxation." The bill was passed by the Commons July 8, and by the Lords on the 24th of the same month. The free education proposals of the Government are said to have been generally accepted throughout the country by both Board and Voluntary schools.

Annual Register, 1891, pages 128 and 97, and part 2, page 51.

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EDUCATION: France: A. D. 1565-1802. The Jesuits. Port Royal. The Revolution. Napoleon.

"The Jesuits invaded the province long ruled by the University alone. By that adroit management of men for which they have always been eminent, and by the more liberal spirit of their methods, they outdid in popularity their superannuated rival. Their first school at Paris was established in 1565, and in 1762, two years before their dissolution, they had eighty-six colleges in France. They were followed by the Port Royalists, the Benedictines, the Oratorians. The Port Royal schools [see PORT ROYAL], from which perhaps a powerful influence upon education might have been looked for, restricted this influence by limiting very closely the number of their pupils. Meanwhile the main funds and endowments for public education in France were in the University's hands, and its administration of these was as ineffective as its teaching. … The University had originally, as sources of revenue, the Post Office and the Messageries, or Office of Public Conveyance; it had long since been obliged to abandon the Post Office to Government, when in 1719 it gave up to the same authority the privilege of the Messageries, receiving in return from the State a yearly revenue of 150,000 livres. For this payment, moreover, it undertook the obligation of making the instruction in all its principal colleges gratuitous. Paid or gratuitous, however, its instruction was quite inadequate to the wants of the time, and when the Jesuits were expelled from France in 1764, their establishments closed, and their services as teachers lost, the void that was left was strikingly apparent, and public attention began to be drawn to it. It is well known how Rousseau among writers, and Turgot among statesmen, busied themselves with schemes of education; but the interest in the subject must have reached the whole body of the community, for the instructions of all three orders of the States General in 1789 are unanimous in demanding the reform of education, and its establishment on a proper footing. Then came the Revolution, and the work of reform soon went swimmingly enough, so far as the abolition of the old schools was concerned. In 1791 the colleges were all placed under the control of the administrative authorities; in 1792 the jurisdiction of the University was abolished; in 1793 the property of the colleges was ordered to be sold, the proceeds to be taken by the State; in September of the same year the suppression of all the great public schools and of all the University faculties was pronounced. For the work of reconstruction Condorcet's memorable plan had in 1792 been submitted to the Committee of Public Instruction appointed by the Legislative Assembly. This plan proposed a secondary school for every 4,000 inhabitants; for each department, a departmental institute, or higher school; nine lycées, schools carrying their studies yet higher than the departmental institute, for the whole of France; and to crown the edifice, a National Society of Sciences and Arts, corresponding in the main with the present institute of France. The whole expense of national instruction was to be borne by the State, and this expense was estimated at 29,000,000 of francs. But 1792 and 1793 were years of furious agitation, when it was easier to destroy than to build. Condorcet perished with the Girondists, and the reconstruction of public education did not begin till after the fall of Robespierre. The decrees of the Convention for establishing the Normal School, the Polytechnic, the School of Mines, and the écoles centrales, and then Daunou's law in 1795, bore, however, many traces of Condorcet's design. Daunou's law established primary schools, central schools, special schools, and at the head of all the Institute of France, this last a memorable and enduring creation, with which the old French Academy became incorporated. By Daunou's law, also, freedom was given to private persons to open schools. The new legislation had many defects. … The country, too, was not yet settled enough for its education to organise itself successfully. The Normal School speedily broke down; the central schools were established slowly and with difficulty; in the course of the four years of the Directory there were nominally instituted ninety·one of these schools, but they never really worked. More was accomplished by private schools, to which full freedom was given by the new legislation, at the same time that an ample and open field lay before them. They could not, however, suffice for the work, and education was one of the matters for which Napoleon, when he became Consul, had to provide. Foureroy's law, in 1802, took as the basis of its school-system secondary schools, whether established by the communes or by private individuals; the Government undertook to aid these schools by grants for buildings, for scholarships, and for gratuities to the masters; it prescribed Latin, French, geography, history, and mathematics as the instruction to be given in them. They were placed under the superintendence of the prefects. To continue and complete the secondary schools were instituted the lyceums; here the instruction was to be Greek and Latin, rhetoric, logic, literature, moral philosophy, and the elements of the mathematical and physical sciences. The pupils were to be of four kinds: boursiers nationaux, scholars nominated to scholarships by the State; pupils from the secondary schools, admitted as free scholars by competition; paying boarders, and paying day-scholars."

M. Arnold, Schools and Universities on the Continent, chapter 1.

EDUCATION: France: A. D. 1833-1889. The present System of Public Instruction.

"The question of the education of youth is one of those in which the struggle between the Catholic Church and the civil power has been, and still is, hottest. It is also one of those in which France, which for a long time had remained far in the rear, has made most efforts, and achieved most progress in these latter years. … Napoleon I. conceived education as a means of disciplining minds and wills and moulding them into conformity with the political system which he had put in force; accordingly he gave the University the monopoly of public education. Apart from the official system of teaching, no competition was allowed except that specially authorised, regulated, and controlled by the State itself. Religious instruction found a place in the official programmes, and members of the clergy were even called on to supply it, but this instruction itself, and these priests themselves, were under the authority of the State. Hence two results: on the one hand the speedy impoverishment of University education, … on the other hand, the incessant agitation of all those who were prevented by the special organisation given to the University from expounding their ideas or the faith that was in them from the professorial chair. This agitation was begun and carried on by the Catholic Church itself, as soon as it felt more at liberty to let its ambitions be discerned. {717} On this point the Church met with the support of a good number of Liberals, and it is in a great measure to its initiative that are due the three important laws of 1833, 1850, and 1875, which have respectively given to France freedom of primary education, of secondary education, and finally that of higher education; which have given, that is to say, the right to everyone, under certain conditions of capacity and character, to open private schools in competition with the three orders of public schools. But the Church did not stop there. Hardly had it insured liberty to its educational institutions—a liberty by which all citizens might profit alike, but of which its own strong organisation and powerful resources enabled it more easily to take advantage—hardly was this result obtained than the Church tried to lay hands on the University itself, and to make its doctrines paramount there. … Thence arose a movement hostile to the enterprises of the Church, which has found expression since 1880 in a series of laws which Excluded her little by little from the positions she had won, and only left to her, as to all other citizens, the liberty to teach apart from, and concurrently with, the State. The right to confer degrees has been given back to the State alone; the privilege of the 'letter of obedience' has been abolished; religious teaching has been excluded from the primary schools; and after having 'laicized,' as the French phrase is, the curriculum, the effort was persistently made to 'laicize' the staff. …. From the University point of view, the territory of France is divided into seventeen academies, the chief towns of which are Paris, Douai, Caen, Rennes, Poitiers, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Montpellier, Aix, Grenoble, Chambéry, Lyons, Besançon, Nancy, Dijon, Clermont, and Algiers. Each academy has a rector at its head, who, under the authority of the Minister of Public Instruction, is charged with the material administration of higher and secondary education, and with the methods of primary instruction in his district. The administration of this last belongs to the prefect of each department, assisted by an academy-inspector. In each of these three successive stages—department, academy, and central administration—is placed a council, possessing administrative and disciplinary powers. The Departmental Council of Public Instruction, which comprises six officials … forms a disciplinary council for primary education, either public or free (i. e., State or private). This council sees to the application of programmes, lays down rules, and appoints one or more delegates in each canton to superintend primary schools. The Academic Council … performs similar functions with regard to secondary and higher education. The Higher Council of Public Instruction sits at Paris. It comprises forty-four elected representatives of the three educational orders, nine University officials, and four 'free' schoolmasters appointed by the Minister, and is the disciplinary court of appeal for the two preceding councils. … Such is the framework, administrative as well as judicial, in which education, whether public or free, lives and moves. … Since 1882 Primary Education has been compulsory for all children of both sexes, from the age of six to the end of the thirteenth year, unless before reaching the latter age they have been able to pass an examination, and to gain the certificate of primary studies. To satisfy the law, the child's name must be entered at a public or private school; he may, however, continue to receive instruction at home, but in this case, after he has reached the age of eight, he must be examined every year before a State board. … At the age of thirteen the child is set free from further teaching, whatever may be the results of the education he has received. … In public schools the course of instruction does not include, as we have said, religious teaching; but one day in the week the school must take a holiday, to allow parents to provide such teaching for their children, if they wish to do so. The school building cannot be used for that purpose. In private schools religious instruction may be given, but this is optional. The programme of primary education includes: moral and civic instruction; reading, writing, French, geography and history (particularly those of France); general notions of law and science; the elements of drawing, modelling, and music; and gymnastics. No person of either sex can become a teacher, either public or private, unless he possesses the 'certificate of capacity for primary instruction' given by a State board. For the future—putting aside certain temporary arrangements—no member of a religious community will be eligible for the post of master in a public school. … As a general rule, every commune is compelled to maintain a public school, and, if it has more than 500 inhabitants, a second school for girls only. … The sum total of the State's expenses for primary education in 1887 is as high as eighty-five million francs (£3,400,000), and that without mentioning grants for school buildings, whereas in 1877 the sum total was only twelve millions (£480,000). … From 1877 to 1886, the number of public schools rose from 61,000 to 66,500; that of the pupils from 4,200,000 to 4,500,000, with 96,600 masters and mistresses; that of training schools for male teachers from 79 to 89, of training schools for female teachers from 18 to 77, with 5,400 pupils (3,500 of them women), and 1,200 masters. As to the results a single fact will suffice. In these ten years, before the generations newly called to military service have been able to profit fully by the new state of things, the proportion of illiterate recruits (which is annually made out directly after the lots are drawn) has already fallen from 15 to 11 per cent."

A. Lebon and P. Pelet, France as it is, chapter 5.

"In 1872, after the dreadful disaster of the war, Monsieur Thiers, President of the Gouvernement de la Défense Nationale, and Monsieur Jules Simon, Minister of Public Instruction, felt that what was most important for the nation was a new system of public instruction, and they set themselves the task of determining the basis on which this new system was to be established. In September, 1882, Monsieur Jules Simon issued a memorable circular calling the attention of all the most distinguished leaders of thought to some proposed plans. He did not long remain in power, but in his retirement he wrote a book entitled: 'Réforme de l'Enseignement Secondaire.' Monsieur Bréal, who was commissioned to visit the schools of Germany, soon after published another book which aroused new enthusiasm in France. … From that day a complete educational reform was decided on. {718} In 1872 we had at the Ministeré de l'Instruction Publique three distinguished men: Monsieur Dumont for the Enseignement Supérieur, one from whom we hoped much and whose early death we had to mourn in 1884; Monsieur Zévort for the Enseignement Secondaire, who also died ere the good seed which he had sown had sprung up and borne fruit (1887); and Monsieur Buisson to whose wisdom, zeal, and energy we owe most of the work of the Enseignement Primaire. At their side, of maturer years than they, stood Monsieur Gréard, Recteur de l'Académie de Paris. … All the educationists of the first French Revolution had insisted on the solidarity of the three orders of education; maintaining that it was not possible to separate one from another, and that there ought to be a close correspondence between them. This principle lies at the root of the whole system of French national instruction. Having established this principle, the four leaders called upon all classes of teachers to work with them, and professors who had devoted their life to the promotion of superior instruction brought their experience and their powers of organization to bear upon schools for all classes, from the richest to the poorest. … But to reform and to reconstruct a system of instruction is not a small task. It is not easy to change at once the old methods, to give a new spirit to the masters, to teach those who think that what had been sufficient for them need not be altered and is sufficient forever. However, we must say that as soon as the French teachers heard of the great changes which were about to take place, they were all anxious to rise to the demands made on them, and were eager for advice and help. Lectures on pedagogy and psychology were given to them by the highest professors of philosophy, and these lessons were so much appreciated that the attention of the University of France was called to the necessity for creating at the Sorbonne a special course of lectures on pedagogy. Eleven hundred masters and mistresses attended them the first year that they were inaugurated; from that time till now their number has always been increasing. Now we have at the Sorbonne a Chaire Magistrale and Conférences for the training of masters and professors; and the faculties at Lyons, Bordeaux, Nancy, and Montpellier have followed the example given at the Sorbonne, Paris. … In 1878, the Musée Pedagogique was founded; in 1882, began the publication of the Revue Pedagogique and the Revue Internationale de l'Enseignement. Four large volumes of the Dictionnaire de Pédagogie, each containing about 3,000 closely printed pages, have also come out under the editorship of Monsieur Buisson, all the work of zealous teachers and educationists. In 1879 normal schools were opened. Then in 1880 primary schools, and in 1882 we may say that the Ecoles Maternelles and the Ecoles Enfantines were created, so different are they from the infant schools or the Salles d'Asile; in 1883 a new examination was established for the Professorat and the Direction des Ecoles Normales, as well as for the inspectors of primary instruction; and in July, 1889, the law about public and private teaching was promulgated, perhaps one of the most important that has ever been passed by the Republic."

Mme. Th. Armagnac, The Educational Renaissance of France (Education, September, 1890).

EDUCATION: France: A. D. 1890-1891. Statistics.

The whole number of pupils registered in the primary, elementary and superior schools, public and private, of France and Algiers (excluding the "écoles maternelles") for the school-year 1890-91, was 5,593,883; of which 4,384,905 were in public schools (3,760,601, "laïque," and 624,304 "congréganiste"), and 1,208,978 in private schools (151,412 "laïques," and 1,057,566 "congréganiste"). Of 36,484 communes, 35,503 possessed a public school, and 875 were joined for school purposes with another commune. The male teachers employed in the elementary and superior public schools numbered 28,657; female teachers, 24,273; total 52,930.

Ministère de l'Instruction publique, Résumé des états de situation de l'enseignement primaire pour l'année scolaire 1890-1891.

EDUCATION: Ireland.

"The present system of National Education in Ireland was founded in 1831. In this year grants of public money for the education of the poor were entrusted to the lord-lieutenant in order that they might be applied to the education of the people. This education was to be given to children of every religious belief, and to be superintended by commissioners appointed for the purpose. The great principle on which the system was founded was that of 'united secular and separate religious instruction.' No child should be required to attend any religious instruction which should be contrary to the wishes of his or her parents or guardians. Times were to be set apart during which children were to have such religious instruction as their parents might think proper. It was to be the duty of the Commissioners to see that these principles were carried out and not infringed on in any way. They had also power to give or refuse money to those who applied for aid to build schools. Schools are 'vested' and 'non-vested.' Vested schools are those built by the Board of National Education; non-vested schools are the ordinary schools, and are managed by those who built them. If a committee of persons build a school, it is looked on by the Board as the 'patron.' If a landowner or private person builds a school, he is regarded as the patron if he has no committee. The patron, whether landlord or committee, has power to appoint or dismiss a manager, who corresponds with the Board. The manager is also responsible for the due or thorough observance of the laws and rules. Teachers are paid by him after he certifies that the laws have been kept, and gives the attendance for each quarter. When an individual is patron, he may appoint himself manager and thus fill both offices. … The teachers are paid by salaries and by results fees. The Boards of Guardians have power to contribute to these results fees. Some unions do so and are called 'contributory.' School managers in Ireland are nearly always clerics of some denomination. There are sometimes, but very rarely, lay managers. … From the census returns of 1881 it appears that but fifty-nine per cent. of the people of Ireland are able to read and write, The greater number of national schools through Ireland are what are called 'unmixed,' that is, attended by children of one denomination only. The rest of the schools are called 'mixed,' that is, attended by children of different forms of religion. The percentage of schools that show a 'mixed' attendance tends to become smaller each year. … There are also twenty-nine 'model' schools in different parts of Ireland. These schools are managed directly by the Board of National Education. … {719} According to the report of the Commissioners of National Education for 1890, the 'percentage of average attendance to the average number of children on the rolls of the schools was but 59.0,' and the percentage of school attendance to the estimated population of school age in Ireland would be less than 50. Different reasons might be given for this small percentage of attendance. The chief reasons are, first, attendance at school not being compulsory, and next, education not being free. … The pence paid for school fees in Ireland may seem, to many people, a small matter. But in a country like Ireland, where little money circulates, and a number of the people are very poor, school pence are often not easily found every week. In 1890, £104,550 4s. and 8d. was paid in school fees, being an average of 4s. 32¾d. per unit of average attendance."

The Irish Peasant; by a Guardian of the Poor, chapter 8.

EDUCATION: Norway.

"In 1739 the schools throughout the country were regulated by a royal ordinance, but this paid so little regard to the economical and physical condition of Norway that it had to be altered and modified as early as 1741. Compulsory instruction, however, had thus been adopted, securing to every child in the country instruction in the Christian doctrine and in reading, and this coercion was retained in all later laws. … Many portions of the country are intersected by high mountains and deep fiords, so that a small population is scattered over a surface of several miles. In such localities the law has established 'ambulatory schools,' whose teachers travel from one farm to another, living with the different peasants. Although this kind of instruction has often been most incomplete and the teachers very mediocre, still educational coercion has everywhere been in force, and Christian instruction everywhere provided for the children. These 'ambulatory schools' formerly existed in large numbers, but with the increase of wealth and population, and the growing interest taken in education, their number has gradually diminished, and that of fixed circle-schools augmented in the same proportion."

G. Gade, Report on the Educational System of Norway (United States Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, July, 1871).

"School attendance is compulsory for at least 12 weeks each year for all children in the country districts from 8 years of age to confirmation, and from 7 years to confirmation in the towns. According to the law of 1889, which in a measure only emphasizes preceding laws, each school is to have the necessary furnishings and all indispensable school material. The Norwegians are so intent upon giving instruction to all children that in case of poverty of the parents the authorities furnish text-books and the necessary clothing, so that school privileges may be accorded to all of school age."

U. S. Commissioner of Education, Report, 1889-90, page 513.

EDUCATION: Prussia: A. D. 1809. Education and the liberation movement.

"The most important era in the history of public instruction in Prussia, as well as in other parts of Germany, opens with the efforts put forth by the king and people, to rescue the kingdom from the yoke of Napoleon in 1809. In that year the army was remodeled and every citizen converted into a soldier; landed property was declared free of feudal service; restrictions on freedom of trade were abolished, and the whole state was reorganized. Great reliance was placed on infusing a German spirit into the people by giving them freer access to improved institutions of education from the common school to the university. Under the councils of Hardenberg, Humboldt, Stein, Altenstein, these reforms and improvements were projected, carried on, and perfected in less than a single generation. The movement in behalf of popular schools commenced by inviting C. A. Zeller, of Wirtemberg, to Prussia. Zeller was a young theologian, who had studied under Pestalozzi in Switzerland, and was thoroughly imbued with the method and spirit of his master. On his return he had convened the school teachers of Wirtemberg in barns, for want of better accommodations being allowed him, and inspired them with a zeal for Pestalozzi's methods, and for a better education of the whole people. On removing to Prussia he first took charge of the seminary at Koenigsberg, soon after founded the seminary at Karalene, and went about into different provinces meeting with teachers, holding conferences, visiting schools, and inspiring school officers with the right spirit. The next step taken was to send a number of young men, mostly theologians, to Pestalozzi's institution at Ifferten, to acquire his method, and on their return to place them in new, or reorganized teachers' seminaries. To these new agents in school improvement were joined a large body of zealous teachers, and patriotic and enlightened citizens, who, in ways and methods of their own, labored incessantly to confirm the Prussian state, by forming new organs for its internal life, and new means of protection from foreign foes. They proved themselves truly educators of the people. Although the government thus not only encouraged, but directly aided in the introduction of the methods of Pestalozzi into the public schools of Prussia, still the school board in the different provinces sustained and encouraged those who approved and taught on different systems. … Music, which was one of Pestalozzi's great instruments of culture, was made the vehicle of patriotic songs, and through them the heart of all Germany was moved to bitter hatred of the conqueror who had desolated her fields and homes, and humbled the pride of her monarchy. All these efforts for the improvement of elementary education, accompanied by expensive modifications in the establishments of secondary and superior education, were made when the treasury was impoverished, and taxes the most exorbitant in amount were levied on every province and commune of the kingdom."

H. Barnard, National Education in Europe, pages 83-84.

For this notable educational work begun in Prussia in 1809, and which gave a new character to the nation, "the Providential man appeared in Humboldt, as great a master of the science and art of education as Scharnhorst was a master of the organisation of war. Not only was he himself, as a scholar and an investigator, on a level with the very first of his age, not only had he lived with precisely those masters of literature, Schiller and Goethe, who were most deliberate in their self-culture, and have therefore left behind most instruction on the higher parts of education, but he had been specially intimate with F. A. Wolf. It is not generally known in England that Wolf was not merely the greatest philologer but also the greatest teacher and educationist of his time. … Formed by such teachers, and supported by a more intense belief in culture than almost any man of his time, Humboldt began his work in April, 1809. {720} In primary education Fichte had already pointed to Pestalozzi as the best guide. One of that reformer's disciples, C. A. Zeller, was summoned to Königsberg to found a normal school, while the reformer himself, in his weekly educational journal, cheered fallen Prussia by his panegyric, and wrote enthusiastically to Nicolovius pronouncing him and his friends the salt and leaven of the earth that would soon leaven the whole mass. It is related that in the many difficulties which Zeller not unnaturally had to contend with, the King's genuine benevolence, interest in practical improvement, and strong family feeling, were of decisive use. … The reform of the Gymnasia was also highly successful. Süvern here was among the most active of those who worked under Humboldt's direction. In deference to the authority of Wolf the classics preserved their traditional position of honour, and particular importance was attached to Greek. … But it was on the highest department of education that Humboldt left his mark most visibly. He founded the University of Berlin; he gave to Europe a new seat of learning, which has ever since stood on an equality with the very greatest of those of which Europe boasted before. We are not indeed to suppose that the idea of such a University sprang up for the first time at this moment, or in the brain of Humboldt. Among all the losses which befell Prussia by the Peace of Tilsit none was felt more bitterly than the loss of the University of Halle, where Wolf himself had made his fame. Immediately after the blow fell, two of the Professors of Halle made their way to Memel and laid before the King a proposal to establish a High School at Berlin. This was on August 22nd, 1807. … On September 4th came an Order of Cabinet, in which it was declared to be one of the most important objects to compensate the loss of Halle. It was added that neither of the two Universities which remained to Prussia, those of Königsberg and Frankfurt-on-the-Oder, could be made to supply the place of Halle, Königsberg being too remote from the seat of Government and Frankfurt not sufficiently provided with means. At Berlin a University could best, and at least expense, be established. Accordingly all funds which had hitherto gone to Halle were to go for the future to Berlin, and assurances were to be given to the expelled Professors which might prevent their talents being lost to the country. A University is not founded in a day, and accordingly while Stein held office the design did not pass beyond the stage of discussion. … Humboldt sent in his Report on May 12, 1809, and on August 16th followed the Order of Cabinet assigning to the new University, along with the Academies of Science and Art, an annual dotation of 150,000 thalers, and the Palace of Prince Henry as its residence. During the rest of his term of office Humboldt was occupied in negotiations with eminent men of science all over Germany, whose services he hoped to procure. He was certainly not unsuccessful. He secured Fichte for Philosophy; Schleiermacher, De Wette, and Marheineke for Theology; Savigny and Schmalz for Jurisprudence; Friedländer, Kohlrausch, Hufeland, and Reil for Medicine; Wolf, Buttmann, Böckh, Heindorf, and Spalding for the Study of Antiquity; Niebuhr and Rühs for History; Tralles for Mathematics (Gauss refused the invitation). The University was opened at Michaelmas of 1810, and as the first result of it the first volume of Niebuhr's Roman History, opening so vast a field of historical speculation, was published in 1811. … Altogether in that period of German history the relations of literature, or rather culture in general, to politics are remarkable and exceptional. There had been a most extraordinary intellectual movement, a great outpouring of genius, and yet this had taken place not, as according to some current theories it ought to have done, in the bosom of political liberty, but in a country where liberty was unknown. And as it was not the effect, so the new literature did not seem disposed to become the cause, of liberty. Not only was it careless of internal liberty, but it was actually indifferent to national independence. The golden age of German literature is the very period when Germany was conquered by France. … So far literature and culture seemed a doubtful benefit, and might almost be compared to some pernicious drug, which should have the power to make men forget their country and their duties. Not unreasonably did Friedrich Perthes console himself for the disasters of Germany by reflecting that at least they had brought to an end 'the paper time,' the fool's paradise of a life made up of nothing more substantial than literature. In Humboldt's reform we have the compensation for all this. Here while on the one hand we see the grand spectacle of a nation in the last extremity refusing to part with the treasures of its higher life, on the other hand that higher life is no longer unnaturally divorced from political life. It is prized as one of the bulwarks of the State, as a kind of spiritual weapon by which the enemy may be resisted. And in the new and public-spirited generation of thinkers, of which Fichte and Sehleiermacher were the principal representatives, culture returns to politics the honour that has been done to it. … In Humboldt and his great achievements of 1809, 1810, meet and are reconciled the two views of life which found their most extreme representatives in Goethe and Stein."

J. R. Seeley, Life and Times of Stein, part 6, chapter 3 (volume 2).

EDUCATION: Prussia: A. D. 1874. The Educational Administration.

"There is no organic school-law in Prussia, … though sketches and projects of such a law have more than once been prepared. But at present the public control of the higher schools is exercised through administrative orders and instructions, like the minutes of our Committee of Council on Education. But the administrative authority has in Prussia a very different basis for its operations from that which it has in England, and a much firmer one. It has for its basis these articles of the Allgemeine Landrecht, or common law of Prussia, which was drawn up in writing in Frederick the Great's reign, and promulgated in 1794, in the reign of his successor:—'Schools and universities are State institutions, having for their object the instruction of youth in useful and scientific knowledge. Such establishments are to be instituted only with the State's previous knowledge and consent. All public schools and public establishments of education are under the State's supervision, and must at all times submit themselves to its examinations and inspections. {721} Whenever the appointment of teachers is not by virtue of the foundation or of a special privilege vested in certain persons or corporations, it belongs to the State. Even where the immediate supervision of such schools and the appointment of their teachers is committed to certain private persons or corporations, new teachers cannot be appointed, and important changes in the constitution and teaching of the school cannot be adopted without the previous knowledge or consent of the provincial school authorities. The teachers in the gymnasiums and other higher schools have the character of State functionaries.' … It would be a mistake to suppose that the State in Prussia shows a grasping and centralising spirit in dealing with education; on the contrary, it makes the administration of it as local as it possibly can; but it takes care that education shall not be left to the chapter of accidents. … Prussia is now divided into eight provinces, and these eight provinces are again divided into twenty-six governmental districts, or Regierungen. There is a Provincial School Board (Provinzial-Schulcollegium) in the chief town of each of the eight provinces, and a Governmental District Board in that of each of the twenty-six Regierungen. In general, the State's relations with the higher class of secondary schools are exercised through the Provincial Board; its relations with the lower class of them, and with the primary schools, through the District Board. In Berlin, the relations with these also are managed by the Provincial Board. A Provinzial-Schulcollegium has for its president the High President of the province; for its director the vice-president of that governmental district which happens to have for its centre the provincial capital. The Board has two or three other members, of whom, in general, one is a Catholic and one is a Protestant; and one is always a man practically conversant with school matters. The District Board has in the provincial capitals the same president and director as the Provincial Board; in the other centres of Regierungen it has for its president the President of the Regierung, and three or four members selected on the same principle as the members of the Provincial Board. The provincial State authority, therefore, is, in general, for gymnasiums, the larger progymnasiums, and Realschulen of the first rank, the Provincial School Board; for the smaller progymnasiums, Realschulen of the second rank, the higher Burgher Schools, and the primary schools of all kinds, the Governmental District Board. Both boards are in continual communication with the Educational Minister at Berlin. … Besides the central and provincial administration there is a local or municipal administration for schools that are not Crown patronage schools. … In most towns the local authority for schools of municipal patronage is the town magistracy, assisted by a Stadtschulrath; sometimes the local authority is a Curntorium or Schulcommission."

M. Arnold, Higher Schools and Universities in Germany, chapter 3.

"The secondary school differs from the elementary schools by a course of instruction going beyond the immediate demands of every-day life; from the special school, by the more general character of the courses of instruction; from the university, by its preparatory character. It has the special aim to give that sound basis of scientific and literary education which enables a man to participate in solving the higher problems of life in church, state, and society, In accordance with their historical development, two directions can be clearly traced, viz., the gymnasium and the real-school: the former comprising gymnasia and pro-gymnasia; and the latter real-schools of the first class, real-schools of the second class, and higher burgher-schools."

History of Secondary Instruction in Germany (U. S. Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, 1874, number 3), page 41.

"The name gymnasium came into use as early as the sixteenth century. The ministerial decree of the 12th of November, 1812, ordered that all learned school institutions, such as lyceums, pedagogiums, collegiums, Latin schools, etc., should bear the name gymnasium. A gymnasium is and has long been a classical school."

U. S. Commissioner of Education, Report, 1889-90, page 318.

ALSO IN: V. Cousin, Report on the state of public instruction in Prussia.

EDUCATION: Prussia: A. D. 1885-1889. The Elementary School-System.

"The New Yorker, anxious for a high degree of perfection in the elementary schools of his State, must be struck forcibly by the following merits of the Elementary School System of Prussia. …

1. Compulsory education laws, necessitating a full and regular attendance of the children of school age.

2. Official courses of study fixing the work to be accomplished in each of the different grades of schools. Uniformity is thus secured in the work done in all schools of the same class.

3. Definite qualifications and experience in teaching for eligibility to the office of school commissioner.

4. Provisions elevating teaching to the dignity of a profession and making the tenure of office secure.

5. Trained teachers in rural as well as city districts and a school year of at least forty weeks.

6. General supervision of instruction for children of school age in private schools and families, including the qualifications of instructors. …

Every Prussian child between the ages of 6 and 14 must, except in cases of severe illness or other extraordinary cause, be present at every session of the school he attends. The lists of the children of school age, in charge of the local police (in rural districts the Burgermeister), are kept so carefully that it is impossible to escape the provisions of the compulsory education laws, as much so as it is to evade the military service. Dispensations amounting to more than four weeks in the school year are never given to children under 12 years of age, and to them only when sickness in the family or other unusual cause make it advisable. … In order to understand the qualifications required of school commissioners (Kreisschulinspektoren) in Prussia, let us review briefly the requirements of male teachers.

1. Elementary schools. It may be stated at the outset that almost all the male elementary school teachers are normal school graduates. To insure similarity in training and a thorough knowledge of character, few foreigners and few beside normal school (Schullehrer-Seminar) graduates are admitted to the male teaching force. From 6 to 14 the would-be teacher has attended, let us suppose, an elementary school. He must then absolve the three years' course laid down for the preparatory schools. … He is now ready for the normal school. At the close of a three years' course at the normal school he is admitted to the first teachers' examination. If successful, he must next practice as candidate or assistant teacher not less than two years and not more than five years before his admission to the final test. … If a teacher fails to pass the examination within five years, he is dropped.

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2. Middle schools. For teachers of lower classes the same requirements with the addition of ability to teach a foreign tongue, or natural history in its broadest sense, and the attainment of the mark 'good' in all subjects at the final examination. … For higher classes, a special examination provided for middle school teachers. … There is really no gradation between elementary and middle schools. The latter merely go on somewhat further with elementary school work, introducing French, Latin and English.

3. High schools (Realschulen, Realgymnasien, Progymnasien and Gymnasien). All high school teachers, except those engaged in technical departments, must first absolve the nine years' gymnasial course, which commences at the close of the third school year.

Next comes the university course of three or four years. The candidate is now ready for the State examination. The subjects for this State examination … are divided into four classes:

1. The ancient languages and German; 2. Mathematics and natural sciences; 3. History and geography; 4. Religion and Hebrew.

At the close of one year's practice to test teaching capacity he receives a second certificate and is thereupon engaged provisionally. … The school commissioners … are either former regular high school teachers, general doctors of philosophy or more rarely theologians, or former normal school teachers. All must have had practical experience in teaching. … The work to be accomplished in each Prussian elementary school is definitely laid down by law. Each school is not a law unto itself as to what shall be done and when and how this is to be done. I have learned by practical experience that the work in ungraded schools compares most favorably with that of graded schools."

J. R. Parsons, Jr., Prussian Schools through American eyes, chapter 1, sections 5-10.

Prussian elementary schools are now free. "In this respect Prussia has passed through three stages. Under the first elementary schools were entirely self-supporting; under the second they received State aid, but were still largely self-supporting; under the third, Laws of 1888 and 1889, elementary schools were made free and the State pays a larger proportion of the cost of maintenance. Districts must pay for repairs, new buildings and cost of heating. If unwilling to provide proper accommodations for the children of school age, they can be forced by the government to do so. Poor districts may receive special government aid to meet such expenses. … The direct aim of the laws of June 14, 1888, and March 31, 1889, was to lighten the burden of local taxation for schools for children of school age. These laws have had a beneficial effect in increasing slightly the wages of teachers. Teachers' salaries are still quite small in Prussia, particularly in the case of females. Allowances are generally made for house-rent and fuel. Teachers in rural districts are provided with a house and garden. Their salaries are often not much more than half those paid city teachers of the same grade, and yet, as regards professional training and character of work, they are fully equal to city teachers. … The average annual salary received by teachers in Prussia in 1886 was $267.50. The average for the same year in New York was $409.27. The Prussian teacher, however, received fuel and dwelling free, in addition to his regular salary. … In 1885 the population of Prussia was 28,318,470, and the total cost of public education per caput was $1,7717. Drs. Schneider and Petersilie of Berlin, in 'Preussische Statistik 101,' published in 1889, reckon the total cost for 1888, excluding army and navy schools, at $50,192,857. … In Prussia, elementary instruction is the first consideration. The resolution adopted by the national assembly (Landtag) December 22, 1870, is a good illustration of this. It was at the very crisis of the Franco-German war, yet the Landtag called on the government to increase the number of normal schools and the capacity of those already existing, and 'thus to put an end to the practice of filling up teachers' vacancies by appointing unqualified individuals.'"

J. R. Parsons, Jr., Prussian Schools through American eyes, chapter 1, sections 15-17.

"Throughout Prussia there is now one school-room and one teacher to 446 inhabitants and 78.8 children actually attending school. This shows that there are far too few teachers. But the government and the cities have recently devoted considerable sums to the establishment of new places for teachers, so that, in the year 1881, there were 10,000 more teachers working in the public schools than in 1873. The salaries of the teachers were also raised. The average payment in the country is 954 marks, in the cities 1,430 marks. … The expense of maintaining the Prussian national schools amounts annually to about 102,000,000 of marks, 43,000,000 of which are paid by the cities. One hundred and ten colleges for the training of teachers are now engaged in the education of male and female instructors, with an attendance of 9,892 pupils; that is, there is one pupil to every 2,758 inhabitants. In the case of the female teachers only, a considerable degree of assistance is rendered by private institutions. … The intermediary schools established in 1872, and recently converted into the higher citizen schools, form a transition from the national schools to the higher schools. These teach religion, German, French, English, history and geography, arithmetic and mathematics, natural history and physics, writing, drawing, singing, and gymnastics. The course embraces six years without Latin, with the privilege of one year's service in the army instead of three. Complementary to the national school is the finishing school. There are a large number in Prussia, namely, 1,261 with 68,766 pupils: 617 with 10,395 in the country, and 644 with 58,371 in the cities. Of these 644,342 are obligatory by local statutes, 302 are optional. Since the law of 1878 special care has been devoted to the compulsory education of orphaned children. … The preparatory instruction of female teachers leaves much to be desired."

F. Kirchner, Contemporary Educational Thought in Prussia (Educational Review, May, 1891).

"About 25 per cent. of all the teachers in public middle schools are women, hence … women hold positions in these schools more frequently than in the lower, the purely elementary, schools of the kingdom. The greatest ratio of women teachers in Prussia is found in private middle schools, where 2,422 of 3,126 (or nearly 80 percent.) are women. … In all the public schools of Prussia (elementary, middle, and secondary) only 10,600 women teachers were employed [1887], or 14¼ per cent. of all the teachers in the kingdom. … Before the public schools of the kingdom had the care and close supervision on the part of the state which they have now, many more private schools were in existence than at present. During the last 25 years the private schools have not increased in numbers, but perceptibly decreased."

United States Commissioner of Education, Report, 1889-90, pages 287-289.

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EDUCATION: Russia.

"After serfdom had been abolished, the Emperor Alexander II. saw that the indispensable consequence of this great reform must be a thorough reorganization of public instruction. In 1861 a committee was appointed to draw up the plan of a law. In 1862 M. Taneef submitted to the Emperor a 'General plan for the organization of popular education,' which contained some very excellent points. The result was the General Regulations of 1864, which are still in force. … The difficulties which a complete reorganization of popular education meets in Russia are enormous. They are principally caused by the manner in which the inhabitants live, scattered over a large extent of country, and by their extreme poverty. … The density of population is so small that there are only 13.6 inhabitants to one square kilometer (2.6 square kilometers to 1 square mile), instead of 69 as in France. Under these circumstances only the children from the center hamlet and those living-nearest to it could attend school regularly, especially during the winter-months. The remainder of the inhabitants would pay their dues without having any benefit, which would necessarily foster discontent. As Prince Gagarin says, 'It has, therefore, not been possible to make education in Russia compulsory, as in Germany, nor even to enforce the establishment of a school in each community.' It is doubtless impossible at present to introduce into Russia the educational systems of the western countries."

E. de Laveleye, Progress of Education in Russia (United States Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, 1875, number 3), pages 31-32.

EDUCATION: Scotland.

"The existing system of education in Scotland is an outcome of causes deeply involved in the political and religious history of the country. … This system was preceded by a complicated variety of educational agencies, of which the chief were parish schools, founded upon a statute of 1646, which was revived and made operative in 1696. Parish and burgh schools, supported by local funds and by tuition fees, made up the public provision for education. In addition there were schools partly maintained by parliamentary grants, mission and sessional schools maintained by the Established Church and the Free Church, and other parochial and private schools. Parish and burgh schools carried instruction to the level of the universities, which were easily accessible to all classes. The date of the passage of the 'Scotch Education Act' (1872) was opportune for the organization of these various agencies into a system maintained by the combined action of the Government and local authorities. In framing the Scotch act care was taken, as in framing the English act two years before, to guard the rights of the Government with respect to funds appropriated from the public treasury. At the same time equal care was shown for the preservation of the Scotch ideal. This was a broad and comprehensive ideal, embracing the different grades of scholastic work. … This ideal differentiates the Scotch act from the English act passed two years before. The latter related to elementary schools exclusively; the former has a wider scope, providing the foundations of a system of graded schools correlated to the universities which lie beyond its province. With respect to the interests of the Government, the two acts are substantially the same. … For the general direction of the system a Scotch educational department was created, composed, like the English department, of lords of the privy council, and having the same president. … The act ordered every parent to secure the instruction of his children between the ages of 5 and 13, or until a certificate of exemption should be secured. Parents failing in this obligation are subject to prosecution and penalty by fine or imprisonment. The compulsory provision extends to blind children. Parochial or burghal authorities were authorized to pay the tuition fees of those children whose parents could not meet the expenditure, a provision rendered unnecessary by the recent remission of all fees. The Scotch act, by a sweeping clause, made compulsory attendance universal; the English act left the matter of compulsion to local managers. A subsequent act (1878) fixed the standard of exemption in Scotland at the fifth [grade, or year of study], which pupils should pass at 11 years of age. In 1883, the upper limit of compulsory attendance in Scotland was raised to 14 years. … The universities of Scotland have been more intimately related to the life of the common people than those of any other country. In this respect, even more if possible than in their constitution, they present a marked contrast to the English universities. To their democratic spirit may be traced many of the characteristics which differentiate the Scotch people and policies from those of England. To their widespread influence, to the ambitions which they awakened, and the opportunities which they brought within the reach of the whole body of Scottish youth is due, in large measure, the independent and honorable part that Scotland has played in the history of the United Kingdom. This popular character of the universities has been fostered by the curriculum of the common schools, by the easy passage from the schools to the higher institutions; by the inexpensive mode of student life in the university towns, and by the great number of scholarship funds available for the poor. These conditions, however, have not been without their disadvantages. Of these, the chief are the low entrance standards and the consequent forcing of preparatory instruction upon the university professors. … As a result of long-continued efforts a Scotch universities act was passed in 1889. This act provided for the reorganization of the four universities; for the elevation of their standards; the enrichment of their curricula, and the increase of their resources. … The Scotch universities have taken part in the popular movements of the last decade. They maintain local examinations for secondary schools and students. St. Andrews has been particularly active in promoting the higher education of women, having instituted the special degree of L. L. A. (lady literate in arts). Edinburgh also grants a certificate in arts to women. Aberdeen has recently appointed a lecturer on education, following thus the precedent set by Edinburgh and St. Andrews. The four universities are united in a scheme of university extension."

United States Commissioner of Education, Report, 1889-90, volume 1, pages 188-207.

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EDUCATION: Sweden.

"Sweden has two ancient and famous universities—Upsala and Lund. That of Lund is in the south part of the kingdom, and when founded was on Danish territory. The income from its estates is about 176,000 rix-dollars ($46,315) per annum. It also receives yearly aid from the state. In 1867 it had 75 professors and tutors, and 400 students. Upsala is the larger university, located at the old town of that name—the ancient capital of Sweden—an hour and a half by rail north of Stockholm. It has 100 professors and tutors, and 1,449 students, an increase of 131 over the year 1869. … This university had its beginning as an institution of learning as far back as 1250. In 1438 it had one academic professorship, and was dedicated as an university in 1477. Its principal endowment was by Gustavus Adolphus in 1624, when he donated to it all of the estate in lands that he possessed, amounting in all to 300 farms."

C. C. Andrews, Report on the Educational System of Sweden (United States Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, July, 1871).

EDUCATION: Switzerland.

"The influence of the Reformation, and, in the following age, of the Jesuit reaction, gave to Switzerland, as to Germany, its original and fundamental means and agencies of national education, and impressed also upon the population a habit of dutiful regard for schools and learning. It was not, however, till forty years ago that the modern education of Switzerland was organized. 'The great development of public education in Switzerland,' to quote Mr. Kay, 'dates from 1832, after the overthrow of the old oligarchical forms of cantonal government and the establishment of the present democratic forms.' Zürich, Lausanne, and Geneva take the lead in Switzerland as centres of educational influence. The canton in which the work of educational reform began was Zürich. … The instrument of the reform, rather the revolution, was Scherr, a trained school-teacher from Würtemberg, a teacher, in particular, of deaf mutes to speak articulately. This man initiated in Zürich the new scheme and work of education, and founded the first Training College. He was looked upon by the oligarchs, partly feudalists, and partly manufacturers, as a dangerous revolutionist, and was exiled from Zürich. But now a monument to his memory adorns the city. The work which he began could not be suppressed or arrested. Zürich has ever since taken the lead in education among the cantons of Switzerland. Derived originally from Germany, the system is substantially identical with that of Germany. … The principles and methods are substantially alike throughout. There are, first, the communal schools—these of course in largest number—one to every village, even for every small hamlet, provided and maintained, wholly or chiefly, by the commune; there are burgher schools in towns, including elementary, real, and superior schools, supported by the towns; there are cantonal schools—gymnasia and industrial or technical schools—supported by the State, that is, by the canton. There is often a Cantonal University. There is of course a Cantonal Training School or College, and there are institutes of various kinds. The Cantonal Universities, however, are on a small and economical scale; as yet there is no Federal University. School life in Switzerland is very long, from six to fourteen or fifteen, and for all who are to follow a profession, from fifteen to twenty-two."

J. H. Rigg, National Education, chapter 4.

EDUCATION: Modern: Asiatic Countries. China.

"Every step in the process of teaching is fixed by unalterable usage. So much is this the case, that in describing one school I describe all, and in tracing the steps of one student I point out the course of all; for in China there are no new methods or short roads. In other countries, a teacher, even in the primary course, finds room for tact and originality. In those who dislike study, a love of it is to be inspired by making 'knowledge pleasant to the taste'; and the dull apprehension is to be awakened by striking and apt illustrations. … In China there is nothing of this. The land of uniformity, all processes in arts and letters are as much fixed by universal custom as is the cut of their garments or the mode of wearing their hair. The pupils all tread the path trodden by their ancestors of a thousand years ago, nor has it grown smoother by the attrition of so many feet. The undergraduate course may be divided into three stages, in each of which there are two leading studies: In the first the occupations of the student are committing to memory (not reading) the canonical books and writing an infinitude of diversely formed characters, as a manual exercise. In the second, they are the translation of his text books (i. e., reading), and lessons in composition. In the third, they are belles lettres and the composition of essays. Nothing could be more dreary than the labors of the first stage. … Even the stimulus of companionship in study is usually denied, the advantages resulting from the formation of classes being as little appreciated as those of other labor saving machinery. Each pupil reads and writes alone, the penalty for failure being so many blows with the ferule or kneeling for so many minutes on the rough brick pavement which serves for a floor. At this period fear is the strongest motive addressed to the mind of the scholar. … This arctic winter of monotonous toil once passed, a more auspicious season dawns on the youthful understanding. The key of the cabala which he has been so long and so blindly acquiring is put into his hands. He is initiated in the translation and exposition of those sacred books which he had previously stored away in his memory. … The light however is let in but sparingly, as it were, through chinks and rifts in the long dark passage. A simple character here and there is explained, and then, it may be after the lapse of a year or two, the teacher proceeds to the explication of entire sentences. Now for the first time the mind of the student begins to take in the thoughts of those he has been taught to regard as the oracles of wisdom. … The value of this exercise can hardly be overestimated. When judiciously employed it does for the Chinese what translation into and out of the dead languages of the west does for us. It calls into play memory, judgment, taste, and gives him a command of his own vernacular which, it is safe to assert, he would never acquire in any other way. … The first step in composition is the yoking together of double characters. {725} The second is the reduplication of these binary compounds and the construction of parallels—an idea which runs so completely through the whole of Chinese literature that the mind of the student requires to be imbued with it at the very outset. This is the way he begins: The teacher writes, 'wind blows,' the pupil adds, 'rain falls'; the teacher writes, 'rivers are long,' the pupil adds, 'seas are deep,' or 'mountains are high,' &c. From the simple subject and predicate, which in their rude grammar they describe as 'dead' and' living' characters, the teacher conducts his pupil to more complex forms, in which qualifying words and phrases are introduced. He gives as a model some such phrase as 'The Emperor's grace is vast as heaven and earth,' and the lad matches it by 'The Sovereign's favor is profound as lake and sea.' These couplets often contain two propositions in each member, accompanied by all the usual modifying terms; and so exact is the symmetry required by the rules of the art that not only must noun, verb, adjective, and particle respond to each other with scrupulous exactness, but the very tones of the characters are adjusted to each other with the precision of music. Begun with the first strokes of his untaught pencil, the student, whatever his proficiency, never gets beyond the construction of parallels. When he becomes a member of the institute or a minister of the imperial cabinet, at classic festivals and social entertainments, the composition of impromptu couplets, formed on the old model, constitutes a favorite pastime. Reflecting a poetic image from every syllable, or concealing the keen point of a cutting epigram, they afford a fine vehicle for sallies of wit; and poetical contests such as that of Melibœus and Menalcas are in China matters of daily occurrence. If a present is to be given, on the occasion of a marriage, a birth-day, or any other remarkable occasion, nothing is deemed so elegant or acceptable as a pair of scrolls inscribed with a complimentary distich. When the novice is sufficiently exercised in the 'parallels' for the idea of symmetry to have become an instinct, he is permitted to advance to other species of composition which afford freer scope for his faculties. Such are the 'shotiah,' in which a single thought is expanded in simple language, the 'lun,' the formal discussion of a subject more or less extended, and epistles addressed to imaginary persons and adapted to all conceivable circumstances. In these last, the forms of the 'complete letter writer' are copied with too much servility; but in the other two, substance being deemed of more consequence than form, the new fledged thought is permitted to essay its powers and to expatiate with but little restraint. In the third stage, composition is the leading object, reading being wholly subsidiary. It takes for the most part the artificial form of verse, and of a kind of prose called 'wen-chang,' which is, if possible, still more artificial. The reading required embraces mainly rhetorical models and sundry anthologies. History is studied, but only that of China, and that only in compends; not for its lessons of wisdom, but for the sake of the allusions with which it enables a writer to embellish classic essays. The same may be said of other studies; knowledge and mental discipline are at a discount and style at a premium. The goal of the long course, the flower and fruit of the whole system, is the 'wen-chang '; for this alone can insure success in the pubic examinations for the civil service, in which students begin to adventure soon after entering on the third stage of their preparatory course. … We hear it asserted that 'education is universal in China; even coolies are taught to read and write.' In one sense this is true, but not as we understand the terms 'reading and writing.' In the alphabetical vernaculars of the west, the ability to read and write implies the ability to express one's thoughts by the pen and to grasp the thoughts of others when so expressed. In Chinese, and especially in the classical or book language, it implies nothing of the sort. A shopkeeper may be able to write the numbers and keep accounts without being able to write anything else; and a lad who has attended school for several years will pronounce the characters of an ordinary book with faultless precision, yet not comprehend the meaning of a single sentence. Of those who can read understandingly (and nothing else ought to be called reading), the proportion is greater in towns than in rural districts. But striking an average, it does not, according to my observation, exceed one in twenty for the male sex and one in ten thousand for the female." The literary examinations, "coming down from the past, with the accretions of many centuries, … have expanded into a system whose machinery is as complex as its proportions are enormous. Its ramifications extend to every district of the empire; and it commands the services of district magistrates, prefects, and other civil functionaries up to governors and viceroys. These are all auxiliary to the regular officers of the literary corporation. In each district there are two resident examiners, with the title of professor, whose duty it is to keep a register of all competing students and to exercise them from time to time in order to stimulate their efforts and keep them in preparation for the higher examinations in which degrees are conferred. In each province there is one chancellor or superintendent of instruction, who holds office for three years, and is required to visit every district and hold the customary examinations within that time, conferring the first degree on a certain percentage of the candidates. There are, moreover, two special examiners for each province, generally members of the Hanlin, deputed from the capital to conduct the great triennial examination and confer the second degree. The regular degrees are three: 1st. 'Siu-tsai' or 'Budding talent.' 2d. 'Ku-jin' or 'Deserving of promotion.' 3d. 'Tsin-shi' or 'Fit for office.' To which may be added, as a fourth degree, the Hanlin, or member of the 'Forest of Pencils.' … The first degree only is conferred by the provincial chancellor, and the happy recipients, fifteen or twenty in each department, or 1 per cent. of the candidates, are decorated with the insignia of rank and admitted to the ground floor of the nine storied pagoda. The trial for the second degree is held in the capital of each province, by special commissioners, once in three years. It consists of three sessions of three days each, making nine days of almost continuous exertion—a strain to the mental and physical powers, to which the infirm and aged frequently succumb. In addition to composition in prose and verse, the candidate is required to show his acquaintance with history, (the history of China;) philosophy, criticism, and various branches of archæology. Again 1 per cent. is decorated; but it is not until the more fortunate among them succeed in passing the metropolitan triennial that the meed of civil office is certainly bestowed. {726} They are not, however, assigned to their respective offices until they have gone through two special examinations within the palace and in the presence of the emperor. On this occasion the highest on the list is honored with the title of 'chuang yuen' or 'laureate,' a distinction so great that in the last reign it was not thought unbefitting the daughter of a 'chuang yuen' to be raised to the position of consort of the Son of Heaven. A score of the best are admitted to membership in the Academy, two or three score are attached to it as pupils or probationers, and the rest drafted off to official posts in the capital or in the provinces, the humblest of which is supposed to compensate the occupant for a life of penury and toil."

Reverend W. A. P. Martin, Report on the System of Public Instruction in China (United States Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, 1877, number 1).

ALSO IN: W. A. P. Martin, The Chinese: their Education, &C.

EDUCATION: Japan.

From the fourth to the eighth centuries of the Christian era, "after the conquest of Corea by the Japanese emperor Jigo Kogo, came letters, writing, books, literature, religion, ethics, politics, medicine, arts, science, agriculture, manufactures, and the varied appliances of civilization; and with these entered thousands of immigrants from Corea and China. Under the intellectual influence of Buddhism—the powerful and aggressive faith that had already led captive the half of Asia—of the Confucian ethics and philosophy, and Chinese literature, the horizon of the Japanese mind was immensely broadened. … In the time of the European 'dark ages' the Japanese were enjoying what, in comparison, was a high state of civilization. … Under the old regime of the Sho-guns, all foreign ideas and influences were systematically excluded, and the isolation of Japan from the rest of the world was made the supreme policy of the government. Profound peace lasted from the beginning of the seventeenth century to 1868. During this time, schools and colleges, literature and learning, flourished. It was the period of scholastic, not of creative, intellectual activity. The basis of education was Chinese. What we consider the means of education, reading and writing, were to them the ends. Of classified science there was little or none. Mathematics was considered as fit only for merchants and shop-keepers. No foreign languages were studied, and their acquisition was forbidden. … There was no department of education, though universities were established at Kioto and Yedo, large schools in the daimio's capitals, and innumerable private schools all over the country. Nine-tenths of the people could read and write. Books were very numerous and cheap. Circulating libraries existed in every city and town. Literary clubs and associations for mutual improvement were common even in country villages. Nevertheless, in comparison with the ideal systems and practice of the progressive men of New Japan, the old style was as different from the present as the training of an English youth in mediæval times is from that of a London or Oxford student of the present day. Although an attempt to meet some of the educational necessities arising from the altered conditions of the national life were made under the Sho-gun's regime, yet the first attempt at systematic work in the large cities was made under the Mikado's government, and the idea of a new national plan of education is theirs only. In 1871 the Mom Bu Sho, or department of education, was formed, of which the high counselor Oki, a man of indomitable vigor and perseverance, was made head. … According to the scheme of national education promulgated in 1872, the empire is divided into eight Dai Gaku Ku, (Daigakku,) or great educational divisions. In each of' these there is to be a university, normal school, schools of foreign languages, high schools, and primary schools. The total number of schools will number, it is expected, over 55,000. Only in the higher schools is a foreign language to be taught. In the lower schools the Japanese learning and elementary science translated or adopted from European or American text-books are to be taught. The general system of instruction, methods, discipline, school-aids, furniture, architecture, are to be largely adopted from foreign models, and are now to a great extent in vogue throughout the country."

W. E. Griffis, Education in Japan (United States Bureau of Education, Circulars of Information, 1875, number 2).

EDUCATION: Modern: America. A. D. 1619-1819. Virginia. College of William and Mary.

"In 1619—one year before the Pilgrim Fathers came to the land named New England by Captain John Smith—Sir Edwin Sandys, president of the Virginia Company in old England, moved the grant of ten thousand acres of land for the establishment of a university at Henrico. The proposed grant, which was duly made, included one thousand acres for an Indian college; the remainder was to be 'the foundation of a seminary of learning for the English.' The very same year the bishops of England, at the suggestion of the King, raised the sum of fifteen hundred pounds for the encouragement of Indian Education. … Tenants were sent over to occupy the university lands, and Mr. George Thorpe, a gentleman of His Majesty's Privy Chamber, came over to be the superintendent of the university itself. This first beginning of philanthropy toward the Indians and of educational foundations for the Indians in America was suspended by reason of the Indian massacre, in the spring of 1622, when Mr. Thorpe and three hundred and forty settlers, including tenants of the university, were cut off by an insurrection of savages. It was only two years after this terrible catastrophe that the idea of a university in Virginia was revived. Experience with treacherous Indians suggested that the institution should be erected upon a secluded sheltered site—an island in the Susquehanna River. … The plan was broken off by the death of its chief advocate and promoter, Mr. Edward Palmer. But the idea of a university for Virginia was not lost. … In 1660, the colonial Assembly of Virginia took into their own hands the project of founding educational institutions within their borders. The motive of the Virginians was precisely the same as that of the great and general Court of Massachusetts, when it established Harvard College, and grammar schools to fit youth 'for ye university.' The Virginians voted 'that for the advance of learning, education of youth, supply of the ministry, and promotion of piety, there be land taken upon purchases for a college and free schoole, and that there be, with as much speede as may be convenient, housing erected thereon for entertainment of students and schollers.' {727} It was also voted in 1660 that the various commissioners of county courts take subscriptions on court days for the benefit of the college, and that the commissioners send orders throughout their respective counties to the vestrymen of all the parishes for the purpose of raising money from such inhabitants as 'have not already subscribed.' It appears from the record of this legislation in Hening's Statutes of Virginia that already in 1660, 'His Majestie's Governour, Council of State, and Burgesses of the present grand Assembly have severally subscribed severall considerable sumes of money and quantityes of tobacco,' to be paid upon demand after a place had been provided and built upon for educational purposes. A petition was also recommended to Sir William Berkeley, then governor of Virginia, that the King be petitioned for letters patent authorizing collections from 'well disposed people in England for the erecting of colledges and schooles in this countrye.' This action of the Virginians in 1660 ought to be taken as much better evidence of an early regard for education in that colony than the well-known saying of Governor Berkeley would seem to indicate. In reply to an inquiry by the lords commissioners of trades and plantations respecting the progress of learning in the colony of Virginia, Berkeley said, 'I thank God there are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not have these hundred years.' This answer by a crusty old governor has been quoted perhaps too often as an index of the real sentiments of colonial Virginia toward the cause of education. Not only is the tone of popular legislation entirely opposed to the current view, but Berkeley's own acts should modify our judgment of his words. He actually subscribed, with other gentlemen of the colony, for 'a Colledge of students of the liberal arts and sciences.' Undoubtedly Sir William did not believe in popular education as it is now understood. If he had done so, he would have been much in advance of his time. … Some writers would have us believe that the college was actually planted as early as 1661, but this is highly improbable. Early educational enactments in Virginia were like many of those early towns—on paper only. And yet the Virginians really meant to have both towns and a college. In 1688-'89, twenty-five hundred pounds were subscribed by a few wealthy gentlemen in the colony and by their merchant friends in England toward the endowment of the higher education. In 1691 the colonial Assembly sent the Reverend James Blair, the commissary or representative of the Bishop of London, back to England to secure a charter for the proposed college. Virginia's agent went straight to Queen Mary and explained the educational ambition of her colony in America. The Queen favored the idea of a college, and William wisely concurred. The royal pair agreed to allow two thousand pounds out of the quit-rents of Virginia toward building the college. … The English Government concluded to give not only £2,000 in money, but also 20,000 acres of land, with a tax of one penny on every pound of tobacco exported from Maryland and Virginia, together with all fees and profits arising from the office of surveyor-general, which were to be controlled by the president and faculty of the college. They were authorized to appoint special surveyors for the counties whenever the governor and his council thought it necessary. These privileges, granted by charter in 1693, were of great significance in the economic history of Virginia. They brought the entire land system of the colony into the hands of a collegiate land office. Even after the Revolution, one-sixth of the fees to all public surveyors continued to be paid into the college treasury down to the year 1819, when this custom was abolished."

H. B. Adams, The College of William and Mary (Circulars of Information of the Bureau of Education, 1887, number 1).

EDUCATION: Modern: America: A. D. 1635. Massachusetts. Boston Latin School.

"The Public Latin School of Boston enjoys the distinction of being the oldest existing school within the bounds of the United States. It was founded in the spring of 1635, thus ante-dating Harvard College, and has been in continuous existence ever since, with the interruption of a few months, during the siege of Boston, 1775-1776." The two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the school was celebrated April 23, 1885, on which occasion the Reverend Phillips Brooks, D. D., delivered an address from which the following passages are taken: "The colony under Winthrop arrived in the Arabella and founded Boston in 1630. On the 4th of September, 1633, the Griffin brought John Cotton from the Lincolnshire Boston, full of pious spirit and wise plans for the new colony with which he had cast in his lot. It has been suggested that possibly we owe to John Cotton the first suggestion of the first town-school. … However this may be, here is the town record of the 13th of the second month, 1635. It is forever memorable, for it is the first chapter of our Book of Genesis, the very cradle of all our race: 'At a general meeting upon publique notice … it was then generally agreed upon that our brother Philemon Pormort shall be entreated to become scholemaster, for the teaching and nourtering of children among us.' It was two hundred and fifty years ago to-day [April 23, 1885] just nineteen years after the day when William Shakespeare died, just seventy-one years after the day when he was born. How simple that short record is, and how unconscious that short view is of the future which is wrapped up in it! Fifty-nine thousand children who crowd the Boston public schools to-day—and who can count what thousands yet unborn?—are to be heard crying out for life in the dry, quaint words of that old vote. By it the first educational institution, which was to have continuous existence in America, and in it the public school system of the land, came into being. Philemon Pormort, the first teacher of the Latin School, is hardly more than a mere shadow of a name. It is not even clear that he ever actually taught the school at all. A few years later, with Mr. Wheelwright, after the Hutchinson excitement, he disappears into the northern woods, and is one of the founders of Exeter, in New Hampshire. There are rumors that he came back to Boston and died here, but it is all very uncertain. … The name 'free school' in those days seems to have been used to characterize an institution which should not be restricted to any class of children, and which should not be dependent on the fluctuating attendance of scholars for its support. It looked forward to ultimate endowment, like the schools of England. The town set apart the rent of Deer Island, and some of the other islands in the harbor, for its help. {728} All the great citizens, Governor Winthrop, Governor Vane, Mr. Bellingham, and the rest, made generous contributions to it. But it called, also, for support from those who sent their children to it, and who were able to pay something; and it was only of the Indian children that it was distinctly provided that they should be 'taught gratis.' It was older than any of the schools which, in a few years, grew up thick around it. The same power which made it spring out of the soil was in all the rich ground on which these colonists, unlike any other colonists which the world has ever seen, had set their feet. Roxbury had its school under the Apostle Eliot in 1645. Cambridge was already provided before 1643. Charlestown did not wait later than 1636. Salem and Ipswich were, both of them, ready in 1637. Plymouth did not begin its system of public instruction till 1663. It was in 1647 that the General Court enacted that resolve which is the great charter of free education in our Commonwealth, in whose preamble and ordinance stand the immortal words: 'That learning may not be buried in the grave of our fathers, in church and Commonwealth, the Lord assisting our endeavors, it is therefore ordered that every township in this jurisdiction, after the Lord hath increased them to the number of fifty householders, shall then forthwith appoint one within their town to teach all such children as shall resort to him to write and read.' There can be no doubt, then, of our priority. But mere priority is no great thing. The real interest of the beginning of the school is the large idea and scale on which it started. It taught the children, little Indians and all, to read and write. But there seems every reason to suppose that it taught also the Latin tongue, and all that then was deemed the higher knowledge. It was the town's only school till 1682."

The Oldest School in America, pages 5-24.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1636. Massachusetts. Harvard College.

"The first settlers in New England, recognizing the importance of a higher education than could be given in the common schools, began at once the founding of a university. The avowed object of this university was the training of young men for the ministry. Nothing could show clearer the spirit of these early colonists. Though less than four thousand in number, and scattered along the shores of Massachusetts Bay in sixteen hamlets, they were, nevertheless, able to engage in such an enterprise before adequate provision had been made for food, raiment, shelter, a civil government, or divine worship; at a time when soil and climate had disappointed them, and their affairs were in a most critical condition; for, not only were they called to face famine, disease, and death, but the mother country and the surrounding savage tribes were threatening them with war. … It was near the close of 1636, a little more than six years after the landing of the Puritans, when this first step was taken by the General Court of the Massachusetts Colony. At this assembly, presided over by Sir Henry Vane, governor of the colony, the General Court agreed to give £400 (a munificent sum for the time) towards the founding of a school or college, but left the question of its location and building to be determined by the Court that was to sit in September of the following year. This, it is said, was the first assembly 'in which the people by their representatives ever gave their own money to found a place of education.' At the next Court it was decided to locate the college at Newtown, or 'the New Towne,' and twelve of the principal magistrates and ministers were chosen to carry out this design. A few months later, they changed the name of the town to Cambridge, not only to tell their posterity whence they came, but also, as Quincy aptly says, to indicate 'the high destiny to which they intended the institution should aspire.' Another year, however, passed before the College was organized. The impulse given to it then was due to aid which came from so unexpected a quarter that it must have seemed to the devout men of New England as a clear indication of the divine favor. The Reverend John Harvard, a Non-conformist minister, was graduated, in 1635, from the Puritan college of Emmanuel, at Cambridge, England, and came, two years later, to America and settled in Charlestown, where he immediately took a prominent part in town affairs. His contemporaries gave him the title of reverend, and he is said to have officiated occasionally in Charlestown as 'minister of God's word.' One has recently said of him that he was 'beloved and honored, a well-trained and accomplished scholar of the type then esteemed,' and that in the brief period of his life in America —scarcely more than a year—he cemented more closely friendships that had been begun in earlier years. The project of a college was then engrossing the thought of these early friends and doubtless he also became greatly interested in it. Thus it happened that, when his health failed, through his own love of learning and through sympathy with the project of his daily associates, he determined to bequeath one-half of his estate, probably about £800, besides his excellent library of three hundred and twenty volumes, towards the endowment of the college. This bequest rendered possible the immediate organization of the college, which went into operation 'on the footing of the ancient institutions of Europe,' and, out of gratitude to Harvard, the General Court voted that the new institution should bear his name."