altogether uselesss. He had the satisfaction of knowing that he had rescued more than an hundred children from the degrading influences under which they were born, and planted the seeds of virtue and religion in their hearts; and, in addition to this, his qualifications for the task to which his life was now devoted, were greatly increased by the insight he had acquired into its real nature, and the means of its accomplishment.

The results of his experience at Neuhof, from the time of opening his asylum in 1775, to its close in 1790, are left on record in the valuable works which he published during that interval. The first of these, entitled 'Leonard and Gertrude,' is a popular novel, under which form he chose to convey his ideas respecting the condition of the lower classes, and the means of their improvement. The success of this work was not what he expected. Though universally popular as a novel, there were few who entered into the spirit of the deep wisdom which it contained. This was published in 1781, and, in order to draw the attention of its readers to the great object which he had in view, he published another work in the following year, entitled 'Christopher and Eliza.' But this also failed of the purpose for which it was principally intended. Still Pestalozzi was not discouraged in his attempts to make the public acquainted with his new ideas. He now addressed himself to the literary world, as he had before written expressly for the common people. In a journal published at Basle, under the direction of Iselin, a distinguished philanthropist, he inserted a series of essays, entitled Evening Hours of a Hermit,' which contained a more systematic account of his mode of instruction and his plans for national improvement. But the current of public thought was in an opposite direction, and little attention could be gained to the plans which he labored to introduce. His success was somewhat better in a weekly publication, which he undertook at the beginning of 1782, under the title of the Swiss Journal.' This was continued for one year, and forms two octavo volumes, in which a great variety of subjects is discussed, connected with his favorite purpose of national improvement.

6

Soon after the breaking up of his establishment at Neuhof, the country began to be agitated with the excesses of the French Revolution; and Pestalozzi, disappointed in the san

guine hopes which he had formed at the commencement of that event, and disgusted with the scenes of brutality and lawlessness, which it had occasioned, wrote his Inquiry into the Course of Nature in the Developement of the Human Species.' This work, published in 1797, marks a new epoch in the developement of his views. It was written at a moment when his mind was covered with the deepest gloom, and he was almost ready to sink under the struggle between the bright conceptions of improvement which he had formed, and the darkness which hung over the existing institutions of society. The following questions, which he proposes to himself at the commencement of the work, will give some idea of its plan, and of the spirit in which it was composed.

'What am I? What is the human species?

'What have I done? What is the human species doing?

'I want to know what the course of my life, such as it has been, has made of me? and I want to know what the course of life, such as it has been, has made of the human species?

'I want to know on what ground my volition and my opinions rest, and must rest, under the circumstances in which I am placed?

'I want to know on what ground the volition of the human species and its opinions rest, and must rest, under the circumstances in which it is placed?' p. 149.

The following portrait of himself, which he draws at the close of the volume, is highly characteristic of his feelings at this time.

.4

6 Thousands pass away, as nature gave them birth, in the corruption of sensual gratification, and they seek no more. 'Tens of thousands are overwhelmed by the burdens of craft and trade; by the weight of the hammer, the ell, or the crane, and they seek no more.

'But I know a man, who did seek more; the joy of simplicity dwelt in his heart, and he had faith in mankind such as few men have; his soul was made for friendship; love was his element, and fidelity his strongest tie.

'But he was not made by this world nor for it; and whereever he was placed in it, he was found unfit.

And the world that found him thus, asked not whether it was his fault or the fault of another; but it bruised him with an iron hammer, as the bricklayers break an old brick to fill up crevices.

'But though bruised, he yet trusted in mankind more than in himself; and he proposed to himself a great purpose, which to attain, he suffered agonies, and learned lessons such as few mortals had learnt before.

'He could not, nor would he, become generally useful; but for his purpose he was more useful than most men are for theirs; and he expected justice at the hands of mankind, whom he still loved with an innocent love. But he found none. Those that erected themselves into his judges, without further examination confirmed the former sentence, that he was generally and absolutely useless.

This was the grain of sand which decided the doubtful balance of his wretched destinies.

'He is no more; thou mayst know him no more; all that remains of him is the decayed remnants of his destroyed existence.

'He fell as a fruit that falls before it is ripe, whose blossom has been nipped by the northern gale, or whose core is eaten out by the gnawing worm.

Stranger that passest by; refuse not a tear of sympathy; even in falling, this fruit turned itself towards the trunk, on the branches of which it lingered through the summer, and it whispered to the tree; "Verily, even in my death will I nourish thy roots."

'Stranger that passest by, spare the perishing fruit, and allow the dust of its corruption to nourish the roots of the tree, on whose branches it lived, sickened, and died."

pp. 157, 158. But a brighter day for Pestalozzi was about to dawn. He now became sensible of the great error of his former plans, which made too much account of external circumstances, without exerting sufficient influence on the inward nature, which it was his object to elevate. His mind gradually arrived at the important truth, which is the key-stone of the system he afterwards matured, that the amelioration of outward circumstances will be the effect, but can never be the means, of mental and moral improvement.'

He had now succeeded in awakening the attention of the Swiss government to the importance of his plans for national education, and was invited to take charge of an asylum for orphans and other destitute children, which should be formed under his own direction and supported at the public expense. The place selected for this experiment was Stantz, the capital of the canton of Underwalden, which had been recently burned and depopulated by the French revolution

46

ary troops. A new Ursuline convent, which was then building, was assigned to Pestalozzi, as the scene of his future operations. On his arrival there, he found only one apartment finished, a room about twenty-four feet square, and that unfurnished. The rest of the building was occupied by the carpenters and masons; and even had there been rooms, the want of beds and kitchen furniture would have made them useless. In the mean time, it having been announced that an asylum was to be opened, crowds of children came forward, some of them orphans and others without protection or shelter, whom it was impossible, under such circumstances, to send away. The one room was devoted to all manner of purposes. In the day it served as a school-room, and at night, furnished with some scanty bedding, was occupied by Pestalozzi, with as many of the scholars as it would hold. The remainder were quartered out for the night in some of the neighbouring houses, and came to the asylum only in the day. Of course, under such circumstances, every thing like order or regularity was out of the question. Even personal cleanliness was impossible; and this, added to the dust occasioned by the workmen, the dampness of the new walls, and the closeness of the atmosphere in a small and crowded apartment, made the asylum an unhealthy abode.

The character of the children, too, was a great obstacle to Pestalozzi's success. Many of them were the offspring of beggars and outlaws, and had long been inured to wretchedness and vice; others had seen better days, and, oppressed by disappointment and suffering, had lost all disposition to exert themselves; while a few, who were from the higher classes of society, had been spoiled by indulgence and luxury, and were now conceited, petulant, and full of scornful airs towards their companions.

The whole charge of the establishment thus composed, devolved upon Pestalozzi. Pestalozzi. From motives of economy and from the difficulty of procuring suitable assistants, he employed no one but a house-keeper. The burden of this task was increased by the caprice and folly of many of the parents, whose children had been sent to the asylum. They were prejudiced against him as a Protestant and an agent of the Helvetic government, and spared no complaints which their unreasonableness or ignorance could suggest.

Mothers who were in the daily practice of begging from door to door, would come on some silly pretext, and take away their children, because they would be no worse off at home. On Sundays especially the whole family circle, from parents to the remotest cousin, would assemble in a body at the asylum, and, after filling the minds of the children with their idle whims, would either take them home, or leave them peevish and unhappy. Sometimes children were brought to the asylum merely to obtain clothing, which being done they were soon removed and no reasons given. In many instances, parents required payment for leaving their children, to compensate for the loss occasioned by taking them off from their begging. In others, they desired to make an agreement for a certain number of days in the week, in which they could have permission to send them out to beg; and this being refused, they indignantly declared, that they would remove them forthwith, a threat which was not unfrequently executed.

Such was the character of the materials on which Pestalozzi was obliged to commence his great experiments. Discouraging, however, as they appear at first sight, we have reason to believe, that they contributed, in no small degree, to the final success of his plans. He was deprived of the ordinary means of instruction and authority, and thus thrown entirely upon his own resources; the inventive genius, for which he was afterwards distinguished, was awakened within him, and the spirit of humanity received fresh excitement. One of the first benefits which he derived from his apparently untoward circumstances, was the necessity of resorting to the power of love in the child's heart as the only source of obedience. There was nothing in the disposition of either the parents or the children, to aid him in his efforts; on the contrary, a spirit of contempt on the one side and of open hostility on the other, placed those obstacles in his way, which a less original and energetic mind than his would not have been able to surmount. The usual methods of punishment could not be applied with any success. Accordingly, he discarded them all. He made no attempt to frighten his refractory troop into order and obedience, but used only the instrument of an all-forbearing kindness. Even when obliged to apply coercive measures, he employed them with such a spirit, as showed the