Εικόνες σελίδας
PDF
Ηλεκτρ. έκδοση

place his own ideas and feelings before his consciousness, and enable him to pursue his course securely and successfully.' p. 51.

With the aid of Niederer and the other instructers, the institution at Burgdorf was soon brought into a better state of organization, and the complaints occasioned by Pestalozzi's desultory manner of teaching gradually ceased. Regular courses of instruction were drawn up by the different teachers in their respective departments; and, after having been put to the test of two years' experience, and jointly revised by Pestalozzi and his assistants, were published in 1803, with the title of Pestalozzi's Elementary Books,' in six parts. The success of these books was not so great as Pestalozzi had anticipated. A great portion of the public was not prepared for them, and could not enter into their spirit; while the few, who fully understood the system of Pestalozzi, did not need them, and, in fact, were able to arrange better manuals for their own use.

Soon after this publication, it became necessary from pecuniary considerations to make some change in the establishment at Burgdorf. The result was the removal of Pestalozzi from that place. After an unsuccessful attempt to accomplish a plan suggested by the celebrated Fellenberg of Hofwyl, for an institution under their united care, Pestalozzi finally took up his abode at the castle of Y verdun, a residence that was offered him by the Canton de Vaud, and which he preferred to some others, on account of its beautiful situation on the south end of the lake Neufchatel.

'Never, perhaps, has the idea of domestic life, in the highest sense of the word, been more beautifully realized, never the effect of a Christian family spirit more powerfully illustrated, than it was in the flourishing times of the establishment at Yverdun; in which persons of all ages, of all ranks, of all nations, persons of the most different gifts and abilities, and of the most opposite characters, were united together by that unaffected love which Pestalozzi, in years a man verging to the grave, but in heart and mind a genuine child, seemed to breathe out continually, and to impart to all that came within his circle. His children forgot that they had any other home, his teachers, that there was any world beside the institution. Even the eldest members of this great family, men who had attained all the maturity of manhood, venerated Pestalozzi with all the reverence of true filial affection, and

VOL. XI. -N. S. VOL. VI. NO. III.

47

cherished towards each other, and towards the younger teachers and the pupils, a genuine brotherly feeling, such as has, perhaps, never existed on earth since the days of the pristine Christian church. There was no man that claimed any privilege for himself, none that sought any thing apart from the others. All the goods of the earth, and all the gifts of immortality, by whomsoever they might be possessed, were enjoyed in common by all; every individual, with all that he had, and all that he could command, devoted himself to the happiness and the improvement of all. There were not times and places set apart for duty, and times and places left without duty; in every place, and at every moment, there was a claim of duty upon the conscience of every individual; but the discharge of that duty was not a toilsome drudgery, it was a true delight.

"Teachers and children were entirely amalgamated; they not only slept in the same rooms, and shared together all the enjoyments and labors of the day, but they were on a footing of perfect ease and familiarity. There was no pedantic superiority, no foppery of condescension, on the part of the teacher; nor was there in the pupils the slavish humility of fear, or the arrogant presumption of an equality, which does not exist in the nature of things. The same man that read a lecture on history one hour, would, perhaps, in the next, sit on the same form with his pupils in a lesson of arithmetic or geometry; nay, he would, without compromising his dignity, request their assistance, and receive their hints. Such facts were of daily occurrence in a house in which every one was a teacher of what he knew, and every one, even the head himself, a learner of what he knew not. The children saw in Pestalozzi, their father; in the teachers of the house, their elder brethren; and they needed no rules to keep them in subjection, where a constant exercise of kindness imposed upon them the restraint of duty and hourly obligation.

[ocr errors]

To awaken that feeling, to kindle that spirit in the children, required, indeed, on the part of the teachers, a greater selfdenial than most heads of establishments would find it possible to impose upon their assistants. But Pestalozzi's example operated like a spell; and his teachers submitted in his house to arrangements, which the same men, perhaps, would no where else have been able to produce. They had the immediate inspection of the different apartments, nay, of the beds and clothes, as well as of the books of the children. In the morning, every teacher assisted those that were especially committed to his care, as far as their age might require it, in washing and dressing themselves; which, being done, he conducted them to

the great hall, where the whole family were assembled for morning service. During the day he lost sight of them only while they were engaged in lessons with other teachers; but at meals, and in the hours of recreation, he joined them again; he participated in their plays, accompanied them in their walks, and, at the close of the day, followed them again to evening prayers, and thence to bed. Yet in all this, there was, on the part of the pupils, perfect freedom; they were not forced to be with their teacher; but their teacher was always ready to be with them; and, as his presence imposed upon them no artificial restraint, they delighted in his company. They found his assistance useful in satisfying their wants, his conversation entertaining in moments of leisure, his advice encouraging in the pursuit of their labors; their games became more interesting by his participation, their walks more instructive by the information they derived from him on a variety of subjects; their conscience was strengthened by the glance of his eye, their prayer sanctified by the fellowship of his love.' — pp. 57, - 59.

It was necessary for the successful execution of Pestalozzi's purposes, that the teachers should be men of kindred spirit with himself. To awaken in their minds a sense of their high responsibleness, and to animate their zeal from the holiest motives, he endeavoured to make their teaching of others, a source of instruction, and the government of others, a means of moral improvement, to themselves. On two eve

nings in the week he met all the teachers who were not engaged with the pupils, and entered into a familiar discussion with them, of the general means of instruction and discipline, and of the individual state of each pupil. At these meetings every teacher was called upon in turn, to give an account of the manner in which he proceeded in his lessons, and of the children who were placed under his care. He was encouraged to state freely his difficulties, and to offer any suggestions which occurred to him; and from Pestalozzi and his brother teachers he had nothing to expect but cordial assent where he was in the right, and kind advice and gentle reproof where he was in the wrong. The remarks of each, and the resolutions to which they led, were put down in a book, which served both as a useful reference, and a valuable aid to future improvement.

In all his labors Pestalozzi had a most efficient assistant in his wife, who interested herself especially in cultivating the

affections of the younger pupils; while the different branches of domestic economy fell upon his daughter-in-law and an old housekeeper, who had been in his family for more than thirty years, and lived in it rather as a friend than a servant.

'The domestic arrangements had for their object to form habits of order, and to ensure the enjoyment of good health to the children. In the morning, half an hour before six, the signal was given for getting up. Six o'clock found the pupils ready for their first lesson, after which, they were assembled for morning prayer. Between this and breakfast, the children had time left them for preparing themselves for the day; and at eight o'clock they were again called to their lessons, which continued, with the interruption of from five to seven minutes' recreation between every two hours, till twelve o'clock. Half an hour later, dinner was served up; and afterwards the children were allowed to take moderate exercise till half past two, when the afternoon lessons began, and were continued till half-past four. From half-past four till five, there was another interval of recreation, during which the children had fruit and bread distributed to them. At five, the lessons were resumed till the time of supper at eight o'clock, after which, the evening prayer having been held, they were conducted to bed about nine. The hours of recreation were mostly spent in innocent games on a fine common, situated between the castle and the lake, and crossed in different directions by beautiful avenues of chestnut and poplar trees. On Wednesday and Sunday afternoons, if the weather permitted it, excursions of several miles were made through the beautiful scenery of the surrounding country. In summer, the children went frequently to bathe in the lake, the borders of which offered, in winter, fine opportunities for skating. In bad weather they resorted to gymnastic exercises in a large hall expressly fitted up for that purpose. This constant attention to regular bodily exercise, together with the excellent climate of Ÿverdun, and the simplicity of their mode of living, proved so effectual in preserving the health of the children, that illness of any kind made its appearance but very rarely, notwithstanding that the number of pupils amounted at one time to upwards of a hundred and eighty. Such was the care bestowed upon physical education in Pestalozzi's establishment; and an equal degree of solicitude was evinced for the intellectual and moral well-being of the children.' pp. 62, 63.

Successful, however, as the purposes of Pestalozzi were at Yverdun, the scene which is most intimately associated

with his name, and which was the theatre of his brightest and most useful achievements, he was destined again to meet with bitter disappointments, and, finally, to go down to his grave in sorrow. After a series of embarrassments, occasioned principally by the artifices of an unprincipled and intriguing adventurer among his teachers, the details of which we will not dwell upon, having suffered in his property, his happiness, and, to a certain degree, in his character, and witnessed the gradual destruction of his establishment, he died at Brugg, in the canton of Basle, on the 17th of February, 1827, at the advanced age of eighty-two years. The following description, by his biographer, will give our readers an idea of his person and manners.

'Pestalozzi was naturally endowed with extraordinary powers of body and mind. By the moral struggles which he sustained, his health was occasionally impaired; but his iron constitution could not be undermined by transient fits of nervousness, which had their origin more in the too free indulgence of his strong and acute feelings, than in any defect of his physical organization. His stature was short, and by a tendency of the head to sink in between the shoulders, his deportment, even in his younger years, uncomely. His eye, beaming with benevolence and honest confidence, soon dispelled any unpleasant impressions which the ruggedness of his appearance was calculated to produce; while his wrinkled countenance, which attested in every feature the existence of a soul, to which life had been more than a thoughtless game, commanded, with irresistible power, that reverence which his figure could never have inspired. His entire neglect of his person and dress increased the natural disadvantages of his exterior; and a characteristic anecdote which has been preserved, shows how much of what is commonly noticed among mankind, the divine credential on his brow caused his admirers to forget. Mrs. Pestalozzi was in company with some other ladies enjoying the promenades of a watering-place, to which she had repaired for the summer months, when her husband, who came travelling on foot to pay her a visit, was perceived at a distance by one of the company; and the singularity and unattractiveness of his appearance having affected the sensibilities of his fair beholder, to whom he was, personally, quite unknown, she exclaimed, addressing Mrs. Pestalozzi, Ah! je vous en prie, Madame, regardez donc, quel monstre !' 'C'est mon mari, Madame,' was Mrs. Pestalozzi's proud reply.

'In his diet, Pestalozzi was a pattern of simplicity and mod

« ΠροηγούμενηΣυνέχεια »