Chapter I: The Nature of Education

§ 13. The nature of Education is determined by the nature of mind--that it can develop whatever it really is only by its own activity. Mind is in itself free; but if it does not actualize this possibility, it is in no true sense free, either for itself or for another. Education is the influencing of man by man, and it has for its end to lead him to actualize himself through his own efforts. The attainment of perfect manhood as the actualization of the Freedom necessary to mind constitutes the nature of Education in general.

--The completely isolated man does not become man. Solitary human beings who have been found in forests, like the wild girl of the forest of Ardennes, sufficiently prove the fact that the truly human qualities in man cannot be developed without reciprocal action with human beings. Caspar Hauser in his subterranean prison is an illustration of what man would be by himself. The first cry of the child expresses in its appeals to others this helplessness of spirituality on the side of nature.--

§ 14. Man, therefore, is the only fit subject for education. We often speak, it is true, of the education of plants and animals; but even when we do so, we apply, unconsciously perhaps, other expressions, as "raising" and "training," in order to distinguish these. "Breaking" consists in producing in an animal, either by pain or pleasure of the senses, an activity of which, it is true, he is capable, but which he never would have developed if left to himself. On the other hand, it is the nature of Education only to assist in the producing of that which the subject would strive most earnestly to develop for himself if he had a clear idea of himself. We speak of raising trees and animals, but not of raising men; and it is only a planter who looks to his slaves only for an increase in their number.

--The education of men is quite often enough, unfortunately, only a "breaking," and here and there still may be found examples where one tries to teach mechanically, not through the understanding power of the creative WORD, but through the powerless and fruitless appeal to physical pain.--

§ 15. The idea of Education may be more or less comprehensive. We use it in the widest sense when we speak of the Education of the race, for we understand by this expression the connection which the acts and situations of different nations have to each other, as different steps towards self-conscious freedom. In this the world-spirit is the teacher.

§ 16. In a more restricted sense we mean by Education the shaping of the individual life by the forces of nature, the rhythmical movement of national customs, and the might of destiny in which each one finds limits set to his arbitrary will. These often mould him into a man without his knowledge. For he cannot act in opposition to nature, nor offend the ethical sense of the people among whom he dwells, nor despise the leading of destiny without discovering through experience that before the Nemesis of these substantial elements his subjective power can dash itself only to be shattered. If he perversely and persistently rejects all our admonitions, we leave him, as a last resort, to destiny, whose iron rule must educate him, and reveal to him the God whom he has misunderstood.

--It is, of course, sometimes not only possible, but necessary for one, moved by the highest sense of morality, to act in opposition to the laws of nature, to offend the ethical sense of the people that surround him, and to brave the blows of destiny; but such a one is a sublime reformer or martyr, and we are not now speaking of such, but of the perverse, the frivolous, and the conceited.--

§ 17. In the narrowest sense, which however is the usual one, we mean by Education the influence which one mind exerts on another in order to cultivate the latter in some understood and methodical way, either generally or with reference to some special aim. The educator must, therefore, be relatively finished in his own education, and the pupil must possess unlimited confidence in him. If authority be wanting on the one side, or respect and obedience on the other, this ethical basis of development must fail, and it demands in the very highest degree, talent, knowledge, skill, and prudence.

--Education takes on this form only under the culture which has been developed through the influence of city life. Up to that time we have the naïve period of education, which holds to the general powers of nature, of national customs, and of destiny, and which lasts for a long time among the rural populations. But in the city a greater complication of events, an uncertainty of the results of reflection, a working out of individuality, and a need of the possession of many arts and trades, make their appearance and render it impossible for men longer to be ruled by mere custom. The Telemachus of Fenelon was educated to rule himself by means of reflection; the actual Telemachus in the heroic age lived simply according to custom.--

§ 18. The general problem of Education is the development of the theoretical and practical reason in the individual. If we say that to educate one means to fashion him into morality, we do not make our definition sufficiently comprehensive, because we say nothing of intelligence, and thus confound education and ethics. A man is not merely a human being, but as a reasonable being he is a peculiar individual, and different from all others of the race.

§ 19. Education must lead the pupil by an interconnected series of efforts previously foreseen and arranged by the teacher to a definite end; but the particular form which this shall take must be determined by the peculiar character of the pupil's mind and the situation in which he is found. Hasty and inconsiderate work may accomplish much, but only _systematic_ work can advance and fashion him in conformity with his nature, and the former does not belong to education, for this includes in itself the idea of an end, and that of the technical means for its attainment.

§ 20. But as culture comes to mean more and more, there becomes necessary a division of the business of teaching among different persons, with reference to capabilities and knowledge, because as the arts and sciences are continually increasing in number, one can become learned in any one branch only by devoting himself exclusively to it, and hence becoming one-sided. A difficulty hence arises which is also one for the pupil, of preserving, in spite of this unavoidable one-sidedness, the unity and wholeness which are necessary to humanity.

--The naïve dignity of the happy savage, and the agreeable simplicity of country people, appear to very great advantage when contrasted on this side with the often unlimited narrowness of a special trade, and the endless curtailing of the wholeness of man by the pruning processes of city life. Thus the often abused savage has his hut, his family, his cocoa tree, his weapons, his passions; he fishes, hunts, plays, fights, adorns himself, and enjoys the consciousness that he is the centre of a whole, while a modern citizen is often only an abstract expression of culture.--

§ 21. As it becomes necessary to divide the work of teaching, a difference between general and special schools arises also, from the needs of growing culture. The former present in different compass all the sciences and arts which are included in the term "general education," and which were classified by the Greeks under the general name of Encyclopædia. The latter are known as special schools, suited to particular needs or talents.

--As those who live in the country are relatively isolated, it is often necessary, or at least desirable, that one man should be trained equally on many different sides. The poor tutor is required not only to instruct in all the sciences, he must also speak French and be able to play the piano.--

§ 22. For any single person, the relation of his actual education to its infinite possibilities can only be approximately determined, and it can be considered as only relatively finished on any one side. Education is impossible to him who is born an idiot, since the want of the power of generalizing and of ideality of conscious personality leaves to such an unfortunate only the possibility of a mechanical training.

--Sägert, the teacher of the deaf mutes in Berlin, has made laudable efforts to educate idiots, but the account as given in his publication, "Cure of Idiots by an Intellectual Method, Berlin, 1846," shows that the result obtained was only external; and though we do not desire to be understood as denying or refusing to this class the possession of a mind _in potentia_, it appears in them to be confined to an embryonic state.--