unded, such as reigned all over Germany
forty or fifty years ago, before party spirit had set to work, and the
flattest of rationalisms had again invaded the nation--a religion
corresponding, for the mass, to what Goethe's and Kant's philosophy,
which is neither materialism nor spiritualism, is for the few--a
religion based on feeling and intuition, on conscience and reverence,
but a religion without dogmas, without ritual, without forms, above all
without exclusiveness and without intolerance. I doubt whether this mild
and noble spirit, which is by no means indifferentism, will soon revive,
as I doubt whether Germany will quickly get over the conflict between
the traditional and the rationalistic spirit which mars her public life;
whether too she will soon reach that political ideal which England
realized most fully in the first half of this century, and which
consists in a perfect equilibrium between the spirit of tradition and
that of rationalism. However, although Kant's lofty and Goethe's deep
philosophy of life is now the treasure of a small minority only, it has
none the less pervaded all the great scientific and literary work done
up to the middle of this century. It has presided over the birth of our
new state; and the day will certainly come when public opinion in
Germany will turn away from the tendency of her present literature,
science, and politics--a somewhat narrow patriotism, a rather shallow
materialism, and a thoroughly false parliamentary _regime_--and come
back to the spirit of the generations to whom, after all, she owes her
intellectual, though not perhaps her political and material,
civilization.

FOOTNOTES:

[58] "Storm and stress," the period of intellectual revolt, struggle,
and emancipation in Germany.--ED.

[59] Written in 1853, five years before the appearance of Mr. Darwin's
great work.

PESTALOZZI'S METHOD OF EDUCATION

A.D. 1775

GEORGE RIPLEY

Modern education began when Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi established
his experimental school at Neuhof in 1775. Comenius had shown the
true path of teaching. Pestalozzi was the enthusiast who felt with
burning passion the injustice done to the child in the schoolhouses
of his day. He protested that the old education was all wrong, and
he proved this by his achievements, establishing a little school in
his own home at Neuhof, and then in 1800 a larger one at Burgdorf.

The Swiss Government adopted hi