and had misunderstood myself; and, therefore,
before I had time to get an answer from my brother to my first letter I
wrote to him again, telling him that my university plans had been given
up, and that my fixed resolve now was to remain at my post. He rejoiced
doubly at my decision, because this time he would have been unable to
agree with me.[59]

No sooner had I firmly come to my decision than I began to apply my
thoughts vigorously to the subjects of education and instruction. The
first thing that absorbed me was the clear conviction that to educate
properly one must share the life of one's pupil. Then came the
questions, "What is elementary education? and of what value are the
educational methods advocated by Pestalozzi? Above all, what is the
purpose of education?"

In answering the question, "What is the purpose of education?" I relied
at that time upon the following observations: Man lives in a world of
objects, which influence him, and which he desires to influence;
therefore he ought to know these objects in their nature, in their
conditions, and in their relations with each other and with mankind.
Objects have form, measurement, and number.

By the expression, "the external world," at this time I meant only
Nature; my life was so bound up in natural objects that I altogether
passed by the productions of man's art or manufacture. Therefore for a
long time it was an effort to me to regard man's handiwork, with
Pestalozzi's scholars, Tobler and Hopf, as a proper subject for
elementary culture, and it broadened my inward and outward glance
considerably when I was able to look upon the world of the works of man
as also part of the "external world." In this way I sought, to the
extent of such powers as I consciously possessed at that time, to make
clear the meaning of all things through man, his relations with himself,
and with the external world.

The most pregnant thought which arose in me at this period was this: All
is unity, all rests in unity, all springs from unity, strives for and
leads up to unity, and returns to unity at last. This striving in unity
and after unity is the cause of the several aspects of human life. But
between my inner vision and my outer perception, presentation, and
action was a great gulf fixed. Therefore it seemed to me that
everything which should or could be required for human education and
instruction must be necessarily conditioned and given, by virtue of the
very nature of