n under a young
German, who was staying there at that time; but I was constructing a
method of my own all the while, by observing all the points which seemed
valuable, as they occurred in actual teaching. But the want of a
satisfactory presentation of the classical tongues as part of the
general means of education and culture of mankind, especially when added
to the want of a consideration of natural history as a comprehensive and
necessary means of education, and above all the uncertain wavering of
the ground-principles on which the whole education and teaching rested
at Yverdon, decided me not only to take my pupils back to their parents'
house, but to abandon altogether my present educational work, in order
to equip myself, by renewed study at some German university, with that
due knowledge of natural science which now seemed to me quite
indispensable for an educator.

In the year 1810 I returned from Yverdon by Bern, Schaffhausen, and
Stuttgart to Frankfurt.

I should have prepared to go to the university at once, but found myself
obliged to remain at my post till the July of the following year. The
piece-meal condition of the methods of teaching and of education which
surrounded me hung heavy on my mind, so that I was extremely glad when
at last I was able to shake myself free from my position.

In the beginning of July 1811 I went to Goettingen. I went up at once,
although it was in the middle of the session, because I felt that I
should require several months to see my way towards harmonising my
inward with my outward life, and reconciling my thoughts with my
actions. And it was in truth several months before I gained peace within
myself, and before I arrived at that unity which was so necessary to me,
between my inward and my outward life, and at the equally necessary
harmony between aim, career, and method.

Mankind as a whole, as one great unity, had now become my quickening
thought. I kept this conception continually before my mind. I sought
after proofs of it in my little world within, and in the great world
without me; I desired by many a struggle to win it, and then to set it
worthily forth. And thus I was led back to the first appearance of man
upon our earth, to the land which first saw man, and to the first
manifestation of mankind, his speech.

Linguistic studies, the learning of languages, philology, etc., now
formed the object of my attack. The study of Oriental tongues seemed to
me the central