“I would have his head turned by it,” says Rousseau, “and have him always busy about his Castle, his goats and his plantation.... I would have him imagine he is Robinson himself.”
It is the reality of drama that appeals to the educator; the hint was not lost upon writers of children’s books.
And now, since Emile cannot remain always in his island, it is time to recall him to everyday life. His natural interest in handicrafts will smooth the transition. The tutor goes with him from shop to shop, that he may understand the division of labour among men. Thus he learns more in an hour than from a whole day’s explanation. And lest this should be only surface knowledge, he must learn some trade (for choice a carpenter’s) which will guard him against common prejudice, and make him independent of fortune.
Rousseau keeps the road so clear for his young traveller that he is not afraid of chance encounters. In these years, Emile is to learn nothing of the relations of man to man. His heart is not to be touched by suffering nor his imagination kindled by the “living spectacle of Nature” which Rousseau himself paints in such glowing colours. Eloquence and poetry are wasted on a child. Moral and spiritual teaching can safely be left till his sixteenth year. Up to that point Emile has studied nothing but the natural world. He has little knowledge, but what he has is real and complete. Simple surroundings have taught him to be content with what he has and to despise luxury, which, according to Rousseau, is the secret of true happiness. His body is strong and active, his mind unprejudiced; he has courage, industry, self-control,—all the virtues proper to his age.
Rousseau’s disciples had some excuse for disregarding one of his chief discoveries: the distinction between childhood and youth. It was obviously impossible to draw a hard and fast line between the two stages, and Rousseau would not give an inch to individual difference. Thus his followers were either forced back upon precedent, or had to trust to their own experience of children. On the one hand, they clung to the old encyclopædic methods; on the other, they transferred Rousseau’s provisions for youth and manhood to an earlier stage. Experience taught them that a child could be stirred by other motives besides prudence and self-love, that moral and spiritual influences in early childhood were not to be ignored, that there were such things as childish imagination and sympathy.
The greater number of moral tales owe their very existence to Rousseau’s inconsistency; for although he had exposed the fallacy of maxims and fables, he found no better substitute than the Example of a perfect Parent or Tutor—a man without passion or prejudice, detached and colourless, who, without seeming to guide or correct, should watch the child’s every movement and on occasion teach Nature herself how to go about her business.
The first generation of Emile, which proved Rousseau’s theory of Childhood, disposed, once for all, of the Infallible Parent in real life. A child might suspect that it was a literary rather than a practical idea, and the few parents who, after a vigorous course of self-discipline, felt equal to the part, would find it easier to sustain by proxy in a moral tale. They decided, at any rate, to ignore Rousseau’s veto upon books for children under twelve, and writers quickly rose to the demand for a new sort of Fables, wherein the Child of Nature, walking in the shadow of the Perfect Parent, acquired a measure of wisdom and philanthropy beyond his years. Such tales, inspired by the Emile, are a satirical comment on the writing of books to prove that books are useless.
Marmontel, though he did not write for children, was an admirable guide for lesser moralists. His vivid character-contrasts, dramatic incidents and humorous treatment of every-day life taught them that art might not be thrown away upon a child’s book, if it only served to keep alive interest and curiosity. The “Good Mother” and “Bad Mother” of the Contes Moraux[75] supplied useful variants of the good and bad child, and the “School for Fathers” encouraged the writers of little books to venture satirical comments on the faults of parents.
It is true that Marmontel’s types are less convincing when reduced for the nursery and coloured by Rousseau. “The School for Fathers” turned out a uniform pattern of the Infallible Parent, and “The Good Mother”, “La femme comme il y en a peu”, assuming the proportions of her virtues, cast a monstrous shadow over two generations; yet there were books that reflected Marmontel’s wise moderation, his sympathy with youthful follies, all that was implied in the motto of his bon Curé, “Moins de prudence et plus de bonté”.
The Nursery had its Marmontel in Armand Berquin, better known by the name of his most famous book, L’Ami des Enfans,[76] an addition that no man deserved better then he. Like Perrault, Berquin owed his reputation to a book that he wrote for children; but times had changed: education had now become of so much consequence that the writer of children’s books was regarded as a public benefactor. Perrault the Academician had never openly acknowledged the Contes of 1697; but in 1784, Berquin’s L’Ami des Enfans was crowned by the French Academy.