The Permanent Influence of Pestalozzi.—It is easy to exaggerate the achievements of this almost sainted reformer of Switzerland. Pestalozzi’s methods were Unoriginal, unpractical, inconsistent, wanting in science and organization; neither very original nor well carried out. His chief merit lay in developing and making positive the suggestions offered by Rousseau, and in utilizing them in the work of the schools. Even in this he failed somewhat in practicality and consistency. Moreover, Pestalozzi was groping and never possessed full vision. He did not grasp definite educational principles in a scientific way, but, like Rousseau, obtained his ideas of teaching from sympathetic insight into the minds of children. His writings for the most part record his empirical efforts at an effective training, and are revelations of methods of teaching in the concrete rather than the abstract. His works are also poorly arranged and inaccurate, and there was little organization or order in his schools.

But all these deficiencies are of small import when but sought to elevate society by education, compared with Pestalozzi’s influence upon society and education. In the eighteenth century caste ruled through wealth and education, while the masses, who supported the owners of the land in idleness and luxury, were sunk in ignorance, poverty, and vice. The schools for the common people were exceedingly few, the content of education was largely limited by ecclesiastical authority, and the methods were traditional and verbal. The teachers generally had received little training, and were selected at random. Ordinarily the pay was wretched, no lodgings were provided for the teacher, and he had often to add domestic service to his duties, in order to secure food and clothing. In the midst of such conditions appeared this most famous of modern educators, who never ceased to work for the reformation of society. As Voltaire, Rousseau, and others had held that the panacea for the corrupt times was rationalism, atheism, deism, socialism, anarchy, or individualism, Pestalozzi found his remedy in education. Like Rousseau, he keenly felt the injustice, unnaturalness, and degradation of the existing society, but he was not content to stop with mere destruction and negations. He saw what education might do to purify social conditions and to elevate the people by intellectual, moral, and industrial training, and he longed to apply it universally and to develop methods in keeping with nature.

Pestalozzi’s achievements contained the germ of and was the progenitor of all modern pedagogy. modern pedagogy, as well as of educational reform. It was he that stimulated educational theorists, instead of accepting formal principles and traditional processes, to work out carefully and patiently the development of the child mind and to embody the results in practice. From him have come the prevailing reforms in the present teaching of language lessons, arithmetic, drawing, writing, reading, geography, elementary science, and music. In harmony with his improved methods, Pestalozzi also started a different type of discipline. His work made clear the new spirit in the school by which it has approached the atmosphere of the home. He found the proper relation of pupil and teacher to exist in sympathy and friendship, or, as he states it, in ‘love.’ This attitude, which appears so fully in his kindly treatment of the poor children at Neuhof and Stanz ([Fig. 33]), constituted the greatest contrast to that of the brutal schools of the times, and introduced a new conception into education.

The Spread of Pestalozzian Schools and Methods through Europe.—The ‘observational’ methods of Pestalozzi and institutions similar to his were soon spread by his assistants and others throughout Europe. Strange to say, as a result of their familiarity with his weaknesses and the conservatism resulting from isolation, the Swiss were, as a whole, rather slow to incorporate the Pestalozzian improvements. In Zurich, however, Zeller of Würtemberg, who had visited Burgdorf and had helped Switzerland, conduct a Pestalozzian training school, was early invited to give three courses of lectures in aid of the establishment of a teachers’ seminary based upon the principles of Pestalozzi. Krüsi, after leaving the institute at Yverdon, also founded a number of schools and carried Pestalozzianism into various parts of Switzerland. And other disciples eventually started or reorganized schools in various parts of Switzerland.

But the Pestalozzian reforms in method secured their best hold upon Germany. The innovations were most Prussia remarkable in Prussia, and the elementary education there has come to be referred to as the ‘Prussian-Pestalozzian school system.’ By the opening of the nineteenth century Pestalozzianism began to find its way into that state. In 1801 the appeal of Pestalozzi for a public subscription in behalf of his project at Burgdorf was warmly supported. In 1802 Herbart’s account of Pestalozzi’s Idea of an A B C of Observation (see p. 337) attracted much attention. A representative was sent from Prussia to Burgdorf to report upon the new system in 1803. Meanwhile the Pestalozzian missionaries were fast converting the land. Plamann, who had visited Burgdorf, in 1805 established a Pestalozzian school in Berlin, and published several books applying the new methods to language, geography, and natural history. Zeller lectured to large audiences at Königsberg, and organized a Pestalozzian orphanage there. A similar institution for educating orphans was opened at Potsdam by Türck. In 1808, two of Pestalozzi’s pupils, Nicolovius and Süvern, were made directors of public instruction in Prussia, and sent seventeen brilliant young men to Yverdon to study for three years. Upon their return these vigorous youthful educators zealously advanced the cause. The greatest impulse, however, was given the movement by the philosopher, Fichte, who was ardently supported by King Frederick William III, and even more by the noble queen, Louise. They held that only through these advanced educational principles could a restoration of the territory and prestige lost to Napoleon at Jena be effected.

and the rest of Germany,

A similar spirit animated the other states of Germany, and Bavaria, Detmold, and other states early undertook to introduce the new principles. Everywhere in Germany the greatest enthusiasm prevailed among teachers, state officials, and princes. Thus in place of the reading, singing, and memorizing of texts, songs, and catechism, under the direction of incompetent choristers and sextons, with unsanitary buildings and brutal punishment, all Germany has come to have in each village an institution for training real men and women. Each school is under the guidance of a devoted, humane, and trained teacher, and the methods in religion, reading, arithmetic, history, geography, and elementary science are vitalized and interesting.

France,

In France the spread of Pestalozzianism was at first prevented by the military spirit of the time and by the apathy in education, and later, when the reaction occurred, the schools came under ecclesiastical control and had little influence upon the people. Nevertheless, there were evidences of interest in the new doctrines. General Jullien came to Yverdon to study the methods, and issued two commendatory reports, which induced some thirty French pupils to go to Pestalozzi’s institute. Chavannes also published a treatise upon the Pestalozzian methods in 1805. These efforts, however, had little effect upon education, and the Pestalozzian principles did not make much headway in France up to the revolution of 1830. After that time they rapidly became popular, especially through Victor Cousin. This famous professor, who was later minister of public instruction, issued in 1835 a Report on the State of Public Instruction in Prussia, which showed the great merit of Pestalozzianism in the elementary schools of that country.

and England.