323. No Books save Robinson Crusoe.—One of the consequences of an education that is natural and negative is the suppression of books. Always going to extremes, Rousseau is not content to criticise the abuse of books. He determines that up to his fifth year Émile shall not know what a book is:—
“I hate books,” he exclaims; “they teach us merely to speak of things that we do not know.”
Besides the fact that this raving is rather ridiculous in the case of a man who is a writer by profession, it is evident that Rousseau is roving at random when he condemns the use of books in instruction.
One book, however, one single book, has found favor in his sight. Robinson Crusoe will constitute by itself for a long time the whole of Émile’s library. We understand without difficulty Rousseau’s kindly feeling for a work which, under the form of a romance, is, like the Émile, a treatise on natural education. Émile and Robinson strongly resemble each other, since they are self-sufficient and dispense with society.
324. Excellent Precepts on Method.—At least in the general method which he commends, Rousseau makes amends for the errors in his plan of study:—
“Do not treat the child to discourses which he cannot understand. No descriptions, no eloquence, no figures of speech. Be content to present to him appropriate objects. Let us transform our sensations into ideas. But let us not jump at once from sensible objects to intellectual objects. Let us always proceed slowly from one sensible notion to another. In general, let us never substitute the sign for the thing, except when it is impossible for us to show the thing.”
“I have no love whatever for explanations and talk. Things! things! I shall never tire of saying that we ascribe too much importance to words. With our babbling education we make only babblers.”
But the whole would bear quoting. Almost all of Rousseau’s recommendations, in the way of method, contain an element of truth, and need only to be modified in order to become excellent.
325. Exclusive Motives of Action.—A great question in the education of children is to know to what motive we shall address ourselves. Here again, Rousseau is exclusive and absolute. Up to the age of twelve, Émile will have been guided by necessity; he will have been made dependent on things, not on men. It is through the possible and the impossible that he will have been conducted, by treating him, not as a sensible and intelligent being, but as a force of nature against which other forces are made to act. Not till the age of twelve must this system be changed. Émile has now acquired some judgment; and it is upon an intellectual motive that one ought now to count in regulating his conduct. This motive is utility. The feeling of emulation cannot be employed in a solitary education. Finally, at the age of fifteen, it will be possible to appeal to the heart, to feeling, and to recommend to the young man the acts we set before him, no longer as necessary or useful, but as noble, good, and generous. The error of Rousseau is in cutting up the life of man to his twentieth year into three sharply defined parts, into three moments, each subordinated to a single governing principle. The truth is that at every age an appeal must be made to all the motives that act on our will, that at every age, necessity, interest, sentiment, and finally, the idea of duty, an idea too often overlooked by Rousseau, as all else that is derived from reason,—all these motives can effectively intervene, in different degrees, in the education of man.