380. Secularization of Education.—As a matter of fact, the whole pedagogy of the eighteenth century is dominated by the idea of the necessary secularization of instruction. Thorough-going Gallicans like La Chalotais or Rolland, dauntless free-thinkers like Diderot or Helvetius, all believe and assert that public instruction is a civil affair, a “government undertaking,” as Voltaire expressed it. All wish to substitute lay teachers for religious teachers, and to open civil schools upon the ruins of monastic schools.
“Who will be persuaded,” says Rolland in his report of 1708, “that fathers who feel an emotion that an ecclesiastic never should have known, will be less capable than he of educating children?”
La Chalotais also demands these citizen teachers. He objects to those instructors who, from interest as well as from principle, give the preference in their affections to the supernatural world over one’s native land.
“I do not presume to exclude ecclesiastics,” he said, “but I protest against the exclusion of laymen. I dare claim for the nation an education which depends only on the State, because it belongs essentially to the State; because every State has an inalienable and indefeasible right to instruct its members; because, finally, the children of the State ought to be educated by the members of the State.” This does not mean that La Chalotais is irreligious; but he desires a national religion which does not subordinate the interests of the country to a foreign power. What he wants especially is, that the Church, reserving to herself the teaching of divine truth, abandon to the State the teaching of morals, and the control of purely human studies. He is of the same opinion as his friend Duclos, who said:—
“It is certain that in the education which was given at Sparta, the prime purpose was to train Spartans. It is thus that in every State the purpose should be to enkindle the spirit of citizenship; and, in our case, to train Frenchmen, and in order to make Frenchmen, to labor to make men of them.”[195]
381. Practical Purpose of Instruction.—The particular charge brought by La Chalotais against the education of his time, against that of the University as well as against that of the Jesuits, is, that it does not prepare children for real life, for life in the State. “A stranger who should visit our colleges might conclude that in France we think only of peopling the seminaries, the cloisters, and the Latin colonies.” How are we to imagine that the study of a dead language, and a monastic discipline, are the appointed means for training soldiers, magistrates, and heads of families?
“The greatest vice of education, and perhaps the most inevitable, while it shall be entrusted to persons who have renounced the world, is the absolute lack of instruction on the moral and political virtues. Our education does not affect our habits, like that of the ancients. After having endured all the fatigues and irksomeness of the college, the young find themselves in the need of learning in what consist the duties common to all men. They have learned no principle for judging actions, evils, opinions, customs. They have everything to learn on matters that are so important. They are inspired with a devotion which is but an imitation of religion, and with practices which take the place of virtue, and are but the shadow of it.”
382. Intuitive and Natural Instruction.—A pupil of the sensational school, a disciple of Locke and of Condillac, La Chalotais is too much inclined to misconceive, in the development of the individual, the play of natural activities and innate dispositions. But, by way of compensation, his predilection for sensationalism leads him to excellent thoughts on the necessity of beginning with sensible objects before advancing to intellectual studies, and first of all to secure an education of the senses.
“I wish nothing to be taught children except facts which are attested by the eyes, at the age of seven as at the age of thirty.