The History of Pedagogy

by Gabriel Compayré

The great novelty of this system was the creation of cantonal schools, open to peasants and to workmen, to those whom, up to this time, improvidence or the purpose of the great sent off to their plows or to their planes.

426. Gratuity of Primary Instruction.—Talleyrand did not desire compulsory education any more than Mirabeau; but, in accordance with the constitution of 1791, he demands the gratuity of primary instruction. Society is under obligations to give elementary instruction, but not intermediate and secondary instruction, and still less, special and higher instruction. Gratuitous for the lowest grade, and in case of that elementary knowledge which constitutes for every civilized man a real moral necessity, instruction ought not to be free to young men who aspire to a liberal profession, because they have leisure, and who have leisure because they have wealth. However, Talleyrand admits exceptions in the case of talent. By the creation of national scholarships, the doors of all the schools will be opened to select intelligences whom the lowness of their condition would condemn to remain obscure and unappreciated, did not society lend to them a helping hand.

427. Programme of Primary Instruction.—Primary instruction should comprise the principles of the national language, the elementary rules of calculation and mensuration; the elements of religion, the principles of morals, the principles of the constitution; finally, the development of the physical, intellectual, and moral powers.

428. Means of Instruction.—We shall not insist on the details of the organization of the different parts of that which Talleyrand himself called his “immense machine.” Let us notice only the last part of his work, where he discusses a certain number of general questions under this arbitrary and unjustifiable title: Des moyens d’instruction. The professors, carefully chosen, shall be elected by the king. Talleyrand does not determine that they shall be irremovable, but he requires that their situation shall be surrounded by all possible guarantees. Prizes, and rewards of every kind, shall encourage the teachers of youth to redouble their zeal and to find new methods. Talleyrand counts on dramatic representations and on national holidays to hasten the progress of instruction. Finally, let it be added that he entrusts the supreme direction of public instruction to six commissioners, chosen by the king and obliged to make an annual report.

429. The Education of Women.—Talleyrand, in his proposal, has not wholly forgotten women, and what he has said of them is just and sensible. He discusses the question of their political rights, and, in accord with tradition and good sense, he concludes that the happiness of women, their own interests, their nature and their proper destination, ought to forbid them from entering the political arena. What is particularly fit for them is a domestic education, which, received in the family, prepares them for living there. Like Mirabeau, he wishes woman to remain a woman. Her function, said the great orator, is to perpetuate the species, to watch with solicitude over the perilous periods of early youth, and “to enchain to her feet all the energies of the husband by the irresistible power of her weakness.” Without being as gallant in his expressions, Talleyrand’s thought is the same. He thought it necessary, however, in order to respond to certain proprieties, that the State should establish institutions of public education destined to replace the convents.

This desire sets right whatever was unreasonable in this passage of his proposed law:—

“Girls shall not be admitted to the primary schools after the age of eight. After that age the National Assembly advises parents to entrust the education of their daughters only to themselves, and reminds them that this is their first duty.”

430. The Legislative Assembly and Condorcet.—Of all the educational undertakings of the Revolution, the most remarkable is that of Condorcet. His Rapport presented to the Legislative Assembly, in behalf of the committee on public instruction, April 20 and 21, 1792, reprinted in 1793 by order of the Convention, did not directly have the honor of a public discussion; but it contained principles and solutions which are found in the deliberations and legislative acts of his successors. It remained, during the whole duration of the Convention, the widely accessible source whence the legislators of that time, like Romme, Bouquier, and Lakanal, drew their inspiration.

431. Condorcet (1743-1794).—Condorcet was admirably qualified for the task which the Legislative Assembly imposed on him, in charging him with the organization of public instruction. During the first years of the Revolution he had employed his leisure (he was not a member of the Constituent Assembly) in writing five Mémoires on instruction, which appeared in a periodical called the Bibliothèque de l’homme public. The Rapport which he submitted to the Assembly was a sort of résumé of his long reflections. Condorcet brought to this work, not the indiscreet imagination of an improvised educator, but the authority of a competent thinker, who, if he had no personal experience in teaching, had at least reflected much on these topics and was conscious of all their difficulties. Besides, he devoted himself to his work with the ardor of an enthusiastic nature, and with the serious convictions of a mind that had carried farther than any one else the religion of progress and zeal for the public good.