The History Of Education - Ellwood P. Cubberley (classic novels for teens .TXT) 📗

after that. There was little knowledge that could not pass from mouth to mouth. Such little vernacular literature as did exist was transmitted orally, and no great issue which appealed to the imagination of the masses had as yet come to the front to create any strong desire for the ability to read. As a result, the education of the masses was in hand labor, the trades, and religion, and not in books, and the need for book education was scarcely felt.

 

A NEW DEMAND FOR VERNACULAR SCHOOLS. The invention of printing and the Protestant Revolts were in a sense two revolutionary forces, which in combination soon produced vast and far-reaching changes. The discovery of the process of making paper and the invention of the printing press changed the whole situation as to books. These could now be reproduced rapidly and in large numbers, and could be sold at but a small fraction of their former cost. The printing of the Bible in the common tongue did far more to stimulate a desire to be able to read than did the Revival of Learning (Rs. 155, 170). Then came the religious discussions of the Reformation period, which stirred intellectually the masses of the people in northern lands as nothing before in history had ever done. In an effort to reach the people the reformers originated small and cheap pamphlets, written in the vernacular, and these, sold for a penny or two, were peddled in the marketplaces and from house to house. While there had been imperfect translations of the Bible in German before Luther’s, his translation (New Testament, 1522) was direct from the original Greek and so carefully done that it virtually fixed the character of the German language. [4] Calvin’s Institutes of Christianity (French edition, 1541) in a similar manner fixed the character of the French language, [5] and Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament (1526) was into such simple and homely language [6] that it fixed the character of the English tongue, and was made the basis for the later Authorized translation.

 

[Illustration: FIG. 93. THE FIRST PAGE OF WYCLIFFE’S BIBLE

Translated between 1382 and 1384. Facsimile of the first verses of Genesis]

 

The leaders of the Protestant Revolts, too, in asserting that each person should be able to read and study the Scriptures as a means to personal salvation, created an entirely new demand, in Protestant lands, for elementary schools in the vernacular. Heretofore the demand had been for schools only for those who expected to become scholars or leaders in Church or State, while the masses of the people had little or no interest in learning. Now a new class became desirous of learning to read, not Latin, but the language which they had already learned to speak. Wycliffe, Huss, Zwingli, Luther, Calvin, and Knox alike insisted on the importance of the study of the Bible as a primary necessity in the religious life. In an effort to bring the Bible within reach of the people Wycliffe’s followers had attempted the laborious and impossible task of multiplying by hand (p. 290) copies of his translation. Zwingli had written a pamphlet on The Manner of Instruction and Bringing up Boys in a Christian Way

(1524), in which he urged the importance of religious education. Luther, besides translating the Bible, had prepared two general Catechisms, one for adults and one for children, had written hymns [7] and issued numerous letters and sermons in behalf of religious education. All these were printed in the vernacular and scattered broadcast. Luther thought that “every human being, by the time he has reached his tenth year, should be familiar with the Holy Gospels, in which the very core and marrow of his life is bound.” In his sermons and addresses he urged a study of the Bible and the duty of sending children to school. Calvin’s Catechism similarly was extensively used in Protestant lands.

 

1. Lutheran School Organization

 

EDUCATIONAL IDEAS OF LUTHER. Luther enunciated the most progressive ideas on education of all the German Protestant reformers. In his Letter to the Mayors and Aldermen of all the Cities of Germany in behalf of Christian Schools (1524) (R. 156), and in his Sermon on the Duty of Sending Children to School (1530), we find these set forth. That his ideas could be but partially carried out is not surprising. There were but few among his followers who could understand such progressive proposals, they were entirely too advanced for the time, there was no body of vernacular teachers [8] or means to prepare them, the importance of such training was not understood, and the religious wars which followed made such educational advantages impossible, for a long time to come. The sad condition of the schools, which he said were “deteriorating throughout Germany,” awakened his deep regret, and he begged of those in authority “not to think of the subject lightly, for the instruction of youth is a matter in which Christ and all the world are concerned.” All towns had to spend money for roads, defense, bridges, and the like, and why not some for schools? This they now could easily afford, “since Divine Grace has released them from the exaction and robbery of the Roman Church.” Parents continually neglected their educational duty, yet there must be civil government. “Were there neither soul, heaven, nor hell,” he declared, “it would still be necessary to have schools for the sake of affairs here below…. The world has need of educated men and women to the end that men may govern the country properly and women may properly bring up their children, care for their domestics, and direct the affairs of their households.” “The welfare of the State depends upon the intelligence and virtue of its citizens,” he said, “and it is therefore the duty of mayors and aldermen in all cities to see that Christian schools are founded and maintained” (R. 156).

 

[Illustration: FIG. 94. LUTHER GIVING INSTRUCTION

An ideal drawing, though representative of early Protestant popular instruction]

 

The parents of children he held responsible for their Christian and civic education. This must be free, and equally open to all—boys and girls, high and low, rich and poor. It was the inherent right of each child to be educated, and the State must not only see that the means are provided, but also require attendance at the schools (R. 158). At the basis of all education lay Christian education. The importance of the services of the teacher was beyond ordinary comprehension (R. 157). Teachers should be trained for their work, and clergymen should have had experience as teachers. A school system for German people should be a state system, divided into:

 

1. Vernacular Primary Schools. Schools for the common people, to be taught in the vernacular, to be open to both sexes, to include reading, writing, physical training, singing, and religion, and to give practical instruction in a trade or in household duties. Upon this attendance should be compulsory. “It is my opinion,” he said, “that we should send boys to school for one or two hours a day, and have them learn a trade at home the rest of the time. It is desirable that these two occupations march side by side.”

 

2. Latin Secondary Schools. Upon these he placed great emphasis (R. 156) as preparatory schools by means of which a learned clergy was to be perpetuated for the instruction of the people. In these he would teach Latin, Greek, Hebrew, rhetoric, dialectic, history, science, mathematics, music, and gymnastics.

 

3. The Universities. For training for the higher service in Church and State.

 

[Illustration: FIG. 95. JOHANNES BUGENHAGEN (1485-1558) Father of the Lutheran Volksschule in northern Germany]

 

THE ORGANIZING WORK OF BUGENHAGEN. Luther assisted in reorganizing the churches at Wittenberg (1523), Leipzig (1523), and Magdeburg (1524), in connection with all of which he provided for Lutheran-type schools. [9]

Luther, though, was not essentially an organizer. The organizing genius of the Reformation, in central and southern Germany, was Luther’s colleague, Philipp Melanchthon (1497-1560), Professor of Greek at the University of Wittenberg. In northern Germany it was Johannes Bugenhagen (1485-1558), another of Luther’s colleagues at Wittenberg. More than any other Germans these two directed the necessary reorganization of religion and education in those parts of Germany which changed from Roman Catholicism to German Lutheranism. The churches, of course, had to be reorganized as Lutheran churches, and the schools connected with them refounded as Lutheran schools. For the reorganization of each of these a more or less detailed Ordnung had to be written out (Rs. 159, 160). In this change cathedral and other large church schools became Latin secondary schools, while the song, chantry, and other types of parish elementary schools were transformed into Lutheran vernacular parish schools.

 

Bugenhagen was sent to reorganize the churches of northern Germany. Being in close sympathy with Luther’s ideas, he made good provision for Lutheran parish schools in connection with each of the churches he reorganized. At Brunswick (1528), Hamburg (1529) (R. 159), L�beck (1530), for his native State of Pomerania (1534), for Schleswig-Holstein (1537), and elsewhere in northern Germany, he drew up church and school plans (_Kirchen und Schule-Ordnungen_) which formed models (Rs. 159, 160) for many northern German cities and towns. Besides providing for a Latin school for the city, he organized elementary vernacular schools in each parish, for both boys and girls, in which instruction in reading, writing, and religion was to be given in the German tongue. He has been called the father of the German Volksschule, though probably much of what he did was merely the redirection of existing schools. In 1537 he was called to Denmark, by the Danish King, to reorganize the University of Copenhagen and the Danish Church and schools as Lutheran institutions.

 

Efforts were also made to create Protestant schools in the Scandinavian countries. In Denmark writing-schools for both boys and girls were organized, and the sexton of each parish was ordered to gather the children together once a week for instruction in the Catechism. In Sweden little was done before 1686, when Charles XI ordained that the sacristan of each parish should instruct the children in reading, while the religious instruction should be conducted by the clergy, and carried on by means of sermons, the Catechism, and a yearly public examination. The ability to read and a knowledge of the Catechism was made necessary for communion. A Swedish law of this same time also ordered that, “No one should enter the married state without knowing the lesser Catechism of Luther by heart and having received the sacrament.” This latter regulation drove the peasants to request the erection of children’s schools in the parishes, to be supported by the State, though it was not for more than a century that this was generally brought about. The general result of this legislation was that the Scandinavian countries, then including Finland, early became literate nations.

 

THE REORGANIZING WORK OF MELANCHTHON. Melanchthon, unlike Bugenhagen, was essentially a humanistic scholar, and his interest lay chiefly In the Latin secondary schools. He prepared plans for schools in many cities and smaller States of central and southern Germany, among which were Luther’s native town, Eisleben (1525), and for Nuremberg (1526), Herzeberg (1538), Cologne (1543), and Wittenberg (1545) among cities; and Saxony (1528), Mecklenberg (1552), and the Palatinate (1556) among States. The schools he provided for Saxony may be described as typical of his work.

 

In 1527 he was asked by the Elector of Saxony to head a commission of three to travel over the kingdom and report on its needs as to schools. In his Report, or Book of Visitation, which was probably the first school survey report in history, he outlined in detail plans for school organization for the State (R. 161), of which the following is an abstract: