MONTESQUIEU 



MONTEVIDEO 



Baron de Montesquieu, 

 French writer 



Montesquieu, CHARLES Louis 

 DB SECOM-VT. HARON DE (1089- 

 1 n ncli writer. Born of 

 affluent par- 

 ents in (ins- 

 cony, Jan. 18, 

 1080, Monte- 

 squieu was 

 trained for 

 the law, and 

 succeeded his 

 uncle, whose 

 \\ I- al th and 

 whose title of 

 Montesquieu 

 he also inherited, as the holder of 

 a high legal office in the parlement 

 of Bordeaux in 1710. There he 

 remained until 1720, when he re- 

 si^nnl his position and went to 

 live in Paris, being admitted to the 

 Academy. A long visit to Eng- 

 land, part of a prolonged tour in 

 Europe, made a deep impression 

 upon him, and soon after his re- 

 turn to France he settled down to 

 literary work at his chateau of La 

 Brede, near Bordeaux, ordering 

 his estates and outer life on the 

 model of an English landowner. 

 He died there Feb. 10, 1755. 



Montesquieu early began to 

 write, and continued to do so to 

 the end of his life. Of his writings 

 three stand out as serious con- 

 tributions to human thought. His 

 Lettres Persanes, which appeared 

 anonymously in 1721, pretend to 

 be the outspoken comments of two 

 Persians on their visit to Europe, 

 and are a wonderful satire on the 

 manners and customs of the age. 

 His Considerations sur les Causes de 

 la Grandeur et de la Decadence des 

 Remains, first published in Am- 

 sterdam in 1734, show the work- 

 ings of a powerful and original 

 mind, strengthened by wide read- 

 ing and by the absence of fettering 

 and conventional theories. The 

 same qualities are revealed in his 

 third and much longer great book, 

 the Esprit des Lois, first published 

 at Geneva in 1748. An edition of 

 Montesquieu's writings appeared 

 in seven volumes at Paris, 1875- 

 79, edited by E. Laboulaye. See 

 Esprit des Lois; Government; 

 consult also Histoire de Montes- 

 quieu, sa Vie et ses Oeuvres, 

 L. Vian, 2nd ed. 1879 ; Montes- 

 quieu, Sir C. P. Ilbert, 1904. 

 Montessori, 

 MARIA (b. 

 1870). Italian 

 educationist. 

 Studying at 

 the university 

 of Rome, she 

 took a medi- 

 cal degree 

 in 1894, and 

 acted as assist- Maria Montessori, 

 ant doctor to Italian educationist 



a psychiatric clinic for men- 

 tally deficient children. From 

 this and her experience, 

 1898-1900, as head of a state in- 

 stitute fur tin- i-i|ilr:iti(,n of SUch 



children, she learned much that 

 went to form her own system of 

 education. She published several 

 works on her methods, and lectured 

 in Kngland in 1920. 



Montessori Method. Method 

 of teaching young children. It was 

 developed by Madame Montessori 

 in Rome, and since widely applied 

 by advanced educationists. She 

 evolved methods which had as- 

 tounding results with the mentally 

 deficient, and went on to find that 

 these were even more successful 

 with normal infants. 



The method demands careful 

 observation of the child's physical 

 condition by monthly measure- 

 ments, which are chartered for the 

 teacher's guidance ; special furni- 

 ture adapted to give the child the 

 completest possible freedom of 

 movement, and to enable him to 

 be independent and to attend to 

 his own personal wants, washing, 

 dressing, etc. ; an active, spon- 

 taneous discipline based on full 

 liberty for the child ; and the abol- 

 ition of prizes and punishments. 



The teacher's function is to 

 direct, and not to repress the child's 

 activities. Stress is laid on simple, 

 scientifically arranged physical 

 exercises ; on open-air work, gar- 

 dening, the care of animals, etc., 

 so that the child may develop on 

 the historical lines of the race ; 

 on plastic work which may, in the 

 child's fifth or sixth year, reach 

 the stage of the potter's wheel ; on 

 the definite training of the senses 

 to receive delicate impressions, 

 special apparatus being devised 

 for the purpose ; and on a careful 

 method of teaching reading and 

 writing, the child passing from 

 simple design to writing. 



There is as yet no formal school 

 for the instruction in the method 

 in England, but there are classes 

 in London, and 

 the Montessori I 

 Society, with 

 headquarters i n 

 Tavistock Place, 

 has a library where 

 the literature of 

 the subject may 

 be studied and 

 where the didactic 

 material may be 

 seen. Montessori 

 teaching has only 

 been adopted in a 

 few schools of the 

 more advanced 

 type, but her 

 theory of pedagogy 

 has been widely 



Claudio Monteverde. 

 Italian composer 



studied, and exercJHCB an increaain .' 

 influence on educational thinkers. 

 See ' Education ; Kindergarten ; 

 MMilt also The MonteMori 

 M. th...l. A. T. Smith, 1912; The 

 New Children, Sheila Radice, 1920. 

 Monteverde, CLAUDIO (1567- 

 1043). Italian composer. Born at 

 Cremona, he became aa a boy a 

 violinist i n 

 the service of 

 the duke of 

 Mantua. His 

 talents at- 

 tracted notice, 

 and in 1002 

 he was made 

 master of the 

 chapel there. 

 He left that 

 city to become 

 music master at S. Mark's, Venice, 

 in 1613, and there he remained until 

 his death, Nov. 29, 1643. His 

 operas, Arianna and Orfeo, mark 

 important advances in the develop- 

 ment of opera, not only in the set- 

 ting of the words, but in the free- 

 dom of the harmony and the treat- 

 ment of the orchestral instru- 

 ments. The harmonic style which 

 he thus invented he outlined in a 

 book.and defended in controversies 

 with rival musicians. 



Montevideo. Maritime depart- 

 ment of Uruguay, at the mouth of 

 the Rio de la Plata. Its surface is 

 hilly, with much pasture land for 

 the grazing of cattle. Exports in- 

 clude beef and other animal pro- 

 ducts, and wine. Its area is 256 

 sq. m. Pop. 382,700. 



Montevideo. City of Uruguay, 

 T ^ capital of the re- 



public and of the 

 dept. of Monte- 

 video. It origin- 

 ally occupied a 

 small peninsula 

 between the Rio 

 de la Plata 

 and a bay, [of 

 which it formed 

 the S. extremity. The city has 

 spread some miles inland in an E. 



Montevideo arms 



Montevideo, Uruguay. Teatro Soils .the principal theatre, 

 built in 1856 with seats for 3,000 spectators 



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