HERBART 



2778 



HERBS 



HERBART 



He believed continuous evo- 

 , , lutionary growth to be the 

 is based basic principle of the world, 



to methods 



cipl 



Herbart. His educational doctrine was the out- 



growth of his philosophy, and his writings on 



education have exerted great influence upon 



the systems of education in Europe and 



America. Herbart believed that all subjects 



were related, and 



that the knowl- 



edge of one was 



strengthened by 



the knowledge of 



others. He was 



the orginator of 



the doctrine of ap- 



perception, which 



means the inter- 



preting of new 



knowledge by the 



knowledge al- 



ready in the mind 



(see APPERCEP- 



TION). His entire 



system 



upon the idea that 



the end and aim 



of education is the development of the indi- 



vidual, whom he places above the family or 



the state. In his system of instruction mor- 



ality held the chief place. He placed special 



stress upon the development of interest, which, 



before his time, had received little attention. 



He advocated the correlation and unification 



of studies, and such methods of instruction as 



would vitalize school subjects and make them 



real to the children. 



Herbart founded a pedagogical seminary at 

 Konigsberg to which students came from other 

 European countries and from the United States. 

 Although the institution was compelled to close 

 in 1833 because of the hostility of the Prussian 

 government, it continued long enough to train 

 a number of men who established Herbart's 

 system in other countries, so that we can truly 

 say that the Konigsberg Seminary was the 

 institution in which the "New Education" had 

 its birth.. 



His Quiet Life. Herbart was born at Olden- 

 burg on May 4, 1776, and his life, despite the 

 fact that it came to maturity during the trou- 

 bled times of the French Revolution and its 

 succeeding wars, was a peaceful one. He 

 studied at the University of Jena, and was there 

 a pupil of Fichte, whose philosophy he adopted 

 ardently for a time but later rejected. He 

 taught at the University of Gottingen, at 

 Konigsberg, and then again at Gottingen, where 

 he died. Such was his uneventful career. The 



wars of Germany did not tempt him; never, so 

 far as is known, did he even think of carrying 

 a weapon in her battles, but he helped to estab- 

 lish for his country a high place in the world 

 of thought. His works, most of which have 

 been translated into English, include General 

 Pedagogy, Introduction to Philosophy, Applica- 

 tion of Psychology to the Science of Education 

 and A B C of Sense-Perception. 



Consult De Garmo's Herbart and the Herbar- 

 tians ; Adams's The Herbartian Psychology Ap- 

 plied to Education. 



HER 'BERT, VICTOR (1859-, ), musician 

 and composer of light operas and musical com- 

 edies, and a music director of international 

 reputation. He was born in Dublin, Ireland. 

 After years of study in Germany and a tour of 

 Europe, he accepted the position of solo 'cellist 

 with the Metropolitan Opera Company, New 

 York City, in 1886. Later he became band- 

 master of the famous Twenty-second Regiment 

 Band; thereafter, until 1904, he was conductor 

 of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Since 

 that he has devoted his time to his composi- 

 tions, with much success. His operas, including 

 Princess Pat, The Singing Girl, Babes in Toy- 

 land and about twenty-five others, are notable 

 for the easy flow of rhythmic melody and ex- 

 traordinary command of the technique of com- 

 position. His Natoma is one of the few at- 

 tempts in the United States to produce 

 American grand opera, with American scenes 

 and American history as its inspiration. His 

 most important composition for the 'cello is a 

 second concerto in E minor, opus 30. 



HERBICIDES, hur'bisydz, chemical prepa- 

 rations employed to kill weeds (which see). 



HERBS, a term which in botany applies to 

 all plants which contain no woody tissue and 

 usually die down to the ground when their 

 growing season is over. Thus herbs are dis- 

 tinguished from shrubs and trees. The word 

 comes from the Latin herba, meaning grass, 

 green stalks, or blades. In popular usage, how- 

 ever, it refers to herbaceous plants of economic 

 value used for their flavor in cooking, for their 

 scent in perfumes or for their properties in 

 medicine. Only the leaves of some are used, 

 as with sage; both leaves and stalk of others 

 are valuable, as with celery. The buds and 

 flowers of capers and saffron; the roots of such 

 herbs as onions; the seeds of others, like dill; 

 and the fruits of some, as of peppers, are the 

 portions of economic value. Some of the herbs 

 in most common use to-day are parsley, onions, 

 sage, thyme, mint, hop and caraway. Others 



