584 



The Review of Reviews. 



De(.*mler 1, 1906. 



GERMAN EDUCATION UNDLR FIRE. 



Mr. J. Ellis Barker writes in the Contemporary 

 .Review on education and mis-education in Germany. 

 He points out that in Germany, and especially in 



Pasquino .'] 



The German Trinity. 



[Turin. 



Prussia, education was from the first used by the 

 Government for the purpose of keeping the people 

 in a state of subjection and of mental servitude. 



THE PEOPLES SCHOOLS TWICE A FAILUEE. 



The German elementary schools, which contain 

 some nine million children, were intended, accord- 

 ing to Dr. Falk — (1) to promote patriotism; (2) to 

 foster religion and morality; (3) to fit the young 

 for practical life. The failure of the first is seen in 

 the three million votes cast by the Social Deriio- 

 crats in 1903, whom the Kaiser described as "fel- 

 lows without a Fatherland, enemies of their nation.' 

 The second aim is said to be also unattained, for 

 the Protestants of Germany, who form two-thirds of 

 the nation, are " not at all religious." Church-going 

 is not a social obligation. The yearly average of 

 illegitimate births in Germany is 180,000, against 

 50,000 in Great Britain. There are 12,000 suicides 

 in Germany, as against 3000 in Great Britain. 

 Toleration is in Germany conspicuous by its ab- 

 sence. The third aim is better served. " The Ger- 

 man child learns a few necessary things fairly 

 well. The English child learns many things ill, of 

 which most are unnecessary." The German child 

 learns in the elementary schools perhaps too 

 slavishlv to obey. The English Board School edu- 



cation errs perhaps in the opposite direction. The 

 English Board School encourages the child to 

 become a pauper by giving everything for nothing. 

 The German parents, who have to pay, value more 

 what they get. All classes join in the German 

 school. The English Board School is still ;!ie 

 charity school of the poor. 



SECONDABT SCHOOLS-CEAMMING SHOPS. 



After these concessions to the public elementary 

 schools of Germany, the writer proceeds to attack 

 the secondarv schools. He savs that they are in the 

 main cramming establishments of the worst type, 

 treated by parents and children as a great but in- 

 inevitable evil. Even the Kaiser denounces the 

 miseducation given therein, saving: "We ought to 

 educate voung Germans, sons of the nation, not 

 voung Greeks and Romans. We ought to desert the 

 programme receixed from the ancient monasteries. 

 Bodilv exercise in schools has been until very re- 

 centlv disparaged. " Germany is by nature a game- 

 less countrv." "As regards physical education,' the 

 German schools are worthless. " 



r>-T:V'ERSlTIES— FACTOEIES OR MEDIOCRITIES. 

 Of the twenty-two German Uni\ersities, with 3000 

 professors and lecturers and 40.000 students, the 

 writer has little good to say. He admits the nimiber 

 of students is increasing by leaps and bounds, but 

 he says. " It may be doubted whether it is a matter 

 for congratulation that the German universities are 

 turning out an army of unemployed lawyers, doc- 

 tors, theologians and teachers." to form "a huge 

 learned, and therefore the more dangerous, prole- 

 tariat." The writer ventures to affirm that "the 

 average British doctor, lawyer, schoolmaster, or 

 clergvman is distinctlv superior to his German col- 

 league." "The output of books, mostly worth- 

 less, has enormouslv increased in Germany." 



TECHNICAL SCHOOLS— TOO THEORETIC. 



Though Germany is held to be no longer the 

 model to Great Britain in elementary, intermediate 

 and practical education, the writer admits she is far 

 ahead of this country in technical education. Yet 

 '" German technical education is more extensive than 

 intensive, more showv than practical and thorough. 

 He quotes Felisch, who wrote. " we pay for our 

 greater theoretical knowledge with diminished 

 practical abilitv." The writer emphatically refuses 

 to attribute the industrial success of Germany tn 

 the general education of its workers. Belgium in- 

 dustries, he savs, are comparatively more flourishing 

 than those of Germany, yet in Belgium 128 of every 

 thousand recruits are unable to write. 



THE PRESS MUCH BELOW OURS. 

 The chief practical value of the German schools 

 consists, he maintains, not in the knowledge dis- 

 seminated, but in. the discipline instilled. German} 

 has learned the lesson of national co-operation, co- 

 ordination of all the national forces, and has de- 



