540 JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 
by all honorable men in France, and those of every shade of 
opinion, that nothing should be left undone to stay the great 
moral decay of the nation, which like an epidemic had been 
attacking every stage of society, and had also spread to the 
adjoining countries. Education of the young was naturally con- 
sidered to be one of the most efficacious means for restoring the 
people to virtue and morality, and through them to thrift and 
prosperity. The Church tried to do so by becoming more strict 
and zealous in disseminating its doctrines, and by trying to hide 
the existing state of things, especially as found in the higher 
social circles. The liberal party or encyclopeedists on the other 
hand, hoped to regenerate the nation by fearlessly exposing all 
the evils then existing in morals and politics in Church and 
State, by spreading philosophical doctrines, and by an- attempt 
to return to a more simple mode of life—the primitive life of 
the savage being fancied the most desirable existence. It is 
natural to suppose that both parties tried to influence education 
in all its phases, and that the tendencies towards realism had 
very strong and powerful advocates. However, it is a strange 
fact that the first successful attempt to combine realistic with 
humanistic studies was made about this time in the pietistic 
Poedagogium of Halle, where, in addition to Greek and Latin, 
history, geography, natural history, and technology were taught. 
The pupils were taken to the rooms of mechanics, and were 
shewn specimens, whilst the masters were particularly charged 
not to teach so much from text-books as by imparting their own 
knowledge to the pupils, and by inviting discussions. The 
result was so encouraging that Christoph Semler opened the 
first Real-schule in 1739, in thesame town. In this new venture 
the other extreme to pure humanistic teaching was adopted. 
Agriculture, horticulture, and many other disciplines now only 
taught at technological schools appear in the programme, 
written, strange to say, in pompous barbarous Latin. I am not 
aware how long this school continued, but I believe that it had 
but an ephemeral existence; for the Real-schule of Johann 
Julius Hecker, founded in 1748, in Berlin, is generally considered 
the type of the schools devoted to realistic teaching in Germany. 
In this Real-schule, mainly devoted to the practical wants of its 
pupils in life, Latin, French, theology, history, agriculture, 
architecture, engineering, including fortification, were the princi- 
pal subjects of teaching. The creation of similar schools in 
many other parts of Germany followed soon, and after the 
appearance of Rousseau’s “ Emile,” in 1761, the enthusiasm rose 
to such a height that we can scarcely conceive it, unless we take 
the important impending political changes into account, and it 
is only to be wondered at that at that time, more than 120 years 
ago, the whole educational system did not undergo a thorough 
alteration. | 
[ have already alluded to the two great contending parties 
in France at the beginning of the eighteenth century, and to the 
earnest endeavors of both to raise the moral standard of the 
