Page images
PDF
EPUB

BELL CHAIR OF EDUCATION*—PROF. S. S. LAURIE.
(Programme of Lectures and Instruction for 1877-8.)

I. Theory, or Philosophy of Education.

End and Idea of Education. Physiology and Psychology of Man, with special reference to Education. The Processes of Intellectual Growth. The Process of Moral and Religious, or Ethical, Growth. The Formal and the Real in Education. Auxiliaries of the Growth of Mind.

The Educative Process from the Ethical point of view. Analysis of the Educative process from the Ethical point of view into four steps.

II. Method and Art of Education.

First Section of the Educative Process-KNOWLEDGE.-Materials of Education. Method of acquisition in its principles Method in relation to Discipline of Intelligence. Method in relation to periods of Mental Evolution.

PARTICULAR METHODOLOGY; or the application of Method to the teaching of Elementary Science, Language, Arithmetic, Geography, History, Grammar, Literature, &c., &c. Religion under this section.

Second Section of the Educative Process-GOODNESS.-Instruction in Goodness. Training to Goodness. Religion in this connection.

Third Section of the Educative Process-OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY.—Instruction in Obedience; Training to Obedience; Motives to Obedience; Moral or Attractive Motives; Legal or Coercive Motives; Punishments. Religion in this connection.

Fourth Section of the Educative Process.-EXERTION OF WILL; Difficulties in the way of Right-Willing; Relation of Right-Willing to Motives; Training to Right-Willing. Religion in this connection.

Music: Drawing: and the Esthetic in Education.

Organization of Schools.

Kindergarten Schools; Infant Schools; Primary Schools; Secondary Schools; University Schools.

Class-manipulation and subsidiary expedients in teaching.
School-Books, Apparatus, Buildings, &c.

III. History of Education, or Comparative Education.

1. Education in China. 2. Education of the Hindu Races. 3. The Education of the Ancient Persians. 4. A brief Sketch of Education among the Semitic Races of the Mesopotamian Basin and among the ancient Egyptians. 5. Education among the Hellenic Races. The educational views of Plato and Aristotle. 6. Education among the Romans. 7. Analysis and exposition of the Institutions of Quintilian. 8. Survey of the History of Education from Constantine to the time of the Reformation. 9. Erasmus and Colet. 10. Luther, Melancthon, and John Sturm. 11. Roger Ascham: Exposition of 'The Scholemaster.' 12. Analysis of Ratichius. 13. of Comenius; Exposition of the Didactica Magna. Realism and Utility as opposed to Humanism and Culture. 14. Milton's Educational views. 15. Analysis and exposition of John Locke's 'Thoughts on Education.' 16. Rousseau, Basedow, and Campe. 17. Dr. Andrew Bell and Joseph Lancaster. 18. Analysis and exposition of Pestalozzi. 19. Jacotot. 20. Fröbel. 21. Jean Paul Richter. 22. Diesterweg. 23. Dr. Arnold. 24. Herbert Spencer and contemporary Realism. 25. Sketch of History of Education in Scotland, and its present condition and prospects. 26. Organization and aims of Educa tion in Germany. and a Sketch of the present state of Education in England, France, and the United States.

N.B. Four Lectures weekly on Theory and Methodology, till the Christmas holidays. Thereafter two of the four Lectures will be devoted to History. Arrangements will be made for the Visitation of Schools. Three written Examinations will be held during the Session, and Essays on practical questions called for.

This Chair was founded in 1876 by the Trustees of Dr. Bell, to further the advancement of the Science and Art of Education in Scotland, by the better professional training of teachers.

The admirable Inaugural Discourse of Prof. Laurie in 1876, will be found in Barnard's American Journal of Education, Vol. XXVII., p. 193-219.

Bell Chair of Education, 1876.-Prof. J. M. D. Meiklejohn.

The Chair of Education was founded in 1876, by the Trustees of Dr. Bell— the Earl of Leven and Melville, Viscount Kirkcaldy, and Mr. John Cook, W.S., Edinburgh. It contemplates the instruction and training of Teachers in the Science and Art of Teaching; and the subject is divided into Three Parts:

I. THE THEORY.-This includes an inquiry into the Psychology of the growing mind-a collection of the knowledge we have of that from observation-an attempt to estimate the mode, rate, and kind of growth by experiment; and an inquiry into the relation of various kinds of knowledge to the mind, and the influence of certain thoughts, emotions, and sets of circumstances upon the character. The growth of the power of the senses, the memory, the understanding, the reason, the will, the imagination, the social emotions-have to be examined. The relation of the religious, moral, and intellectual sides of human nature to each other has to be shown; and the end of all processes which go by the name of Education clearly perceived. The best means toward the various minor ends -such as, the building up of a sound understanding, the formation of a just habit of action in the soul, etc, etc.-are to be inquired into and discussed. The forms of school-life, and the relation of school-life to the ordinary public life of this country, will also be examined. Under this head, too, fall to be discussed the theories and writings of the best thinkers upon education.

II. THE HISTORY.-This includes the history of the notions regarding education and the processes employed in producing it followed by all nations that are called civilized-that is, who have endeavored to found forms of society favora ble to the growth of what is best in man. It therefore takes notice of the chief educational ideas of the East, of Greece and Rome, of the Jews, of Early, Medieval, and Reformed Christianity, of the Jesuits, and of the great men who have practiced, or thought and written on, education. It collects also the best and most inspiring statements of such men as Bacon, Selden, Milton, Locke, Jean Paul, Goethe, Herbert Spencer, and others. It discusses and compares the educational ideas and processes of such men as Comenius, Pestalozzi, Ratich, Jacotot, Diesterweg, Fröbel, &c.; and it also examines and weighs the educational aims, beliefs, habits, and processes of the national systems which exist in Germany, France, England, and other countries.

III. THE PRACTICE.-This includes an examination of all the processes at present going on in the schools of the country-the relation of these processes to the growth of the mind, and their value considered as means to ends. It therefore discusses the teaching of languages-how they may best be taught, what are the mental habits to be created, what are the difficulties, either inherent in the language or adherent to the circumstances under which it is taught, which beset the road of the teacher, and how he may reduce these difficulties to a minimum. The difference between our aims in teaching classical and modern languages, and the consequent difference in the means, is also discussed. The best methods of teaching science, especially the sciences of observation, and the necessary conditions under which these must be taught, are also examined. The methods by which, and the conditions under which, a love of literature may be produced in the mind, is one of the subjects of prelection. Courses of lectures are also to be given on the more usual school subjects-such as History, Geography, Grammar, English Composition, &c. The engineering of each of these subjects-so that the pupil may go from the simpler and more striking parts of each subject to the more complex and intricately connected parts-is fully examined in relation to its principles; and the ground and nature of the obstacles are surveyed. What parts of a subject are fitted for what age; what are the tentacula by which the growing mind lays hold of each part; what and how much ought to be done by the teacher; what and how much must be done by the pupil; at what point mental action becomes independent and self-efficient; what powers of the mind are called into exercise by what subjects and by what parts of a subject. These are some of the questions which occupy the time of the Chair. The characteristics of the best books on each subject are also set forth and valued. The mental outfit of a Teacher, his aims, his practical ends, and the means to these; his difficulties, his rewards; the nature and limitations, of his profession, its advantages,—all these are to be lectured on by the Professor.

VAN DER PALM AND PUBLIC SCHOOLS IN HOLLAND.

BY NICOLAAS BEETS, D. D.

MEMOIR

JOHN HENRY VAN DER PALM was born in Rotterdam July 17, 1763, in the house of his father Kornelis Van der Palm, who kept there, and afterward at Delfthaven, a very flourishing Dutch and French boarding-school, or institute. His father was a man of ability and learning, an accomplished linguist, and poet, and as such received several coronations for his special performances. He was one of the founders of the Rotterdam Society, a social literary club, of which his son was made a member at the age of sixteen. In his father's school the son was trained till the age of ten, when he passed into the Erasmian Grammar school, of which Henricus Dreux was Rector. Here he won several prizes in the competitions of the several classes-his themes foreshadowing the labors of his future life-Diligence (In Laudem Diligentia)' and 'A Sound Mind in a Sound Body-de Sano Mente in Corpore Sano'-robust, cheerful health being with him the normal condition of the human being, which, he inculcated, could only be secured by diligent and regular occupation, in which head, heart, and body were associated. His father's school and methods, and his home life were the ideals which the son held up for the instruction of teachers and school officials.

At the age of fifteen, young Van der Palm began his university studies at Leyden, where he continued in hard study for six years. Of this period of his life, his biographer, Dr. Beets, remarks:—

The years spent by Van der Palm at the University of Leyden fell in one of the most flourishing periods of that institution. Three years before his matriculation, the bi-centenary of its existence had been magnificently celebrated. The recollection of its foundation and princely founder, joined to the remembrance of the ancient famous occurrences which gave rise to its establishment; the rapid but deliberate review of its history, which brought before the mind such an extensive and estimable series of great men as had ever been its ornaments;-all this gave a new stimulus to resort to this seat of learning. The professorial chairs were filled by the most celebrated men in all departments of knowledge and science. Besides not a few English, the concourse of Netherland youth was greater than ever; and of these were formed in that period a great multitude of men who were destined to become eminent in every branch of learning and literature, and to be in different relations ornaments to Church and State. Among these, without contradiction of any, Van der Palm was to

occupy a most prominent position; and of this his first instructors, Valckenaar, Ruhnkenius, Van de Wijnpersse, and especially Hendrik Albert Schultens, were quickly convinced. To the instruction of these lights, which he improved with the greatest conscientiousness and with the most ardent zeal, was soon added that of Pestel, to whose lectures on the fundamenta jurisprudentiæ naturalis he attached great importance. In theology, he afterward heard Hollebeek, the reformer of the Netherland style of preaching, Gillissen, Scholten, Boers, and Rietveld; to the lectures of the last mentioned, he seems to have applied himself with special diligence. Of Schultens, his biographer Wijttenbach remarks: 'He had received from nature the rare gift of appearing to be what he really was. Uprightness of heart, greatness of mind, and benevolence were expressed in his countenance; yea, all that is praiseworthy. His bearing, gestures, movements, were most graceful. Add to this the finest perception of the beautiful and the true, an uncommon familiarity and affability, and the greatest agreeableness of speech and expression; and all this entirely natural, without the least affectation. Few therefore were, whether teaching or speaking, listened to with greater pleasure, or with greater confidence in their ability; and few there were whose society and intercourse were more sought in social life.'

On this high model Van der Palm formed his own ideal. Schultens was not only his favorite instructor, who imbued him with that genuine taste for Oriental languages and literature which was so peculiar to him, but he was also the man after whom he entirely formed himself; the man to whom he was indebted for that high refinement by which he was so peculiarly distinguished; the man whom he proposed to himself as his model in all things, and whose entire being he endeavored to express in his own, when he was afterward called to fill the same professorial chair himself.

The image of Schultens lived in his heart during the whole of his long life. His name sounds through all his writings; he denominates it a name 'which humanity in its highest nobility claims as its own.' After Schultens he named one of his sons; and of Schultens he spoke, as long as his strength permitted him to speak of any one, and his spirit roamed through the past. How high this man placed the youthful Van der Palm we can easily conceive, if we can represent to ourselves how agreeable it is to exercise influence over a gifted youth, to infuse our spirit into a susceptible breast, and to see our youth renewed as it were in another. He was the apple of his eye, his glory, his hope. He saw him daily at his own house, and saw no one more gladly; and when, after five years' instruction and intercourse, he parted with his beloved pupil, his eye followed him in his course, and up to his death he cherished him in his heart.

Van der Palm's collegiate life was of an exceptional high and pure character, which both his teachers and his fellow students unite in lifting into the region of the ideal. The professors, on whose instruction he attended during his six years connection with the university, vie with one another in extolling his eminent gifts, and his rare improvement of opportunities. It does not often happen that we send forth from our seminary a youth so thoroughly versed in all polite literature, and so far advanced in sacred learning.'

At no period of its history was the attendance of studious and talented young men larger in the different faculties of the university, or their mutual intercourse lively or more intimate. Schimmelpenninck, Brugmans, Nieuwland, Bilderdijk, were all his friends. Besides these were Jan Willem Bussingh, already mentioned, were Henricus van Roijen, Jacobus Kantelaar, Cornelis Fransen van Eck, Jacobus van Heusden, Johannes Stolk, Thomas Hoog, and particu

larly Ewaldus Kist. How much he was attached to the last appears from the Dedication of the second volume of his Sermons, in which he recalls, with the greatest delight, the six years spent in daily intercourse with this friend. He mentions there that they as an inseparable pair were accustomed to walk together the streets of Leyden and its circumjacent lanes, and were in all things each other's confidants. We strengthened each other in our taste for, and knowledge of the best Greek and Latin writers; we stimulated each other in our diligent study of the speculative parts of philosophy; we roamed together through the fields of theology, rejected, again accepted, and formed for ourselves those fixed principles which to this moment have not failed us; together we chose our modern reading, and by no means neglected this means of enriching our minds; and we went together to the beloved house of our great and never to be forgotten Schultens, to gather up lessons on the knowledge of the world and on polite intercourse. But whilst all these advantages were naturally reciprocal, there is one thing for which I am wholly indebted to you, without knowing that I ever rendered you an equivalent for it. I mean the refinement and elevation of my taste by the influence of music. Still, it seems to me, I am seated in my apartment, and the transporting tones of your harpsichord are sounding in my ears; still, it seems to me, I close my books, leave my room, go to yours, give you a wink as I enter, to proceed undisturbed, place myself behind you, turn over for you the pages of your music, and leave you not, till the concert of Jourdany or Bach has been played to its close; and, attuned to the per- · ception and appreciation of the humane and the beautiful, I return to my old books, to search in them especially for what is humane and beautiful in sentiment and expression.'

With Ewaldus Kist and a few of the other friends above mentioned, Van der Palm held a stated weekly conference, in which each in his turn read a composition of his own, and in which the criticism, both on that which had been read and on what might be further discussed, was free and informal. The youthful Van der Palm was lively, fond of visiting, of walking, of bodily exercises, of the theater,* of sports, and especially of playing at golf, which he did almost daily, and at which he was very expert. Though he

* He resorted to it, so far as the opportunity was afforded in Leyden, somewhat frequently, especially when the great Corver was still on the stage. He testified that he, in the part of the Notary in The Indigent of the Mereier, first caused him to feel the nature of external eloquence, the idea of which was afterward fully developed in him by Bellamy,

† Fondness for social recreations continued with Van der Palm even to advanced age, and it was doubtless very beneficial to him both as to mind and body. He was particularly fond of relaxing

« PreviousContinue »