On the nature of the new education in general (cont.)
Chapter 2, part 2 of Johann Gottlieb Fichte's "Addresses to the German Nation"
We said earlier that the education which directly stimulates the pupil’s mental self-activity produces knowledge. This gives us the opportunity to describe in more detail the difference between the new education and the old. The proper and immediate aim of the new education is to stimulate regular and progressive mental activity. Knowledge results, as we saw earlier, only incidentally, but as an inevitable consequence. Now, although we would be right to see in knowledge an integral part of the kind of education that we seek, since only thereby can the pupil, once he has become a man, grasp the image for real life that in the future will stimulate his earnest activity, so we cannot nevertheless say that the new education intends this knowledge directly, but rather that knowledge merely falls to its share. By contrast, knowledge, and a certain degree of knowledge of a given subject, was the express object of education hitherto. Moreover, there is a considerable difference between the kind of knowledge that arises incidentally from the new education and that aimed at by the old. The former gives rise to knowledge of the laws conditioning the possibility of all mental activity. For example, when the pupil, in the free exercise of his imagination, attempts to delimit space by drawing straight lines, this is the primary mental activity that is stimulated in him. If he discovers through his experiments that he can delimit no space with fewer than three straight lines, then this knowledge is the by-product of a second quite different activity of the cognitive faculty, one that restricts the free operation of the first faculty to be stimulated. Thus, at its very commencement this education gives rise to a knowledge that truly surpasses all experience, that is supersensuous, strictly necessary and general, that embraces in advance all subsequently possible experience. By contrast, the previous method of instruction aimed as a rule only at the permanent qualities of things, as they exist without one being able to give a reason for them, and as they had to be believed and observed. Hence it aimed at a merely passive apprehension [Auffassen] through the faculty of memory, which is employed only in the service of things; by such means one could have no glimmer at all of the mind as the independent and original principle of the things themselves.1 Modern pedagogy must not think it can defend itself against this criticism by appealing to its oft-attested revulsion for mechanical rote-learning and to its well-known masterpieces in the Socratic manner; for some time ago its practitioners were advised by another writer that these Socratic arguments are likewise only learned mechanically, that this is an even more dangerous kind of rote-learning since it still gives the pupil who does not think the impression that he can indeed think;2 that there could have been no other outcome with the material which this pedagogy wanted to use to develop independent thought, that to achieve this purpose one must begin with a quite different material. This character of the old method of instruction sheds light on why the pupil in the past has as a rule learned reluctantly – and hence slowly and inadequately – and why, when learning itself did not provide the stimulus, external incentives had to be brought to bear. It also explains past exceptions to the rule. Memory, when it alone is called upon, without having to serve some other mental purpose, is a passivity rather than an activity of the mind, and it is plain to see that the pupil would be extremely unwilling to assume this passive state. Also, the acquaintance with things quite alien to him and in which he has not the slightest interest, and with the properties of these things, is a poor compensation for that passivity inflicted on him. For that reason his disinclination had to be overcome by the promise that this knowledge would be useful in the future, as the only way to earn a living and a reputation, and even, in the immediate present, by punishing and rewarding him. Accordingly, knowledge was from the start installed as the servant of one’s sensuous well-being; and this education, which in respect of its content we established earlier was simply incapable of developing a moral way of thinking, was obliged, in order to make any impression on the pupil at all, actually to implant and cultivate moral corruption in him, and unite its own interest with the interest of this corruption. Further, one will find that the natural talent, who, as an exception to the rule, learned willingly and hence well in the schools based on this system of education, and through this higher love reigning in him overcame the moral corruption of his surroundings and kept his mind [Sinn] pure, gained from those subjects of study a practical interest thanks to his natural inclination; that, guided by happy instinct, he aimed at bringing forth knowledge of this kind rather than merely apprehending it; consequently, that those subjects with which, as exceptions to the rule, this education succeeded most generally and felicitously, are on the whole those that it permitted to be practised actively, such as the one classical language, where the aim was to write and speak it as well as read it, and this was done almost universally to a fairly high standard, whereas the other, in which written and oral exercises were neglected, was as a rule learned very badly and superficially, and forgotten in later years. Finally, previous experience also teaches us that only the development of mental activity through instruction produces pleasure in knowledge, simply as such, and thus also keeps the mind [Gemu¨t] open to moral culture, whereas merely passive reception paralyses and deadens knowledge just as it corrupts the moral sense utterly. To return to the pupil of the new education: it is clear that, impelled by his love, he learns much; and, since he grasps everything in its interconnections and puts what he has grasped directly into action, he will learn it correctly and never forget it. Yet this is only incidental. More significant is that through this love his self is exalted and admitted, deliberately and according to a rule, into an entirely new order of things, which only a few, by the grace of God, had stumbled on before. He is impelled by a love that absolutely does not aim at some sensuous enjoyment, because such a motive holds no appeal to him, but at mental activity and the law governing this activity for their own sake.
Now, although it is not this mental activity in general with which morality is concerned – for that purpose a special direction must be given to the activity – this love is nevertheless the general constitution and form of the moral will. And so this method of mental culture is the immediate preparation for the moral one; the root of immorality, however, it eliminates completely, by never allowing sensuous enjoyment to become the motive. Hitherto this motive was the first to be stimulated and developed, because it was believed that otherwise the pupil could not be fashioned at all and a measure of influence gained over him. Should the moral motive have been subsequently developed, then it arrived too late and found the heart already taken and filled with another kind of love. In the new education, conversely, the formation of a pure will shall take precedence, so that, if at some later time selfishness should indeed stir within, or be stimulated from without, it will arrive too late and find no room in a soul already occupied by something else.
Already essential to this first objective as well as to the second, which I shall indicate shortly, is that from the outset the pupil be brought completely and uninterruptedly under the influence of this education, and that he be entirely separated from the community and kept safe from any contact with it. He need not hear at all that one can bestir oneself in life for the sake of its preservation and welfare, no more than he need know that one may learn for that reason or that learning can be of some help towards these ends. It follows that the spiritual development after the manner we indicated earlier must be the only one imparted to him and that he must concern himself with it ceaselessly; that on no account, however, may this mode of instruction alternate with the one requiring the opposing sensuous motive. Now, although this spiritual development may prevent selfishness from arising and provide the form of a moral will, it is not yet for that reason the moral will itself. If the new education that we propose went no further than this, it would at most school excellent men of learning, as in the past, of whom only a few are required, and who could contribute no more to our proper, humane and national purpose than such men have done previously: exhort and exhort again, allow themselves to be gaped at and on occasion scorned. But it is clear – as I have already said – that this free activity of the mind has been developed with the intention that the pupil thereby projects the image of a moral order of actually existing life, grasps this image with the love that has likewise already developed within him, and by this love is impelled to realise it in and through his own life. The question arises as to how the new education can prove that it has achieved its proper and final aim with its pupil.
In the first place, it is clear that the pupil’s mental activity, which earlier was exercised on other objects, must be stimulated to project an image of the human social order, as it ought to be according to the law of reason. Whether this image projected by the pupil is correct can most easily be judged by an education that is in sole possession of this correct image. Whether it was projected by the pupil’s self-activity and on no account apprehended merely passively and parroted credulously in schoolish fashion; whether, furthermore, it was raised to the proper degree of clarity and vividness – this the education will be able to judge in the same way as it earlier passed correct judgements on other objects in the same regard. All this is still a matter of knowledge pure and simple, and remains in its domain, access to which is exceedingly easy in this education. A quite different and higher question, however, is this: whether the pupil is so seized by an ardent love for such an order of things that, released from the tutelage of education and declared independent, it will be simply impossible for him not to will this order and work with all his powers for its advancement. There is no doubt that this question cannot be settled by words, and tests framed in words, but only by visible actions.
I solve the task set by this last observation thus: without doubt the pupils of this new education, though separated from adult society, will nevertheless live in fellowship with one another and thus form an independent and self-sustaining commonwealth possessed of its own constitution; one that is clearly defined, grounded in the nature of things, and absolutely demanded by reason. The very first image of a social order that the pupil is stimulated to project in his mind shall be of the community in which he himself lives, in such a way that he is inwardly compelled to form an image of this order point by point, just as it actually appears before him, and that he understands it in all its parts as utterly necessary in relation to its principles. This is once again the mere work of knowledge. In this social order every individual must now in real life continually abstain, for the sake of the whole, from much that, were he alone, he could do without a second thought; and it will be expedient if, in the legislation and in the teaching of the constitution to be based thereon, to each individual all the others are represented as being actuated by an idealised love of order, which perhaps none really has but all ought to have; and that consequently this legislation maintains a high degree of severity and places a great deal of weight on abstentions from certain acts. This, as something that simply must be, and on which the existence of society rests, is in extremity even to be coerced through fear of immediate punishment; and this penal law must be carried out without clemency or exception. This use of fear as a motive is not at all prejudicial to the morality of the pupil, because here it is not the doing of good that is to be encouraged but only the abstention from what is bad according to the constitution. Furthermore, when teaching the constitution it must be made completely clear that he who still requires the idea of punishment or perhaps even the refreshment of this idea by actually suffering punishment himself, stands on a very lowly level of culture. Yet in spite of all this, it is evident that, since one can never know whether obedience is inspired by love of order or fear of punishment, in this circumstance the pupil cannot outwardly prove his good will nor education appraise it.
Conversely, the circumstance in which such an appraisal is possible is the following. The polity must be so arranged that the individual must not merely abstain for the sake of the whole, but also be able to act and work on its behalf. In this commonwealth of pupils, physical exercise, and the mechanical but here idealised labours of agriculture and of various handicrafts, are practised in addition to the development of the mind through learning. It shall be a basic rule of the constitution that everyone who excels in any one of these departments is expected to help instruct the others therein, and to assume various functions and responsibilities; that everyone who discovers an improvement, or is the first to grasp most clearly an improvement suggested by a tutor, is exempted from carrying it out by his own efforts, without his therefore being relieved of his personal tasks of learning and working, which go without saying; that each satisfies these demands willingly and without coercion, while those who are unwilling are also at liberty to refuse them; that he should not expect any reward because in this constitution all are equal in relation to work and enjoyment, nor even praise, because the prevailing mentality in the community is that each is only doing his share; that instead he merely takes pleasure in his activities and work on behalf of the whole, and in being successful in them, should he meet with success. Accordingly, in this polity the acquisition of greater skill, and the effort expended therein, are followed only by renewed effort and more toil, and it is precisely the more capable pupil who will often have to keep watch while others sleep, and reflect while others play.
Those pupils who, regardless of whether all this is perfectly clear and intelligible to them, nevertheless continue gladly to take on that initial effort and all the subsequent exertions that follow from it, and such that they can be reckoned on with certainty, and remain strong in the feeling of their power and activity and grow yet stronger – those pupils education can by all means release into the world without worry. In them its purpose has been achieved; in them love has been kindled and burns right down to the root of their vital stirrings, and from now on it will continue without exception to embrace everything that reaches this vital stirring. And in the larger commonwealth, which they now enter, these pupils will never be able to be anything but what they were in the smaller commonwealth which they are leaving: steadfast and immutable.
In this way the pupil is ready to meet the next demands that the world will inevitably make on him, demands that arise without exception. What education requires from him in the name of this world has been done. But he is not yet complete in and for himself, and what he himself can require of education has not yet been done. As soon as this demand, too, is fulfilled, he will be capable of satisfying those which, in special circumstances, a higher world might make of him in the name of the present one.
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That is to say, previous systems of education have made idealism all but impossible.
Fichte is here thinking of Pestalozzi’s criticisms, in How Gertrude Teaches Her Children (1801), of the catechistic or Socratic method of teaching favoured by a number of contemporary German writers on education; see e.g. Friedrich Eberhard von Rochow’s Versuch eines Schulbuchs fu¨r Kinder der Landleute (1772), Karl Friedrich Riemann’s Versuch einer Beschreibung der Reckmanschen Schuleinrichtung (1781) and C. G. Salzmann’s Ameisenbu¨chlein, oder Anweisung zu einer vernu¨nftigen Erziehung der Erzieher (1806).