[The section begins on P13]

"In 1813 I returned to Germany, drawn by the chance of winning back the fatherland [from Napoleonic forces]. - Pestalozzi was despite his Italian origin genuinely German by nature. He was thus very keen to take part in the liberation of Germany. 'Get stuck in there!' was the last thing the old hero shouted after me as I set off. And certainly that liberation had to be accomplished to gain a suitable soil to cultivate his ideas. To begin with Bonaparte had grasped nothing of the plans of the Swiss[i.e. Pestalozzi]. When attempts were made to win over Bonaparte when he was First Consul, he answered: 'I can't get involved in the teaching of the ABC'. But when he later began to realise that Pestalozzi had some other intention than just teaching the ABC, he is supposed to have said that all Pestalozzi's adherents were Jesuits. Also Pestalozzi was warned by his friend General Jullien to be on his guard. If Napoleon had remained master of the continent, would he have allowed us for long to educate young Germans according to those precepts [Pestalozzi's] so that they would turn out to be people who thought for themselves? I don't think so. A sort of Lancastrian barracks drill would rather have corresponded to his political ends. But we today would probably have as little freedom to celebrate our regard for our great master as is the case today in some darkened parts of his own fatherland.

After the war's end I headed first of all to England and my job in the Lancaster schools, then the Bell schools, and thus to daily contact with the first inventor of that entire school mechanism, old Dr Bell himself. What a stark contrast! This mechanism, this purely passive memory work vis-à-vis the active Pestalozzian development of the young mind from its first reflections to the highest mental conception! But my efforts to convince old Dr Bell, determinedly enthusiastic about his mechanism, of this contrast and of the correctness of Pestalozzi's teaching, were all in vain. 'That is very fine, what you are telling me; but you see, I go on further.'- So in the end I went on further too, back to my revered Pestalozzi in Iferten.

It wasn't long before Dr Bell came after me. He wanted to meet the great rival to his fame in the field of educational theory, and on that occasion see if some element or other of Pestalozzi's method might not be usable in his own system. Since he spoke neither German nor French, he asked me to interpret for him at Pestalozzi's. I was only too happy to do so as I thought that would give me the best chance, if not of convincing him, at least of delivering the proofs of what I had said in opposition to his views in England. Fortune favoured me. During those days a public exam was being held in the Institute. I did not leave Bell's side, translated, explained, and drew his attention to everything that I thought might interest him. However nothing seemed to make an impression on him, save at the end when the military exercises of the pupils drew some expressions of applause from him.

We then thought he had perhaps not yet had the chance of penetrating into the actual essence of the teaching being carried out at the Institute &endash; which was as far as possible heuristic(self-motivated, self-finding). So we brought him some boys into another room and requested him to test them himself. He demanded that they should prove the theorem of Pythagoras. One of the boys did so. But Bell said that proof wasn't the right one, in English schools they had another. The boy said he could prove it another way; and the other boys had also found proofs. I think that on that occasion twelve different proofs of that theorem had been found by the pupils themselves. A couple more attempts were made, so as to see if the English one was among them. But it was not, and Bell maintained his view that it, the one they used in English schools, was the best.

Thus it seemed impossible to teach the 'school man', caught up in his system, even the concept that - instead of giving his pupils a whole lot of 'prescriptions' for life - it was infinitely better to develop their thinking and knowledge in such a way that they would be able to help themselves in the various events of life and would know to write their own 'prescriptions'.

Then the next day a meeting was organised in which Pestalozzi and Bell were to give their views on popular education, and Bell intended then to present his system in a practical way. The teachers who were in the castle, strangers and notable visitors who were in town all assembled for this remarkable Colloquium, perhaps one which even promised important results. Were not here the two most famous and at the same time opposing contemporary schoolmen? - two world schoolmasters, opposed to one another in their principles as - as an aside - in their financial positions; insofar as one of them had more than once made himself into a poor man by his work in the schoolroom for the good of humanity, whereas the other for similar work to promote the purposes of the English High Church drew an annual salary from church livings and other emoluments of more than £2000 sterling; a sum from which, I believe, around 200 country schoolmasters in this Germany of ours have to live on for a year - I won't say they are able to live on it, the way things are with us, but they are forced to.

Pestalozzi began to expound his principles with all the intelligence and skill he possessed, with all the clarity which was possible when his speech was being translated. But he achieved from Dr Bell no other result than that previously attained. When for example he spoke of the stimulation of activity in the children and said inter alia that he made as little use as possible of the concept of honour/honesty which was strong in the child anyway and could easily be over-stimulated, but preferred to emphasise purer motives such as love of duty, of one's parents, teachers and especially love of the object itself, for which the child needed to be won over by a treatment during teaching corresponding to its intellectual point of view; - to this Bell gave the old reply again, that that was all very well, but he, Bell, went further by basing his system on that same powerful motivator, ' this powerful engine', as he put it.

His system was next due to be demonstrated. Pestalozzi withdrew to his sofa, and the gentlemen present were asked to stand on the three sides of a rectangle drawn with chalk on the floor, and whose fourth side was occupied by Bell and his interpreter. And then began the putting in of letters and syllables and all the fussing about very unimportant trifles, e.g. if someone stumbled as they walked forward, didn't hold their book correctly, dropped it, didn't stand as they were told to, walked round the back instead of the front. In the same way there was arithmetic, finally even religion, i.e. the catechism according to the schema: 'God created the world; who created the world? What did God create? Etc. I turned to look at my old Pestalozzi, to see what he would say to this instruction. He lay on the sofa chewing the end of his neckerchief, as was his wont, when he had been dressed in one on formal occasions. Was he doing it now from inner satisfaction - or because of ill-humour at this sort of mental education? I don't know!

The next day Bell went to Freiburg, to visit the deserving and at that time flourishing schools of Father Girard, now closed down by Jesuits. Jullien and I went with him. Before we took our leave of him in Freiburg, Bell took me to one side and said the following:

'I have now familiarised myself with the method used by your Pestalozzi. Believe me, in twelve years no one will be talking about his method any more; but mine will be spread round the globe. Come back with me to England. You'll make name and fortune there. With Pestalozzi's teaching method you won't get far.'

It is 30 years since old Bell spoke these words to me. - His method is yet to spread round the globe. In this Germany of ours at least, the attempts to introduce this teaching mechanism, with a few exceptions, have fortunately all failed, in face of the awareness that we have something better. - But you, good father Pestalozzi! Humanity, on all the roads that it will travel along to elevate itself and to make itself purer, will always find you, again and again, as one of its most faithful guides, one of its most benevolent geniuses, and will not forget your name in the course of the centuries! - "

On 30 July I made the acquaintance of Dr Bell from England, famous through the teaching method he had borrowed from India. He stayed a few days in Iferten to learn about Pestalozzi's way of teaching and to present his own as well. I was there when Pestalozzi explained his principles clearly and concisely. Mr Bell gave Pestalozzi his entire applause and said that he himself had felt all that without having been so clearly aware of the reasons for doing so in the way which had just been explained. He only felt the lack of one thing, he said, what for him was the soul of teaching, namely the awakening of emulation. Pestalozzi replied: Nothing, not even emulation, could take the child as far as the feeling of its own power when it could say Eureka, eureka! - Dr Bell asked leave to present to those present (teachers and visitors in the Institute) his method, which he did at once. On this and the next day I acted as his pupil, without however being especially convinced by his method.

The main thing he had learned in India is that children can teach each other, where otherwise several teachers would be needed, and that you can have simpler materials than slates and paper for poor children, by getting them to do their writing and drawing exercises in the sand. - Strict, almost military discipline, a constant competitiveness and changing of seats whenever a child has made even a small mistake or uttered a sound at the wrong time, a system of rewards by giving ribbons and similar ridiculous nonsense - that's how the school discipline is maintained. The teaching itself is extremely mechanical in reading and arithmetic, the child is drilled without learning to give opinion or develop awareness. That writing, starting from the formation of the simplest letters I, l t, o is done before reading and thus the latter is learned through the former, is the only thing different from the usual and possibly merits being copied, as I have already mentioned in relation to Graser's similar process. In the same way there is no reason to object to the formation of smaller groups in very large classes, these led by more advanced boys - as long as attention is paid to the child's individuality and that the children that are put in charge as representing the teacher are not merely the strong ones, but those who combine strength with benevolence and modesty. But the Bell system in its fixed form can hardly accommodate such consideration and doesn't wish it, because it favours pushing forward, competition throughout.

- I mention as well only that this method, publicly and extensively made known by Bell and Lancaster, is at present being well received in France, also around Iferten, in Freiburg, some use is being made of it.