Page:Addresses to the German nation.djvu/59

 informed, too, that no other result was possible with the material it employed to develop spontaneous thought, and that for this purpose one must commence with entirely different material. This quality of the old education shows clearly why the pupil generally learned unwillingly, and therefore slowly and but little, and why, because learning itself was not attractive, extraneous motives had to be introduced; it also shows the reason for the exceptions to the rule hitherto. Memory, if employed alone and without serving any other purpose in the mind, is a passive condition rather than an activity of the mind, and it is easy to understand that the pupil will be very unwilling to accept this passive state. Besides, acquaintance with things and with the properties of things which are quite strange, and which have not the slightest interest for him, is a poor recompense for the passivity inflicted on him. His aversion, therefore, had to be overcome by holding out hopes of the usefulness of such knowledge in the future, by asserting that by it alone could a living and a reputation be obtained, and even by direct immediate punishment and reward. Thus from the very outset, knowledge was set up as a servant of material welfare; and this education, which was described above, from the point of view of its content, as simply incapable of developing a moral sense, was in fact obliged, in order to reach the pupil at all, to implant and develop moral corruption in him and to unite its own interest with that of this corruption. Further, it will be found that the natural talent, which, as an exception to the rule, learned willingly and therefore well in schools under the old education, overcame the moral corruption of the environment and kept its character pure, thanks to this greater love that governed it. Owing to its natural inclination it acquired a practical interest in