have for ourselves too (if possible) a means of making others partakers of our own thoughts; and if we consider what kind of communications we may be more likely to get through a foreign language than through our own, the highest purpose in the teaching of languages may perhaps be said to be the access to the best thoughts and institutions of a foreign nation, its literature, culture—in short, the spirit of the nation in the widest sense of the word. But at the same time we must remember that we cannot reach the goal with one bound, and that there are many other things on the way which are also worth taking in. We do not learn our native tongue merely so as to be able to read Shakespeare and Browning, and neither do we learn it for the sake of giving orders to the shoemaker or making out the washerwoman’s bill. So likewise in the case of foreign languages, we ought not exclusively to soar above the earth, nor on the other hand exclusively to grovel on the ground; between those two spheres there are large fields in manifold shades where it might be of great value for us to stand in direct communication with other nations.
II
We may already from what has been said draw some conclusions as to the method which we ought to use. We ought to learn a language through sensible communications; there must be (and this as far as possible from the very first day) a certain connection in the thoughts communicated in the new language. Disconnected words are but stones for bread; one cannot say anything sensible with mere lists of words. Indeed not even disconnected sentences ought to be used, at all events, not in such a manner and to such an extent as in most books according to the old method. For there is generally just as little connexion between them as there would be in a newspaper if the same line were read all the way across from column to column. I shall take a few specimens at random from a French reader that is much used: “My aunt is my mother’s friend. My dear friend, you are speaking too rapidly. That is a good book. We are too old. This gentleman is quite sad. The boy has drowned many dogs.” When people say that instruction in languages ought to be a kind of mental gymnastics, I do not know if one of the things they have in mind is such sudden and violent leaps from one range of ideas to another.
In another French schoolbook we find: “Nous sommes à Paris, vous êtes à Londres. Louise et Amélie, où êtes-vous? Nous avons trouvé la lettre sur la table. Avez-vous pris le livre? Avons-nous été à Berlin? Amélie, vous êtes triste. Louis, avez-vous vu Philippe? Sommes-nous à Londres?”
The speakers seem to have a strange sense of locality. First, they say that they themselves are in Paris, but the one (the ones?) that they are speaking with are in London (conversation by telephone?); then they cannot remember if they themselves have been in Berlin; and at last they ask if they themselves are in London. Unfortunately, they get no answer, for the next sentence is, “Pierre, vous avez pris la canne.”
Or take some of the books which are supposed to help Danes learn English. They are no better. In one (which appeared in 1889) we find: “The joiner has made this chair. What a fine sunshine! For whom do you make this bed? Which of you will have this box? I should like to have it. Of whom have you got this cake? I am very fond of cakes. I have borrowed a great deal of books from a public library.”
From a “practical” primer in English, which appeared in its second edition in 1893, I take the following specimens: “Are the king’s horses very old? No; but the duke’s carriage is old. Is it older than your friend’s?... Has the nobleman told you the news? No, sir; but the lady has told me the news about the business and the wedding. Why do you not give the negro a house? No, sir; but I can tell you that the German has given each of the negroes a pretty little house. Has the lady a knife? Yes, the lady has two knives. Why do you not give the ladies the German’s keys to the church? The noblemen have the German’s keys.”
I could give you almost any number of that kind of specimens. The ones I have chosen are not even of the very worst type, since there is (some sort of) meaning in each sentence by itself. But what shall we say when, in a German reader, to the question Wo seid ihr? we find the answer, Wir sind nicht hier! The author of that book also seems to have had a very vivid imagination when it came to the use of pluperfects. “Your book had not been large. Had you been sensible? Your horse had been old.” We ask ourselves in surprise, when did this wonderful horse then cease to be old? But that kind of material information is not given in the book; it stops at the sphinx-like remark: Dein Pferd war alt gewesen. Could it really have been that kind of schoolbooks that the Danish writer, Sören Kierkegaard, alluded to when he wrote that language had been given to man, not in order to conceal his thoughts, as Talleyrand asserted, but in order to conceal the fact that he had no thoughts?
Now it must immediately be admitted that there may be a big difference in the schoolbooks made, even according to this single-sentence system. It never seems to have occurred to the authors of some of them that there might be a limit to the amount of rubbish that can be offered children under the pretext of teaching them grammar. Others again try to give sentences which are both sensible and in accordance with a child’s natural range of ideas. With respect to the latter principle, there has been steady progress from the times when the sentences either were moral rules of conduct and philosophical profundities, or selections about Greek heroes, etc. But even in the best modern books the exercises are often strangely disjointed (cf., for instance, this exercise from one of the better books: “My brother had not many lessons yesterday. Where had you been? The weather had been fine for a long time. This boy had only been in our house three or four weeks. Has your uncle had many tulips this year? How long had you had this frock?”), and even if they are not so glaringly nonsensical as some others, yet their very disconnectedness makes them bad enough.
It is easy enough, however, to find something to make fun of in all such books. Let us then rather ask the reason why this system has so long been dominant. Its defenders will, of course, refer to the difficulties in all connected reading exercises; even the simplest stories contain so many grammatical forms, and so many words, that the beginner would be overwhelmed and confused by having them all thrown at him at once. There must be gradual progress in difficulty, that is, the material for instruction must be arranged in stages from very easy to more and more difficult things, and this is supposed to be attainable only by means of disconnected sentences. The principle is sound, but it is unsound to put it into practice in such a manner that other pedagogical principles which are just as sound are neglected. Should pedagogy not also demand some sense in what one treats the children to? But, as we have seen, it is not always so easy to find the sense. And should it not also be of some significance to attract the interest of the pupils? Nothing seems hard to a willing mind. That which is associated with pleasant recollections has a firmer place in the memory than dry stuff. But exercises where it alternates between the Frenchman who has taken the Englishman’s hat and the Englishman who has taken the Frenchman’s cane, or where either Marie sees Louise’s dog or Peter sees Henry’s horse—they cannot be anything but boring, even if they give the pupils ever so gradual practice in the use of the genitive. Grown persons can, of course, put up with a little boredom, if they think they can attain anything by it; but in their heart of hearts they find such things killing, and so they are; yes, even killing for the linguistic sense. Children can, of course, put up with a good deal, too, when they have a teacher who can win their respect and affection; they also put up with many things only for the sake of getting good marks, or when they are stimulated by other equally unsound means. But still, it is better to avoid boring them.
I suppose it is also of pedagogical importance for the teaching to be correct. But here we have just one of those points where we see what evil results may come of the system of disconnected sentences: it is so extremely easy for them to become stilted; indeed, even incorrect. Some examples may be found in the exercise already cited on p. 12, where the sentence, “For whom do you make this bed?” is not good English, at any rate, and where “a great deal of
