I think Froebel is right.  If his educational principles were the common property of mankind, we might hope for a realization of Jean Paul’s prediction that the world would end with a child’s paradise.  We enjoyed a foretaste of this paradise in Keilhau.  But when I survey our modern gymnasia, I am forced to believe that if they should succeed in equipping their pupils with still greater numbers of rules for the future, the happiness of the child would be wholly sacrificed to the interests of the man, and the life of this world would close with the birth of overwise greybeards.  I might well be tempted to devote still more time to the educational principles of the man who, from the depths of his full, warm heart, addressed to parents the appeal, “Come, let us live for our children,” but it would lead me beyond the allotted limits.

Many of Froebel’s pedagogical principles undoubtedly appear at first sight a pallid theorem, partly a matter of course, partly impracticable.  During our stay in Keilhau we never heard of these claims, concerning which we pupils were the subject of experiment.  Far less did we feel that we were being educated according to any fixed method.  We perceived very little of any form of government.  The relation between us and our teachers was so natural and affectionate that it seemed as if no other was possible.

Yet, when I compared our life at Keilhau with the principles previously mentioned, I found that Barop, Middendorf, and old Langethal, as well as the sub-teachers Bagge, Budstedt, and Schaffner, had followed them in our education, and succeeded in applying many of those which seemed the most difficult to carry into execution.  This filled me with sincere admiration, though I soon perceived that it could have been done only by men in whom Froebel had transplanted his ideal, men who were no less enthusiastic concerning their profession than he, and whose personality predestined them to solve successfully tasks which presented difficulties almost unconquerable by others.

Every boy was to be educated according to his peculiar temperament, with special regard to his disposition, talents, and character.  Although there were sixty of us, this was actually done in the case of each individual.

Thus the teachers perceived that the endowments of my brother, with whom I had hitherto shared everything, required a totally different system of education from mine.  While I was set to studying Greek, he was released from it and assigned to modern languages and the arts and sciences.  They considered me better suited for a life of study, him qualified for some practical calling or a military career.

Even in the tasks allotted to each, and the opinions passed upon our physical and mental achievements, there never was any fixed standard.  These teachers always kept in view the whole individual, and especially his character.  Thereby the parents of a Keilhau pupil were far better informed in many respects than those of our gymnasiasts, who so often yield to the temptation of estimating their sons’ work by the greater or less number of errors in their Latin exercises.