Gen. ii. 19, 20.

The Lord God brought unto Adam every Beast of the Field, and every Fowl of the Air, to see what he would call them. And Adam gave Names to all Cattle, and to the Fowl of the Air, and to every Beast of the Field.

Gen. ii. 19, 20.

Adduxit Dominus Deus ad Adam cuncta Animantia Terræ, & universa volatilia Cœli, ut videret quomodo vocaret illa. Appellavitque Adam Nominibus suis cuncta Animantia, & universa volatilia Cœli, & omnes Bestias Agri.

I. A. Comenii opera Didactica par. 1. p. 6, Amst. 1657. fol.

Didacticæ nostræ prora & puppis esto: Investigare, & invenire modum, quo Docentes minus doceant, Discentes vero plus discant: Scholæ minus habeant Strepitus, nauseæ, vani laboris; plus autem otii, deliciarum, solidique profectus: Respublica Christiana minus tenebrarum confusionis dissidiorum; plus lucis, ordinis, pacis & tranquilitatis.

The Author’s Preface to the Reader.

Instruction is the means to expel Rudeness, with which young wits ought to be well furnished in Schools: But so, as that the teaching be 1. True, 2. Full, 3. Clear, and 4. Solid.

1. It will be true, if nothing be taught but such as is beneficial to ones life; lest there be a cause of complaining afterwards. We know not necessary things, because we have not learned things necessary.

2. It will be full, if the mind be polished for wisdom, the tongue for eloquence, and the hands for a neat way of living. This will be that grace of one’s life, to be wise, to act, to speak.

3, 4. It will be clear, and by that, firm and solid, if whatever is taught and learned, be not obscure, or confused, but apparent, distinct, and articulate, as the fingers on the hands.

The ground of this business, is, that sensual objects may be rightly presented to the senses, for fear they may not be received. I say, and say it again aloud, that this last is the foundation of all the rest: because we can neither act nor speak wisely, unless we first rightly understand all the things which are to be done, and whereof we are to speak. Now there is nothing in the understanding, which was not before in the sense. And therefore to exercise the senses well about the right perceiving the differences of things, will be to lay the grounds for all wisdom, and all wise discourse, and all discreet actions in ones course of life. Which, because it is commonly neglected in schools, and the things which are to be learned are offered to scholars, without being understood or being rightly presented to the senses, it cometh to pass, that the work of teaching and learning goeth heavily onward, and affordeth little benefit.

See here then a new help for schools, A Picture and Nomenclature of all the chief things in the world, and of men’s actions in their way of living: Which, that you, good Masters, may not be loath to run over with your scholars, I will tell you, in short, what good you may expect from it.

It is a little Book, as you see, of no great bulk, yet a brief of the whole world, and a whole language: full of Pictures, Nomenclatures, and Descriptions of things.

I. The Pictures are the representation of all visible things, (to which also things invisible are reduced after their fashion) of the whole world. And that in that very order of things, in which they are described in the Janua Latinæ Linguæ; and with that fulness, that nothing very necessary or of great concernment is omitted.

II. The Nomenclatures are the Inscriptions, or Titles set every one over their own Pictures, expressing the whole thing by its own general term.

III. The Descriptions are the explications of the parts of the Picture, so expressed by their own proper terms, as that same figure which is added to every piece of the picture, and the term of it, always sheweth what things belongeth one to another.

Which such Book, and in such a dress may (I hope) serve,

I. To entice witty children to it, that they may not conceit a torment to be in the school, but dainty fare. For it is apparent, that children (even from their infancy almost) are delighted with Pictures, and willingly please their eyes with these lights: And it will be very well worth the pains to have once brought it to pass, that scare-crows may be taken away out of Wisdom’s Gardens.

II. This same little Book will serve to stir up the Attention, which is to be fastened upon things, and even to be sharpened more and more: which is also a great matter. For the Senses (being the main guides of childhood, because therein the mind doth not as yet raise up itself to an abstracted contemplation of things) evermore seek their own objects, and if they be away, they grow dull, and wry themselves hither and thither out of a weariness of themselves: but when their objects are present, they grow merry, wax lively, and willingly suffer themselves to be fastened upon them, till the thing be sufficiently discerned. This Book then will do a good piece of service in taking (especially flickering) wits, and preparing them for deeper studies.

III. Whence a third good will follow; that children being won hereunto, and drawn over with this way of heeding, may be furnished with the knowledge of the prime things that are in the world, by sport and merry pastime. In a word, this Book will serve for the more pleasing using of the Vestibulum and Janua Linguarum, for which end it was even at the first chiefly intended. Yet if it like any, that it be bound up in their native tongues also, it promiseth three good thing of itself.

I. First it will afford a device for learning to read more easily than hitherto, especially having a symbolical alphabet set before it, to wit, the characters of the several letters, with the image of that creature, whose voice that letter goeth about to imitate, pictur’d by it. For the young Abc scholar will easily remember the force of every character by the very looking upon the creature, till the imagination being strengthened by use, can readily afford all things; and then having looked over a table of the chief syllables also (which yet was not thought necessary to be added to this book) he may proceed to the viewing of the Pictures, and the