A system of instruction through monitors, developed by Lancaster and Bell, while formal and mechanical, furnished a sort of substitute for national education in England, and, spreading throughout the United States, paved the way for state support, and greatly improved the methods of teaching. ‘Infant schools’ for poor children also grew up during the nineteenth century in France, England, and the United States, and found a permanent place in the national systems, but they soon became formalized and mechanical. Philanthropic education proved a first step toward universal and national education. [Sidenote: Even in Rousseau and the philanthropinists,] [Sidenote: and especially in England.] =Reconstructive Tendencies of the Eighteenth Century.=--The eighteenth century cannot be regarded altogether as a period of revolution and destruction. While such a characterization describes the prevailing tendencies, there were also social and educational forces that looked to evolution and reform rather than to a complete disintegration of society and a return to primitive living. Even in Rousseau, the arch-destroyer of traditions, we found many evidences of a reconstruction along higher lines, and such a positive movement was decidedly obvious in Basedow, Salzmann, and other philanthropinists. But in England reforms were especially apparent. In the land of the Briton, progress is proverbially gradual, and sweeping victories and Waterloo defeats in affairs of society and education are alike unwonted. The French tendency to cut short the social and educational process and to substitute revolution for evolution is out of accord with the spirit across the English Channel. [Sidenote: Wretched conditions of laboring class.] [Sidenote: Charity schools as remedy.]