He was thus, in a sense, the combined product of the philosophy of Comenius and the zeal of Pestalozzi, although working along lines carefully marked out by himself. It does not detract from the fame of Fröbel to say that most of the root-ideas of his kindergarten are to be found in the _School of infancy_. Mr. Bowen, who has given us one of the best expositions[49] of Fröbel’s ideas, pays a just tribute of the obligation of his master to the writings of Pestalozzi and Comenius. He says: “With all his enthusiasm for education and his desire to found it on a scientific basis, Comenius had but little scientific knowledge of child-nature, and troubled himself not at all to acquire it. He constantly insisted, it is true, upon the exercise of the senses, and an education in accordance with nature; but his exercise of the senses soon reduced itself, in the main, to the use of pictures, with a view to a readier and more intelligent acquirement of language; and, even in his _ergastula literaria_, or literary workshop, the manual and other work introduced was intended to aid poor children in partly getting their own living while at school, rather than to exercise faculty; while his ‘nature’ was as quaint and conventional as that in a pre-Raphaelite picture. _None the less, however, Comenius was the true founder of educational method._” There is entire agreement in a few of the most fundamental aims of the two reformers. Comenius, no less than Fröbel, preached the gospel of self-activity, and demanded that play be given important consideration in the training of the child. What Comenius says on these subjects has already been given in the exposition of the _School of infancy_. In his _Education of man_,[50] Fröbel says: “Play is the purest, most spiritual activity of the child at this period; and, at the same time, typical of human life as a whole—of the hidden natural life in man and all things. It gives, therefore, joy, freedom, contentment, inner and outer rest, peace with the world. A child that plays thoroughly, with self-active determination, perseveringly, until physical fatigue forbids, will surely be a thorough, determined man, capable of self-sacrifice for the promotion of the welfare of himself and others. Is not the most beautiful expression of child-life at this time a playing child?—a child wholly absorbed in his play?—a child that has fallen asleep while so absorbed?... The plays of the child contain the germ of the whole life that is to follow; for the man develops and manifests himself in play, and reveals the noblest aptitudes and the deepest elements of his being.”