It has been suggested that the literary intercourse of France, England, and Germany was far closer in the eighteenth century than it is to-day, in spite of the immense mechanical development of communication in the interval. National self-consciousness and the divergent growth of national minds have, it is urged, raised a barrier between peoples, which existed in the last century to a far smaller degree. [1] This question of literary history lies beyond my subject; but at least it seems probable that Rousseau had a power in Germany which no French writer of to-day could possibly exercise outside his own country. His educational influence [2] alone forms a considerable chapter in the history of _Pädagogik_, and touches closely on philosophy. Our psychologists of childhood are his spiritual descendants, and indeed the question of the development of the human being is closely akin to the question of liberty. [1] See M. Lévy-Bruhl, “De l’Influence de Jean Jacques Rousseau en Allemagne,” _Annales de l’École libre des Sciences Politiques_, Juillet, 1897. [2] Cf. _Kant et Fichte et la Problême de l’Education_, Duproix, Alcan., 1897; and on Rousseau’s varied initiative, see Amiel, _Journal Intime_ E. tr. I. 202, “J.J. Rousseau is an ancestor in all things. It was he who founded travelling on foot before Töpffer, reverie before René, literary botany before George Sand, the worship of nature before Bernardin de St. Pierre, the democratic theory before the Revolution of 1797, political discussion and theological discussion before Mirabeau and Rénan, the science of teaching before Pestalozzi, and Alpine description before De Saussure.”