several other
works of a similar kind, as the _Eruditionis scholasticae janua_ and the
_Janua linguarum trilinguis_. His method of teaching languages, which he
seems to have been the first to adopt, consisted in giving, in parallel
columns, sentences conveying useful information, in the vernacular and
the languages intended to be taught (i.e. in Comenius's works, Latin and
sometimes Greek). In some of his books, as the _Orbis sensualium pictus_
(1658), pictures are added; this work is, indeed, the first children's
picture-book. In 1638 Comenius was requested by the government of Sweden
to draw up a scheme for the management of the schools of that country;
and a few years after he was invited to join the commission that the
English parliament then intended to appoint, in order to reform the
system of education. He visited England in 1641, but the disturbed state
of politics prevented the appointment of the commission, and Comenius
passed over to Sweden in August 1642. The great Swedish minister,
Oxenstjerna, obtained for him a pension, and a commission to furnish a
plan for regulating the Swedish schools according to his own method.
Devoting himself to the elaboration of his scheme, Comenius settled
first at Elbing, and then at Lissa; but, at the burning of the latter
city by the Poles, he lost nearly all his manuscripts, and he finally
removed to Amsterdam, where he died in 1671.

As an educationist, Comenius holds a prominent place in history. He was
disgusted at the pedantic teaching of his own day, and he insisted that
the teaching of words and things must go together. Languages should be
taught, like the mother tongue, by conversation on ordinary topics;
pictures, object lessons, should be used; teaching should go hand in
hand with a happy life. In his course he included singing, economy,
politics, world-history, geography, and the arts and handicrafts. He was
one of the first to advocate teaching science in schools.

As a theologian, Comenius was greatly influenced by Boehme. In his
_Synopsis physicae ad lumen divinum reformatae_ he gives a physical
theory of his own, said to be taken from the book of Genesis. He was
also famous for his prophecies and the support he gave to visionaries.
In his _Lux in tenebris_ he published the visions of Kotterus, Dabricius
and Christina Poniatovia. Attempting to interpret the book of
Revelation, he promised the millennium in 1672, and guaranteed
miraculous assistance to those w