and sentiments, this carefully
selected _historical series_ of studies has been chosen as the basis
for a concentration of all the studies of the school course. Ziller,
as a disciple of Herbart, was the first to lay out a course of study
for the common school with history materials as a central series, based
upon the idea of the culture epochs. Since religious instruction drawn
from the Old and New Testament has always been an important study in
German schools, he established a double historical series. The first
was scriptural, representing the chief epochs of Jewish and Christian
history from the time of Abraham to the Reformation; the second was
national German history from the early traditional stories of Thuringia
and the Saxon kings down to the Napoleonic wars and the entry of
Emperor William into Paris in 1871. It should be remarked that in the
first and second grade religious instruction does not appear in regular
form, but in devotional exercises, Christmas stories, etc. Fairy
stories and Robinson Crusoe are the chief materials used in the first
and second grades, so that the regular historical series begin in the
third.

The two lines of religious and secular history are designed to
illustrate for each grade corresponding epochs of national history,
both Jewish and German. The parallel series stand as follows:

Religious. Secular.

1st Grade. Fairytales.

2nd Grade. Robinson Crusoe.

3d Grade. The patriarchs, Stories of Thuringia.
Abraham, Joseph, Moses.

4th Grade. Judges and Kings. The Nibelungen Song,
Samuel, Saul, David, Siegfried.
Solomon.

5th Grade. Life of Christ. Henry I., Charlemagne,
Boniface, Armenius.

6th Grade. Life of Christ. Teutonic migrations,
Crusades, Attila, Barbarossa,
Rudolph.

7th Grade. Life of Paul. Discovery of America,
Reformation, Thirty Years'
War.

8th Grade. Life of Luther. Frederick the Great, Wars
against Napoleon, William I.

The above outline is Ziller's plan, modified by Professor Rein.

In each grade is selected a body o