convert the world?" was, "Call things by their right names." He refused
to use the word school, because "little children, especially those under
six, do not need to be schooled and taught, what they need is
opportunity for development." He had great difficulty in selecting a
name. Those originally suggested were somewhat cumbrous, e.g.
_Institution for the Promotion of Spontaneous Activity in Children_;
another was _Self-Teaching Institution_, and there was also the one
which Madame Michaelis translated "_Nursery School for Little
Children_."

But the name Kindergarten expressed just what he Wanted: "As in a
garden, under God's favour, and by the care of a skilled intelligent
gardener, growing plants are cultivated in accordance with Nature's
laws, so here in our child garden shall the noblest of all growing
things, men (that is, children), be cultivated in accordance with the
laws of their own being, of God and of Nature."

To one of his students he writes: "You remember well enough how hard we
worked and how we had to fight that we might elevate the Darmstadt
crèche, or rather Infant School, by improved methods and organisation
until it became a true Kindergarten.... Now what was the outcome of all
this, even during my own stay at Darmstadt? Why, the fetters which
always cripple a crèche or an Infant School, and which seem to cling
round its very name--these fetters were allowed to remain unbroken.
Every one was pleased with so faithful a mistress as yourself,... yet
they withheld from you the main condition of unimpeded development, that
of the freedom necessary to every young healthy and vigorous plant....
Is there really such importance underlying the mere name of a
system?--some one might ask. Yes, there is.... It is true that any one
watching your teaching would observe _a new spirit_ infused into it,