Utrecht in 1771.

The nature of our intellect is such that _ideas_ are said to spring by
abstraction from _observations_, so that the latter are in existence
before the former. If this is really what takes place, as is the case
with a man who has merely his own experience as his teacher and book, he
knows quite well which of his observations belong to and are represented
by each of his ideas; he is perfectly acquainted with both, and
accordingly he treats everything correctly that comes before his notice.
We might call this the natural mode of education.

On the other hand, an artificial education is having one's head crammed
full of ideas, derived from hearing others talk, from learning and
reading, before one has anything like an extensive knowledge of the
world as it is and as one sees it. The observations which produce all
these ideas are said to come later on with experience; but until then
these ideas are applied wrongly, and accordingly both things and men are
judged wrongly, seen wrongly, and treated wrongly. And so it is that
education perverts the mind; and this is why, after a long spell of
learning and reading, we enter the world, in our youth, with views that
are partly simple, partly perverted; consequently we comport ourselves
with an air of anxiety at one time, at another of presumption. This is
because our head is full of ideas which we are now trying to make use
of, but almost always apply wrongly. This is the result of ὑστερον
προτερον (putting the cart before the horse), since we are directly
opposing the natural development of our mind by obtaining ideas first
and observations last; for teachers, instead of developing in a boy his
faculties of discernment and judgment, and of thinking for himself,
merely strive to stuff his head full of other people's thoughts.
Subsequently, all the opinions that have sprung from misapplied ideas