# Preface Cast on this globe, without physical powers, and without innate ideas; unable by himself to obey the constitutional laws of his organization, which call him to the first rank in the system of being; Max can find only in the bosom of society the eminent station that was destined for him in nature and would be, without the aid of civilization, one of the most feeble and least intelligent of animals; — a truth which, although it has often been insisted upon, has not as yet been rigorously demonstrated. Those philosophers who have laid down the principles upon which it is founded; those who have afterward supported and propagated it, have given, as proof of it, the physical and moral state of some wandering tribes, whom they have regarded as not civilized at all, merely because they were not civilized in our particular manner: to these they had recourse, to become acquainted with the features of the man in the pure state of nature. It is not, however, in these circumstances that we are to seek and study it. In the savage horde of the most vagabond, as well as in the most civilized nations of Europe, man is only what he is made to be by his external circumstances; lie is necessarily elevated by his equals; he contracts from them his habits and his wants; his ideas are no longer his own; he enjoys, from the enviable prerogative of his species, a capacity of developing his understanding by the power of imitation, and the influence of society. We ought, then, to seek elsewhere the model of a man truly savage, of him who owes nothing to his equals, and to form our opinion of him from the particular histories of a few individuals, who, during the seventeenth century, and at the beginning of the eighteenth, have been found, at different intervals, living in a state of solitude among the woods, where they had been abandoned at the most tender age \*. > \* Linnaeus makes the number amount to ten and exhibits them as forming a variety of the human species. (*Système de la Nature.*) But such was at these times the tardy progress of science, the students of which were devoted to theory and uncertain hypothesis, and to the exclusive labor of the closet, that actual observation was reckoned of no value; these interesting facts tended little towards improving the natural history of man. Everything that has been left of them by contemporary authors, is confined to some insignificant details, the most striking and general result of which is, that these individuals were not susceptible of any decidedly marked improvement; evidently for this reason, because to them was applied, without the slightest regard to the difference of their organs, the ordinary system of education. If this mode of instruction proved completely successful with the savage girl found in France towards the beginning of the last century, the reason is, that, having lived in the woods with a companion, she was indebted already to this simple association for a certain development of her intellectual faculties. This was, in fact, an education such as Condillac \* speaks of, when he supposes two children abandoned in profound solitude, in whose case the sole influence of their cohabitation must give scope to the exercise of their memory and their imagination, and induce them to create a small number of artificial signs. > \* Essai sur l’origine des connaissances humaines, 2e partie, Sect. 1re. It is an ingenious supposition; which is amply justified by the history of this same girl, whose memory was so far developed as to retrace various circumstances of her residence in the woods, and in the most minute manner, especially the violent death of her female companion \*. > \* This girl was caught in the year 173 ! in the environs of Chalons-sur-Marne, and educated in a convent, under the name of *Mademoiselle Leblanc*. She related, as soon as she was able to speak, that she had lived in the woods with a companion, and that she had unfortunately killed her by a violent. Now on the head one day, when, upon finding a chaplet under their feet, they disputed about the exclusive possession of it. > > *Racine Poeme de Religion.* Deprived of these advantages, the rest of the children found in a state of individual insulation, brought into society faculties. This history, although it is very circumstantial, is nevertheless so ill-told, that if one were to deduce from it, in the first place, what is insignificant, and, in the next, what is incredible, it presents only a tiny number of particulars deserving notice; the most remarkable of which is the faculty which this young savage possessed, of recalling to her memory the circumstances of her previous condition that were completely insusceptible, which must baffle, supposing that they were directed towards their education, all the united efforts of a moral philosophy scarcely in its infancy, still untrammeled with the prejudice of innate ideas, and by theories of medicine, the views of which, being necessarily contracted by a doctrine altogether mechanical, could not rise to philosophical reflections regarding the maladies of the understanding. Assisted by the light of analysis, and lending to each other mutual support, these two sciences have in our days gotten rid of their old errors and made immense progress towards perfection. On this account we have reason to hope, that, if ever a similar individual is presented to those of whom we have been speaking, they would *employ, to produce his physical and moral development, all the resources to be derived from their actual knowledge:* or, at least, if this application proved impossible or fruitless, there would be found in this age of observation someone individual, who, carefully *collecting the history of a being so astonishing, would ascertain what he is, and would infer, from what is wanting to him, the sum, as yet not calculated, of that knowledge and of those ideas for which man is indebted to his education.* Maybe I dare to confess that it is my intention to accomplish both of these important objects? But let me not be asked if I have already been successful in the execution of my design. This would be a question very premature, to which I shall not be able to answer for a considerable time to come. Nevertheless, I should have waited for it in silence, without wishing to occupy the public with an account of my labors, if it had not been as much my desire as it was my duty to prove, by the success of my first experiments, that the child on whom I have made them is not, as is generally believed, a hopeless idiot, but a being fascinating, who deserves, in every perspective, the attention of observers, and the assiduities which are devoted to him by an enlightened and philanthropic administration. > **The Exile of Kotzebue into Siberia.** > > Just Published by R. Phillips, 71, St. Paul’s Church Yard, > > In three handsome Volumes, small 8vo. price 15s. in Boards > > embellished with Engravings, arid with a fine Portrait of > > the Author, drawn from Life, purposely for this > > Translation, > > **The** > > **Most Remarkable Year** > > **in the** > > **Life of August von Kotzebue.** > > Contains a full Account of his late Exile and Journey into Siberia, and of the other extraordinary Incident, which happened to him in Russia; with authentic Particulars relative to the present State of the Interior of the Russian Empire, and new and curious Anecdotes of the Court of Petersburg. > > Written by himself. > > Translated from the German, under the Superintendence of the Author, by > > The Rev. B. Beresford, > > English Lecturer to the Queen of Prussia. > > This Work may be pronounced the most interesting account of extraordinary personal adventures which has appeared for many years. It moreover contains a considerable number of secret and *authentic* anecdotes, connected with the Court of Russia, and with public events, in which the Author took a part, and it may be presumed that a narration of such incidents by such a pen as that of Kotzebue gives the publication an extraordinary claim upon the public curiosity. > This eBook is available to everyone wherever they are for free and with almost no restrictions. may be distributed or reused under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License that accompanies this eBook or online at [www.projectgutenberg.com](http://www.projectgutenberg.com/). [www.gutenberg.org](http://www.gutenberg.org/) > > Topic: About the upbringing of the barbarians or the first physical and moral development of the barbarians of Aveyron.\ > Author: Jean Itard\ > Date: 3 April 2007 \[EBook #20966\]\ > English > > Produced by Andrew Ward, Laurent Vogel, and the Feral Children website at [http://www.feralchildren.com](http://www.feralchildren.com).\ > (This book is based on photographs provided by the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF/Gallica) at [http://gallica.bnf.fr](http://gallica.bnf.fr))) > License of this page:\ > This page is part of “Montessori Restoration and Translation Project”\ > Please support the initiative. With our "All-Inclusive Montessori Education for All 0-100+ Worldwide" we create an open, free and affordable resource for anyone interested in Montessori Education. 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You may copy, redistribute or reuse it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License accompanying this eBook or online at [www.projectgutenberg.com](http://www.projectgutenberg.com/). [www.gutenberg.org](http://www.gutenberg.org/) If you are not in the United States You will need to check the laws of the country in which you reside before using this ebook. > > Read this book in… > > Project Gutenberg > > [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/0966](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/0966) > > [Archive.org](http://archive.org/) > > \[[https://archive.org/search.php?query=De](https://archive.org/search.php?query=De) l'éducation d'un homme sauvage Itard\]([https://archive.org/search.php?query=De](https://archive.org/search.php?query=De) l'éducation d'un homme sauvage Itard) **Chapters of the Fulltext Version** * [Chapter 0 - Preface](https://montessori-international.com/s/de-leducation-dun-homme-sauvage/wiki/Chapter+0+-+Preface) * [Chapter 1 - The First Developments of the Young Savage of Aveyron](https://montessori-international.com/s/de-leducation-dun-homme-sauvage/wiki/Chapter+1+-+The+First+Developments+of+the+Young+Savage+of+Aveyron)