is the custom. The environment for teaching these languages is crafted in such a way (as has been previously mentioned) that the child finds it as conducive to learning as an infant does. There is no attempt to forcibly impose anything upon the mind. However, if it becomes apparent that the child has no interest in that direction, no pressure is applied. Upon entering the children’s class, the children are instructed in their daily routines.

As soon as we arrived in the children’s class, we were welcomed by both the teachers and the community of students. All the boys and girls stood in rows. Their attire consisted of shorts and a tunic. In winter, warm clothing to cover the head, as well as shoes and socks, are also provided. Each sub-class forms a small village of its own, where, in addition to the dining hall and assembly room, there is also a storeroom. Here too, there is a pool for swimming and bathing, and complete arrangements for gymnasiums and playgrounds. The building is three stories high. To ascend, there is an electric lift. Arrangements are made for reading, writing, lighting, and storing books. Upon waking from sleep, the children go for their morning ablutions at five o’clock. After bathing and other routines, the children have their morning meal. The four meal times set for the day are the same for the children’s class as well—unlike the infants’ class, where there are six. There is a separate school for instruction here. Benches are provided for seating.

Although, according to the rules, formal study begins in the children’s class, great care is taken to make the subjects interesting. At this time, the teaching of history is continued through books written in delightful language, through plays, and through bioscopes. The children themselves act in the plays. To satisfy their curiosity about science and astronomy, telescopes and laboratories are also utilized when there is eagerness. Practical instruction is emphasized in subjects like agriculture and cattle care, for which fields and cowsheds are provided. After completing the first two years in the children’s class, students are taught the universal language for two years. During this period, the subjects remain as before.

...continue in their mother tongues. Only the children reside in the Universal Hostel, where everyone speaks only that language.

What is this universal language? It is an even more refined form of Esperanto. The articles used in Esperanto have been omitted. Its entire grammar is encompassed in just fifteen rules. Gender, case, and suffixes have immutable rules, with no exceptions anywhere. For instance, there are only two numbers—singular and plural. There are three genders, but for all inanimate objects, only the neuter gender is used. All feminine words end with ‘a’, ‘i’, or ‘u’, and are used solely for living beings. Similarly, other vowel-ending words, when used for living beings, are masculine. For verb forms, there are directly four tenses: past, future, present, and imperative. Here too, there are only two numbers. The persons remain as they are. The selection of roots has been made very carefully. First, those roots which are common in Pali, Prakrit, Zend, and Sanskrit have been chosen. Now, by comparing these roots with those in Greek, Latin, Teutonic, Roman, Slav, and Celtic languages, those roots which are found in many languages have been selected. In the universal language, only words and verbs formed from these roots have been adopted.

Scientific terms that were already prevalent in European languages have been accepted as they are, only with suffixes added at the end according to their gender. In life, for national necessities or travel and so on, this language is greatly needed. Therefore, in the children’s classes, its instruction is almost compulsory in the ninth and tenth years. When I went to the Universal Hostel, I found all the children conversing in it. On that occasion, the ten-year-olds expressed their happiness at my arrival in this very language, many of whose words I had begun to understand. People told me that, since this language contains the essential seeds of almost all the mother tongues of the world’s inhabitants, it is easy for everyone. It is widely spread even in countries like China, Japan, Siam, Tibet, Burma, and so on.

X X X X X X In all regions of India, the Bharati language is now the mother tongue. Persian, spoken from Peshawar to Baghdad, also belongs to its family. The same is true of the languages of Europe, which are not only prevalent in Europe itself, but also in Africa, America, Australia, and other islands of the globe.

It has already been mentioned that the fundamental principle of today’s educational system is to assist the child’s natural, inquisitive intellect in achieving its desired goals. For this reason, after examination, the path of education is opened in the direction of the child’s innate interest. Two centuries of experience have shown that this is true education. The old method of forcibly hammering and molding children into physicians and scholars had caused many obstacles in various places. People of the olden times were indeed peculiar—especially those of the twentieth century. Just as parents, without considering the wishes and aims of their child, would bind a partner to his neck in childhood itself, so too would they decide that “my son will be a lawyer, my son will be a doctor,” and so on. The result was that, many times, the child found his studies not merely uninteresting, but more bitter than quinine pills, and no good ever came of it. But now, ordinary etiquette and useful knowledge of social conduct are acquired by children simply by observing and listening. And the pursuit of learning begins according to their inclination. Thus, children inclined toward mathematics and astronomy acquire in the children’s classroom as much knowledge as the M.A.s of the twentieth century did not possess in those subjects. In arithmetic, geometry, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, dynamics, and all branches of mathematics, they attain complete mastery. They