The Life and Works of Christopher Dock/1 Introduction

by Martin G. Brumbaugh

INTRODUCTION

Twenty-five years ago the name of Christopher Dock, the pious schoolmaster on the Skippack, was unknown to the reading world, and the light of local fame, extending from Germantown to Goshenhoppen, which in the eighteenth century gave a genial glow to his life, had faded to an almost imperceptible ember. To-day it is no exaggeration to say that any treatise upon pedagogy which should omit recognition of his important labors would be regarded as a failure, and his reputation as a leader in educational development in America is universally recognized.

Many learned authors have vied with each other in doing homage to the memory of one so worthy. To have written the earliest American book upon the subject of school teaching is a fact sufficient in itself sooner or later to attract the attention of men of letters, but that fact is much emphasized when the study of his essay discloses that he was far in advance of his time and that in his methods of teaching and of enforcing discipline he forecast what more recent experience has proven to be correct.

Moreover, he was virtuous in life, sweet in disposition and lovable in character, so that when the simple people who surrounded him, grown to maturity, sought to impress upon their children an example of modest merit, they ever recurred to the conduct of the pious Schoolmaster.

Recently the Mennonites of Pennsylvania have been introduced into modern literature in a romance, the motive of which is an effort to show their disregard for learning. It is rather remarkable that the dawn of our science of pedagogy and the most extensive literary production of the American colonies were both due to the efforts of these interesting people. Dr. Martin G. Brumbaugh, the able Superintendent of the public schools of Philadelphia, has assumed the congenial task of gathering into this volume all of the works of Dock, in order that they may have a wider circulation among the reading public. It is fortunate for the future fame of the venerable Schoolmaster that his accomplishment has been appreciated by one so entirely capable of doing him justice and whose industry has left no source of information uninvestigated.