Augustine, like a great artist, had worked from
multiplicity to unity, while he, like a small one, had to reverse
the method and work back from unity to multiplicity. The scheme
became unmanageable as he approached his end.
Probably he was, in fact, trying only to work into it his
favorite theory of history, which now fills the last three or
four chapters of the "Education," and he could not satisfy
himself with his workmanship. At all events, he was still
pondering over the problem in 1910, when he tried to deal with it
in another way which might be more intelligible to students. He
printed a small volume called "A Letter to American Teachers,"
which he sent to his associates in the American Historical
Association, hoping to provoke some response. Before he could
satisfy himself even on this minor point, a severe illness in the
spring of 1912 put an end to his literary activity forever.
The matter soon passed beyond his control. In 1913 the
Institute of Architects published the "Mont-Saint-Michel and
Chartres." Already the "Education" had become almost as well
known as the "Chartres," and was freely quoted by every book
whose author requested it. The author could no longer withdraw
either volume; he could no longer rewrite either, and he could
not publish that which he thought unprepared and unfinished,
although in his opinion the other was historically purposeless
without its sequel.
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