Kardec, Allen (ps. of Denizard Hyppolyte Léon Rivail), * 3 Jan 1804 (Lyons), † 31 Mar 1869 (Paris)

Léon Rivail was born at 76 Rue Sala in Lyons. His father, a jurist in that city, sent him to study, from the age of ten, in Yverdon (Switzerland), in one of the most famous institutions of the era, directed by Rousseau's disciple Jean Henri Pestalozzi. Pestalozzi put the pedagogy of Emile into practice and offered his pupils, who came from every country in Europe, an original method that he called “mutual instruction”. The older children taught the younger; mutual a…