3/6 THE LATEST REFORM IN THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS. 



research, the ColUge de France^ had gradually degenerated into 

 an athenaeum, pretty well analogous w.th the Sorbonne jacultis. 

 Of the ecoles, some resembled externally the Colleges of the old 

 French and foreign universities (say Oxford and Cambridge), so 

 far as to have resident students, and consequently halls, refec- 

 tories, dormitories and gardens. The ecole normale superieure 

 and the 6cole polytechnique were examples of this class. Others 

 again were open to all and everybody, without even any condition 

 of lawful matriculation, like the College de France and the Sor- 

 bonne, which latter had formerly been the College de Sorbonne. 

 All these oddities and many more could be explained and even 

 justified from an historical point of view, but in practical life they 

 entailed a host of vexatious and undesirable consequences, among 

 which a general incoherence, segregation, double chairs and 

 others were unpleasantly prominent. Besides, these institutions, 

 which had been made illustrious through the services rendered 

 by great men that had once belonged to them, were, without any 

 exception, placed under the guardianship of the State. The 

 State duly provided for the upkeep of all the establishments of 

 higher education ; but there is no denying, that the State financed 

 them on principles of strict parsimony and presided over them 

 directly and without control. However, this chaotic and unsatis- 

 factory state of affairs was to come to a close, a few years after 

 the disastrous Franco-German war of 1870. 



In 187s a remarkable movement was set on foot. As a piece 

 of good luck, certain men of high public spirit, inspired with an 

 enthusiastic zeal for the general good, and keenly alive to the 

 highly important part that science has to play in modern society, 

 had been elected about that time to the high and responsible 

 posts of Minister of Public Education, or Director of Higher 

 Education in France. Now it happened, that in 1875, the then 

 Higher Education of the State had to endure the brunt of a severe 

 attack from the clerical party ; the Church venturing in that year 

 upon an attempt at competition, by creating Roman Catholic 

 Universities. In this serious emergency, the secular representa- 

 tives and champions of the State, on communing with themselves, 

 had to acknowledge, that the general condition of public higher 

 education was appallingly open to criticism. They now became 

 aware, that the traditional organization was utterlv unsatisfac- 

 tory, and on the spur of the moment some of the Ministers of 

 Education under the third Republic, firmly resolved to take the 

 matter in hand with a view to serious improvement. They started 

 with an unflinching purpose of stirring up and increasing scien- 

 tific activity everywhere, and at the same time with the intimate 

 conviction that the reform was to be best accomplished by properly 

 arranging and grouping the scattered forces into great teaching 

 bodies, to whom an appropriate material and moral autonomy was 

 to be granted. These great teaching bodies, well endowed and 

 adequately staffed, were to make it their task, to raise the old 

 French and international name of " University " to its pristine 

 honour and glory. Subsequently, the Ministers, Waddington, 

 Ferry, Bert, Goblet, Bourgeois, the Directors du Mesnil, Dumont 

 and Liard undertook to endow both " facult^s " and "6coles. " 



