The ancient Sorbonne came to an end, as a matter of course, at the epoch of the Revolution. It was suppressed as soon as the Revolutionists had time to attend to it, in 1790. If the Sorbonne was greatly indebted to the minister of Louis XIII., it had again to thank a Richelieu for new life and new fame when, in 1821, the minister of Louis XVIII. made it the head and centre of teaching throughout France. At the same time a body of electors was appointed who represented, not the scholasticism and theology of the middle ages, but modern literature and modern science. Among those named in 1821, the year of the Sorbonne’s resuscitation, may be mentioned Biot, Poisson, Gay-Lussac, Thénard, Haüy, Brogniart, and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, who were to be followed by such men as Dumas (the celebrated chemist), Bulart, Dulong, Pouillet, Milne-Edwards, and Leverrier. Nor must the names of Guizot, Victor Cousin, Saint-Marc Girardin, Jules Simon, and Nisard be omitted from the list of those writers and professors who have given even greater reputation to the Sorbonne in the present day than it enjoyed of old. The Sorbonne, however, of history, the Sorbonne associated with severe theology and with still severer theological persecution, perished beneath the first blows of the Revolution; thus verifying a prophecy put forth when Richelieu, while reconstructing its walls, seemed disposed to modernise its spirit —
Instaurata ruet jamjam Sorbona. Caduca
Dum fuit, inconcussa stetit, renovata peribit.
“If,” wrote Mercier at the end of the eighteenth century, “the Académie Française is the seat of literary despotism, the Sorbonne may be called the throne of ignorance, superstition, and folly. This foundation is the work of an obscure priest, whose name it retained, though it was afterwards enlarged, beautified, and amply endowed by Cardinal Richelieu, who, as we have had occasion to mention in the foregoing description, never formed an establishment which did not tend in some measure to support his favourite plan of carrying arbitrary power beyond all bounds. Whilst his politics made slaves of the subjects, he supported this kind of spiritual inquisition in order to enthral their very minds. The Sorbonne was consulted on all occasions, and the decree of a few ignorant divines respected as the oracle of the Deity himself.”
CHAPTER XI.
THE INSTITUTE
THE Institute – immediately facing the wayfarer who crosses by the Bridge of Arts from the right bank to the left – is, says M. Renan, who was himself a member of it, “one of the most glorious creations of the Revolution, and a thing quite peculiar to France. Many countries have academies which may rival our own by the distinction of the persons composing them, and by the importance of their labours; France alone possesses an Institute in which all the efforts of the human mind are bound together as in a sheaf; where the philosopher, the historian, the philologer, the critic, the mathematician, the physicist, the astronomer, the analyst, the economist, the jurisconsult, the sculptor, the painter, the musician, may call one another colleagues.” The simple and great men who conceived the design of this absolutely new establishment were preoccupied by two thoughts: the first, admirably true, that all the productions of the human mind have something in common and are interdependent; the second, more open to criticism, but connected in any case with all that is deepest in the French mind, that science, literature, and art are state affairs, recognisable in corporate form, which the country is bound to protect, encourage, and reward. On the last day but one of the Convention, October 25th, 1795, appeared the law destined to realise this idea, so prolific of great things. The object of the Institute was the progress of science; the general utility and glory of the Republic. Every year it renders an account to the legislative body of the progress accomplished. It has its budget, its collections, its prizes. It sends out scientific missions at its own expense. To form the nucleus of the institution forty-eight persons were named, a third of the whole number of members, the remaining two-thirds to be nominated by the original members. The three men to whom, in particular, this project was due, were Lakanal, Dainon, and Carnot. Unhappily France was at that time in the condition of a patient who is just recovering from an attack of fever. Entire branches of human culture seemed to have disappeared; the moral, political, and philosophical sciences were at the lowest level. Literature scarcely existed. The historical and philological sciences counted scarcely more than one man of eminence, Silvestre de Sacy. On the other hand the physical and mathematical sciences were at one of their highest states of development. The division of the institute into classes and sections was affected by this condition of things. There were originally three classes; one answered precisely to the Academy of Sciences as it now exists, and contained nearly the same sections; the second was called the class of moral and political science; the third represented Literature and the Fine Arts. It embraced what is now known as the French Academy, the Academy of Fine Arts, and the greater part of the Academy of Inscriptions. The principal error of this division was that it took no count of historical science. To tell the truth, the mistake was excusable, since the science in question had then scarcely come into existence in France. Historical science presupposes long traditions, together with a refined and, up to a certain point, aristocratic society. Philosophy, on the other hand, cannot be made to order, and defies classification. Something rather scholastic, savouring of the pedagogue, presided over this primitive distribution. The second class had a section called “Analysis of sensations and ideas.” Six persons were constantly occupied with this difficult labour. The third class comprised eight sections, which were entitled: “Grammar, Ancient Languages, Poetry, Antiquities and Monuments, Painting and Sculpture, Architecture, Music, and Declamation.”
This organisation lasted six years; to be subsequently modified by various regulations. In 1816, immediately after the Restoration, a serious blow was struck at the Institute, whose revolutionary origin was not forgotten. The First Consul had suppressed the class of moral and political sciences, without depriving of their titles those who had belonged to these classes. The case was not the same in 1816, when twenty-two persons, with the painter David, the Bishop Grégoire, Monge, Carnot, Lakanel, and Sieyès, were deprived of a title on which they themselves conferred honour. On the other hand seventeen persons received, by royal edict, a title which has no value except when it is conferred on a man of letters or of science by the free suffrage of his peers.
Under Louis XVIII. and Charles X. science was held as of no account, and the academy which represented historical studies was invaded by gentlemen of the chamber, who had neither literary nor scientific claims. The Duke of Berry, the Duke of Angoulême, everyone connected with the royal family or with the court could be admitted to the honours of the Institute. M. Renan declares that there were candidates so degraded as to wish to become members of the Institute simply that they might wear an embroidered uniform and carry a sword.
The Revolution of 1830 brought better days, though the Legitimist party, defeated in the public street, had still the majority in all the academies. Gradually the slightly-educated men of modern fashion and ancient birth – “benè nati, benè vestiti, moderatè docti,” as used to be said at All Saints, were eliminated, or rather were allowed to disappear in the ordinary course of nature without being replaced.
Such as it now exists, “the Institute,” says M. Renan, “is one of the essential elements of intellectual labour in France, controlled as it is by three powers, neither of which can be allowed to reign absolutely – the government, the academies, and the public. These three great patrons are not always of one mind, and the divisions between them afford the necessary guarantee of liberty for thinkers, writers, and inventors. Constituted into irresponsible senates, the academies would often show themselves narrow, egotistical, and self-willed. The government, possessing means of action superior to any the academies can possess, corrects at need their unjust exclusiveness; while the public, with the crown of glory it holds in its hand, can always console those who, in spite of everything, are kept out. Alone privileged to decide in intellectual questions, the government would often be too much influenced by personal considerations. But the academies bring it back to a healthy appreciation of the men themselves, while the control exercised by the public prevents it from yielding everything to court favour or party interests. The public is often a bad judge; it is incapable of appreciating certain scientific merits. The government and the academics can enable scientific men to dispense with public encouragement in order to pursue those special