FRANCE
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FRANCE
them a few last years of existence. The bishops are
seeking to maintain primary Catholic education or to
reorganize it with secularized or lay teachers. In
some dioceses a movement is on foot for the acquisi-
tion of teaching diplomas by the seminarists. Already
in twenty-four dioceses there are diocesan organiza-
tions for free teaching — diocesan committees, com-
posed of ecclesiastics and laymen, which maintain a
strict control of all the private schools of their dioceses.
These measures have been imperatively demanded in
order to repair the losses sutTered by free primary
education, the number of pupils having fallen, accord-
ing to statistics compiled in 1907 byM. Keller, from
l,(iOO,()IM) I.I 1,000,000.
D< iniiiiiti'ilioiiid Secondary Education. — Statistics published liy the Education Commission {Commission d'Enseignemenl) show that, out of a total of 162,110 pupils in the secondary schools for the year 1898, 50,793 belonged to the b/cccs, 3.3,949 to the colleges, 9725 to private establishments taught by laymen, ancl ()7,643 to private establishments taught by ecclesias- tics. To these figures must be added 23,497 boys in the petits scminaires. Thus, in the aggregate, the State was giving primary education to 84,742 pupils; the Church to 91,140.
The fundamental law on secondary education is still the Falloux Law of 15 March, 1850. _ Any Frenchman over twenty-five years of age, having the degree of Bachelor or a special diploma of qualification (brevet de capacili) , may, after passing a term of five years in a teaching establishment, open a house of secondary education, subject to objections on moral or hygienic grounds, of which grounds the university councils are the judges. In contrast with the case of private pri- mary education. Catholic establishments of secondary education may be subsidized by the communes or the departments.
A first serious stroke at the liberty of secondary education was delivered by the Law of 7 July, 1904, depriving the congrcgnnistes of the right of teaching. Other projects, which the Government has alreatly induced the Senate to accept, are now pending, and these would exact much more rigorous conditions as to pedagogic qualifications on the part of Catholic second- ary teachers of either sex ; the (,'atholic establishments would be subject to a compulsory inspection, bearing, as in the case of primary education, upon the con- formity of the teaching with the Constitution and the law; the Government would reserve the right to close the establishment by decree. It may be foreseen that in the course of the year 1909 all or a part of these proposals will become law, and the effect will be dis- astrous, first, to Catholic girls' schools, where many of the teachers, whether laywomen or secularized con- greganistes, will not immediately be in possession of the requisite diplomas. Such schools will thus be placed at a further disadvantage in competition with the lycces, colleges, and courses for young women organized by the State under the Law of 21 December, 1880, numbering as many as 104, with 8300 pupils, in 1883, and in 190G numbering 171, with 32,500 pupils. Secondly, for the petits scminaires the results will be still more disastrous.
These institutions have hitherto existed under a particular statute, which it will be necessary here to consider. " Secondary ecclesiastical schools ' ', as the petits scminaires were then called, were made by the decrees of 9 April, 1809, and 15 November, 1811, de- pendent on the LTniversity. There was to be only one secondary ecclesiastical school in each department, and its course was to be that of the h/cee or college of the State. A warrant of Louis XVIII, dated 5 Octo- ber, 1814. allowed a second petit scminnire in each department subject to the authorization of the head (grand mattre) of the University of France ; it also gave permission for the.se institutions to be establi.shed in country districts, that the pvipils should be obliged to
assume the ecclesiastical habit after two years of
studies, and that the teachers should be directly de-
pendent on the bishops. The circular of 4 July, 1816,
forbade the petits si-minaires to receive externs, and
this prohibition was confirmed by the ordinance of
June, 1828, which limited the number of their pupils to
20,000. In this way the Government wished the
petits scminaires to be reserved exclusively for the
education of future priests, and to be kept from com-
peting with the University in any sense whatever, and
upon these conditions it exempted them from taxation
and from the control of the University, and granted
them the rights of legal personality. The Ordinance
of 1828 was never formally abrogated, but in practice,
since 1850, a certain number of petits siminaires, re-
taining certain privileges and immunities in considera-
tion of their special mission, have received pupils in
preparation not only for the priesthood, but also for a
great variety of careers.
Legislative projects, the passage of which is now immment, will be a source of at lea.st temporary em- barrassment to the petits scminaires, a certain number of which — those, namely, which were diocesan insti- tutions — have disappeared in consequence of the Law of Separation. Statistics show that m 1900 Catholic secondary education possessed 104 fewer colleges and 22,223 fewer pupils than in 1898, and that the num- ber of pupils in the petits scminaires had in eight years decreased by 8711.
Denominational Higher Education. — Until 1882 the State supported five faculties of theology: at Paris, Bordeaux, Aix, Rouen, and Lyons. These faculties had no regular pupils, but only attendants at the lectures delivered by their professors; the Church at- tached no canonical value to their degrees; the State did not make tho.se degrees a condition for any eccle- siastical appointment. The faculties themselves were suppressed liy the Ferry Ministry.
The Protestants still had two faculties of theology maintamed by the State: that of Paris, for Calvinists and Lutherans, and that of Montauban, for Calvinists exclusively. The Separation Law of 1905 left these two faculties to be supported by the Protestants, and once detached from the university organizations, they have become free theological schools.
The university monopoly, abolished as to primary education by the Law of 1833, and as to secondary education by the Law of 1850, was also abolished for higher education by the Law of 12 July, 1875, which permitted any Frenchman, subject to certain easy conditions, to create establishments of independent higher education. In the period between 1875 and 1907 the Institut Catholiquede ParLs admitted twenty- nine doctors of theology, thirteen of canon law, eight of scholastic philosophy, one hundred and ninety-two of law, thirty-two of literature, ten of science. The first three of these degrees have been gained by can- didates under tests of the institute itself; the others, from state boards (jurys). The institute is preparing to set up a medical course and one in the history of religion. The Institut Catholiquede Lille has con- nected with itself a school of higher industrial and commercial instruction (see Baunard, Louis); the Institut Catholique d'Angers, one of agriculture. The Institut Catholique de Toulouse has but one faculty, that of theology; it is organizing lectures for the stu- dents of literature and of science who are following the courses of the state faculties.
Laws Affecting the .■ipplications and Effects of Re- ligion in Civil Life. — (a) The Sunday Rest. — The Revolution had abolished all institutions which for- merly existed in connexion with the Sunday rest and had substituted the dicadi (see above) for the Sunday. Under the Restoration the Law of 18 November, 1814, forbade all "exterior" labour on Sunday: a trades- man might not open his shop; by the letter of the law, he might work and cause others to work in his closed
