Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 48.djvu/630

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
560
THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

thought; but it is not willing, and never henceforth will be willing, to substitute any form of theological prescription for the authority which it has learned to attach to verified truth. If we have battles to fight we must fight them, and perhaps, when it comes to that, we may learn a wisdom which in times of comparative ease and prosperity we were incapable of learning. Certain it is that in this world everything has its specific cause, which means that every evil has its specific remedy. Trouble, it was long ago observed, does not spring out of the ground; it is for us to find out where it does spring from; and when the trouble becomes acute, our intellectual operations are wont to be greatly stimulated.

The dean would have us restore the Bible to the schools and place the latter in effect under the control of the clergy. Our idea is to study out the problem of education in the widest sense until we have, in a really effectual manner, correlated it with the whole life of society. The former is the ecclesiastical remedy for social ills; the latter is the scientific, and we believe it to be that which the future is destined to justify.


THE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FRENCH INSTITUTE.

The Institut de France, popularly known as the French Academy, and which is undoubtedly the oldest and the most famous of the world's learned societies, celebrated with great ceremony and with the active participation of the Government of France, on October 23d-26th last, the hundredth anniversary of its existence; one of the most noted and pleasant features of which was the hearty welcome extended to its foreign associates and corresponding members. As it is generally understood that these two titles are the highest honors which France can award in testimony of intellectual work actually done by foreigners—the cross of the Legion of Honor being often conferred for merely political reasons—it is a matter of interest to know what citizens of the United States have been the recipients of these honors. Preliminary, however, to their specification, it is desirable to explain the organization of the institute. It consists of five departments or divisions, each of which is designated as an academy—namely, the Académie Française, Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Académie des Sciences, Académie des Beaux-Arts, Académie des Sciences Morales et Politique. Each academy, except the Academie Française, which comprises a general reunion of all the other academies, is divided into sections for the consideration of special subjects, and is made up of members of the institute who are regarded as specialists, or acknowledged authorities in different departments of learning. Thus, the domain of the "Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres" embraces the learned languages, antiquities, monuments. Oriental literature, and history; that of "Sciences," astronomy, geography, navigation, general physics, chemistry, zoölogy, botany, medicine, andx surgery; that of "Beaux-Arts," painting, sculpture, architecture, engraving, and music; and that of "Sciences Morales et Politique," morals, philosophy, jurisprudence, political economy, finance, and philosophical history. Each of the academies holds weekly meetings, and once a year the five academies as a rule hold a public meeting in common; and occasionally other general meetings for the reception of new members and the distribution of prizes. In virtue of endowments, be-