Besides the faculties there are a number of institutions, both state-supported and private, giving higher instruction of various special kinds. In the first class must be mentioned the Collège de France, founded 1530, giving courses of highest study of all sorts, the Museum of Natural History, the École des Chartes (palaeography and archives), the School of Modern Oriental Languages, the École Pratique des Hautes Études (scientific research), &c. All these institutions are in Paris. The most important free institution in this class is the École des Sciences Politiques, which prepares pupils for the civil services and teaches a great number of political subjects, connected with France and foreign countries, not included in the state programmes.
Commercial and technical instruction is given in various institutions comprising national establishments such as the écoles nationales professionnelles of Armentières, Vierzon, Voiron and Nantes for the education of working men; the more advanced écoles d’arts et métiers of Châlons, Angers, Aix, Lille and Cluny; and the Central School of Arts and Manufactures at Paris; schools depending on the communes and state in combination, e.g. the écoles pratiques de commerce et d’industrie for the training of clerks and workmen; private schools controlled by the state, such as the écoles supérieures de commerce; certain municipal schools, such as the Industrial Institute of Lille; and private establishments, e.g. the school of watch-making at Paris. At Paris the École Supérieure des Mines and the École des Ponts et Chaussées are controlled by the minister of public works, the École des Beaux-Arts, the École des Arts Décoratifs and the Conservatoire National de Musique et de Déclamation by the under-secretary for fine arts, and other schools mentioned elsewhere are attached to several of the ministries. In the provinces there are national schools of fine art and of music and other establishments and free subventioned schools.
In addition to the educational work done by the state, communes and private individuals, there exist in France a good many societies which disseminate instruction by giving courses of lectures and holding classes both for children and adults. Examples of such bodies are the Society for Elementary Instruction, the Polytechnic Association, the Philotechnic Association and the French Union of the Young at Paris; the Philomathic Society of Bordeaux; the Popular Education Society at Havre; the Rhône Society of Professional Instruction at Lyons; the Industrial Society of Amiens and others.
The highest institution of learning is the Institut de France, founded and kept up by the French government on behalf of science and literature, and composed of five academies: the Académie française, the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, the Académie des Sciences, the Académie des Beaux-Arts and the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques (see [Academies]). The Académie de Médecine is a separate body.
Poor Relief (Assistance publique).—In France the pauper, as such, has no legal claim to help from the community, which however, is bound to provide for destitute children (see [Foundling Hospitals]) and pauper lunatics (both these being under the care of the department), aged and infirm people without resources and victims of incurable illness, and to furnish medical assistance gratuitously to those without resources who are afflicted with curable illness. The funds for these purposes are provided by the department, the commune and the central authority.
There are four main types of public benevolent institutions, all of which are communal in character: (1) The hôpital, for maternity cases and cases of curable illness; (2) the hospice, where the aged poor, cases of incurable malady, orphans, foundlings and other children without means of support, and in some cases lunatics, are received; (3) the bureau de bienfaisance, charged with the provision of out-door relief (secours à domicile) in money or in kind, to the aged poor or those who, though capable of working, are prevented from doing so by illness or strikes; (4) the bureau d’assistance, which dispenses free medical treatment to the destitute.
These institutions are under the supervision of a branch of the ministry of the interior. The hospices and hôpitaux and the bureaux de bienfaisance, the foundation of which is optional for the commune, are managed by committees consisting of the mayor of the municipality and six members, two elected by the municipal council and four nominated by the prefect. The members of these committees are unpaid, and have no concern with ways and means which are in the hands of a paid treasurer (receveur). The bureaux de bienfaisance in the larger centres are aided by unpaid workers (commissaires or dames de charité), and in the big towns by paid inquiry officers. Bureaux d’assistance exist in every commune, and are managed by the combined committees of the hospices and the bureaux de bienfaisance or by one of these in municipalities, where only one of those institutions exists.
No poor-rate is levied in France. Funds for hôpitals, hospices and bureaux de bienfaisance comprise:
1. A 10% surtax on the fees of admission to places of public amusement.
2. A proportion of the sums payable in return for concessions of land in municipal cemeteries.