Philosophy
Despite the differences on economic, social, and other issues among the Republican radicals with whom Jules Ferry identified, they were united by the desire to obtain a secular republic due to the growing popularity of anti-clericalism since the Revolution and notably during the Third Republic. In the wake of the Industrial Revolution and its new practices of employment and work days, the radicals also “hoped that schooling would make workers as reasonable and self-satisfied as it was credited with making the bourgeoisie.”
The 1698 attempt would not have held sway with the Republican radicals of Ferry’s generation, who would have seen it as Catholic propaganda and as a defense against the growing popularity of Protestantism. Likewise, Napoleon’s Imperial University remained connected to the Church and paid little heed to primary education that would ensure basic literacy needs among the larger population. In Ferry’s view, schools would educate on political doctrine and the virtues of nationalism, emphasizing independent thought.
Read more about this topic: Jules Ferry Laws
Famous quotes containing the word philosophy:
“And new Philosophy calls all in doubt,
The element of fire is quite put out;
The Sun is lost, and th’earth, and no mans wit
Can well direct him where to look for it.”
—John Donne (c. 1572–1631)
“Philosophy aims at the logical clarification of thoughts. Philosophy is not a body of doctrine but an activity. A philosophical work consists essentially of elucidations.”
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“When Philosophy with its abstractions paints grey in grey, the freshness and life of youth has gone, the reconciliation is not a reconciliation in the actual, but in the ideal world.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)