Norwich bulletin., 1913-02-17
Heroes of the "cours Public"

One of the notable things about France is the ease with which the pub lie may benefit by the result of the life studies in literature. art and science of
 men of European reputation. Anyone
 who will may attend free the s.cours
 public Of the Sorbonne, the College de
 France, the Ecole des Hautes- -Etudes-
 he has simply to go to the place and
 find the amphitheatre or sa1le. And
 when you say .cours public you say
 hundred and one courses on all manner
 Of subjects in literature ana science.
 On payment of sovereign or so and
 the production of pieces d'identite,"
 and some indication that you are able
 to follow with intelligence the more
 specialized work. you are free of every
 course in the syllabus of all three insti-
 tutfons. The system has it's disadvan-
 tageS. When a professor becomes
 fashionable his feminine admirers are
 at pains to attend in hundreds, and
 will cheerfully sit out the dullest course
 which precedes, in the same salle, their
 idols. As result your serious student,
 who may have other lectures elsewhere
 until the hour, finds himself excluded
 If Bergson attracted the 'furs and the
 gold pencils"--be assured there was no
 lead in most of them-to such an ex-
 tent that they went through hours as
 long as days of lectures on political
 economy to gaze upon the features and
 drink in the words of wisdom that fell fom the lips of their hero. This year they say 1t is a Greek who Is to be the adored of all Bergson's adorers. But 1t is not the "e1egantes" alone who crowd the amphitheatres and mark how splendidiy their hero combats with knowledge in the ring. There are the
 gems serieuX,' who choose their pro- lessor for the subject, and not the sub ject for the Professor. These gather round such a man as Gustave Lanson. q heard" writes a correspondent. 'Lanson's first lecture, which he has just delivered. I tried to enter suc- cession of doors. At every one it was the same. Even the steps leading to people who could not even see the audience At last I found a doorway that lead to staircase, and at the top of the stfrcase an inch of room At | first the speaker was invisible. A voice | hoated up from somewhere-very far | down, it seemed. Gradually I traced i the sound and related it to the utterer | It was a. little man, with a shining head i Sorbonne, has passed from jet black to | grey. He had before him as he sat in 1 he rostrum no more than MT BalfoUr's of notepaper. do not re- member that he paused in his discourse once There were no eDigramS or par ldoxes, no periods. Merely out of an immense learning and the penetration of a clear and searching spirit the man i inafyzed the characteristics of the trench genius in literature@tfe turn ng away from the pure idea, the pas ifon for the idea that had some sentf- nent as it's lever, the 'idee objet q lmour. Prose was the essential in
 of an intelligence so fash oned. With a touch of race. which l vas as well an application of the truth le uttered. fe said: One need not be he less. profound for being so clear Surveying the noderns for literature l he French University professor still 1 -oes on: he analysed recent develop nents, and found that romanticists and 1 he synbolists had but strengthened he instrument which is today, accord ng to his view of it, a 'c1assicisme nriehi.' M Lanson has no fears for Trench prose. The great audience. ising tier upon tier all round 1istenet~ without a sound. At the close it heered. IIalf-sheet of notepaper un- btrusively away. He wore neither |, ood or gown.