So,
too, the contemporary Emperor of Austria attempted indirectly
something of the same sort; and at a still later period Popes
Gregory XVI and Pius IX discouraged, if they did not forbid, the
meetings of scientific associations in Italy. In France, war
between theology and science, which had long been smouldering,
came in the years 1867 and 1868 to an outbreak. Toward the end
of the last century, after the Church had held possession of
advanced instruction for more than a thousand years, and had, so
far as it was able, kept experimental science in
servitude--after it had humiliated Buffon in natural science,
thrown its weight against Newton in the physical sciences, and
wrecked Turgot's noble plans for a system of public
instruction--the French nation decreed the establishment of the
most thorough and complete system of higher instruction in
science ever known. It was kept under lay control and became one
of the glories of France; but, emboldened by the restoration of
the Bourbons in 1815, the Church began to undermine this hated
system, and in 1868 had made such progress that all was ready
for the final assault.
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