Theologicum, his leaning towards the entire catholic system is manifest.
The celebrated controversy between Bossuet and Fenelon, on the subject of quietism—the one only transaction in the life of Bossuet which his biographer approaches with regret—extended over a period of five years, from 1694 to 1699. Some years before, Molinos, a Spanish monk, had published a work on the nature of true spiritual perfection, so redolent of delusion and false mysticism, as to have incurred the formal condemnation of the Holy See. Madame Guyon, about the year 1694, revived, both in her writings and in the conferences at which she enlightened her disciples, the principles of Molinos, though in a somewhat modified form. Fenelon, who was at that time preceptor of the dauphin, but was nominated in 1695 archbishop of Cambrai, was inclined, from a similarity of mental structure, to view with favour the rhapsodies of Madame Guyon; but others, particularly the bishop of Chartres, strongly disapproved of her proceedings, and at length prevailed upon Bossuet to take notice of them. He invited Madame Guyon to visit Meaux, where she resided for six months in a convent. During this period Bossuet examined all her writings, which she freely confided to him, and in frequent conversations with her explained the nature of the errors into which she had fallen, and counselled her respecting her future conduct. She was apparently all docility and submission, and Bossuet, on her leaving Meaux, gave her a certificate stating his belief in the perfect rectitude of her intentions. In the meantime took place the conferences at Issy (February, 1695), at which some important articles on the disinterested love of God were drawn up, and signed by Fenelon himself, to which we shall presently have occasion to refer. Mme. Guyon upon leaving Meaux, instead of remaining quietly in the country as she had promised, went up to Paris, and there circulated among her followers copies of Bossuet's certificate, as if it amounted to a complete justification of her conduct. An order was thereupon issued from the court, which Bossuet seems to have approved or obtained, that she should be arrested and placed in confinement. This measure was the commencement of the estrangement between Bossuet and Fenelon, which was widened shortly after by Fenelon's refusal of his approbation to a work which Bossuet had got ready for the press, entitled "Instructions on States of Prayer." Fenelon meantime was preparing his Maximes des Saints, which appeared in January, 1697. In this work, although approved by several censors, and although Fenelon prefixed to it a declaration of his entire adherence to the articles of Issy, the traces of a false mysticism and a spurious spirituality are indubitably present. It contains this assertion, that "a habitual state of love to God is possible, which excludes both the fear of punishment, and the desire of reward;" and it admits an hypothetical case, in which, so long as it retained the love of God, "a soul could consent to the absolute sacrifice of its salvation." Both these propositions were clearly inconsistent with the articles of Issy. Bossuet's work on states of prayer appeared six weeks after that of Fenelon. The feeling at court (see St. Simon's memoirs) set at first strongly against the work of the archbishop of Cambrai. Bossuet immediately set to work to examine the Maximes des Saints, and soon extracted from it a number of propositions which he judged to be deserving of condemnation. After many conferences he prevailed on the archbishop of Paris, and the bishop of Chartres, to join with him in a declaration which appeared in August, 1697, condemnatory of these propositions. But Fenelon had already sent his book to Rome, and submitted it to the judgment of the pope. Rome proceeded in the matter with her usual deliberation; and during the eighteen months which elapsed before her decision was promulgated, an incessant war of pamphlets was carried on between the two disputants. Each put forth his utmost powers; and while the brilliancy and force of the one never appeared to greater advantage, the calm argumentative dignity of the other caused him to have certainly not the worst in the strife. But it is painful to see, as the dispute proceeds, a gradual increase of bitterness on both sides, but particularly on that of Bossuet, and at last a recourse even to personalities. It must have been only in a moment of extreme irritation that Bossuet could commit to paper the comparison of Fenelon and Mme. Guyon to Montanus and Priscilla. At last, in March, 1699, arrived the brief of Innocent XII., condemning the Maximes des Saints, with twenty-three propositions extracted from it. Fenelon's prompt and edifying submission is well known. It is consoling to know that Bossuet took steps before his death to bring about a reconciliation with Fenelon, which were baffled by a series of unfortunate contre-tems.
We can only devote a very few words to Bossuet's remaining works. His funeral orations—a kind of composition which, greatly as he excelled in it, he disliked—are a mine of profound and consoling thoughts—of vivid images—of inspiring exhortations. Among his devotional works are the "Meditations sur l'Evangile," and the "Elevations sur les Mystères." The "Paraphrase du Pseaume XXI." was written only two months before his death. But we cannot undertake to give even all the titles of his many works, but must refer the reader either to the Benedictine edition of them, or, for a general view of their contents, to the Life by de Bausset.
The time now drew near when this great man, who had been for fifty years the soul of France and the admiration of the catholic world, was to pay himself that last debt of nature which he had taught so many to contemplate with holy hope. In 1701 another assembly of the French clergy was held, in which, as in that of 1682, Bossuet's was still the master spirit, guiding all deliberations, and shaping all decisions. He obtained a formal censure by this assembly of a number of propositions involving a lax and pernicious casuistry, and especially of the monstrous doctrine of probabilism. In December of the same year he was visited by the first premonitory symptoms of the disease of which he died. The physicians upon examination declared it to be the stone. Lithotomy was at that time imperfectly understood, and as Bossuet himself shrank from the operation, the medical men confined themselves to administering such palliatives as their art could supply. He was at Meaux for three months in the spring of 1702, and preached for one hour in the cathedral with all his wonted fluency and power on the subject of frequent communion. The last words of this, his last sermon in that place, were as follows:—"I wish that you should remember that a certain bishop, your pastor, who professed to preach the truth and to uphold it without disguise, collected together in this one discourse the capital truths of your salvation." He returned to Paris to be near the physicians, but spent the end of the year 1702 at Meaux, leaving it for the last time early in 1703. The remainder of that year was spent in Paris or Versailles, the physicians not allowing him to return to Meaux. Prolonged and racking pains gradually attenuated and enfeebled his powerful frame; but except when at rare intervals physical agony caused a temporary suspension of the mental powers, his intellect retained its full strength, and his wonderful memory was as clear as ever. In the midst of his sufferings the slightest sign of impatience never escaped him; but he was often heard to murmur, "Lord, I am cast down, but not confounded; for I know on whom I have believed; Thy will be done." His chief consolation was in hearing the New Testament read to him, particularly the Gospel of St. John, which was thus read over to him more than sixty times during his illness. In March, 1704, he was constantly attended by his confessor, the abbé de St. André. Upon the abbé's expressing some surprise that Bossuet, so profound and experienced a theologian, should consult him so minutely upon questions of conscience, he replied—"Undeceive yourself; God only gives us light for the guidance of others; he often leaves us in darkness with respect to our own conduct." On the 8th April he received the last sacraments, making all the necessary responses with the humility and docility of a child. On the night of the 10th, when he was evidently sinking, the Abbé Ledieu, his secretary, entreated that he would sometimes think on those whom he had left behind him, who had been ever so devoted to his person and to his glory. At these words the living bishop half raising himself up, said with a holy indignation—"Cessez ces discours. Priez pour moi pardon á Dieu de mes péchés." After a day of great suffering, he quietly expired in the night between the 11th and 12th of April, without agony or convulsion, when the body came to be opened, a stone was found as large as an egg.
Bossuet was tall and of a commanding presence; there was something remarkably noble about the expression of his head and face, and the effect was heightened in his old age by his long white hair. By a fortunate mistake his tomb escaped the iconoclastic fury of the Jacobins during the French revolution, and his relics still rest in the cathedral of Meaux. The above sketch has been chiefly compiled from the admirable Life by M. de Bausset (Paris, 1814), formerly bishop of Alais.—T. A.
BOSSUT, Charles, Abbé, a distinguished French mathe-
