JANSENIUS
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JANSENIUS
convened their synods, but, as later became known,
all four gave oral explanations authorizing respectful
silence on the question of fact, and it would seem that
they acted thus with some connivance on the part of
the mediators, luiknown, however, to the nimcio and
perhaps to d'Estrees. But this did not prevent them
from affirming, in a common address to the sovereign
pontiff, that they themselves and their priests had
signed the formulary, as had been done in the other
dioceses of France.
D'Estrees for his part wrote at the same time: "The four bishops have just conformed, by a new and sincere subscription, with the other bishops". Both letters were transmitted by the nuncio to Rome, where Lyonne, also alleging that the signatures were absolutely regular, insisted that the affair shoidd be brought to an end. For this reason the pope, who had received these documents 24 September, informed Louis XIV of the fact about 28 September, expressing his joy for the "subscription pure and simple" which had been obtained, announcing his intention to re- store the bishops in question to favour and requesting the king to do the same. However, before the Briefs of reconciliation thus announced had been sent to each of the four prelates concerned, rumours which had at first been current with regard to their lack of frank- ness grew more definite, and took the shape of formal and repeated denunciations. Hence, by order of Clement IX, Bargellini had to make a new investiga- tion at Paris. As the final result he sent to Rome a report drawn up by Vialar. This report stated with regard to the four bishops: "They have condemned and caused to be condemned the five propositions with all manner of sincerity, without any exception or restriction whatever, in every sense in which the Church has condemned them"; but he then added explana- tions concerning the question of fact which were not altogether free from ambiguity. The pope, no less perplexed than before, appointed a commission of twelve cardinals to obtain information. These se- cured, it seems, the proof of the language made use of by the bishops in their synods. Nevertheless, in con- sideration of the very grave difficulties which would result from opening up the whole case again, the major- ity of the commission held that they might and should abide practically by the testimony of the official docu- ments and especially by that of the minister Lyonne regarding the reality of the "subscription pure and simple ", at the same time emphasizing anew this point as the essential basis and the condition sine qua non of peace.
The four Briefs of reconciliation were then drawn up and dispatched; they bear the date, 19 January, 1669. In them Clement IX recalls the testimony he had re- ceived "concerning the real and complete obedience with which they had sincerely subscribed to the form- ulary, condemning the five propositions without any exception or restriction, according to all the senses in which they had been condemned by the Holy See ". He remarks further that being "most firmly resolved to uphold the constitutions of his predecessors, he would never have admitted a single restriction or ex- oeption ". These preambles were as explicit and formal as possible. They prove, especially when com- pared with the terms and object of the formulary of Alexander VII, how far wrong the Jansenists were in celebrating this termination of the affair as the triumph of their theory, as the acceptance by the pope himself of the distinction between right and fact. On tlie other hand it is clear from the whole course of the negotiations that the loyalty of these champions of a stainless and unfaltering moral code was more than doubtful. At all events, the sect profited by the mud- dle these manoeuvres had created (o extend its con- quest still further and to get a stronger hold on several religious congregations. It was favoured l>y various circumstances. Among them must be included the
growing infatuation in France for the so-called Gal-
ilean Lilierties, and in consequence a certain attitude
of defiance, or at least indooility, towards the supreme
authority; then the Declaration of 1682, and finally
the unfortimate affair of the Regale. It is worthy of
remark that in this last conflict it was two Jansenist
bishops of the deepest dye who most energetically
uphehl the rights of the Church and the Holy See,
while the greater numljer of the others too readily
bowed before the arrogant pretensions of the civil
power.
V. JAN.SENISM AT THE BEGINNING OP THE EIGH- TEENTH Century. — Despite the reticence and equivo- cation which it allowed to continue, the "Peace of Clement IX " found a certain justification for its name in the period of relative calm which followed it, and which lasted imtil the end of the seventeenth century. Many minds were tired of the incessant strife, and this very weariness favoured the cessation of polemics. Moreover the Catholic world and the Holy See were at that time preoccupied with a multitude of grave ques- tions, and through force of circumstances Jansenism was relegated to second place. Mention has already been made of the signs of a recrudescence of Gallican- ism betrayed in the Four Articles of 1682, and in the quarrels of which the Regale was the subject. To this period also belongs the sharp conflict regarding the franchises, or droit d'asile (right of a.sylum), the odi- ous privilege concerning which Louis XIV showed an obstinacy and arrogance which passed all bounds (1687). Moreover, the Quietist doctrines spread by de Molinos, and which seduced for a brief period even the pious and learned Fonelon as well as the relaxed opinions of certain moralists, furnished matter for many condemnations on the part of Innocent XI, Alexander VIII, and Innocent XII (see Quietism). Finally, another impassioned debate had arisen which drew into the arena several groups of the most dis- tinguished and best intentioned theologians, and which was only definitively closed by Benedict XIV, namely the controversy concerning the Chinese and Malabar Rites. All these combined causes had for a time distracted public attention from the contents and the partisans of the " Augustinus ". Besides, "' Jansen- ism " was beginning to serve as a label for rather divergent tendencies, not all of which deserved equal reprobation. The out-and-out Jansenists, those who persisted in spite of everything in upholding the prin- ciple of necessitating grace and the consequent errors of the five propositions, had almost disappeared with Pascal. The remainder of the really Jansenist party, without committing itself to a submission pure and simple, assumed a far more cautious demeanour. The members rejected the expression "necessitating grace ", substituting for it that of a grace efficacious "in itself", seeking thus to identify themselves with the Thomists and the Augustinians.
Abandoning the plainly heretical sense of the five propositions, and repudiating any intention to resist legitimate authority, they conliiicd themsolvcs to de- nying the infallibility of the Cluirch with regard to dogmatic facts. Then, too, they were still the fanati- cal preachers of a discouraging rigorism, which they adorned with the names of virtue and austerity, ana, untler pretext of combating abuses, openly antago- nized the incontestable chanictcristies ni Catholicism, especially its unity of government, the tnulitional con- tinuity of its customs, and tlie legitimate jiart which heart and feeling play in its worship. With all their skilful extenuations they bore the mark of the levelling, innovating, and ariil spirit of Calvinism. These were the fins Jansinistes. They formed thenceforth the bulk of the sect, or rather in them the sect properly so called was summed up. But apart from them, though side by sitle with them, and bordering on their tendencies and beliefs, history points out two rather well-d('fined groups known as the " dupeil Jansenists "
