—_— —l THE MOVEMENT FOR REFORM 1684-1700 extremely important part of the education of M. the Duke of Burgundy, I humbly pray you, sir, to send me toward the end of the year an ample and de tailed memoir answering the articles in the en, closed . . . questionnaire.” The nineteen articles ac. companying this letter were designed to obtain the kind of information which Fénelon thought essential for competent direction of state affairs, The inquiry was, however, unofficial. Beauvillier did not invoke royal authority: the intendants were to write memoirs for the instruction of the Duke of Burgundy, and it was in his capacity as governor of the young prince that the minister launched the investigation." Inter- estingly enough, the response from the intendants was almost unanimous.* When Colbert had under- taken a similar inquiry a generation previously, of ficially and in Louis XIV’s name, he had received a comparatively small number of answering reports ‘The three decades which separate the two inquests were among the most difficult in French history. Per- haps the conscientious efforts to satisfy Beauvillier’s demands indicate that the overworked intendants also hoped the Duke of Burgundy would one day bring better government to France. iv. THE QUIETIST CONTROVERSY ANOTHER DIMENSION TO REFORM The reaction to Fénelon’s activities, leading ulti mately to his disgrace and exile on 1 August 1697. ‘11-This point is strened by Professor Esmonin: “Lenquéte est faite en dchore de Padministation régulire, les mémoires n'ont pas de caractére officiel, ils sont simplement offciens, au méme tte que les renseignements quiun intendant peut étre appelé 4 donner Sun particulier” bid, p. "The one exception was de to the premature desth of he in tendant from Perpignan, "#See F, Esmonin’s introduction to his edition of Voysin de la Noitaye’s Mémoire sur la gendralité de Rowen, Paris, 1919 286 CHRISTIAN AGRARIANISM centers principally on the Quietist controversy. The intense character of this dispute, involving the two Jeading religious figures in France, Bossuet and Féne Jon, and the widespread passion it aroused is enough to suggest that more than a few doctrinal points were at stake. In fact, the quarrel raised basic issues with ramifications affecting many areas of thought; it was nothing less than the first large-scale encounter be tween the forces of tradition and those of reform. Negative versus positive conceptions of government— based on pessimistic and optimistic notions of human nature—were now, for the first time, an expression of open political struggle. So fundamental a conflict is, of course, complex. Indeed, historians are still writing contrary interpretations of the confused body of sources which relate to the great battle between Fénelon and Bossuet. Some emphasize political as- pects of the question;"* others, the religious." Dis tinctions of this kind, however, are to some extent misleading because they did not exist so clearly at a time when men saw immediate political implica- tions in what today appears as the most remote type of theological argument ‘The facts of the Quietist affair have been frequently recounted; therefore only the briefest attention will be given here to the details of an unusually complex story. But even the most summary account must be- gin with a few words about the career of Jeanne- HEM, R. Schmitdein, Laspect politique dw diférend Bostuet-Féne: fon, Raden, 1954. A hastily written, often inaccurate and impas sioned polemic against Bossuet which adds nothing new to ou ui derstanding of the problem, Ts Louis Cognet, Crépuscule des Mystiquee: te confit Fénelon Bossuet, Tournai, 1998. This Se book, the fret of a projected «wo volume’ work, provider an excellent introduction to! the religious background of the controversy. Morcover, no other istorian has pre sented so complete and straightforward an account of the events Teading up to the struggle between Bostuet and Fenelon. 287THE MOVEMENT FOR REFORM 1684-1700 Marie Bouvier de la Motte, better known as Madame Guyon."* Jeanne-Marie entered into an unhappy mar- riage when she was fifteen with a man twice her age, Jacques Guyon, Seigneur du Chesnoy, son of the en: gineer responsible for constructing the canal de Briare. Her intense mystical experiences, first occur- ting in the early years of marriage, embarrassed and annoyed Monsieur Guyon; it was not until his death in 1674 that Jeanne-Marie, now a wealthy young widow, could give free reign to her religious vocation, Her activities during the next decade antagonized powerful ecclesiastical figures, particularly Jean d'Arenthon of Alex, Bishop of Geneva, and Bishop Camus of Grenoble, later appointed Cardinal. More- over, these enmities were intensified by the publica. tion of Madame Guyon’s mystical treatises, Les Tor- rents and the Moyen court et trés facile pour Voraison, que tous peuvent pratiquer et arriver par la a une haute perfection, sometime between 1683 and 1685. The second work, Moyen court, explains that “nothing is more easy than to have God and to taste Him. He is more within us than we are inside our- selves, He wishes to give Himself to us more strongly than we desire to possess Him. There remains only the method to seek Him, which is as easy and natural as breathing." From this premise Madame Guyon went on to describe step by step how the individual may abandon himself entirely to the divine presence ‘Who is within and Whose infinite spirit extends out- ward, penetrating and exalting every part of crea~ tion, True prayer is interior communion with God. Neither confession nor any other religious observ- ‘Except where otherwite indicate, I have depended entirely on Father Cognets work (ibid) in describing the events leading up to the Council of sy in 1654 by Cognet, sid, pg. 288 (Quot CHRISTIAN AGRARIANISM ance is a substitute for that totally passive state in which the soul receives the “divine effusion” present inside us all, ‘The book was immensely popular, fifteen hundred copies being distributed in the Grenoble region alone But hostility to the young widow grew apace with her popularity. Compelled to leave Grenoble, Mad- ame Guyon arrived in Paris in July 1686. One year later, Frangois La Combe, a Barnabite priest enjoying an intense spiritual intimacy with Madame Guyon, was arrested and imprisoned in the Bastille, destined never to regain his liberty. The man who obtained the lettre de cachet for the Barnabite’s arrest, Francois de Harlay de Champvallon, Archbishop of Paris, a Person held in wide contempt for his worldly life and dissimulating ways," never made clear the charges against La Combe; Harlay was also equally mysterious about the reasons which led him to order Madame Guyon’s arrest shortly after La Combe's imprisonment. Meanwhile, friends were active on Madame Guyon's behalf. ‘The intervention of her twenty-fiveycar-old first cousin, Marie-Frangoise- Silvine Le Maistre de la Maisonfort, proved decisive. Mademoiselle de la Maisonfort was a member of Saint-Gyr, the religious establishment for daughters of impoverished aristocratic families established in 1686 and directed by Madame de Maintenon. Having Jong disliked Harlay, she caused Madame Guyon to be released from prison on 13 September 1688. A few Gays later the mystic was received at SaintCyr by Madame de Maintenon, the Princess of Harcourt, and the Duchesses of Chevreuse, of Beauvillier, and “aFénelon’s eter to Louis XIV caved the following reference to Hatay: “Vous aver un archevégue cotrompu,seaniaeus ine Hiible, fans, malin atfccuy,eonem| de tate sens ot a tee sei out les gens deen” Bare letirespaltyusy, cl, tes P- 150). rae 289THE MOVEMENT FOR REFORM 1684-1700 of Béthune-Charost—Foucquet’s daughter and Mad. ame Guyon’s old friend, This group of aristocratic ladies, who looked toward Fénelon as their spiritual director, understandably enough, arranged a meeting between the mystic and the future Archbishop. Fénelon shortly became persuaded that Madame Guyon was divinely inspired. His own spirituality developed in the light of her mystical teachings; and to the end of his life, Fenelon never denied his vener- ation for this woman, Indeed, the fundamental mis- take made subsequently by Fénelon’s enemies was to underestimate the Archbishop's intense loyalty. Ad- mired by Fénelon as “a prodigy of sainthood and doctrine” and surrounded by a powerful but sin- cerely devout group of aristocratic ladies, Madame Guyon rapidly became a kind of spiritual authority. Her book, Moyen court, circulated freely at Saint-Cy’ At the same time Madame de Maintenon had. copies made of long passages from Fénelon’s letters addressed, to her; these “secret notebooks” contained spiritual advice’ inspired directly by Guyonian mysticism. Fénelon’s well-known theology of “pure love,” sub- sequently called Quietist, is the direct product of his personal and peculiar interpretation of Madame Guyon’s teachings. ‘The astonishingly rapid rise of Madame Guyon's influence at Saint-Cyr, at first accepted by Madame de Maintenon, shortly caused her considerable alarm, In September 1687 both the person and doctrines of the Spanish priest Molinos had been condemned in Rome by the Papal Inquisition. Molinos’ writings, Defense of Contemplation, The Accord of Fatigue ‘and Repose in Prayer and The Spiritual Guide con- tained views capable of being interpreted as danger- ously similar to those held by Madame Guyon. And a man like Harlay, the Archbishop of Paris, for ex: 290 ——— CHRISTIAN AGRARIANISM ample, would be only too anxious to point out how Saint-Cyr was infected by the heretical teachings of a petson whom he, the ever-vigilant Harlay, had sought to silence at an early date. The gravity of the issue becomes clear when it is remembered that Molinos’ condemnation had been major issue in the protracted and intense struggle between Louis XIV and Innocent XI. The Sun King had been particularly irritated by Innocent when the latter, in 1678, refused to recognize Louis XIV's claim to the régale, the right to temporal revenues of vacant bishoprics. The régale, however, was only one dramatic incident in a number of Franco-Papal quarrels which all had their source in the crown's claim to exercise absolute dominion over the clergy’s temporal wealth.*" Innocent X1’s prolonged and stub- born resistance provoked Lois XIV to convene the French clergy in a national council; and in 1682 this body issued the well-known four articles reaffirming the crown’s temporal powers and appealing to the old theory of conciliar supremacy. The conflict con- tinued and grew increasingly bitter: on one side In. nocent refused to recognize episcopal and other re- ligious appointments; on the other, anti-papal feck ing ran high. Relations became most strained, however, during the years 1687-1693. Long sympathetic to the teach- fe Antoine Adam, Histoire de la hitdature frencete a XVI6 sited, y vols, Paris, soigeag6, Ve ugign explains that Hclays intentions were made cear when "il oulutsoumette a Sorbonne Je Gas de conscience suivant: si un prince chrdtien Powis meat auprés des enfants un précepteut aupconné de quigtenee” Noe one, leat of all Madame de Mintenon, coud thith dls quendion o mere academic point. joule Io iil avsient une cause commune: Ta oyance 4 sowverain& son domaine abaolt sur tout le tempore te Vging de France” (Jean Orel, Louis XIV conte Innocent 1, He 4919, P- 8. The author provides fll documentation fr this polar 291