Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 2.djvu/876

BROGLIE soon after Lieutenant. While thus occupied he felt himself called to the ecclesiastical state. After taking the preparatory studies he was ordained priest, 18 October, 1870. In his numerous publications the Abb6 de Broglie was always a faithful defender of Catholic dogma. At the time of his death, which resulted from the ,,olence of an insane person, he was preparing a book on the agreement of reason and faith. His most important work is "L'histoire des religions". Of his other WTitings, some of which were pamphlets and some articles in reviews, the following may be mehtioned: "Le positi%-isme et la science exp,rimentale"; "Religion de Zoroastre et religion v,dique"; "Le bouddhisme"; " Religions n6obrahmaniques de I'lnde"; "L'islamisme"; "La vraie definition de la rehgion"; "La transcendance du christianisme"; "L'histoire religieuse d'lsrael"; "Les prophetes et les proph,ties, d'apres les travaux de Kuenen"; "L'id,e de Dieu dans I'Ancien et le Nouveau Testament"; "Le pr&ent et I'avenir du catholicisme en France". Two posthumous publications, "Questions bibliques" and "Religion et critique", were edited by the Abbe Piat.

Broglie,, French statesman and historian, b. at Paris, 13 June, 1821; d. there 19 January, 1901. After a brief diplomatic career he resigned his post to devote himself to literature. His work, "L'Eglise et I'Erapire remain au IV, siecle" (6 vols., 1856), won for him Lacordaire's seat in the French Academy (1862). In 1871 he was appointed ambassador to England, but was recalled in 1872 and, taking his seat in the Assembly, soon became the leading spirit of the opposition to the Republic and M. Thiers. Twice President of the Coimcil (1873 and 1877), the Dukede Broglie was finally defeated in his own district and withdrew from public life.

Besides editing the " souvenirs " of his father (1886), the "Memoires of Talle\Tand (1871), and the letters of the Duchesse Albertine de Broglie, he published a series of works on the diplomacy of Louis XV, which placed their author in the first rank of historians.

Broglie,, b. in Paris, 5 September, 1766; d. there, 20 June, 1821. He was the son of the Field-Marshal, Victor-Francois, Due de Broglie, created, by Emperor Francis I, Prince of the Holy Roman Empire, a title which was to be hereditary in the family. Called to the ecclesiastical state, Maurice pursued his studies at St.-Sulpice. During the Reign of Terror, when persecution drove both his father and him out of France, they went to Berlin. King Frederick William received the duke with marked distinction and granted to the young prince a provostship in the cathedral chapter of Posen. Maurice returned to France in 1803, and the steps he took to recover some family property not yet sold, brought him to the attention of Napoleon, who invited him to his court and named him his almoner. Recognizing in the emperor the restorer and support of order and religion, de Broghe became a devoted follower of the monarch and eulogized him in a pastoral letter issued on the occasion of the victorj' of .\usterhtz. In 1805 Napoleon nominated him to the See of Acqui, Italy, and in 1807 to Ghent, Belgium. When it became evident, however, to de Broglie that the pope and clergj' were to be mere tools of the despot, and religion the instrument of his ambitious designs, he showed determined opposition to Napoleon. In 1809 the minister of worship wrote in a letter that the sovereign was liighly displeased with the bishop because of his lack of devotion to the royal person; in

1810 the bishop refused the Cross of the Legion cif Honour, sent to him by the emperor, judging that he could not accept such a distinction at the tiniiwhen the Papal States had been seized, and he explained his refusal in a memoir, a model of moder;ition. sent to the minister.

By order of Napoleon, a council was assembled in Paris. 17 June, 1811, imder the presidency ot Cardinal Fesch, uncle of the emperor and Archbishop of Lyons. The object of Napoleon was to oblige the pope to grant the Bulls of institution to the priests nominated by him to bishoprics; this Pius VII had firmly refused. Napoleon wished, furthermore, to make an arrangement that would force the pope in the future to issue the Bulls within six months, and should His Hohness fail to do so in that time, the metropohtan or the oldest bishop of the ecclesiastical province would then confirm the nominee, the sovereign pontiff's silence being considered as assent. The fathers of the council solemnly assembled in the metropolitan church, there being present six cardinals, nine archbishops, and eighty bishops; this was the first and the last general session. After six preliminary particular sessions, a decree in compHance with the will of Napoleon was proposed to the bishops. At first only two, d'Aviau, Archbishop of Bordeaux, and de Broglie, Bishop of Ghent, rejected it; but subsequently, only four members were for the pure and simple acceptance of the decree. The pope had privately declared that such encroachments on his spiritual power were contrary to the laws of the Church and ecclesiastical discipline, destructive of the authority of the Holy See and of the principles on which depended the lawful mission of bishops.

The anger of Napoleon, provoked by such firm and general opposition, led him to prorogue the council and visit with severe pimishnients the bishops who had been most prominent in their opposition. -Arrested on 12 July, 1811, de Broglie was cast into the dimgeon at Vincennes and kept in close confinement for more than four months, without outside communication, and without books or writing materials. He was next sent as an exile to Beaime. On the mere suspicion that he had intercourse with his clergy, he was deported to the island of Ste.-Marguerite on the coast of Provence. De Broglie, while in prison signed, imder compulsion, his resignation as Bishop of Ghent. Although it was not accepted by the pope and was consequently null, Napoleon named a successor to the see. As the great majority, however, of the clergy and people refused to acknowledge him, they were subjected to vexations and persecution. The fall of Napoleon restored peace, and de Broglie, returning to his diocese, was received amid the rejoicings of liis clergy and flock.

The bishop was not to enjoy a long rest. The allied sovereigns of Europe after the overthrow of Napoleon had formed Holland and Belgium, or the Low Countries, into a kingdom and appointed Wilham of Nassau to rule over them. The plenipotentiaries of the powers, assembled in London, 1814, made the Dutch Constitution the fundamental law of Belgium; with a proviso that it should be modified according to circumstances. The generahty of Belgians are Cathohcs. On 18 July, 1815. AVilham proposed the Dutch Constitution to the Belgians, and the representatives summoned to vote upon it rejected it by 796 to 527. (See BELGirM.) The king, disregarding the vote, imposed upon the Belgians a constitution that deprived the Cathohcs of all their rights. Joseph II by his petty persecutions had lost the Netherlands for Austria; Napoleon, following in the footsteps of the "emperor sexton", lost them for France; William, his imitator, brought about the secession of Belgium from Holland and its independ-