Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 6.djvu/54

 FELIX

32

FELIX

Amadeus had been in close relations with the schis- matic Council of Basle; and was elected pope, 30 October, 1439, by the electoral college of that council, including one cardinal (d'AlIemand of Aries), eleven bishops, seven abbots, five theologians, anil nine canonists. After long negotiations with a deputation from the council, Amadeus acquiesced in the election, 5 Feb., 1440, completely renouncing at the same time all further participation in the government of his duchy. Ambition and a certain fantastic turn of char- acter induced him to take this step. He took the name of Feli.K V, and was solemnly consecrated and crowned by the Cardinal d'AUemand, 24 July, 1440. Eugene IV had already excommunicated him, 23 March, at the Council of Florence. Until 1442, the famous jEneas Sylvius Piccolomini, later Pius II, was the anti-pope's secretary. This renewal of the schism ruined any surviving prestige of the Basle assembly, just closed at Constance. Subsequently, Amadeus took up Jiis residence in Savoy and Switzerland ; his efforts to surround himself with a curia met with little success; many of those whom he named cardinals de- clined the dignity. He found general recognition only in Savoy and Switzerlantl, but his claims were also recognized by the Dukes of Austria, Tyrol, and Bayern-Munchen, the Count-Palatine of Simraern, the Teutonic Order, some orders in Germany and some universities, hitherto adherents of Basle. He was soon embroiled in a quarrel with the Council of Basle concerning his rights and the distribution of revenues. The rightful pope, Eugene IV, and his suc- cessor Nicolas V (1447), who were universally recog- nized from the first in Spain and Poland, found tlieir claims even more widely admitted in France and Ger- many. In 1442, Felix left Basle; and on 16 May, 1443, occurred the last session of the Basle assembly. Felix, who had for the sake of its revenue assumed the administration of the Diocese of Geneva, clung for six years more to his usurped dignity, but finally sub- mitted (1449) to Nicolas V, received the title of Cardinal of St. Sabina, and was appointed permanent Apostolic vicar-general for all the states of the House of Savoy and for several dioceses (Ba.sle, Strasburg, Chur, etc.). Thus ended the last papal schism.

iENEAS Sylvius. Commentarii de geslis Concilii Basileensis in Opera Omnia (Basle, 1551): Fea, Pius II, Pontifex maximus (Rome, 1823): Gabotto, Lo Stato Sabaudo da Amedeo VIII ad Emmanude Filiberlo I (Turin, 1892); Monod, Amedeus Pacifi- cus seu de Eugenii IV et Aviedei Sabaudiw ducis, in sua obedi~ entia Feticis papa V nuncupati, controversiis commentarius (Turin, 1624): Lecoy de la Marche, Amedee VIII et son sejour h Ripaille in Revue des quest. Histor., 1866, 1, 192-203; Bruchet, Notice sur te buUaire de Felix V, conserve aux archives de Turin in Mem. et docum. publics par la Societe savoisienne, 1898, XII, XXX-XXXIII; InEM, Le Chateau de Ripaille (Paris, 1907); Pastor, GescAtcftiederPflpsie, 4th ed., 1,317 sqq.; Baumgarten, Die beiden ersten Kardinalskonsistorien des Gegenpapstes Felix V in Rum. Quartalschrift fiir chrisll. Altert. u. fiir Kirchengesch., 1908, GeschiclUe, 153 sqq.

J. P. KiRSCH.

F6Iix, Celestin-Joseph, French Jesuit, b. at Neuville-sur-l'Escaut (Nord), 28 June, 1810; d. at Lille, 7 July, 1891. He began his studies under the Brothers of Christian Doctrine, going later to the preparatory seminary at Cambrai, where he com- pleted his secondary studies. In 1833 he was named professor of rhetoric, received minor orders and the diaconate, and in 1837 entered the Society of Jesus. He began his noviceship at Tronchiennes in Belgium, continued it at Saint-Acheul, and ended it at Bruge- lettes, where he studied philosophy and the sciences. Having completed his theological studies at Louvain, he wa-s ordained in 1842 and returned to Brugelettes to teach rhetoric and philosophy. His earliest Lenten discourses, preached at Ath, and especially one on true patriotism, soon won him a brilliant reputation for eloquence.

Called to Amiens in IS.TO, he introduced the teach- ing of rhetoric at the College de la Providence and preached during Advent and Lent at the cathedral.

His oratorical qualities becoming more and more evident, he was called to Paris. He first preached at St. Thomas d'Aquin in 1851, and in 1852 preached Lenten sermons at Saint - Germain - des - Pr6s, and those of Advent at Saint-Sulpice. It was then that Mgr. Sibour named him to succeed the Dominican, Father Lacordaire, and the Jesuit, Father de Ravi- gnan in the pulpit of Notre-Dame (1853 to 1870). He became one of its most brilliant orators. The conferences of the first three years have not been published in full. In 1856 Pere F^lix began the sub- ject which he made the master-work of his life: "Progres par le Christianisme". This formed the matter of a series of Lenten conferences which are pre- served for us in fifteen volumes, and which have lost none of their reality. True progress in all its forms, whether of the individual or of tlie family, in science, art, morals, or government, is herein treated with great doctrinal exactness and breadth of view. The practical conclusions of these conferences Pere F(51ix summed up every year in his preaching of the Easter retreat, which had been inaugurated by Pere de Ravignan. This was the side of his ministry which lay nearest his heart. While he was in Paris, and especially during his stay at Nancy (1867-1883), and at Lille (1883-1891), the illustrious Jesuit spoke in nearly all the great cathedrals of France and Belgium. In 1881 he even went to Copenhagen to conduct the Advent exercises, and there he held a celebrated conference on authority. PY'lix founded the Society of St. Michael for the distribution of good books, and employed the leisure moments of his last years in the composition of several works and in the revision of his "Retraites a Notre-Dame", which he published in six volumes.

The eloquence of Pere F(51ix was characterized by clearness, vigorous logic, unction, and pathos, even in his reasoning. He lacked imagination and the en- thusiasm of Lacordaire, but he was more skilled in dialectic and surer in doctrine. His diction was richer than that of de Ravignan, and while he was less di- dactic than MonsabrS he was more original. A list of his works is given by Sommervogel.

Jenner, Le R. P. Felix, with the catalogue of Sommervogel as appendix (Paris, 1892), 260; Cornut, Le R. P. Fflix in the Etudes (1891), Aug.; Pontmartin, Le R. P. Felix (Paris, 1861).

Louis Lalande.

FeUx and Adauctus, Saints, martyrs at Rome, 303, under Diocletian and Maximian. The Acts, first published in Ado's Martyrology, relate as follows: Felix, a Roman priest, and brother of another priest, also named Felix, being ordered to offer sacrifice to the gods, was brought by tlie prefect Dracus to the tem- ples of Serapis, Slercury, and Diana. But at the prayer of the saint the idols fell shattered to the ground. He was then led to execution. On the way an unknown person joined him, professed himself a ('hristian, and also received the crown of martyrdom. The Christians gave him the name Adauctus (added). These Acts are considered a legendary embellishment of a mis- understood inscription by Pope Damasus. A Dracus cannot be fouml among the prefects of Rome; the other Felix of the legentl i.s St. Felix of Nola; and Felix of Monte Pincio is the same Felix honoured on the Garden Hill. The brother is imaginary (Anal. Boll., XVI, 19-29). Their veneration, however, is very old; they are commemorated in the Sacramentary of Greg- ory the Great and in the ancient martyrologies. Their church in Rome, built over their graves, in the ceme- tery of Comniodilla, on the Via Ostiensis, near the basilica of St. Paul, and restored by Leo III, was dis- covered about three huntlred years ago and again un- earthed in 1905 (Civilt;\Catt.,'l905, IT, (108). Leo IV, about S.W, is said to have given their relics to Irmen- gard, wife of Lothair 1; .she placed (hem in the abbey of canonesses at Eschau in Alsace. They were brought