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Duplessis-Mornay, Foix-Candale and the Hermetic Religion of the World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Jeanne Harrie
Jeanne Harrie*
Affiliation:
California State College, Bakersfield
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Extract

The cumulative results of over thirty-five years of research by historians of Renaissance thought have established the importance of the Hermetic tradition in the intellectual life of Renaissance Europe. The studies of Frances Yates especially have focused the attention of historians of science upon the problem of the relationship of Hermetic magic to the development of modern scientific attitudes. Others have regarded the Hermetic tradition as a foundation of religious toleration in late Renaissance Europe. The studies of Yates, Walker, and Dagens have suggested that acceptance of the Hermetica, together with the remaining texts of the prisca theologia, by Renaissance intellectuals was manifested in practical life in ‘eirenic, reunionist opinions’ and efforts to effect a reconciliation between warring Catholics and Protestants at the end of the sixteenth century.

Type
Research Article
Information
Renaissance Quarterly , Volume 31 , Issue 4 , Winter 1978 , pp. 499 - 514
Copyright
Copyright © Renaissance Society of America 1978

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References

1 See, in particular, Kristeller, Paul Oskar, ‘Marsilio Ficino e Lodovico Lazzarelli: Contributo alia diffusione delle idee ermetiche nel Rinascimento,’ Studies in Renaissance Thought and Letters (Rome, 1956), pp. 221–242 Google Scholar; Garin, Eugenio et al., Testi utnanistici su l'ertnetismo (Rome, 1955)Google Scholar; Yates, Frances A., Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (New York, 1969 [1964])Google Scholar; Rossi, Paolo, Francis Bacon: From Magic to Science, trans. Sacha Rabinovitch (Chicago, 1968 [1957])Google Scholar; Walker, D. P., ‘The Prisca Theologia in France,’ Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 17 (1954), 204–259 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in revised form in his The Ancient Theology: Studies in Christian Platonismfrom the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Ithaca, N.Y., 1972), pp. 63-131; Walker, , Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella (London, 1958)Google Scholar.

2 See especially Yates, Giordano Bruno, pp. 144-156 and 432-455, and her ‘The Hermetic Tradition in Renaissance Science,’ in Art, Science and History in the Renaissance, ed. C. S. Singleton (Baltimore, 1967), pp. 255-274. For a recent reinterpretation of the contributions of Hermetism to the scientific revolution, see Robert S. Westman, ‘Magical Reform and Astronomical Reform: The Yates Thesis Reconsidered,’ in Westman, Robert S. and McGuire, J. E., Hermeticism and the Scientific Revolution (Los Angeles, 1977), pp. 1–91 Google Scholar-

3 The term prisca theologia, or ‘ancient theology,’ refers to a religious and philosophical tradition drawn from the texts of pre-Christian authors, including the Orphica, the Oracula Chaldaica, the Hermetica, and the works of Plato, and was employed by Christian apologists as pagan affirmation of the truth of Christian doctrine. See Walker, The Ancient Theology, pp. 1-3.

4 Walker has argued in The Ancient Theology (p. 131) that use of the prisca theologia helped support a religious liberalism which stressed similarities rather than differences between various religions and philosophies. See also his ‘Orpheus the Theologian and Renaissance Platonists,’ Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 16 (1953), 100-120, reprinted in revised form in The Ancient Theology, pp. 22-41; Yates, , The French Academies of the Sixteenth Century (London, 1947), esp. p. 199 Google Scholar ff.; Dagens, Jean, ‘Hermétisme et cabale en France de Lefèvre d'Etaples à Bossuet,’ Revue de littéature comparée, 35 (1961), 5–16 Google Scholar.

5 The Hermetic literature is sometimes divided into two categories: the philosophical which includes the Pimander, the Asclepius, and the fragments of Stobaeus; and the practical which comprises the magical, astrological, and alchemical literature ascribed to Hermes Trismegistus. However, the division is not clear. Some religious Hermetists repudiated the Asclepius for its magic and those who practiced spiritual alchemy accepted the Emerald Table as the work of Hermes. The term ‘religious Hermetism,’ therefore, generally refers to the purely religious and philosophical use of the Hermetica purged of magical elements. See Yates, Giordano Bruno, p. 44 and n. 2. A.-J. Festugière, however, in his La Révélation d'Hermès Trismegéste (Paris, 1950), I, 88, views the magical and astronomical texts as closely linked to the philosophical.

6 Dagens, ‘Hermétisme et cabale,’ p. 8.

7 de Mornay, Philippe du Plessis, De la Verité de la Religion Chrestienne contre les Athées, Epicuriens, Payens, Juifs, Mahumedistes et autres Infideles (Antwerp: Plantin, 1581)Google Scholar. Unless otherwise noted, the edition cited is that published by Claude Micard (Paris, 1585). On Duplessis-Mornay's life and career, see Patry, Raoul, Philippe du Plessis-Mornay: Un huguenot homme d'Etat (1540-1623) (Paris, 1933)Google Scholar.

8 Walker, The Ancient Theology, pp. 31-33, 39, 97-98, 126-127, and 152-153.

9 ‘Il semble qu'il ait une prédilection particulière pour Mercure Trismégiste… . Duplessis-Mornay fonde ses démonstrations apologétiques sur les theologiens anciens et particulièrement sur le plus ancien de tous: Mercure’ (Dagens, ‘Hermétisme et cabale,’ p. 8).

10 Yates, Giordano Bruno, pp. 176; 180; 186. Burke, John in ‘Hermetism as a Renaissance World View,’ in The Darker Vision of the Renaissance, ed. Robert Kinsman (Berkeley, 1974), pp. 95–117 Google Scholar, follows Yates in describing Duplessis-Mornay as a ‘Protestant Hermetist’ who ‘believed that religious tolerance would be attained by a return to a Hermetic religion of the world.’

11 François de Foix, due de Candale and Bishop of Aire, is best known for his editions of Euclid's Elements and of the Pimander of Hermes Trismegistus. His contemporaries accorded him respect as a successful scientist and alchemist. See my unpublished doctoral dissertation, ‘François Foix de Candale and the Hermetic Tradition in Sixteenth Century France,’ Univ. of California, Riverside, 1975.

12 de Candalla, Franciscus Flussates, Euclidis Megarensis Mathematici Clarissimi elementa, Libris XV… Accessit decimus sextus liber, de solidorum regularium sibi invicem inscriptorum collationibus (Paris: Jean Le Royer, 1566)Google Scholar; Euclidis Megarensis Mathematici Clarissimi elementa … Novissime collati sunt decimus Septimus & decimus octauus, priori editione quodammodo polliciti, de componendorum, inscribendorum, & conferendorum compositorum solidorum inventis, ordine et numero absoluti (Paris: Jacques du Puys, 1578).

13 Dagens, ‘Hermétisme et cabale,’ pp. 6-7; ‘Le Commentaire du Pimandre de Francois de Candale,’ in Mélanges d'histoire littéraire offerts à Daniel Mornet (Paris, 1951), pp. 21-26; Bérulle et les origines de la restauration catholique (1575-1611) (Paris, 1952), esp. pp. 21-22.

14 Yates, Giordano Bruno, p. 173.

15 One encounter, in which Foix-Candale was persuaded by his cousin Henry of Navarre to give his party, which included Duplessis-Mornay, a tour of his famous laboratory, is described by Théodore-Agrippa d'Aubigné, Œuvres, ed. H. Weber, J. Bailbé, and M. Soulié (Paris, 1969), p. 414.

16 Foix-Candale, , Le Pimandre de Mercure Trismegiste de la Philosophie Chrestienne, Cognoissance du verbe divin, et de l'excellence des oeuvres de Dieu (Bordeaux: Simon Millanges, 1579)Google Scholar.

17 See above, note 7.

18 Duplessis-Mornay, , De l'Institution, Usage et Doctrine du Sainct Sacrement de l'Eucharistie, en l'Eglise Ancienne (La Rochelle: Hierosme Haultin, 1598)Google Scholar; Foix-Candale, ‘Traicte du Saint-Sacrement par lequel plusieurs intelligences divines, jusques a present couvertes, sont esclaircies pour rendre la [sic] disputes qui perturbent ce jourd'huy grand nombre de peuple de Dieu, le tout prins des sainctes lettres,’ Bibliotheque nationale, Fonds Français, 1886. The letter of dedication to Henry III is dated 1584.

19 In 1576, Duplessis-Mornay was entrusted by Henry of Navarre with a diplomatic mission to Elizabeth I of England. In 1582, he formally attached himself to Henry, whom he served until Henry's abjuration of Protestantism. See Osborn, Albert W., Sir Philip Sidney en France (Paris, 1932), p. 27 Google Scholar.

20 See below p. 511.

21 Foix-Candale succeeded his younger brother, Christophe, as Bishop of Aire-sur l'Adour. Although Christophe died in 1570, Francois did not assume control over the diocese until 1576 and was not consecrated as bishop until 1578. See A. Degert, ‘L'ancien diocese d'Aire,’ Revue de Gascogne, n.s. 6 (1906), 456-457. On Duplessis-Mornay's position among the Huguenots, see Yardeni, Myriam, La conscience nationale en France pendant les guerres de religion (1559-1598) (Louvain, 1971), p. 172 Google Scholar.

22 See above, note 18. In addition, Foix-Candale published a Greek-Latin edition of the Pimander, Mercurij Trismegisti Pimandras utraque lingua restitutus (Bordeaux: Simon Millanges, 1574), and a Greek-French edition, Le Pitnandre de Mercure Trismegiste nouvellement traduict de l'exemplaire grec restitue en langue francoyse (Bordeaux: Simon Millanges, 1574).

23 See above, note 12.

24 See above, note 18.

25 Foix-Candale included among the prefatory material of his Pimandre (1579) an essay by the humanist Jean Puget de Saint Marc, entitled ‘Du temps qu'a fleury Mercure Trismegiste’ in which the author noted that Plato in his Phaedrus had referred to Hermes as the ‘inventeur de 1'Astrologie, Geometrie, et Arithmetique’ (Pimandre, sig. A5V). Duplessis-Mornay acknowledged his familiarity with the legend: ‘Or, c'est, dit-on, ce Trismegiste, autrement appellé Theut, qui apprit à lire aux Egyptiens, qui leur inventa la Geometrie, et l'Astronomie’ (De la Verité, p. 72).

26 Foix-Candale, Eudidis elementa (1578), Preface, sig. 3. On the place of mathematics in the thought of Foix-Candale, see my dissertation, ‘François Foix de Candale,’ pp. 162-214.

27 Dagens, ‘Hermétisme et cabale,’ p. 7.

28 ‘Et combien que c'est aucteur et son traicté n'ayé este receu et auctorisé au nombre des sainctes lettres, si est ce que de tant qu'il se trouve estre concordant et expositeur, non discordant des sainctz ecritz Ton ne peut faillir a reverer son advis, comme des autres sainctes personnes de telle condition’ (Foix-Candale, Pimandre [1579], Preface, sig. A2). The translation is that of Walker, The Ancient Theology, p. 69.

29 See below pp. 508-509.

30 Yates, Giordano Bruno, p. 150.

31 Foix-Candale, Pimandre, Preface, sig. a4.

32 Vindiciae contra tyrannos, sive de Principis in populum populique in principem legitima potestate, Stephano Junio Bruno, Celta, auctore (Edinburgh [Basel], 1579). Attributed both to Hubert Languet and to Duplessis-Mornay, the work was probably the effort of both, although there is little scholarly accord on the question. See Yardeni, La conscience nationale, p. 45, n. 5, and Giesey, Ralph E., ‘The Monarchomach Triumvirs: Hotman, Beza and Mornay,’ Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, 32 (1970), 42 Google Scholar, n. 2. For a list of the works of Duplessis-Mornay, see the bibliographical appendix in Patry, Philippe du Plessis-Mornay, pp. 633-647.

33 See above, note 18.

34 Yates, Giordano Bruno, p. 176.

35 Dagens remarked in his ‘Hermétisme et cabale,’ p. 8, that Duplessis-Mornay ‘fait l'accueil le plus libéral à toutes les autorités de la prisca theologia.’ Walker described De la Verité as ‘stuffed with, prisca theologia’ and ‘heavily Platonic’ in his ‘Ways of Dealing with Atheists: A Background to Pamela's Refutation of Cecropia,’ Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, 17 (1955), 254, reprinted in revised form without the above remarks in The Ancient Theology, pp. 132-163.

36 Noting the common consent of men through the ages on key philosophical issues, Duplessis-Mornay concluded that ‘c'est nature, et non institution, imitation, nourriture qui parle, et la voix de nature, c'est la voix de verite’ (De la Verité, sig. eiiiv).

37 ‘Mercure Trismegiste, qui est (si vrayment ces livres sont de luy, et pour le moins sont-ils bien anciens) la source de tous’ (Duplessis-Mornay, De la Verité, p. 27). Purnell, Fredderick, Jr., in his ‘Francesco Patrizi and the Critics of Hermes Trismegistus,’ The Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 6 (1976), 155–178 Google Scholar, has shown that serious criticisms of the authenticity of the Hermetic works had begun not with Isaac Casaubon's Exercitationes of 1614 but as early as 1567 with Gilbert Genebrard's Chronographia. On Genebrard, see also Purnell's ‘Hermes and the Sibyl: A Note on Ficino's Pimander,’ Renaissance Quarterly, 30 (1977), 305-310.

38 Duplessis-Mornay, De la Verité, pp. 125-126.

39 See Walker, The Ancient Theology, p. 69 and n. 4.

40 Foix-Candale agreed with Puget de Saint Marc who, drawing upon Suidas and Eusebius of Caesarea, maintained that Hermes was a contemporary of ‘Saturne Roy d'Aegypte’ who preceded Abraham by several generations (Pimandre [1579], sig. A5).

41 Duplessis-Mornay, De la Verité, Preface, passim.

42 Walker, The Ancient Theology, p. 142.

43 Duplessis-Mornay, De la Verité, pp. 27, 41.

44 ‘Ceste grande personne a esté favorisée de Dieu, qu'elle se trouvera avoir reçu de luy la mesme instruction, qu'en ont reçeu Moïse, les Prophetes, et Apostres’ (Pimandre [1579], Preface, sig. [A1]v).

46 Duplessis-Mornay, De la Verité, p. 30.

46 In Poix-Candale's opinion, Hermes’ descriptions of the creation of the world were ‘telles que Moïse les a descriptes, mais d'un plus grand ordre et cognoissance’ (Pimandre, Preface, sig. [a5]v; p. 2).

47 See Yates, Giordano Bruno, pp. 6-12.

48 See above, note 46.

49 ‘ … il a esté vray praecurseur annonçant les principaux poinctz de la religion Chrestienne’ (Pimandre [1579], sig. a4). ‘Nous ne pouvons penser, attendu ces preuves et infinies autres concordantes totalement a la religion Chrestienne, que l'homme puisse ignorer Mercure avoir esté non seulement agreable a Dieu, mais aussi comme vray Chrestien recherchant son salut et de ses prochains par les mesmes moyens, qu'il est donné aux Chrestiens’ (ibid., sig. A2).

50 Ibid., pp. 150-155, 685.

51 ‘C'est toutes-fois chose tres-admirable qu'il aye pleu a ce bon Dieu reveler a ce tres-grand philosophe, non seulement les premiers pointz de l'ancien testament … mais aussi luy a revelé outre le don de son filz faict à l'homme pour son sauvement, ce filz estre Dieu homme, & lequel proposeroit l'operation du sauvement, par renaissance ou regeneration, qui ne feust jamais escrit ou proposé par aucun de ce grand nombre qui ont basty la saincte Escripture & vieux testament’ (ibid., p. 563). See also p. 243.

52 Ibid., p. 638. On the history of the term ‘Christian philosophy,’ see Kristeller, Paul O., Medieval Aspects of Renaissance Learning, ed. Edward P. Mahoney (Durham, N. C., 1974), pp. 34–35.Google Scholar

53 Duplessis-Mornay, De l'lnstitution du Sainct Sacrement, sig. B2V.

54 Foix-Candale, ‘Traicte du Saint-Sacrement,’ fols. IV-II.

55 Gardiner, Stephen, Confutatio Cavillationum, quibus sacrosanctum eucharistiae sacramentum, ab impiis Capernaitis, impetisolet (Paris, 1552)Google Scholar.

56 Foix-Candale, however, did not advocate a Hermetic interpretation of the Eucharist as a practical means of reconciling liberal Catholics and Protestants in Europe as did Giordano Bruno in his La Cena de la Ceneri (London, 1584). See Bruno, Giordano, The Ash Wednesday Supper, ed. and trans. Edward A. Gosselin and Lawrence S. Lerner (Hamden, Conn., 1977), pp. 47–49 Google Scholar.

57 Foix-Candale's identification of the Hermetic process of regeneration and Christian redemption led him to dangerous positions on the nature of evil, the question of faith, and the means of achieving salvation. See my dissertation, ‘Francois Foix de Candale,’ p. 110 ff.

58 Duplessis-Mornay's use of the Hermetic literature appears to have had its counterpart among Catholic theologians. Gabriel Du Préau (1511-88), whose French translation of the Hermetica, Deux livres de Mercure Trismegiste Hermés tres ancien Theologien & excellent Philosophe, l'un de la puissance & sapience de Dieu, l'autre de la volonte de Dieu. Aveq'un Dialogue de Loys Lazarel poëte Chrestien intitulé le Bassin d'Hermés. Le tout traduit de Grec enfrancoys par Gabriel du Preau … was published in Paris in 1549 and 1557, was the author of an extensive corpus of apologetic and polemical literature directed against the Protestants and was known to contemporaries for the zeal with which he combatted the ideas of the reformers. For an incomplete list of his works, see Dictionnaire de biographie française, ed. Roman d'Amat (Paris, 1970), XII, 543-544.

59 Mémoires et correspondance de du Plessis Mornay pour servire à l'histoire de la Réformation et desguerres civiles et religieuses en France, ed. A. D. de la Fontenelle de Vaudoré and P. R. Auguis (Paris, 1824), 1, 20-37. See also Patry, Philippe du Plessis-Mornay, p. 21.

60 Patry, Philippe du Plessis-Mornay, pp. 52-53.

61 Lecler, J., Histoire de la tolérance au Siècle de la réforme (Paris, 1955), II, 57, 90Google Scholar.

62 Patry, Philippe du Plessis-Momay, p. 68. Yardeni sees Duplessis-Mornay as ‘l’un des représentants les plus autorisés d'un patriotisme authentique, qui dépasse largement les cadres confessionels. Par là, il est beaucoup plus proche des politiques que de certains milieux fanatiques de son propre parti’ (La conscience nationale, p. 191). See pp. 187-190 for a discussion of the theme of national unity in his pamphlet literature.

63 In 1587, at the age of seventy-five, Foix-Candale traveled from Bordeaux to Paris for his investment in the Ordre du Saint Esprit. ‘Promotion de 31 Xbre 1587,’ Bibliothèque nationale, Fonds Français, 25200, fol. 311.

64 See Desgraves, Louis, ‘Aspects des controverses entre catholiques et protestants dans le Sud-Ouest entre 1580 et 1630,’ Annales du Midi, 76 (1964), 153–187 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

65 Gaullieur, Ernest, Histoire de la Réformation à Bordeaux et dans le ressort du parlement de Guyenne (Paris, 1884), p. 286 Google Scholar.

66 See above, note 15; Lauzun, Philippe, Itinéraire raisonné de Marguerite de Valois en Gascogne d'après ses livres de comptes (1578-1586) (Paris, 1902), p. 166 Google Scholar.

67 ‘… ce present oeuvre: lequel nous prions le lecteur voir et poiser entierement, pour apres en donner son plus sain iugement: et le bon Dieu nous face la grace qu'il puisse servir tant aux siens, pour les confirmer en sa devotion, que aux esgarez, pour les reduire à son troupeau: à celle fin qu'il soit faict soubz un seul Pasteur, une mesme et seule Bergerie’ (Foix-Candale, Pimandre [1579], sig. A4V).

68 Foix-Candale, Pimandre, pp. 717, 722-723.

69 Foix-Candale's stress on the individual extended to his understanding of the value of the Eucharist. He strongly rejected the view that God had intended the sacrament as an aid to human communication, asserting that men could only hope to gain the vices, blemishes, and sins of others if they failed to realize that it is Christ with whom they must commune. Through each man's personal communion with Him the entire body of Christians is united (ibid., p. 581).

70 Lecler, Histoire de la tolérance, II, 57, 90.

71 See especially The Valois Tapestries (London, 1959); The Rosicrucian Enlightenment (London, 1972); Astraea: The Imperial Theme in the Sixteenth Century (Boston, 1975).

72 In particular, Evans, R. J. W. who, in his Rudolf II and His World: A Study in Intellectual History, 1576-1612 (New York, 1973), p. 92 Google Scholar, has characterized irenicism as ‘an attempt to evade tightening religious antagonisms by calling on intellectual reserves which the practical world would not admit.’