Overview
Pasquier Quesnel
(1634—1719)
Quick Reference
(1634–1719),
French Jansenist. He became an Oratorian in 1657. In 1672 he issued the first edition of the book which became famous as Réflexions morales. As against the formalized methods of spirituality in the manuals, the work emphasized the value of close study of the Bible in increasing devotion. His edition of the works of Leo I (1675) was put on the Index because of the Gallican theories developed in the notes. In 1684 he refused to subscribe to an anti-Jansenist formula imposed by his superiors and went to Brussels; he was imprisoned but escaped to the Netherlands. His Réflexions were condemned in a brief by Clement XI in 1708 and by the bull Unigenitus (1713); among the doctrines censured were the theses that no grace is given outside the Church, that grace is irresistible, that without grace no one is capable of any good, and that all acts of a sinner, even prayer, are sins.
