BAUTAIN, LOUIS EUGÈNE MARIE

Philosopher and theologian; b. Paris, Feb. 17, 1796;d. Viroflay, Oct. 15, 1867. He went through stages of eclecticism and rationalism, but he regained the faith of his childhood in 1819 under the influence of Louise Humann and began studies for the priesthood. He was ordained in 1828 and became dean of the faculty of letters at the University of Strasbourg in 1838. In the same year he went to Rome to disprove the accusation of fideism brought against him by his bishop, Le Pappe de Trévern. From 1842 to 1846 he gave many conferences to the Cercle Philosophique de Paris. He became vicar-general for Monsignor Sibour, archbishop of Paris in 1849, and was professor of moral theology at the Sorbonne from 1853 to 1863. He founded the Sisters of St. Louis, who have extended their teaching apostolate well beyond France (see st. louis, sisters of).

His extreme reaction to rationalism made him one of the principal representatives of fideism. His bishop suspended him in 1834 because of his philosophical manifesto in 1833 that sustained the Augustinian thesis that "philosophy, which is the study of wisdom, is nothing else but religion." On April 26, 1834, however, he signed a profession of faith rejecting as erroneous these two propositions: Reason alone cannot demonstrate the existence of God; reason alone cannot establish the credibility of the Christian religion. His principal works were La Philosophie du Christianisme (1835), Philosophie, psychologie expérimentale (1839), Philosophie morale (1842), and L'Esprit humain et ses facultés (1859).

Bibliography: e. de rÉgny, L'Abbé Bautain (Paris 1884). w.m. horton, The Philosophy of the Abbé Bautain (New York 1926). p. poupard, Un Essai de philosophie chrétienne au XIX ^e siècle: L'Abbé Louis Bautain (Paris 1962). p. archambault, Catholicisme 1:1322–23. m. a. michel, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche (Freiburg 1957–65) 2:73–74.

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