Consciences en liberté? Itinéraires d'ecclésiastiques convertis au protestantisme (1631–1760) (review)

Didier Boisson provides in this wide-ranging survey an account of the identities, motivations, and biographical trajectories of over four hundred and fifty members of the Catholic clergy, secular and regular, who converted to Protestantism over the periods preceding and following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Much of the research is archival (centred on the Archives d'État de Genève, in which all such records are held), statistics abound, and the volume concludes with a substantial sequence of (largely descriptive) tabulated annexes. In the body of the text Boisson looks first of all at the origins and biographies of the figures involved. The mixed motives for the transition appear frequently to arise from any or all of a lack of vocation, a reaction to controversy, or the experience of persecution, with the influence of Jansenism a significant additional factor, both before and after the Bull Unigenitus. St Paul is an obvious canonical model, and the attendant desire for a 'retour à un christianisme des origines' (p. 531) is cited as a determining criterion. There are fascinating accounts of the attitudes of Calvinists in the pays d'accueil towards their new co-religionists, and of the geographical and financial disruption involved in almost all of their narratives. A particularly enlightening aspect of the study lies in the emphasis placed on continuing elements of instability evident within many of its subjects, whose récits de conversion might well also include a reconversion to Catholicism. On the other hand, attempts at dissuasion by the Roman Church to prevent the initial apostasy are extensively recorded, with Bossuet identified as a key player (and one brave soul even records his campaign to convert the Bishop of Meaux to Protestantism). The converts in question were, unsurprisingly, rejected by members of the communion they had abandoned; and yet their welcome into the Protestant faith was in many cases far from straightforward, as the written accounts testify. Boisson gives deserved attention to the careers pursued by his subjects, which ranged from journalism through creative writing to teaching (at a period when French was the dominant language of continental Europe), commerce, and spying. More intriguing again are their ensuing spiritual trajectories, leading some into Anglicanism, others into the excesses of sectarian enthousiasme, and others into deism. In the light of this diversity, their involvement in religious and political controversy both in France and in the host countries is extensively explored; and the work concludes on an examination of certain works that addressed broader sociopolitical issues, such as the status of women (Poulain de la Barre), equality of wealth and opportunity (Gueudeville), and educational reform (Maubert de Gouvest). Many of the names of those discussed are, and are likely to remain, unfamiliar. The major exception is the Abbé Prévost, whose confessional vacillations are helpfully tied into the chronology of his novelistic output. Overall this is an impressive piece of scholarship, not least because the reader is reassured to discover that the question mark of the title is reflected throughout in Boisson's open-minded approach to his material.