It is not sufficiently known, that during his retreat in Holland, some years before the Revocation, he was almost the only opponent (le seul tenant, as they called it), of Arnauld, Bossuet, Nicole, and Maimbourg. The others, being still in France, dared not speak out. But in his pulpit at Rotterdam, he recoiled before no truth, and his strong and unfettered voice often inflicted the most severe and just chastisements upon the persecutors.
Nor is it sufficiently known that he became, after the fatal edict, the protector of a crowd of refugees, that he solicited and procured for them the assistance of several sovereigns, and that at the same time he gave them the shelter of hospitality, he consoled and encouraged their brethren, who languished at home, by his Pastoral Letters.
The list of Jurieu’s works is very extensive. While yet with his flock at Vitry-le-Français, he composed a Treatise on Devotion, which was reprinted seventeen times within a few years, and twenty-six times in an English translation. This work has induced the regret that the author, absorbed by controversy, did not employ more of his time in writing books of simple edification.
His reply to Father Maimbourg, Le Calvinisme et le Papisme mis en parallèle (“Calvinism and Popery Compared”), less pointed than the answer of Bayle, and less venomous, nevertheless obtained considerable applause, and was greatly read. Claude wrote to him: “Your last work against Maimbourg has at length reached me, and I have not read, but devoured it, without the possibility of quitting it. Everybody here (at Paris) of any note, with any courage or zeal left, is charmed with the book.”
He answered the attacks of Nicole by the Vrai Système de l’Eglise (“The True System of the Church”), which competent judges declare to be his master-piece. In it Jurieu develops the doctrine of the invisible church, in opposition to the visible communion of Rome. He also produced Histoire Critique des Dogmes et des Cultes (“A Critical History of Dogmas and Forms of Worship”), where humanity is considered in its religious development. The illustrious defender of the Reformed faith did not cease to wield his pen until the eve of the day of his death.
Pierre Allix (1641-1717) withdrew to England after the Revocation. He was only thirty years of age when he was summoned to succeed to the Drelincourts and Daillés. His discourses were full, solid, and distinguished for a sobriety and a clearness of style that made them equally pleasing to the educated and the ignorant. He had prepared his last sermon upon the farewell of Saint Paul to the Ephesians, to be preached at Charenton; but the place of worship was closed by the kings order eight days sooner than was expected.
“Doctor Allix,” says one of his biographers, “was loved and esteemed by all the learned men of his time. Extremely zealous for the Protestant religion, he was always ready to undertake its defence against the partisans of the Romish church. He passionately desired to unite the Protestants, particularly the Lutherans, with the Reformed, and he frequently consulted the ministers of Geneva, Holland, and Berlin, on this subject. He had a profound acquaintance with all the sciences. He was well versed in the Hebrew, Syriac, and Chaldean languages; and as his erudition was vast, and his memory excellent, he was a kind of living library.” Some writers of great weight have considered him to be the most learned of the ministers of Charenton.
Pierre Allix received at London the title of Honorary Doctor, from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. The Anglican clergy had so high an opinion of his ability that they confided to him the task of writing The History of the Councils, and even the Parliament bestowed upon him particular marks of consideration.
Jean La Placette (1639-1718) was surnamed the Nicole of the Reformed, on account of his numerous and judicious moral writings. He equalled the Jansenist doctor in knowledge of the human heart, and surpassed him in that of the Scriptures. His style was simple and chaste, and he was, above all, sincere in the highest sense of the word.
La Placette was a pastor of the French church at Copenhagen for the space of twenty-six years (1685-1711). He dedicated his Nouveaux Essais de Morale (“New Moral Essays”) to the queen of Denmark. “Our people,” he says in the preface, “are far from comprehending the extent of purity which the Gospel requires of us. They are even influenced by a great number of false maxims, more pernicious than errors of pure speculation. Besides, our writers—at least those of our nation—have been forced by the importunity of their adversaries, to give up all their leisure to the defence of the truth, so that they have been able to compose but a very few works of morality, and these only treat of some particular matters. Thus, that part of religion, which is, if I may venture to say so, the soul and essence of it, and which it is so necessary should be well explained and understood, has been in some sort neglected.”