BENEDICT XIV

This article appears in Volume V03, Page 719 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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BENEDICT XIV . (Prospero Lorenzo Lambertini),

pope

from 1740 to 1758, was born at Bologna on the 31st of

March

1675. At the age of thirteen he entered the Collegium Clementinum at Rome. He served the Curia in many and important capacities, yet devoted his leisure time to theological and canonistic study. Benedict XIII. made him archbishop of Theodosia in partibus, then of Ancona (1727), and the next year created him cardinal priest. In 1731 Clement XII. translated him to his native cityof Bologna, where as archbishop he was both efficient and popular. He published valuable works, notably De servorum Dei beatification et canonizatione, De sacrificio missae, as well as a treatise on the feasts of Christ and the Virgin and of some saints honoured in Bologna. In a

conclave

CONCLAVE (Lat. conclave, from cum, together, and clavis, a key)

which had lasted for months he was elected on the 17th of August 1740 the successor of Clement XTI. Benedict XIV. was not merely

earnest

EARNEST (probably a corruption of the obsolete arles or erles, adapted from Lat. equivalent arrha, due to a confusion with the adjective " earnest," serious, O. Eng. eornust, cognate with Ger. ernst)

and conscientious, but of incisive intellect, and unfailingly cheerful and witty. In several respects he bettered the economic conditions of the pas al states, but was disinclined to undertake the needed thorough-going reform of its administration. In foreign politics he made important concessions to Portugal, Naples, Sardinia, Spain, and was the first

pope

expressly to recognize the king of Prussia as such. In 1741 he issued the

bull

Immensa pastorum principis; demanding more humane treatment for the Indians of Brazil and

Paraguay

PARAGUAY

, and in the bulls Ex quo singulari (1742) and mnium sollicitudinum (1744) he rebuked the missionary methods of the

Jesuits

JESUITS

in accommodating their

message

MESSAGE (a word occurring in slightly different forms in several languages, e.g. Fr. message, Span. mensaje, Ital. messagio; adapted from the Low Lat. missaticum, from mittere)

to the heathen usages of the Chinese and of the natives of Malabar. In accord with the spirit of the age he reduced the number of holy days in several Catholic countries. To the end of his life he kept up his studies and his intercourse with other scholars, and founded several learned societies. His masterpiece, Libri octo. de synods diocesana, begun in Bologna, appeared during his pontificate. He died on the 3rd of May 1758.
His works, published in twelve quarto volumes at Rome (1747-1751), appeared in more nearly complete editions at Venice in 1767 and at Prato, 18391846; also Briefe Benedicts XIV., ed. F. X. Kraus (2nd ed., Freiburg, 1888); Benedicti XIV. Papae opera inedita, ed. F. Heiner (Freiburg, 1904). See

Herzog

HERZOG, HANS (1819–1894)
HERZOG, JOHANN
JAKOB
- JAKOB, LUDWIG HEINRICH VON (1759—1827)
(1805-1882)

-Hauck, Realencyklopadie, ii. 572 ff. ; Wetzer and Welter, Kirchenlexikon, ii. 317 ff . (W. W. R.*)

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