Arnauld

Arnauld, French family involved in Jansenism (see under Jansen, Cornelis). The name is also spelled Arnaut or Arnault. The leader was a nun, Marie Angélique de Sainte Madeleine, 1591-1661, abbess from early youth of Port-Royal, a Cistercian house near Paris. Under the influence of St. Francis de Sales she reformed her abbey. She was interested in Jansenism by Duvergier de Hauranne, and her introduction of the ideas into Port-Royal was an important step in forwarding the movement.

Her younger brother, Antoine Arnauld, 1612-94, was a leading Jansenist controversialist. He was a priest and a member of the Sorbonne. His best-known work was an attack on the Jesuits, De la fréquente communion (1643). He also wrote against Calvinism and the freethinkers. In 1656 he was expelled from the Sorbonne and the faculty of theology. He lived for some years at Port-Royal-des-Champs, where he collaborated on the Port-Royal textbooks. He withdrew to Belgium in 1679. The chief controversy of his later years was with Malebranche on the theology of grace.

His elder brother, Robert Arnauld d'Andilly, 1588-1674, was a translator of religious writings and a religious poet of originality. He lived for many years in retirement at Port-Royal-des-Champs.

See Arnaud