Yvo Parisiensis (Ivo Parisiensis/Yves de Paris/Charles de la Rue/Franciscus Allaeus/'le Phoenix', 1588-1678)
Yvo Parisiensis (Ivo Parisiensis/Yves de Paris/Charles de la Rue/Franciscus Allaeus/'le Phoenix', 1588-1678) OFMCap. French Capuchin friar and member of the Parisian province. Born in Paris. Studied in Italy (influenced by Ficinian and related forms of neo-Platonism, as well as by Lullist currents). Further studies of law at Orléans. Advocate at the Parliament of Paris (1610-19). After the death of his father and the apparent ruin of his family, he retired in a Capuchin convent in 1619, taking Yves as his order name. Became priest in 1632. Prolific author on a range of topics, including natural theology, and spiritual works. His first book issued after his profession, entitled Les heureux succès de la piété (Paris, 1632), which reacted against the book Le Directeur spirituel désinteréssé of Jean-Pierre Camus, secretary of Francis of Sales, drew a huge controversy. Yves attacked Camus's thesis that secular clerics made better spiritual guides than regular clerics. Eventually, Camus was able to have the book condemned by the University of Paris. But after Camus became bishop of Belley, he wrote an apology concerning the matter to the Capuchin leaer Joseph du Tremblay. In 1633, Yves wrote his major work, the La théologue naturelle ou les premières véritez de la foy sont éclaircies par raisons sensibles et moralles , which was directed against sceptic tendencies in France. Opposed to the Augustinians of Port Royal and other forms of Jansenism. After 1646, Yves transferred to the monastery of Meudon (where he worked on his Digestum sapientiae ), and after 1649, due to political unrest, Yves transferred to Croisie near St. Lazaire, where he remained until 1657 (continuing his work on the Digestum sapientiae , writing the Traité de la necessité , Conduite du religieux , two astrological works (published under the pseudonym of Franciscus Allaeus), namely Astrologia nova methodus and Mi>Fatum Universi , as well as the L'agent de Dieu dans le monde and Ius naturale rebus creatis a Deo constitutum ). Back in Paris after 1567, he continued working on his Digestum . In Paris, he wrote his last works Les vaines ecuses des pécheurs , Les fausses opinions du monde, ou le monde combatu dans ses maxcimes criminelles , Le gentil-homme chrestien , Le magistrat chrestien and, near the end of his life, he also oversaw the publication of the first volume of Les oeuvres françoises du P. Yves de Paris He died in Paris after a long proces of dementia in 1678, at the age of 90. Somehow, the order rather quickly after this death began to ignore his literary legacy.