Clement Xi
bull
CLEMENT XI. (Giovanni Francesco Albani) was elevated to the pontificate in November 1700, and died in March 1721. The most memorable transaction of his administration was the publication in 1713 of the bull Unigendus, which so greatly disturbed the peace of the Gallican church. By this famous document 101 propositions extracted from the works of Quesnel were condemned as heretical, and as identical with propositions already condemned in the writings of Jansenius. The resistance of many French ecclesiastics and the refusal of the French parliaments to register the bull led to controversies extending through the greater part of the 18th century. Another important decision of this Pope's was that by which the Jesuit missionaries were forbidden to take a part in idolatrous worship, and to accommodate Christian language to pagan ideas under plea of conciliating the heathen. The political troubles of the time greatly embarrassed Clement's relations with the leading Catholic powers, and the moral prestige of the Holy See suffered much from his compulsory recognition of the Archduke Charles of Austria as king of Spain. His private character was irreproachable ; he was also an accomplished scholar, and a patron of letters and science.

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