Arnoult, John Baptist

, an ex-jesuit, was born in 1689, and died at Besancon in 1753. He was the author of some curious pieces. The first was a collection of French, Italian, and Spanish proverbs, a scarce little work in 12mo, Besançon, 1733, and published under the assumed name of Antoine Dumont, to prevent any unpleasant consequences to the author for some humorous attacks which it contains on the Jansenists. In 1738, he published under the same name, in Latin, “A treatise on Grace,” but his most considerable work is “Le Precepteur,” Besançon, 1747, 4to, somewhat on the plan of Dodsley’s Preceptor; and Sabathier says, there are many useful reflections in this work, although it is not well written. Arnoult attached great importance to a new plan for the reformation of French orthography, and intended to have introduced it in an edition of Joubert and Danet’s French and Latin and Latin and French dictionaries, but this he did not live to execute. ²