, in Latin Belcarius Plguilio, bishop of Metz, a man of some note
, in Latin Belcarius Plguilio, bishop of Metz, a man of some note
in the sixteenth century, was born April 15, 1514, of one
of the most ancient families of the Bourbonnois. The progress he male in polite literature induced Claude de Lorraine, the h'rst duke of Guise, to choose him to be preceptor to cardinal de Lorraine, his second son, an appointment which very naturally, we will not say very justly, attached him to the family of Guise, and made him too partial in his writings to their character. He attended his
pupil to Rome, where he became acquainted with Paul
Jovius, in whose history he afterwards pointed out some
errors. On his return from Italy, the cardinal of Lorraine
procured him in 1555 the bishopric of Metz, but according
to Beza (Hist. Ecclesiast. lib. xvi. p. 439), this was little
more than a titular preferment, the cardinal reserving the
revenues, or the greater part of them, to himself. According to the same author, Beaucaire, with two other
bishops, came to Metz, and occasioned an alarm among
the inhabitants of the reformed religion, some of whom
thought proper to retire for safety from the city. Beza,
however, adds that Beaucaire only wrote a small tract in
Latin on “Sanctification,
” and “The Baptism of Infants,
” which was soon answered. Some time after his
promotion, his patron, the cardinal, carried him with him
to the council, on the day that the fathers of the council
had appointed as a thanksgiving for the battle of Dreux,
fought Jan. 3, 1563, and here Beaucaire pronounced an
oration, which was much applauded, and is inserted at the
end of the thirtieth book of his “History of his own times.
”
This work he began in Rerum Gallicarum Coramentaria, ab. A. 1462 usque ad A. 1566,
” Lyons, Traité des enfans morts dans le sein de
leurs meres,
”