ABELLY, LOUIS. - French theologian and writer whose exact birth year (1603, 1604, 1606) and place (either in the Vexin or in Paris) remain uncertain. Died 4 October 1691 in Paris. He opposed both Jansenists and Gallicans. From the earliest years of his priesthood he placed himself under the direction of St Vincent de Paul, whose counsel led him to accept the post of vicar general to the bishop of Bayonne, Francesco Fouquet (1640–43). When the latter was transferred to Agde, Abelly returned to Paris, where he became parish priest of Saint-Josse and then spiritual director of the General Hospital. Elected bishop of Rodez in 1664, he resigned three years later after suffering a stroke. He spent the remainder of his life at Saint-Lazare in Paris, devoted to study and prayer.
He composed some forty works, which may be grouped into three main categories: theological and ascetical writings, to which belong his earliest and best-known works; polemical writings defending the dignity and prerogatives of the Blessed Virgin, ecclesiastical hierarchy, and Eucharistic worship; and historical works, especially on heresies.
Three works in particular brought him lasting renown: 1) the *Medulla Theologiae*... (approved by the doctors of the Sorbonne, in 2 vols., Paris 1650: 13 editions), which earned him from Boileau (*Le Lutrin*, IV) an ironical epithet (*les moëlleux A.*), yet which St Alphonsus himself recommended for the formation of the clergy (cf. letter to Di Costanzo, 17 Jan 1782: *Lettere di S. Alfonso*, II, Rome 1887, p. 623); 2) *La Couronne de l’Année Chrétienne, ou Méditations sur les principales et les plus importantes vérités de l’Évangile de J. C. disposées pour tous les jours de l’année*, in 2 vols. (Paris 1657), constantly reprinted until the second half of the last century: 45 editions; 3) *La vie du Vénérable Serviteur de Dieu Vincent de Paul*, in 3 vols. (Paris 1664), judged by Coste to be “the most pious and the most accurate,” whereby Abelly passed into history as the first biographer of the great saint.
Noteworthy for its positive method is the work on the Madonna: *La tradition de l’Église touchant la dévotion particulière des chrétiens envers la Très-Sainte Vierge Marie, Mère de Dieu*... (Paris 1652). To ecclesiastics he addressed *Sacerdos christianus, seu ad vitam sacerdotalem pie instituendam manuductio* (Paris 1656), which likewise enjoyed many editions.
For the efficacy of his action and writings, he must be counted among those who, in the 17th century, most strenuously laboured to restore ecclesiastical discipline in France.