BARRÉ, NICOLAS. — Popular educator and ascetical writer, born at Amiens on 21 October 1621, died in Paris on 31 May 1686 in the odour of sanctity. At the age of twenty he entered the Minims of his native city. At Paris, in the convent of Place Royale, he acquired a broad education in mathematics and theology. He held the chair of theology even before priestly ordination and occupied it for many years. A preacher, apostle, and director of souls, he was renowned for his piety and austerity. His principal achievement was the foundation of the “Charity Schools of the Infant Jesus,” in which he revealed himself as an outstanding and pioneering educationalist. There was no school open to the children of the people, and no suitable teachers; B. created the “normal schools” for the training of male and female teachers who would dedicate themselves entirely to free education; they were not to be priests or religious women, so that the sacred ministry or the cloister would not hinder teaching. Having abolished the individual method, he prescribed the simultaneous method, gradually distributing the pupils into three classes, with separation of the sexes. Instruction was to be given in the vernacular and not in Latin. The subjects were reading, writing, arithmetic, drawing, penmanship, history and geography, Christian doctrine, and, for girls, domestic work. The timetable and school days were precisely regulated. Lessons were interrupted in the morning for Mass and spiritual chants, and for a school meal. The hierarchical organization consisted of a general director, local directors, and councillors. He also created vocational schools of handicrafts for adults, intended to supplement elementary education. It was an organic and complete conception, with little to envy in modern methods.
B. was followed and imitated by all subsequent similar institutions. St. John Baptist de La Salle was advised and encouraged by him to devote himself to the Christian schools for boys, without departing from B.’s system. His principal pedagogical treatise is Statuts et règlements des Écoles charitables du st. Enfant Jésus (Paris 1685); B.’s innovations and creations are set forth by G. Blain, the first biographer of St. J. B. de La Salle, in the Discours pour l'institution des maîtres et des maîtresses d'écoles chrétiennes et gratuites, prefixed to the Vie de M. de La Salle (Rouen 1733).
After B.’s death, some of his ascetical works were published, including the Maximes spirituelles du r. p. B. Minime, by the Abbé de Servien de Montigny (Paris 1694), and the Lettres spirituelles (Rouen 1697, 2nd ed., Toulouse 1876). In them he teaches total self-abnegation, trusting surrender, and ardent zeal for the glory of God.
His cause of beatification, introduced in 1931 before the Sacred Congregation of Rites, is in progress.