FLEURY, CLAUDE. - French jurist and historian, b. in Paris on 6 Dec. 1640, d. there on 17 July 1723. Lawyer in the Parliament (1658). Following his contacts with Bossuet and Bourdaloue he studied theology and in 1672 took Holy Orders. In the same year he was appointed tutor to the princes of Condé, companions at court of the Dauphin, and in 1680 to the count of Vermandois, natural son of Louis XIV. In 1685 he worked with Fénelon in the mission of Saintonge and Poitou for the conversion of the Huguenots. He was subsequently vice-tutor to the sons of the dukes of Burgundy, of Berry and of Anjou (1689), a member of the Académie française (1696), confessor of the young Louis XV (1716).
His principal work, the Histoire ecclésiastique, carried down to 1414, which won him his seat in the Académie française (20 vols., Paris 1691-1720), of broad design, rich in critical acumen, in original dissertations, well documented, independent in its judgments, of excellent style; which explains the numerous editions and translations; not free, however, from Gallican tendencies, which aroused serene and at times even satirical criticisms. Other works worthy of note: Institutions au droit ecclésiastique (Paris 1687; placed on the Index, 21 Apr. 1693). The same work translated into Latin and annotated by Boehmer (Institutiones iuris ecclesiastici, Frankfurt 1723) was placed on the Index by decr. 17 Jan. 1729; Histoire de droit français (Paris 1674); Cathéchisme historique (ibid. 1679; prohibited "donec corrigatur" 5 Apr. 1728; the Avignon edition of 1859 permitted, decr. 7 July 1859).
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Zaccaria da San Mauro