HAYNEUFVE, JULIEN. - Jesuit, writer on asceticism, one of the most distinguished masters of the spiritual life of the 17th century, b. at Laval on 3 Sept. 1588, d. at Paris on 31 Jan. 1663. For six years he was master of novices and instructor of the Fathers in the third year of probation. An assiduous student of the Fathers, but especially of St. Augustine, and an eminent theologian, he drew from these sources the doctrine disseminated in his writings, which earned him the reputation of a man thoroughly versed in the most intimate secrets of asceticism and spiritual direction. While remaining faithful to the principles set forth by St. Ignatius in the Exercises, he nevertheless insists forcefully on the interior life and on the divine life in the soul, through Grace.
His principal works, which had various translations and editions, are: L'ordre de la vie et des moeurs qui conduit l'homme à son salut et le rend parfait dans son état (Paris 1639); Méditations sur la vie de Jésus-Christ pour tous le jours de l'année et pour le fêtes des saints (4 vols., ibid. 1611-1642); Méditations pour le temps des exercices (ibid. 1653). Of these last two works he himself prepared a compendium to make them more accessible: Abrégé des méditations pour le temps des exercices (ibid. 1655) and Abrégé des méditations sur la vie de Jésus-Christ (ibid. 1655), both of which had numerous editions. To these may be added: Le grand chemin qui perd le monde. Comme on y entre. Comme on en sort (ibid. 1646); and the work that may be called the most personal and profound: Réponses aux demandes de la vie spirituelle par les trois voies qu'on appelle purgative, illuminative et unitive (2 vols., ibid. 1663-65, the second, posthumous, edited by Fr. L. Le Roy).
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