MORIN, LÉOPOLD-GERMAIN. - Benedictine, b. at Caen (Normandy) on 16 Nov. 1861, d. at Orselina "al Sasso" (Locarno) on 12 Feb. 1946. He entered in 1881 the abbey of Maredsous (Belgium), in which—
he was able to form in himself that ardor for research and that keen critical sense which enabled him to confront with a sure hand the most arduous questions and the most debated theses concerning monastic life and history, patrology, ancient liturgy and the sacred literature of the early Middle Ages; if he could not resolve them all, if on some he even later corrected himself (and not always rightly), on all of them he certainly knew how to shed new light and to bring the problems into focus.
He was particularly assisted by that most happy intuition that was his own in the service of that dangerous instrument of investigation which is internal criticism, and which guided him in his best identifications of texts. Traveling incessantly, he visited the most important European libraries, discovering new texts, correcting ancient attributions and reclaiming for authors works assigned to others or anonymous, thus bringing a notable contribution to advanced scholarship. In 1907, establishing his habitual residence in the abbey of St. Boniface at Munich, he was able to deepen his research in the Bavarian and German libraries. The war of 1914 forced him to take refuge in Fribourg in Switzerland; having returned to Munich in 1918, the Second World War made him return in 1939 to Fribourg. He received honorary degrees from the most celebrated universities of Europe and was a member of the most illustrious scientific institutes.
He had a large part in the founding of the Revue bénédictine (1884) and constantly devoted articles and notes to it. Of particular importance are his researches on the De Sacramentis attributed to St. Ambrose, on the mysterious Ambrosiaster, on the Capitulare Evangeliorum of the Würzburg codex (Revue bénéd., 27 [1910], pp. 41-74); on the Micrologus; on the Athanasian Creed; the critical editions of certain unpublished opuscules of the heretic Gottschalk and of Arnobius the Younger. He vindicated the literary work of Gregory of Elvira, of Pacian of Barcelona, of Nicetas of Remesiana, to whom he attributes the Te Deum. In the Anecdota Maredsolana (3 vols., Maredsous 1893-1903) he published critically the Mozarabic Liber comicus, Sancti Clementis Romani ad Corinthios epistolae versio latina antiquissima, Sancti Hieronymi Commentarioli in Psalmos; id., Tractatus in Psalmos... in Esaiam tractatus etc., besides other texts. Lesser researches in bulk, but not in importance, are included in: Etudes, Textes, Découvertes. Contributions à la littérature et à l'histoire des douze premiers siècles (1913). Great acclaim was met by: Sancti Augustini Sermones post Maurinos reperti published in vol. I of the Miscellanea Agostiniana (Rome 1930); among these, 51 were rediscovered by himself, thanks to his special knowledge of the Saint's work; and S. Caesarii Arelatensis episcopi opera omnia nunc primum in unum collecta (Maredsous 1937-42, in 2 vols., of which the second, destroyed by the war, was later reprinted through the munificence of Pius XII). This was the work to which M. devoted himself for nearly 60 years, through endless vicissitudes and his entire career as a scholar, in order to sift out what circulated under the name of the great Gallic bishop as apocryphal and to reclaim for him what circulated under the name of others or was regarded as his uncertain work; among these, the monastic rules and the testament.
He found time in 1905 to point out: De la besogne pour les jeunes (Rev. d'hist. eccl., 2 [1905], p. 327 ff.), that is, subjects for critical research. Later he published: L'idéal monastique et la vie chrétienne des premiers jours, Paris 1921, also translated into Italian (Sorrento 1927) and into German (Sct. Ottilien 1949).