WATRIGANT, HENRI. – Jesuit, writer on asceticism, born 20 February 1845 at Lille, died at Enghien (Belgium) on 23 February 1923.
He entered the Order in 1868 and was ordained a priest in 1880. From his earliest years he devoted himself to the study of the Spiritual Exercises of s. Ignatius, dedicating the best of his strength and time to it and founding a house for closed retreats at Château-Blanc (Lille), which he had to leave in 1887 because of his poor health. He nevertheless continued his scholarly research on the same subject, giving rise to the periodical Collection de la Bibliothèque des Exercices de 1st Ignace (from 1906), and opening at Enghien a library on the Exercises, in which he collected more than 8,000 works, including several that were very rare. He devoted himself to the bibliography of the Exercises and became an expert consultant and guide to numerous investigators in this field. He also wrote several spiritual pamphlets, such as Deux méthodes de spiritualité (Paris 1900); Ecole de spiritualité simplifiée et la formule « Laissez faire Dieu » (ibid. 1903); and edited ancient works and texts concerning the Exercises.