Wilmart, Henri-Marie-André

WILMART, HENRI-MARIE-ANDRÉ. - Benedictine scholar, b. at Orléans on 28 Jan. 1876, d. at Paris on 21 Apr. 1941.

the toleration of every form of worship and, in politics, for universal suffrage. In 1644 he returned to England to defend there the interests of his colony, and there he met Milton and Cromwell and wrote his most important work on toleration: The bloody Tenent of persecution (1644).

Augusto Guidi

He completed his classical studies in Paris (1893-95), where he attended the «École des Hautes études», the «Institut catholique» and the Sorbonne; he began his ecclesiastical studies with the Sulpicians (1897-99) and in Sept. 1899 entered the abbey of Solesmes, from which he was removed in Sept. 1901, a few months after his religious profession (24 June), following the suppression of the religious orders. Having taken refuge on the Isle of Wight, he was ordained priest there on 24 June 1906 and was immediately afterwards assigned to the abbey of St. Michael of Farnborough, to which he always belonged. Toward the end of 1928 he was called to the Vatican Library for the cataloguing of the Latin manuscripts of the Queen's collection, a work to which he devoted himself for eleven years, lavishing upon it his vast and sure erudition. Three great masters exercised a decisive influence at the beginning of his scholarly career, though it was so personal thereafter: Msgr. P. Batiffol (v.), who, besides setting him on the path of the priesthood, initiated him into the study of Christian antiquity; L. Traube (v.), who led him to regard palaeography as a historical discipline, and E. Bishop (v.), who set him on the path of liturgical studies, understood as a part of ecclesiastical literature.

W., a profound connoisseur of the art of scrutinizing the secrets of codices, proceeded in the course of numerous scholarly journeys to their systematic examination for the part that concerned his studies. It is therefore no wonder that every work of his is regarded as a first-hand contribution. A palaeographer and philologist of rare experience, he was most meticulous in his editions of ancient and medieval texts, which can be pointed to as models. His works, apart from the unpublished ones, amount on a first survey to about 380, to which must be added more than eighty reviews. He was an assiduous contributor to many journals, above all to the Rev. bénédictine, in which he published 150 articles. A fair-sized collection of his studies scattered in various journals is found in the vol. Auteurs spirituels et textes dévots du moyen âge latin (Paris 1932). Here now in brief is the indication of some of his principal contributions to patristics, liturgy and medieval literature (in parentheses are given the year of publication and the progressive number of the bibliography compiled by J. Bignami Odier). 1. Patristics: Gregory of Elvira (1906, 1909, 1912, nos. 2, 10, 28, 32), to whom he claimed the Tractatus Origenis published by Batiffol with his collaboration (1900, no. 1); Phoebadius of Agen (1908, no. 7); St. Hilary of Poitiers (from 1907 to 1938, 7 studies); St. Augustine (from 1912 to 1938 more than 20 studies, of fundamental importance those on the manuscript tradition of the Saint's works, nos. 194, 205, 233, and the ed. of the Indicium of Possidius, no. 232). 2. Liturgy: the Sacramentary of Bobbio (from 1909 to 1924, 5 studies); the Psalter of Count Everard (1911, no. 26); the Masses of Mone (1911, no. 27); the liturgical manuscripts of Corbie (1913, no. 36); the Comes of Murbach (1913, no. 37); the letters of pseudo-Germanus of Paris on the Gallican liturgy (1924, no. 125); the Lectionary of Alcuin (1937, no. 322); the collects of the Psalters (1949, no. 365) and the opuscule of E. Bishop, Le Génie du rit romain, French version enriched with numerous notes, to which W. was extremely attached, so much so as to call it the substance of his creed as a historian of the liturgy (1919, 1920, nos. 54, 55). 3. Medieval literature: St. Anselm (from 1923 to 1937, about twenty studies); John of Fécamp (from 1926 to 1937, 6 studies); Guigo I the Carthusian (from 1924 to 1936, 4 studies and the ed. of the meditations, no. 311); Hildebert of Lavardin (from 1935 to 1939, 4 studies); John abbot of St. Mary in Trastevere (1938, no. 332); the ed. of the Precum libelli of the Carolingian era (1940, no. 357); the ed. of the Jubilus on the name of Jesus (1943, no. 360). 4. Methodology and description of codices: the entry Delisle in DACL (1916, no. 46); the review of the Sacramentaires et Missels... de France of V. Leroquais (1925, no. 156); the catalogue of 500 Latin codices Reginenses (1937, 1945, nos. 321, 362) with the Analecta Reginensia (1933, no. 261).

W. was always generous with advice and help to those who devoted themselves to study with seriousness of purpose; it suffices to recall his generous gesture toward Fr. G. M. Hanssens, S. J., the learned editor of the liturgical works of Amalarius (cf. Amalarii Episcopi opera lit. omnia, I, Vatican City 1948, p. 7).

A. Pietro Frutaz