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Lupus, Servatus, or Loup, de Ferrieres

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Lupus, Christian

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a French ecclesiastical writer, was born in the neighborhood of Sens about the year 805; studied at the abbey of Ferrieres, and afterwards at Fulda. under the celebrated Rabanus Maurus. Eginhard instructed him in the classics. In 836 he returned to Sens, where he soon acquired a great reputation for learning. He was called to the court of the empress Judith, and became a favorite both with Louis le Debonnaire and his successor, Charles the Bald. In 841, the latter prince, having resolved to remove Odon, abbot of Ferrieres, appointed Lupus in his stead. This intervention of the royal power in the affairs of the Church displeased the ecclesiastical authorities, and Lupus failed to secure their sanction until he had obtained from king Charles a charter granting to the monks of Ferriires the right of appointing in future their own abbots. This charter is to be found in the Galliat Christisana, among the Instrumenta of volume 12, column 8. Lupus had great influence both with the king and with the clergy, and was present at all the councils held in France from 844 to 859, taking an active part in their proceedings. When the Normans landed in France in 861 he sought refuge in the diocese of Troyes. Still in the same year we find him present at the Council of Pistes, and in 862 at that of Soissons. There is no mention made of him afterwards; whether he died then, or whether, as would appear from the chronicle of Robert of Auxerre, he was exiled from Ferriress, and his rival Guanelon appointed in his stead, does not appear. His works, so far as they were then extant, were collected by Etienne Baluze, and published first in 1644, then, with notes and corrections, in 1710, 1 volume 8vo. His treatise De tribus Quaestionibus discusses free- will, the twofold predestination, and the question whether Christ died for all men, or only for the elect. Gottschalk had mooted these three questions, strongly maintaining the necessity of grace; John Scotus Erigena, Rabanus Maurus, and Hincmar had more or less defended the doctrine of free-will. Lupus here attempts to conciliate these two opposite views, without, however, concealing his preference for that of Gottschalk. He thinks that, in the fallen human nature, free-will does indeed, to some extent, participate in our good impulses, yet is of no effect compared with grace. These impulses themselves originate in grace, and can only avail through grace; but, at the same time, grace enlightens the will, which becomes then a voluntary agent in continuing the work thus begun by grace alone. The Jansenists often quoted these views of Lupus. See Gallia Christ. volume 12, col. 159; Hist. Litt. de la France, 5:255; Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Gener. 32:19; Herzog, Real-Encyklop. 8:562; Neander, Ch. Hist. 3:459, 482.