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Denis-Nicolas Le Nourry

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Denis-Nicolas Le Nourry, of the Congregation of St-Maur, ecclesiastical writer, b. at Dieppe in Normandy, 18 Feb., 1647; d. at the Abbey of St-Germain in Paris, 24 March, 1724. He received his first education from the priests of the Oratory at his native place; then entered the Benedictine Order at Jumièges, 8 July, 1665. After completing his theological studies and being ordained to the priesthood, he was sent to Rouen, where, in the Abbey of Bonnenouvelle, he assisted John Garet in publishing the writings of Cassiodorus (1679). For this work he wrote the preface and the life of the author. In the edition of the works of St. Ambrose he aided Jean du Chesne and Julien Bellaise at Rouen, and later Jacques du Frische at Paris, where he spent the last forty years of his life. His greatest work is the "Apparatus ad bibliothecam maximam veterum patrum et antiquorum scriptorum", published at Paris in two volumes (1703 and 1715) as an aid to the study of the Lyons collection of the Fathers. In extensive dissertations he gives the biography of each writer; the occasion, design, scope, and genuineness of every writing; a history of the time in which the author lived; its dogmatical and moral tendency, and its struggles against heathenism or heresies. The work was well received. In 1710 he edited the "Liber ad Donatum confessorem de mortibus persecutorum", and in a special dissertation tries hard to prove that the book was written by Lucius Caecilius and not by Lactantius. Besides these he edited the "Epitome institutionum divinarum" of Lactantius, the "Expositum de die paschae et mensis" of Hilarianus, and a fragment "De origine generis humani".