The Making of the French Episcopate: 1589-1661.

More than 350 men were nominated to the office of bishop in France's 113 dioceses between the death of Henri III in 1589 and the personal assumption of power by Louis XIV in 1661. Joseph Bergin's The Making of the French Episcopate asks who these men were and how they acquired the bishop's miter. He begins with an institutional study of episcopal office and the revenues that accompanied it and then looks at the nominees themselves, examining their social origins, education, clerical status, and activities prior to the call to episcopal office. The last part of the book gives a chronological account of the way the crown used its right to nominate bishops for papal confirmation.

The book is an inquiry into the politics of church and state in a key period for the recovery and extension of monarchical authority. It comes as no surprise that episcopal nominations were patronage driven for the entire period under study, but Bergin nuances this picture by showing that there were significant changes in the way this patronage was used. Henri IV's need to pacify his kingdom after decades of civil war led to a broad distribution of church benefits, to former enemies as well as friends, as part of an acknowledged policy of purchasing his subjects' obedience. Reinforcing traditional bastions of noble power in key provinces, he did little to improve the quality of the French episcopate. The political instability of the regency allowed this situation to continue. Gradually, however, a reaction occurred, and pressure mounted for reform. The success that Richelieu and Louis XIII enjoyed in subduing a rebellious nobility allowed them a new freedom in distributing church patronage. Bishops were still political appointments, but the office was more often used to reward ministerial families and other royal servants than to placate disgruntled nobles. At the same time, higher standards were expected of potential candidates. Richelieu may have defeated the devot faction politically in 1630, but he and Louis XIII continued to subscribe to many of their ideals for church reform. With the Fronde, powerful nobles regained some of their lost position, and Mazarin never achieved the kind of freedom in his appointments that Louis XIII and Richelieu had enjoyed. Nevertheless, some things definitively had changed. Most important, there was now a firm expectation that a bishop be a man of mature years and academically prepared for his new duties. "Ministerial and courtly nepotism . . . remained as real as ever, but it was by now absolutely out of the question for bishoprics to be granted to fathers for their underaged sons or to powerful nobles for as yet unnamed caretakers" (543).

The period covered here was crucial to the implantation of the Catholic Reformation in France, and Bergin's examination of the qualifications expected of aspiring bishops gives important clues about French response to the demand for a better trained and more educated clergy. Some readers will be disappointed that this fat book does not go on to examine how well these bishops did serve the cause of Catholic revival and reform. Bergin defends his choice to concentrate on the making of bishops on the ground that an attempt to generalize about the results of these men's careers, holding office as they did under immensely diverse conditions and circumstances, would inevitably result in superficiality. Given the important research currently being undertaken at the local level, it would also be "premature and highly questionable" (12). Bergin cannot be faulted for his logic here. Readers will have to stifle a vague wish for more and acknowledge how much they have already been given.

BARBARA B. DIEFENDORF Boston University