Life
He completed his higher studies at Leuven (French: Louvain), became priest in 1673, and doctor of civil and canon law in 1675. He soon began to teach canon law at the University of Louvain where he was obliged to lecture only for six weeks during the summer vacation; the professor might explain one or other important chapter of the decretals, at his choice. He never accepted any other chair at the university, and he resigned even this position in order to devote himself entirely to study.
The Jansenist quarrels led to Van Espen's ruin. On being consulted by the Jansenists of Holland with regard to the ordination of the Jansenist Bishop of Utrecht, Cornelius Steenoven, he pronounced in favour of this ordination, which had been performed without the authorization of the Holy See. An attempt has been made to justify Van Espen's conduct in this matter, on the ground that he merely declared that episcopal ordination performed by a single bishop was valid. This was not the whole question, nor was it indeed the principal question, viz. to determine whether an episcopal ordination, performed without the pope's consent, was admissible.
His action in this matter and his Jansenist doctrines brought about his suspension a divinis by the Bishop of Mechlin. The latter summoned him to make a declaration of orthodox faith. At the order of the civil power, the University of Leuven condemned and deprived (1728) Van Espen of his university functions.
In the meantime he fled, and took refuge first at Maastricht, and afterwards at Amersfoort, where he found protection in the Jansenist community, and where he died. The Augustinian Bernardus Désirant (1656–1725), professor at the University of Leuven, is accused of having fabricated false documents in the controversy with Van Espen (the "Forgery of Louvain"). Désirant was condemned by the academical authorities and banished forever from his native country.
Read more about this topic: Zeger Bernhard Van Espen
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“I see a man’s life is a tedious one.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The dignity to be sought in death is the appreciation by others of what one has been in life,... that proceeds from a life well lived and from the acceptance of one’s own death as a necessary process of nature.... It is also the recognition that the real event taking place at the end of our life is our death, not the attempts to prevent it.”
—Sherwin B. Nuland (b. 1930)
“As the two boys walked sorrowing along, they made a new compact to stand by each other and be brothers and never separate till death relieved them of their troubles. Then they began to lay their plans. Joe was for being a hermit, and living on crusts in a remote cave, and dying, some time, of cold, and want, and grief; but after listening to Tom, he conceded that there were some conspicuous advantages about a life of crime, and so he consented to be a pirate.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)