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Professor of Church History; and was rector of Breslau University, 1865-66. He was one of the fourteen professors who, at Nuremburg, protested against the Vatican decrees in Aug., 1870. For this he was suspended from his professorship; and in 1872 he was excommunicated by Bishop Förster of Breslau. Dr. Reinkens became a prominent leader of the self-styled "Old Catholics" and was elected Bishop of the new sect, June 4, 1878, at Cologne, in an assembly consisting of twenty-one priests and fifty-six laymen. The consecration ceremony was performed (Aug. 11) by the Dutch Jansenist Bishop Heycamp of Deventer. Dr. Reinkens has published numerous works in German on the theological controversies of the day.

RENAN, Joseph Ernest, philologist, member of the Institute, born at Tréguier, Côtes-du-Nord, Feb. 27, 1823, was destined for the ecclesiastical profession, and went to Paris at an early age in order to study. His abilities having attracted attention, he was chosen at the termination of his classical studies to follow the course of theology at the seminary of Saint-Sulpice, when he showed a taste for the study of languages and philosophy, and commenced learning Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac. But his independence of thought did not accord with the necessary qualifications for the priesthood, and he quitted the seminary in order to be better able to pursue his own course. In 1848 he gained the Volney prize for a mémoire upon the Semitic languages, which has been published under the title of "Histoire Générale et Systèmes Comparés des Langues Sémitiques." His work, entitled "Étude de la Langue Grecque an Moyen Age," published in 1845, was crowned by the Institute. In 1849 he was sent to Italy on a literary mission by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, in 1851 was attached to the department of Mannscripts in the Bibliothèque Nationale, and in 1856 was elected a member of the Académie des Inscriptions in place of M. Augustin Thierry. At the end of 1860 he was sent on a mission to Syria. In 1862 he was appointed Professor of Hebrew, but did not permanently occupy the chair for fear of a renewal of the manifestations which occurred at his opening lecture in February. In 1863 he published his well-known "Vie de Jésus," which he wrote after his voyage to Syria, and of which numerous editions have been issued. This work was vehemently attacked by the bishops and clergy, the result being that the author was dismissed from his professorship. M. Duruy, the Minister of Public Instruction, endeavoured to conceal the significance of this dismissal by giving him an office in the Bibliothèque Impériale; he, however, strongly protested against the appointment, which was revoked June 11, 1861. At the elections to the Corps Législatif in May, 1869, he was an unsuccessful candidate in the second circonscription of the department of Seine-et-Marne. M. Renan was elected a member of the French Academy June 13, 1878, in the room of M. Claude Bernard: he defeated M. Wallon by 19 votes to 15. He attended the Congress of Orientalists held at Florence in Sept. 1878. M. Renan has, in addition to the works already mentioned, published numerous mémoires on comparative philology, and articles in the Liberté de Penser, the Revue des Deux Mondes, the Journal de l'Instruction Publique, the Debats, &c. Some of these were published in a collected form, under the title of "Études d'Histoire Religieuse," in 1857. He published a translation of "Le Livre de Job," 1859, and of the "Cantique des Cantiques," 1860; "Lettre à mes Collègues," 1862; "Mission de Phénicie, 1864; "Trois Inscriptions Phéniciennes," 1864; "Les Apôtres," 1866; "Nouvelles Observa-