Antoine Singlin

Who was Antoine Singlin?

Antoine Singlin was a French Jansenist Catholic priest, best known as a member of the Jansenist community at Port-Royal-des-Champs and as head of the Petites écoles de Port-Royal.

Antoine Singlin began his priestly career beside Vincent de Paul, at the hospice de la Pitié in Paris. He was then a devoted disciple of Jean du Vergier de Hauranne, abbot of Saint-Cyran and spiritual director of the monastery of Port-Royal. When he was imprisoned in the Bastille on the orders of cardinal Richelieu, he declared Antoine Singlin's spiritual training complete and made him his intermediary between prison and the nuns and Solitaires at the monastery.

When Jean du Vergier de Hauranne died in 1643, some months after leaving prison, Antoine Singlin accepted the post of almoner and spiritual director of the community, despite his own wishes to live a more retired life. Even so, in 1637 he set up Port-Royal-des-Champs's famous Petites écoles de Port-Royal, with Jean Hamon and the other Solitaires. His correspondence, recently studied and annotated, is a valuable witness to the practicalities of the monastery's life.