Claude-Adrien Nonnotte

Who was Claude-Adrien Nonnotte?

Claude-Adrien Nonnotte was a French Jesuit controversialist, best known for his writings against Voltaire.

At nineteen he entered the Society of Jesus and preached at Amiens, Versailles, and Turin. When Voltaire began to issue his Essai sur les moeurs, an attack on Christianity, Nonnotte published, anonymously, the Examen critique ou Réfutation du livre des moeurs; and when Voltaire finished his publication, Nonnotte revised his book, which he published at Avignon. He dealt with what he saw as historical and doctrinal errors contained in Voltaire's work. Nonnotte's work reached the sixth edition in 1774. Voltaire retorted in his Eclaircissements historiques, and for twenty years continued to attack Nonnotte.

Nonnotte's publication continued to circulate, and was translated into Italian, German, Polish, and Portuguese. After the suppression of the Jesuits, Nonnotte withdrew to Besançon and in 1779 added a third volume to the Erreurs de Voltaire, namely, L'esprit de Voltaire dans ses écrits, for which it was impossible to obtain the approval of the Paris censor. Against the Dictionnaire philosophique, in which Voltaire had recapitulated all his attacks on Christianity, Nonnotte published the Dictionnaire philosophique de la religion, in which he replied to all the objections then brought against religion. The work was translated into Italian and German.