Bergier, Nicolas Sylvestre

BERGIER, bār´´zhyê´, NICOLAS SYLVESTRE: French Roman Catholic; b. at Darnay (18 m. s.e. of Mirecourt), Lorraine, Dec. 31, 1718; d. at Paris Apr. 19, 1790. He gained repute while a teacher at the college at Besançon by essays in philology and mythology; abandoned this line of study to devote himself to Christian apologetics, and polemics against the Encyclopedists. In 1765–68 he published at Paris Le Déisme réfuté par lui-même (2 vols.) and in 1768 the Certitude des preuves du christianisme (2 vols.), which achieved a great success and called forth replies from Voltaire and Anacharsis Cloots. In 1769 followed Apologie de la religion chrétienne (2 vols.) against Holbach, in 1771 Examen du matérialisme (2 vols.), and in 1780 Traité historique et dogmatique de la vraie religion avec la réfutation des erreurs qui lui ont été opposées dans les différens siècles (12 vols.). He also wrote a Dictionnaire 60théologique (3 vols., 1789), which formed part of the Encyclopédie, but has several times been separately edited (latest by Le Noir, 12 vols., 1876). As a reward for his services he was made canon of Notre Dame in Paris and confessor to the aunts of the king, with a pension of 2,000 livres.

Bibliography: Biographie nouvelle des contemporains, ii, 378, Paris, 1821; Biographie générale, v, 14.