Raillon, Jacques

Raillon, Jacques a French prelate, born at Bourgoin, July 17, 1762, was educated for the priesthood at the seminary in Lucon, in which he had been placed by bishop Mercy of that place. After graduation he was made a curate of Montaigu, but was obliged in the Revolutionary period to quit his parish, alnd lived for some time at Paris, where he took the defence of the priests in his Appel au Peuple Catholiqe (1792, 8vo). But he became only notorious, and, by the gravity of the situation, was forced from the country. He lived for a while at Soleur, in Switzerland, then at Venice, in Italy, and only returned to France in 1804. He at once became teacher in the house of Portalis, then minister of cultus, and by his influence Raillon was in 1809 made professor of pulpit oratory in the theological faculty at Paris, and titulary canon of Notre Dame. In the latter capacity he pronounced the funeral orations upon marshal Lannes and other distinguished countrymen of his, and so markedly acquitted himself in this task that he was given the episcopacy of Orleans in 1810. The unpleasant relations then existing between the government of France and the papacy, however, prevented his confirmation, and in 1816 he went into retirement at Paris. The government, however, was unwilling to suffer the loss of such a faithful and efficient ecclesiastic, and in 1829 he was nominated bishop of Dijon and promptly confirmed as such. In 1830 he was made archbishop of Aix, and there he resided until his death, in 1835. On his departure from Dijon a medal was struck in his honor by his diocese, so greatly was he beloved. The recently expired Dupanloup (1878), who figured as bishop, and more recently as archbishop, of Orleans, at one time involved Raillon in controversy and took offensive ground; but Raillon was universally supported by the French press and a majority of the French clergy, and for a while bishop Dupanloup lost much of his popularity on account of his conduct in this affair. His works are of a secular character, excepting the Histoire de Saint-Ambrose (which was to form four or five vols. in 8vo, but of which the MS. was lost). See Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Generale, s.v. (J. H. W.)