Yves Marie André (1675–1764), also known as le Père André, was a French

Jesuit The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

, and

essayist An essay ( ) is, generally, a piece of writing that gives the author's own argument, but the definition is vague, overlapping with those of a Letter (message), letter, a term paper, paper, an article (publishing), article, a pamphlet, and a s ...

. André entered the Society of Jesus in 1693. Although distinguished in his scholastic studies, he adhered to

Gallicanism Gallicanism is the belief that popular secular authority—often represented by the monarch's or the state's authority—over the Catholic Church is comparable to that of the pope. Gallicanism is a rejection of ultramontanism; it has something ...

and

Jansenism Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century Christian theology, theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in Kingdom of France, France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of Free will in theology, f ...

and was thus considered unsuitable for responsible office by Church authorities. He therefore pursued scientific studies and became royal professor of mathematics at Caen. He is best known for his ''Essai sur le Beau'' (''Essay on Beauty''), a 1741 philosophical work on

aesthetics Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste (sociology), taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Ph ...

, which made him famous at the time and remained a well-known work into the 19th century.André, ''Essai sur le Beau'' in ''Œuvres Philosophiques'' (Paris: Adolphe Delahays, 1843).

References

External links

Œuvres Philosophiques du Père André
Collected works on the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

Essay on Beauty
Annotated English translation of ''Essai sur le Beau'' 17th-century French Jesuits 17th-century French essayists Jansenists 1675 births 1764 deaths 18th-century French Jesuits 17th-century French mathematicians 18th-century French mathematicians 18th-century French philosophers French male essayists 18th-century French essayists 18th-century French male writers 17th-century French male writers {{France-mathematician-stub