BOURIGNON, ANTOINETTE (1616-80). A Flemish religious visionary, once very popular. She was born at Lille, January 13, 1616. Iler father was a merchant, and she inherited from him a considerable patrimony. She was so ugly an infant that there was some thought of killing her as a monstrous birth. Her intellect, however, was very acute, and its powers were early developed, along with a tendency to religious mysticism, which was much encouraged by the reading of mystie books, till her imagina tion became inflamed, and she began to fancy that she saw visions, conversed with God, received spe cial revelations, and was called to restore the pure spirit of the Gospel. By the good ollices of the Archbishop of Cambrai, she obtained admission into a convent, where she won over some of the nuns to her opinions, and soon found herself at the head of a considerable party. She after wards had charge of a hospital at Lille, but from this position she was driven in consequence of her extravagant fancies. She now. traveled through various countries, her enthusiasm gain ing proselytes, whose conversion, she said, caused her to suffer the pains of childbirth. At last she was appointed head of a hospital in East Fries land. According to Madame liou•ig,non, religion
consists in internal emotion, and not in either knowledge or practice. Among the chief ex pounders of Bourirmianism was Peter Poiret, a Calvinistic minister. It spread to a remarkable extent among botli Roman Catholics and Prot estants; and about the end of the Seventeenth Century, and beginning of the Eighteenth, pre vailed so much in Scotland that a solemn renun ciation of it was demanded from every entrant on the ministry at his ordination. A minister of Aberdeen was deposed for it in 1701. The formal renunciation of Bourignianism is still continued in the Established Church of Scot land, but has been given up as needless by other Presbyterian churehes. The works of :Madame Bourignon were edited by Poiret (Am sterdam. 1680-86. 19 vols., •d ed. 1717). They exhibit not a little fiery eloquence. She died at Francker, Oetober :30, 1680. Several of her works—e.g. Treatise of Solid Virtue (11199); Restoration of the Gospel Spirit (1707) —have been translated into English, and The Light of th, ll'or/d (reprinted, London, 1863, from the edition of 1696).