View source for Pierre Paul Royer-Collard

{{Short description|French statesman and philosopher (1763–1845)}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name             = Pierre Paul Royer-Collard
| image            = Pierre Paul Royer-Collard.jpg
| caption          = Portrait by [[Louis-Léopold Boilly]], 1819
| office           = [[List of Presidents of the National Assembly of France|President of the French Chamber of Deputies]]
| term_start       = 25 May 1828
| term_end         = 16 May 1830
| predecessor      = Auguste Ravez
| successor        = [[Casimir Perier]]
| office1          = [[Chamber of Deputies (France)|Member of the French Chamber of Deputies]]
| term_start1      = 25 August 1815
| term_end1        = 5 July 1831
| constituency1    = [[Marne (department)|Marne]]
| office2          = [[Council of Five Hundred|Member of the Council of Five Hundred]]
| term_start2      = 21 March 1797
| term_end2        = 4 September 1797
| constituency2    = [[Marne (department)|Marne]]
| office3          = [[Paris Commune (French Revolution)|Councillor of the Paris Commune]]<br>for the [[4th arrondissement of Paris|4th arrondissement]]
| term_start3      = 20 July 1789
| term_end3        = 10 August 1792
| birth_date       = {{Birth date|1763|6|21|df=y}}
| birth_place      = [[Sompuis]], [[Champagne (province)|Champagne]], [[Kingdom of France|France]]
| death_date       = {{Death date and age|1845|9|2|1763|6|21|df=y}}
| death_place      = [[Châteauvieux, Loir-et-Cher|Châteauvieux]], [[Loir-et-Cher]], [[July Monarchy|France]]
| nationality      = [[French nationality law|French]]
| party            = ''[[Girondin]]'' {{small|(1791–1793)}}<br>''[[Club de Clichy|Clichyen]]'' {{small|(1794–1797)}}<br>[[Legitimist]] {{small|(1797–1815)}}<br>''[[Doctrinaires|Doctrinaire]]'' {{small|(1815–1831)}}
| alma_mater       = [[Colleges of St Omer, Bruges and Liège|Saint-Omer College]]
| profession       = [[Lawyer]], [[teacher]], [[philosopher]]
| spouse           = Augustine de Forges de Chateaubrun
| children         = 4 children
}}
'''Pierre Paul Royer-Collard''' ({{IPA|fr|pjɛʁ pɔl ʁwaje kɔlaʁ}}; 21 June 1763 – 2 September 1845) was a French statesman and [[philosopher]], leader of the [[Doctrinaires]] group during the [[Bourbon Restoration in France|Bourbon Restoration]] (1814–1830).

==Biography==
===Early life===
He was born at [[Sompuis]], near [[Vitry-le-François]] (in modern-day [[Marne (department)|Marne]]), the son of Anthony Royer, a small businessman. His mother, Angélique Perpétue Collard, had a reputation for strong character and great piety.<ref>{{cite journal|editor1-first=William|editor1-last=Gifford|editor2-first=John|editor2-last=Taylor Coleridge|editor3-first=John Gibson|editor3-last=Lockhart|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0tTUAAAAMAAJ&q=angelique+collard+royer+collard&pg=PA217|title=The Later Jansenists|journal=[[The Quarterly Review]]|publisher=[[John Murray (publishing house)|John Murray]]|location=London, England|volume=173|year=1891|page=216}}</ref> His younger brother, [[Antoine-Athanase Royer-Collard]], was a physician and pioneer in the field of psychiatry, at one point serving as chief physician at Charenton Asylum.<ref>{{cite book|first=Jan E.|last=Goldstein|title=Console and Classify: The French Psychiatric Profession in the Nineteenth Century|chapter=The Transformation of Charlatanism|publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]]|location=Chicago, Illinois|date=2001|isbn=9780226301617|page=116|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WiqKcO5OawgC&q=royer+collard+charenton&pg=PA116}}</ref>

Royer-Collard was sent at 12 to the college of Chaumont of which his uncle, Father Paul Collard, was director. He subsequently followed his uncle to [[Saint-Omer]], where he studied [[mathematics]].

===Career===
At the outbreak of the [[French Revolution]], to which he was passionately sympathetic,<ref>{{cite journal|first=Aurelian|last=Craiutu|title=Tocqueville and the Political Thought of the French Doctrinaires (Guizot, Royer-Collard, Remusat)|journal=History of Political Thought|publisher=Imprint Academic Ltd.|volume=20|issue=3|location=Exeter, England|date=Autumn 1999|pages=456–493}}</ref> he was practising at the [[Paris, France|Parisian]] bar. He was returned by his section, the Island of Saint-Louis, to the Commune, of which he was secretary from 1790 to 1792. After the revolution of 10 August in that year he was replaced by [[Jean-Lambert Tallien]].

His sympathies were now with the [[Gironde]], and after the insurrection of the 12th Prairial (31 May 1793) his life was in danger. He returned to Sompuis, and was saved from arrest possibly by the protection of [[Georges Danton]] and in some degree by his mother's influence on the local commissary of the Convention. In 1797 he was returned by his department (Marne) to the [[Council of the Five Hundred]], where he allied himself especially with [[Camille Jordan (politician)|Camille Jordan]]. He made a well-regarded speech in the council in defence of the principles of religious liberty, but the [[Coup of 18 Fructidor]] (4 September 1797) drove him back into private life.<ref>{{cite book|first=Harold J.|last=Laski|title=Authority in the Modern State|chapter=The Political Theory of Royer-Collard|publisher=Batoche Books|location=Kitchener, Ontario, Canada|date=2000|isbn=1-55273-011-5|pages=141–155}}</ref>

It was at this period that he developed his legitimist opinions and entered into communication with the Comte de Provence ([[Louis XVIII]]). He was the ruling spirit in the small committee formed in Paris to help forward a Restoration independent of the Comte d'Artois and his party; but with the establishment of the Consulate he saw the prospects of the monarchy were temporarily hopeless, and the members of the committee resigned. From that time until the Restoration Royer-Collard devoted himself exclusively to the study of [[philosophy]]. He derived his opposition to the philosophy of [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac]] chiefly from the study of [[René Descartes]] and his followers, and from his early veneration for the fathers of [[Port-Royal-des-Champs|Port-Royal]]. He was occupied with developing a system to provide a moral and political education consonant with his view of the needs of France. From 1811 to 1814 he lectured at the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]]. He was strongly influenced by the [[Scotland|Scottish]] philosopher [[Thomas Reid]], and in 1811-12 he lectured on Reid at the [[École normale supérieure (Paris)|École Normale]].<ref>[[Duncan Macmillan (art historian)|Macmillan Duncan]] (2023), ''Scotland and the Origins of Modern Art'', [[Lund Humphries]], London, p. 155, {{isbn|978-1-84822-633-3}}</ref>

From this time dates his long association with [[François Guizot]]. Royer-Collard himself was supervisor of the press under the first restoration. From 1815 onwards he sat as deputy for Marne in the chamber. As president of the commission of public instruction from 1815 to 1820 he checked the pretensions of the clerical party, the immediate cause of his retirement being an attempt to infringe the rights of the [[University of Paris]] by awarding diplomas, independent of university examinations, to the teaching fraternity of the [[Congregation of Christian Brothers|Christian Brothers]]. Royer-Collard's acceptance of the legitimist principle did not prevent a faithful adhesion to the social revolution effected in 1789, and he protested in 1815, in 1820, and again under the Monarchy of July against laws of exception.

He was the moving spirit of the "[[Doctrinaires]]", as they were called, who met at the house of the Comte de Ste Aulaire and in the salon of [[Madame de Staël]]'s daughter, the duchesse de Broglie. The leaders of the party, beside Royer-Collard, were Guizot, PFH de Serre, Camille Jordan and [[Charles de Rémusat]]. In 1820 Royer-Collard was excluded from the Council of State by a decree signed by his former ally Serre. In 1827 he was elected for seven constituencies, but remained faithful to his native department. Next year he became president of the chamber, and fought against the reactionary policy which precipitated the Revolution of July. It was Royer-Collard who in March 1830 presented the address of the 221. From that time he took no active part in politics, although he retained his seat in the chamber until 1839. Whilst during the first half of the nineteenth century the word "liberal" was generally synonymous with [[Voltaireanism]] and hostility to the Jesuits, certain speeches of Royer-Collard quoted by [[Barante]] show that he professed a deferential attachment for the Church. "If Christianity", he wrote, "has been a degradation, a corruption, [[Voltaire]] in attacking it has been a benefactor of the human race; but if the contrary be true, then the passing of Voltaire over the Christian earth has been a great calamity."<ref>{{cite book|editor1-first=Charles George|editor1-last=Herbermann|editor2-first=Edward Aloysius|editor2-last=Pace|editor3-first=Condé Bénoist|editor3-last=Pallen|editor4-first=Thomas Joseph|editor4-last=Shahan|editor5-first=John Joseph|editor5-last=Wynne|title=The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church|volume=13|publisher=Robert Appleton Company|location=New York City|date=1911|page=212}}</ref> In a letter to Père de Ravignan he comments upon the institution of the Jesuits as a "wonderful creation".<ref>Herbermann, et al., pg. 214</ref>

===Personal life===
Royer-Collard married Augustine Marie Rosalie de Forges de Chãtaeubrun on 20 October 1800. They had four children, two of whom predeceased them.<ref>{{cite book|first=Adrienne|last=Phillippe|title=Royer-Collard, sa vie publique, sa vie privée, sa famille|url=https://archive.org/details/royercollardsav01philgoog|publisher=[[Michel Lévy Frères]]|location=Paris, France|date=1857|page=41|language=French}}</ref>

He died at his estate of [[Châteauvieux, Loir-et-Cher|Châteauvieux]] in the [[Berry (province)|Berry]], south of [[Blois]].

==Further reading==
*[[Amable Guillaume Prosper Brugière, baron de Barante|Prosper de Barante]]. (1861) ''Vie politique de M. Royer Collard, ses discours et ses écrits'' (2 vols).
*Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911) "Royer-Collard, Pierre Paul". ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. 23 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p.&nbsp;794.
* Doria, Corinne, (2018) ''Un philosophe entre deux révolutions. Pierre Paul Royer-Collard (1763-1845)''. Presses Universitaires de Rennes, p.&nbsp;350.

==References==
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Royer-Collard, Pierre Paul}}
[[Category:1763 births]]
[[Category:1845 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Marne (department)]]
[[Category:Politicians from Grand Est]]
[[Category:Doctrinaires]]
[[Category:Orléanists]]
[[Category:Deans of the Faculté des lettres de Paris]]
[[category:Deans of the Sorbonne]]
[[Category:Members of the Council of Five Hundred]]
[[Category:Members of the Chamber of Deputies of the Bourbon Restoration]]
[[Category:Members of the 1st Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy]]
[[Category:Members of the 2nd Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy]]
[[Category:Members of the 3rd Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy]]
[[Category:Members of the 4th Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy]]
[[Category:Members of the 5th Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy]]
[[Category:Academic staff of the University of Paris]]
[[Category:Members of the Académie Française]]