NORIS, Henry, a cardinal, and a great ornament of the monastic order of St Augustin, was descended from the president Jason, or James de Noris, and was born at Verona in 1631. He was carefully educated by his father Alexander Noris, originally of Ireland, and well known by his history of Germany. From his infancy he discovered an excellent understanding, great vivacity, and quick apprehension. His father instructed him in the rudiments of grammar, and procured an able professor of λ τ erona, called Massoleim, to act as his preceptor. At fifteen he was admitted as a boarder in the Jesuits’ College at Rimini, where he studied philosophy; after which he applied himself to the writings of the fathers of the church, particularly those of St Augustin; and taking the habit in the convent of the Augustinian monks of Rimini, he in a short time distinguished himself amongst that fraternity by his erudition, insomuch that, as soon as he had completed his noviciate, the general of the order sent for him to Rome, to give him an opportunity of improving himself in the more solid branches of learning. Nor did he disappoint the expectations of bis superior. He gave himself up entirely to his studies, and spent whole days, and even nights, in the library of the Angeliques of St Augustin. His constant course was to study fourteen hours a day; and this he continued till he became a cardinal. Thus he became qualified to instruct others, and was first sent to Pezaro, and thence to Perugia, where he took his degree of doctor of divinity; after which, proceeding to Padua, he applied himself to finish his History of Pelagianism. He began it at Rome at the age of twenty-six, and when he had completed his design, the book was printed at Florence, and published in 1673. In the following year the Grand Duke of Tuscany invited him to that city, made him his chaplain, and appointed him professor of ecclesiastical history in the university of Pisa, which his highness had recently founded.

In his history he explained and defended the condemnation pronounced, in the eighth general council, against Origen and Mopsuesta, the original authors of the Pelagian errors; and he also added an account of the schism of Aquileia, with a vindication of the books written by St Augustin against the Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians. The work procured the author great reputation, but called forth several antagonists, to whom he published proper answers. The dispute grew warm, and was carried before the sovereign tribunal of the Inquisition. There the history was examined with the utmost rigour, and the author dismissed without the least censure. It was reprinted twice afterwards, and the author was honoured by Pope Clement X. with the title of qualificator of the holy office. Notwithstanding this, the charge was renewed against the History, and it was delated afresh to the Inquisition in 1676; but it [7:16:248]came again out of the trial with the same success as before. Mr Noris was now suffered to remain in peace for sixteen years, and taught ecclesiastical history at Pisa, without any molestation, until he was called to Rome by Innocent XII., who, in 1692, made him under-librarian of the Vatican. This post was a step to a cardinal’s hat; his accusers, therefore, took fire afresh, and published several new pieces against him. Upon this the pope appointed some learned divines, who had taken neither side, to re-examine Father Noris’s books, and report on them. Their testimony was so advantageous to the author, that his holiness made him counsellor of the Inquisition. Yet this did not prevent one of his adversaries, the most formidable on account of his erudition, from rising up against him, and attacking him warmly, under the assumed title of a Scrupulous Doctor of the Sorbonne. Noris tried to remove these scruples in a work which appeared in 1695, under the title of, An Historical Dissertation concerning One of the Trinity that suffered in the Flesh, in which, having justified the monks of Scythia, who had made use of that expression, he vindicated himself also from the imputation of having attainted the Pope’s infallibility, and abused Vincentius Lirinensis, and other bishops of Gaul, as favourers of Semi-Pela2f1an- ism, and as having themselves fallen into the errors of the Bishop of Ypres. But his answers to all these accusations were so much to the satisfaction of the pope, that at length, in 1695, his holiness honoured him with the purple.

After this he was in all the congregations, and employed in the most important affairs; so that he had little time to spend in study, a circumstance of which he frequently complained to his friends. Upon the death of Cardinal Casanati, he was made principal keeper of the Vatican Library in 1700, and two years afterwards he was nominated, amongst others, to reform the calendar; but he died at Rome, of a dropsy, in 1704. He was one of the most learned men of his time; his writings abound with erudition, and are also remarkable for their elegance. His works are numerous, and 4 were published at Verona, in 1729 and 1730, in five volumes folio.