Charles Forbes comte de Montalembert

Charles Forbes Montalembert, comte de , 1810-70, French political leader and writer, b. London. He went to Paris (1830), where he became associated with Jean Lacordaire and Félicité de Lamennais in the Catholic liberal movement and served as editor of the Avenir until 1831; the journal was condemned in 1832 by the pope. He hoped to weld French Catholicism into a united political force, and in the legislature he associated Roman Catholicism with liberalism and worked for civil liberty and for education under churchly auspices. An enthusiastic republican, he was the chief figure in the early liberal opposition to Emperor Napoleon III. For a time he opposed the dogma of papal infallibility.

Montalembert, Charles René Forbes (1810–70), French RC historian. He associated himself with the movement sponsored by F. R. de Lamenais and H.-D. Lacordaire, but when Gregory XVI condemned liberalism in 1832, he submitted and ceased to propagate his views for some time. His historical works were polished in style, but uncritical. The best-known is his Moines d'occident (1860–7; Eng. tr., 1896).