| Description | The contents of the ten volumes are described in detail by Professor E.R. Briggs (in French) in 'Tydschrift voor de Studie van de Verlichting' (Free University of Brussels), No. 4, 1977, pp. 358-378. The volumes contain nearly six thousand folios in small close writing, mostly Le Cène's own, though some MSS in other hands have been bound in. Volume 1 is a French translation of Volkelius's "De Vera Religione" by the Abb Talman. Prof. Briggs is of the opinion that only the three articles forming volume 10 are certainly Le Cène's own writings, the contents of the other volumes being a miscellany of copies, translations and contributions from many sources. All volumes are numbered. Each has a copper-plate writing title-page with list of contents. |
| AdminHistory | Le Cène (born c 1647, died 1703) came from Caen, and became a minister at Hornfleur, and for a short time at Charenton; but in France as well as later in England his Socinian views involved him in controversy. He arrived in England, probably in 1686, via Holland. A French 'conformist' church in Jewin Street, London, was established by Le Cne, his friend Pierre Allix, and others; but before 1691 he was back in Holland, returning to England about 1699 and dying in London in 1703. A bookseller's notice pasted in Vol. 1 of his manuscripts says that he was pastor of the French congregation in Canterbury Cathedral, but there seems to be no confirmation of this. He spent many years on a new translation of the Bible into French, published by his son in 1741. |
| CustodialHistory | The ten vols. of manuscripts contain the bookplate of Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex (sixth son of George III), were probably bound for the Duke, and likely sold with his large library in 1846. |