Discourse Delivered at the Consecration of the Elector of Cologne[Pl. 2:945–971]

The Discourse Delivered at the Consecration of the Elector of Cologne is a transcript of Fénelon’s sermon on the occasion of the 1707 consecration of Joseph-Clément of Bavaria, Elector and ultimately Archbishop of Cologne. Fénelon used this occasion to present his core lessons on what was at once a central theme of his political philosophy and a principal theme of early modern philosophy, one that indeed received particular attention in the seventeenth century in the wake of the writings of Hobbes and Spinoza: the proper relation of church and state, and the ways in which civil authorities ought to be disposed to ecclesiastical authorities.