Henri Gregoire, a French revolutionist, born at Veho, near Luneville, Dec. 4, 1750, died in Paris, May 28, 1831. He commenced active life as a parish priest, and being nominated by the clergy of Lorraine in 1789 to represent them in the states general, he at once took ground as a republican, and was one of the first of the clergy to take the oath of fidelity to the constitution. He voted against primogeniture and special privileges, and zealously advocated the admission of Jews and men of color to full rights of citizenship. Under the new constitution of the clergy the department of Loir-et-Cher in 1702 elected him bishop, on which he assumed, from the seat of the episcopate, the appellation of bishop of Blois. In the convention he led the movement for the abolition of the regal office, and made a bitter speech against kings in general, ending by demanding that Louis Capet should be brought to trial. One maxim of his became a watchword of the revolution: L'histoire des rois est le martyro-loge des nations. His oration caused him to be made, the same day, president of the convention.

He was absent with three other delegates on a mission to revolutionize Savoy when the king was brought to trial, but with his colleagues he wrote from Chambery to the convention, urging the condemnation of the king, though he afterward denied that he wished him to be condemned to death. Further, he says he endeavored to save the life of the king by proposing to abolish the death penalty. When Gobel, archbishop of Paris, assented to the worship of Reason, Gregoire boldly refused to follow his example. He contributed zealously to preserve the monuments of art, and extended his protection to men of letters and artists. In 1800 he entered the legislative body, and having been transferred in 1801 to the senate, formed one of the minority of five opposed to the accession of the first consul to the throne. He alone opposed the reestablishment of titles of nobility. Napoleon unwillingly, on the request of both houses of the legislature, afterward made him a count of the empire and officer of the legion of honor. He was also opposed to the emperor's divorce, and declined to be present at the marriage with Maria Louisa. On Napoleon's reverses in 1814 Gregoire pronounced a vehement oration against him.

On the second restoration he was excluded from the institute, deprived of his bishopric, and compelled by the stoppage of his pension to sell his library for the means of support. He retired to Auteuil, where he passed the last 15 years of his life in literary labor. He never renounced his republican principles. The last offices of religion were denied him on his deathbed by his ecclesiastical superiors; but the civil power having interfered, funeral rites were performed over his body in the church of the Abbaye aux Bois by a proscribed priest. The people then took his remains in charge, and, removing the horses from the hearse, drew it to the cemetery of Mont Parnasse. Bernardin de l'Oise describes Gregoire's character in saying that he wished to "Christianize the revolution." The most important of his numerous publications are his Histoire des sectes religieuses (2 vols., 1810); Essai historique sur les liberies de l'Eglise gal-licane (1818); De l'influence du Christianisme sur la condition des femmes (1821); Histoire des confesscurs des empereurs, des rois et d'autres princes (1824); and Histoire du manage despretres en France (1826). He also wrote a work entitled De la litterature des negres, containing sketches of the lives and writings of negroes " who have distinguished themselves in science, literature, and the arts." This work has been translated into English, and published both in Great Britain and the United States. His Memoires were published in 1837.