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HENSCHEN


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HENSEL


find a Christian prince who would aid him in his cru- sading work (he had heard of Prester John) ; (5) to spread the Christian Faith. To achieve these objects, his sn"ift caravels made continual voyages down the African coast, and in 1434, after twelve years of fail- ures, one of his seamen, Gil Eannes, bolder than the rest, and inspired by his master's zeal and generosity, doubled the terrible Cape. From that date events move quickly, and Henrj-, while still bearing in mind his crusading ideal, became more and more an explorer for the sake of knowledge, though he also endeavoured to draw commercial profit from the new-found lands which would recoup his order for the vast expense of the voyages. He showed his scientific sagacity by ob- taining from some captured natives (Azenegues) suffi- cient information about the Senegal to enable his men to recognize it when they reached it ; moreover, he not only studied the ancient geographers and medieval maps, but engaged an expert map and instrument- maker, Jayme of Majorca, so that his explorers might have the best nautical information. This last incident probably ac- counts for the legend of the School of Sagres, which is now discredited. Though Henrj' cer- tainly spent much time in the Algarve, of which pro\'ince he was governor, the centre of his maritime activity was not Sa- gres or the Villa do Infante, but Lagos, where nearly all the early expeditions were equipped.

In 14.36 Affonso Baldaya reached the Rio do Ouro and went 300 miles beyond Bojador; in 1441 Antam Gonial ves brought back the first captives, and Xuno Tristam penetrated as far as Cape Branco, and a j'ear later to Arguim Bay ; while in 1445 Dinis Diaz discovered Cape Verde. In two subse- quent voyages, Cadamosto (1455-6) and Diogo Gomes (1458-60) explored the Senegal and the Gambia, and sailed down the coast as far as Sierra Leone. But this and the finding of the Azores and Cape Verde Islands was all the result Prince Henry saw, for he died in November, 1460, deeply in debt as the price of his lifelong ser\nce to the cause of CTiristianity and science. The finding of the road to India by Vasco da Gama, which completed Henry's work, and the discoverj' of America, to which Columbus was inspired by the achievements of Henry and his successors, led to a greater spread of the Faith than the Prinze could have unagined. By hLs voyages he removed the imagined terrors of the deep and, in the words of Azurara, joined East to West, that the peoples might learn to exchange their riches". Under his aegis were established the first exploring and com- mercial companies of modern times, and, though he has been reproached with encouraging slavery, it must be remembered that the age saw no harm in the traflBc, that the Africans who were brought to Portugal by his captains were employed in domestic offices and fairlj' treated, and that nearly all of them became Christians. If the men who carried on his work fell short of his high ideals, Henry at least lived up to the verj- letter of hisde\-ice, Talant de bien faire, "the desire to do well".

M.UOH, Life oi Prince Henry of Portugal (London. 1868); Ip.. Discoveries of Prince Henry the Xaviaalor (London, 18771; Beazlet, Prince Henry the Navigator (New York and London, 1895); AzuRAE.*, Chronica de Guine (Paris. 1841). and tr. by Beazlet and Prebtage. The Chronicle of Guinea (2 vols., Lon- don, 1896-9); OuvEiRA Mabtd."6, Os Filhos de D. Jo6o I.


Henry the N.^vig.ktor After the miniature in the "Chronica do descobri mento e conquistn de Guine" (MS. of the years 144S-1453). Biblioth^que Nationale, Paris


(Oporto, 1S9_1): Alguns Documentos da Torre do Tombo acer^a das Xarega^aoes e Conquistas Portuguezas (Lisbon, 1892;) DE Veer. Prinj Heinrichder Scefahrer (Danzig. 1864); de Sousa Holstein, a Escola de Sagres (Lisbon, 1877); Bourne. Prince Henry the Navigator in Yale Review (1894); RrcE, Prim Hein- rich der Seefahrer in Globus (1894). LXV'I; Mees, Henri le Xavigateur (Brussels. 1901).

EDG.A.R PrEST.^GE,

Eenschen (or Henskens), Godfrey, Jesuit, hagi- ographer; b. at Venray (Limburg), 21 June, 1601; d. at Antwerp, 11 Sept., 1681, The son of Henry Hensehen, a cloth merchant, and Sibylla Pauwels, he studied the humanities at the Jesuit College of Bois-le-Duc ('s Hertogenbosch), and entered the novitiate at Mechlin on 22 Oct., 1619. He taught successively Greek, poetry, and rhetoric at Bergues, Bailleul, Ypres, and Ghent, was ordained priest on 15 April, 1634, sent to the pro- fessed house at Antwerp in the following year, and admitted to the profession of the four vows on 12 May, 1636. He re- mained at Antwerp imtil his death. 11 Sept.. ItiSl. From the time of his arrival in the city he was associated as col- laborator \N-ith Father Bollan- dus, who was then preparing the first volumes of the "Acta Sanctorum". As has been said in speaking of this collection (see BoLLANDiSTs), it was Hen- sehen who. by his commentary on the Acts of St. Amand, sug- gested to BoUandus the course to follow, and gave to the scientific work undertaken by his learned master its definitive form. The same article speaks of the hterarj- journey, under- taken by Hensehen in com- pany with Father Papebroch, to Italv, France, and Germany (22 July, 1660-21, December, 1662) . He collaborated on the volumes for January, February, March, and April, and on the first six volumes for May, that is on seventeen volumes of the Several of his posthumous com- A list


" Acta Sanctorum

mentaries appeared in the succeeding volumes

of some other works from his pen will be found in De

Backer's "Bibhotheque des ^crivains de la Com-

pagnie de J^sus". Hensehen was the first Ubrarian

of the Museum BoUandianum at Antwerp,

Papebroch, De vitti, operibus, et virlutibue God, Henschenii in Ada SS.. S'll. May; Habets. Godfried Henschenius medeatich- ier der Acta Sanctorum (Maastricht. 1S6S).

HlPPOLTTE DeLEHAYE.

Hensel, Luise, poetess and convert ; b, at Linum, 30 March, 1798; d. at Paderborn, IS December, 1876. Her father was Johann Hensel, Lutheran parson at Linum in the Mark of Brandenburg. After the father's death in 1809, the mother with her son and three daughters returned to her birthplace, Berlin, where the family dwelt, at first in somewhat needy circumstances. Luise attended the high school (Real- schiile), now the EUsabethschtile, showing extraor- dinary talent. In consequence of the religious teaching there, she conceived doubts as to the truth of the Lutheran creed. When she was about to be con- firmed (on 31 March, 1813), she made the following compact with God: "that by this act I only embrace Christianity in general and renew the covenant of my baptism, but that I in no way agree to bind mj-self to any creed concerning which I am not convinced as to whether or not it is the Church established by Christ", The political events in 1813 inspired several fen-id