John Baptist

John Baptist, a French missionary priest in the latter part of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. The son of the emperor of Cochin China, Gya-Long, having come to France with the bishop of Adran in 1787, concluded a treaty with king Louis XVI, by which the latter was to aid him in regaining his throne, which he had lost by a revolution. Events prevented Louis from keeping his promise, but Gya-Long, having regained his kingdom, called to his court the bishop of Adran, who became his prime minister, and John Baptist, who had acted as general vicar to the bishop. He also enacted several laws favoring Roman Catholicism. The bishop of Adran died in 1817, and Gya-Long himself in 1819. His successor being opposed to Christianity John Baptist left Huë-Foo, the capital of the empire of Annam, where he had resided, travelled through the East, and in 1827 settled in the convent of St. Francis at Macao, where he died July 9, 1847. He is said to have left a collection of interesting documents on China and the other countries he visited. See Le Constituionnel, Oct. 17, 1847. — Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Générale, 26:567. (J.N.P.)

⇒See also the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia.