Eighteenth-Century Studies

The cultural and religious phenomena of the convulsionaries of Saint-Médard, linked to Parisian Jansenism, raises questions concerning the testimonial discourses and their procedures of validation and accreditation within the context of the eighteenth century in France. The article focuses on Carré de Montgeron’s corpus and examines the discursive modalities concerning the question of authenticity and the choices of rhetoric strategies used in order to legitimate irrational testimony within a hostile model of evidence that privileges rationality and objectivity. I argue that Montgeron intended not only to transmit a real life experience but tended towards the construction of “public opinion” that was likely to influence the course of political and religious events in France.