Abraham a Sancta Clara, painting, c. 1700

The son of a Swabian inn-keeper, Hans Ulrich Megerle (1644-1709) entered the order of the Discalced Augustinians in 1662, assuming the religious name of Abraham a Sancta Clara. From 1677 he was a preacher in the Augustinian monastery of the Court Church in Vienna. His sermons were widely published and are regarded as major works in the Catholic homiletic literature of the Baroque era.

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