Born into a peasant family in Aquitaine, France. After studying theology in Toulouse, he was ordained a priest in 1600. Captured by pirates in 1605, he was for two years a slave in Tunisia, but then escaped back to France where he decided to dedicate all of his efforts to the service of the poor.

He founded a congregation of priests (called Lazarists or Vincentians) for missionary work, groups of laymen to help paupers and galley-slaves, and, with St Louise de Marillac, the Sisters of Charity, the first congregation of women entirely devoted to the care of the sick and the poor. In 1833 the "Society of St. Vincent de Paul', a lay organization for service of the poor, was founded in his honor