YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

EAELY SOUECES
OF
ENGLISH UNITARIAN
CHRISTIANITY

BY
GASTON BONET-MAURY, D.D.
PROFESSOR OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY IN THE FACULTY OF
PROTESTANT THEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF FRANCE.

REVISED SY THE AUTHOR
AND TRANSLATED BY
EDWARD POTTER HALL.
WITH A PREFACE BY
JAMES MARTINEAU, LL.D., D.D.

BRITISH & FOREIGN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION,
37, NORFOLK Street, Strand, London.
1884,

Note, — The British and Foreign Unitarian Association, in accord
ance with its First Rule, gives publicity to works calculated "to promote
Unitarian Christianity by the diffiision of Biblical, theological, and
literary knowledge, on topics connected with it," but does not hold
itself responsible for every statement, opinion, or expression of the
writers, *,f* For the notes in brackets in this work the author is not respon
sible. They have been contributed, with the Index, at the request of the
Committee of the Association, by Alex. Gordon, M. A.

Mk.

¦1 T-
I i' I 1—

15645'

CONTENTS.

page
Preface to the English Translation, by Dr, Martineau v
Introduction  i
Chapter I.
Is Unitarian Christianity of English origin ? — Its relation to Wiclif
and the Lollards ; to Reginald Pecock ; to the Nonconformists. —
The Anglican Church  ;  23
Chapter II.
Was Unitarian Christianity imported into England'from the Low
Countries ? — Its relation to Erasmus and the Anabaptists  38
Chapter III.
Is Unitarian Christianity of Alsatian or of Swiss origin ? — Capito. —
Hooper and Pturitanisin. — Cranmer and the Strangers' Church... 52
Chapter IV.
Is Unitarian Christianity of Italian or Spanish origin ? — Antitrinita-
rian tendencies of the Italian Reformation. — Influence of Juan
de Valdes and Michael Servetus  67
Chapter V.
The Italian Reformed Churches in Switzerland. — Antitrinitarian
Controversies. — Relations with England  ,  ¦  87
Chapter VL
The Strangers' Church in London. — Birth ofthe Unitarian idea ... 115
Chapter VII.
Bernardino Ochino, his religious development, and his influence on
English theology. — Corranus  137

IV CONTENTS.
Chapter VIII. page
Acontius, his philosophical and religious ideas, and his influence on
English theology  '"'
Chapter IX.
Socinianism ; its two authors, Lelio and Fausto Sozzini ; stages of
their doctrine, and its introduction into England  178
Chapter X.
Influence of the Anglo-Saxon genius on the development of English
Unitarian Christianity: Bidle and Firmin. — Relations with the
Latitudinarians, the Quakers, the New- Arians. — Milton, Locke
and Newton  199
Conclusion  217
Appendix.
I. — Extract from the Confession of John Theobald, 1528  231
2. — Extract from Erasmus' Preface, 1523, to Works of St. Hilary 232
3. — Letters Patent of Edward VL, constituting the Strangers'
Church in London, 1550  236
4- — Extract from Letter ofthe Geneva Ministers to the Ministers
of East Friesland, 1 566  243
5. — Extract from Grisons Ministers' Questions on the Trinity, 1561 244
6. — Confession of Faith imposed on Italian Church, Geneva, 1558 245
7. — Organisation of the Strangers' Church, London, 1550  249
8- — Letter from Microen to BuUinger respecting the first Unitarians
ofLondon, 1551  251
9.— Formula of Retractation presented to Adriaans van Hamstede
by the Bishop of London, 1562  257
10. — Extract from Ochlno's De Purgatorio, 1556  261
"¦—Letter of Pierre La Ramee to Acontius, 1565  264
12.— The inadequacy of the Apostles' Creed as a common Confes- '
sion among Protestants, according to Acontius, 1565  266
'3- — Letters of Lelio Sozini to Johann Wolif, 1554—1^5^ _ 260
14.— Extract from the Racovian Catechism, 1609 
'S-— John Milton on the Unity of God, 1674   272

PKEFACE TO THE ENGLISH TEANSLATION.

The merits of this volume, as an example of special his
torical study, are so conspicuous, that it might well dispense
with all external commendation : and from mine, I am well
aware, no other advantage can be gained than such support
as an old man's friendship and esteem may be supposed to
afford to a young author's modesty. The investigation to
which the following pages are devoted interests me the more,
because it takes me up far less as the critic than as the
learner, and leaves me grateful for new knowledge and for
many a charming or impressive picture from the drama of
the past. Tlieiuthar!s pioblem,— to find the source of
Unitarian Christianity in this country, — has naturally led
him away from the main roads of the revolt from Rome,
which ended in the AngUcan, the Lutheran, and the Re
formed Churches, and thrown him into the ecceritric by
paths of the Reformation, where the freer minds are sure
to be found, and coherent thought is yet in the making.
Whether or not he alights there on the true solution of his
problem, I will not venture to pronounce ; but as he ques
tions group after group, and elicits their curious enthusiasms,
and follows them in their flight from danger, to Emden, to
London, to Chiavenna, to Basel, to Poland, he lays bare the
very spirit of the times in its ferment of belief and struggle
of character.

VI PREFACE TO
To discover the origin of Christian Unitarianism in
England we may proceed in either of two opposite direc
tions ; from the present formed results backwards, step by
step, through the influences which have shaped them, as far
as we can see our way ; or from the earliest traces of anti
trinitarian opinion that could move forward into these
results. The latter is the method pursued by Professor
Bonet-Maury, and is indeed rendered inevitable at last by
the disappearance of clear historical continuity at the upper
end. It involves the inquirer, and still more the reader, in
a danger against which it is difficult to guard the imagination.
As he searches through the dark places of the sixteenth
century, the gleam which he wants turns up at more points
than one, and visits him with rival possibilities of derivation ;
and by the need of selection, the problem is apt to assume
in his mind an alternative form : " Is this doctrine, in its
beginning, indigenous or foreign ? — if foreign, from the Latin
races or the Germanic ? — if the former, from Spain or Italy ?
— if the latter, from Saxony or Holland ? — if from Holland,
from the Anabaptists of Delft, or the scholar of Rotterdam?''
Thus a host of hypotheses springs up, some of which may no
doubt be put out of court by sufficient evidence of fact, but
none of which can be taken as intrinsically excluding any
other ; and yet the advocate of each is apt, in the eagerness
of discussion, to believe himself possessed of the sole key to
the problem. Unitarian theology is not so artificial a phe
nomenon that we are obliged to refer it, like the enunciation
of Kepler's laws or the spectrum analysis, to a single dis
coverer. Dn the contrary, as a simple reversion from some
thing far more artificial than itself, it may well be expected
in^an age which breaks up the stagnation of thought, to arise

THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. vii
simultaneously as a function of many moyeinents and in the
experience of many minds. Nothing therefore precludes us
from accepting for it, in its modern re-appearance, several
concurrent beginnings, instead of a single line of filiation
from a preferred historical source.
The study of comparative mythology at one time consisted
of little else than a fancied detection of identity, under the
disguise of different names and symbols, between the gods
of separated tribes, and the skilful use of this identity in
evidence of a certain order of interdependence in the devel
opment and relations of these tribes. It is now well under
stood that the similarities insisted on imply no process of
borrowing, that the growth of a mythology is a natural and
traceable process in the mental history and crystalizing
language of mankind, and can hardly fail, under the play of
common psychological laws, to create resembling forms in
races externally distinct. By its theory of the Mythos,
philosophical philology has not only found a meaning for
what appeared to be mere childish dreams, but restrained
the aberrations of speculative history. No important belief
can any longer have its story told from the outside. How
ever modified by surrounding conditions, and geographically
conveyed to new regions, it has its root and aliment in the
inward nature, as the expression of some want, the asser
tion of some affection which time and place will not wear
out. The dissolution of a mythology is no less natural a process
than its growth, and is indeed secured the moment we have
discovered how it has grown. No one who sees in Zeus,
Osiris and Isis, the personification of certain natural phe
nomena, or in Heracles, Romulus, and the Hebrew Messiah,

Vlll PREFACE TO
the ideal genius of a race, can any longer pay them the homage
expected at their temples or held due to their names. In
the same way the objective reality of Trinitarian worship
inevitably vanishes for one who knows the successive incre
ments by which its organism of doctrine has formed itself:
to see its construction is to feel its dissolution. And even
without this power of outwardly following a belief through
its embryonic stages, the mere reflective sense of its internal
incongruity or its contradiction to the better known, prac
tically cancels its Divine pretensions, and concentrates the
soul's religion on what remains when it retires. But what is
this natural residue of faith, when the enigma of tripersonality
brings thought into confusion and the affections into conflict?
Its object is simply the Unipersonal God, the beginning and
the end- of every perfection, the centre and the infixiitud&.of
all good. , To be precipitated upon -this faith, nothing more
is needed than for a religious mind to find itself, from some
cause or other, on uneasy terms with a doctrine which has
various ways of offending the awakened reason and con
science. It ought not to surprise us therefore if, on the
weakening of ecclesiastical pressure or the increased tension
of spiritual independence. Unitarian theology repeatedly
appears upon the scene, and enters it from several sides.
In seeking for it everywhere, within the area of the Refor
mation, and in discriminating its different types. Professor
Bonet-Maury works strictly within the limits of his inquiry.
He deals in each case with what was, or at least mio-ht be
a vera causa of the phenomenon which he proposes to
explain. He collects his resources before he allots to them
their work ; assembling them, for the most part, at the
" Foreigners' Church" in Austin Friars, where the seeds of

THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. ix
many a heresy found, it would seem, if not a kindly soil, at
least some stony ground for a brief flowering season.
Among the several possible tributaries to English Uni
tarianism which were co-present there about the middle of
the sixteenth century, some one influence must have taken
the initiative. Was it the speculation of Servetus ? or the
personal weight of Laelius Sozini ? or the spiritual catholicity
of Ochino? or the devotion ofthe " Family of Love"? or
the heroic piety ofthe Smithfield martyr, George van Parris?
On reviewing the whole evidence. Professor Bonet-Maury
assigns the first place to the Spanish and Italian writers and
refugees ; and it is impossible to regret an opinion to which
we owe his deeply interesting sketches of Servetus, of Valdes,
of Altieri, of Ochino. But of these reformers, however ani
mated by evangelical freedom of spirit, Servetus alone
departed from the orthodox Christology; and the charac
teristics of their thought are so alien from the genius of the
known Unitarianism in the 17th and i8th centuries, that
any prior school which they might cause in the i6th would
sit apart and fail to give us the requisite historical continuity.
There are two ways in which a rank more than human has
been provided for the person of Christ by those who could
not admit his equality with the Father. Either he was a
higher pre-existent nature sunk into manhood by incarnate
birth ; or he was simply human to begin with, and through
spiritual endowment and holy obedience exalted to Divine
functions and near communion with the Indivisible God.
The former conception, starting from the supernatural nati
vity and following it into the ministry of humiliation and
sacrifice, has marked every form of Arianism. The latter,
beginning, like Mark's Gospel, with the simply human pro-

X PREFACE TO
phet of Galilee, and then finding him, like Paul, reserved,
immortal in the heavens, for judicial offices proper only to
omniscient power, is the Socinian characteristic. Many
English Unitarians have held, in conformity with the former,
that Christ was made man, but few, so far as I am aware,
that he was made God. Even those who retained the escha
tology of a general resun-ection and judgment have tried
to bring these stupendous processes within the resources
of an inspired humanity. If among the South European
refugees in London this type of heresy had its votaries, it
seems to have remained an exotic, and not to have repro
duced itself in English thought.
The estimate which disciples make of the person of their
Master is determined by their preconception of the work he
has to do. Whatever that requires bim to be, they cannot
doubt that he really is. There are two aspects under which
that work has presented itself to their minds — as Redemption
and as Revelation — the former, a transaction, altering the
real relations of persons and the very nature of things ; the
latter, a superhuman enlargement of knowledge and showing
of things as they are, without further change in them than
may arise from clearer apprehension. To effect the former,
— to abolish a primeval curse and neutralize the power of
Sin and Death, to render pardon accessible and holiness
possible, and re-open the closed gates of eternal life, — is
to revolutionize the universe, and may well be deemed
beyond the reach of any nature less than God. Certainly it
is an infinite overmatch for a personality like ours, however
filled to its utmost capacities by heavenly aids. But to be
the organ of Revelation,— to have the incubus of spiritual
doubt removed and the sad enigmas of life resolved  to be

THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. xi
inwardly told what we have longed to know, and see the
mists disperse from the future we could never pierce, — this
is but the flow of light upon the faculties we have, and needs
no more than the open reason and purified conscience of
a true Son of Man. Accordingly it is not among those
reformers who approach Christianity from the Augustinian
side, — not with Luther or the Swiss leaders, not with Farel,
not even with Valdes and Ochino, — that we meet with dis
affection towards the received Christology ; they leave un
touched the Divine Drama of Salvation, and take nothing
from its objective conditions or the portentous meaning of
its Calvary ; but only snatch its benefits from sacerdotal
grasp and distribution, and set them free for appropriation
by personal faith, and for the emergence of a new life of the
Spirit. This is the form of evangelic thought congenial to
passionate and turbulent natures that need a foreign rescue
from their own inward tyrannies. But there are quieter
spirits, less stormy in their impulses and of more steadfast
will, whose chief need for higher life is, to know more of
higher things ; whose love is ready for any Divine Perfection
that may be opened to their sight ; and who will enter at
once upon any sanctifying trust or glorious hope from which
the clouds may clear away. These it is that ask from
Christianity nothing but Revelation; who require therefore
in its Author only the power to reveal, — that is, insight,
however given, into the spiritual truth they miss. If they
feel that, for this end, the incarnate appearance of God in
person would be an incredible over-provision, they will natu
rally be the first to rest contented with the Humanity of
Christ, as an adequate medium of light from heaven. If
Luther represents the former class, Erasmus belongs by

xii PREFACE TO
nature and by habit to the latter ; and certainly he was, if
not Unitarian himself, at least a very early cause of Unita
rianism in others. Among scholars, his text of the New
Testament, in a far wider circle his exegetical Annotations,
dlff-used anti-trinitarian modes of thought. If ever the Dutch
and English Anabaptists, who disowned for the most part
the doctrine of the Trinity, departed so far from their rigid
Scripturalism as to cite a human authority in their defence,
it was under his writings that they sheltered their heresy.i
His influence, moreover, entered as a factor into the Armi-
nianism of Holland, and through this, as well as directly,
into the Socinianism of Poland, and thence again into the
Latitudinarianism of England; which, in the writings of
Hales, ChiUingworth and Locke, is theologically indistin
guishable from Unitarian Christianity. In this line of
descent, the phenomena appear to be continuous by natural
heredity ; whilst the South European examples of anti-trini
tarian doctrine are sporadic, and do not seem to supply
the true root of the English school.
But there is one unorthodox influence so powerful and
so extensively diffused as almost to supersede inquiry into
the personal pedigree of English Unitarianism — I mean, the
English Bible. It is difficult for us to realize the startling
effect of throwing open to Europe in its vernacular tongues
a Sacred Literature vehemently contrasted, in matter, in
form, in spirit, with the ecclesiastical stereotype of Chris
tianity. For their impressions of the Saviour's life and
person, the multitude had been dependent on pictures in

1 See the curious Dialogue between the Inquisitor of Bruges and an
Anabaptist, in Ch. II.

THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. xiii
the churches, which taught whatever the artist fancied ; and
they knew as much about cherubs and angels and legendary
saints, and things in heaven and things in hell, as about the
Galilean lake and hills, and the gracious figure and real
incidents that have consecrated them for ever. The cele
bration of the Mass, the repetitions counted by the Rosary,
the resort to the Confessional, the submission to penance,
the purchase of indulgences, the recital of the Creeds, the
exercise of Mariolatry, set up in their imagination a vast
mytholog)' as the faith of Christendom. The Trinity is in
every prayer; the prayers go through the day; and the
church-days go through the year ; and at every turn, of
nature or of grace, the Priest steps in to find it ill or make it
good. Suppose a worshipper, with mind thus pre-occupied,
to find, chained to a public desk within his church, one of
the new Bibles in his own language, and to be so arrested
by it as to forget what he came for, and stay with it while
others pass on to the choir. As he reads, are the thoughts and
images which the page throws upon his mind in tune with the
familiar offices which he faintly overhears ? Does his atten
tion rest upon the suppliant cries of Psalmist or Prophet or
Apostle or of the Man of Sorrows himself — They are silent
of the " Holy, Blessed, and Glorious Trinity, three Persons
and One God,'' wherein every church prayer finds its crown.
Does he alight on the Pauline Unipersonal profession of
theistic faith, "To us there is One God, the Father'' — Does
then the Apostle's "One God" comprise no "Son," and no
" Holy Ghost"? Does he read the story of the Last Supper,
or the Apostolic instructions for its celebration at Corinth —
Is this a Sacrament? Where is the Priest? Where, the
Miracle? Where,the sacerdotal monopolyof the cup? Where,

xiv PREFACE TO
the "Unbloody Sacrifice"? It is the same all through, A
mind surrendered, with the freshness and freedom which true
piety gives, to the broad characteristics ofthe Scriptures, could
not but suffer estrangement from the very essence ofthe eccle
siastical theory;— first, no doubt, escaping from its degrading
imposture of priestly mediation, into immediate spiritual rela
tions with heaven ; but, ere long, irresistibly impressed by the
purely monotheistic character of the Biblical Theology, and
the genuine humanism of the Christology, The evangelical
spirit that sprung from the re-opened "Word of God" was,
in all its operations, a new birth of Religion into simplicity ;
throwing off, to begin with, the incubus of church " works,"
and delivering the individual soul to the life of inward faith
and love ; and then, in due time, reducing that inward faith
itself to simpler terms, without the tangled threads which no
thought could smooth into a consistent tissue. Starting from
Luther's first-translated Pauline Epistles, it snatched Redemp
tion from the Altar and made it over to the Conscience.
Concentrated next upon the Gospels, it identified itself with
the Religion of Christ, and found the Revelation only the
perfecting of Reason. It was the mission of Wiclif and the
" Reformers before the Reformation" as well as at its outset,
to carry the emancipation through the first stage ; of Crell
and Biddle, of the Arminians and Latitudinarians, of Price
and Priestley, of Channing, the Coquerels and Parker, to
suffer no pause short of the second.
Throughout this movement till very near its end, both
impulse and direction have been due to the Scriptures, used
as the charter of spiritual rights. By resort to this test every
thing has been accomplished. Fathers, Councils, Tradition,
Donation of Constantine, Primacy of Peter, have been put

THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION, xv
to flight by rigorous loyalty to the "pure Word of Holy
Writ,"— the "Naked Gospel," the "Oracles of God," as
understood by the individual disciple's reason and con
science. The earlier Unitarians, notwithstanding their repute
of rationalism, drew their doctrine out of the Scriptures,
much to their own surprise, and did not import it into them.
Biddle, for instance, declares that " he experienced his first
doubts respecting the Trinity in reading the Bible, before
he had ever seen a Socinian book." And how great a thirst
was appeased by the opening of the long-sealed fountain of
living waters may be judged from this— that the first enthu
siasm of the evangelic spirit, in both its forms, was for
diffusing the Bible in the language of each land : till that
was done, there was neither Redemption for the soul, nor
Revelation of the truth. Nor was this estimate mistaken.
The reforming energy became intense and persistent pre
cisely in those countries w^hich early possessed a widely
distributed version of the Scriptures in the spoken tongue,
in Germany, Holland, Britain, and even France. Spain, on
the other hand, though furnished with its translation about
the middle of the i6th century, stood, like Italy, in such
relations to Rome, that it was not publicly accessible. If
the religious revolution failed in Southern Europe, it was not
because the genius of the Latin races gave it no response,
but (inter alia) because the new life, after its first pulsations
had been suppressed, was without the permanent aHment
which alone could again and again revive it and carry on its
growth. This general cause of modified doctrine, the vernacular
Bible, is of course everywhere pre-supposed by the accom
plished author of the following Treatise, and neither supple-

kvi PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION,
ments nor replaces any source to which he is disposed to
trace the Unitarian Christianity of England. I dwell upon
it only as a caution to the reader against excessive historical
simplification — i. e. against insisting upon some single origin
for an assemblage of facts whose unity may be not that of
external concatenation, but that of internal agreement. Lay
but the Christian records before a mind devout and clear,
and leave them alone with each other, and is it wonderful if
the Christianity of a Channing should emerge ? And if this
may happen in one place, so may it in a hundred ; and the
great river of faith which flows before us as a single stream,
may be the blending of many rills descending from separated
heights, and knowing nothing of each other till they mingle.
With these few words, suggested by Professor Bonet-
Maury's rich and instructive pages, I take my leave of him
for the present, in the hope of ere long meeting him again,
and the entire confidence that, when he speaks again, it will
be to no small audience, English and American, rendered at
once grateful and expectant by his first work.
James Martineau.

SOURCES OF
ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

INTRODUCTION.
It is an opinion much in favour with historians that Pro
testantism is uncongenial to the Latin races. Nations of
the Teutonic stock, it is affirmed, being by temperament
inclined to reflection, have accepted Protestantism; while
the Southern populations, requiring a religion which speaks
to eye and imagination as well, would of necessity reject it
in the sixteenth century.^ A mere glance over the period of
the spread of the Reformation (15 12 — 1564) will convince
us of the falsity of this conclusion.
Let us leave out of account France, a country of mixed
race, where it is scarcely contested any longer that the
Reformation took deep root, especially in the South, as is
proved by the existence ofthe Albigenses and the Waldenses.
Let us take Spain and Italy. The twenty volumes of the
' Such seems to be the opinion of M. Taine, in his Histoire de
la Litterature Anglaise (vol. ii. 288, 289), where he contrasts the
serious and moral races of the North with the frivolous and irreligious
peoples of the South. " The Refonnation," says he, " is a Renascence
appropriate to the genius of the Germanic nations." Cf. the contrary
opinion of E. Renan, in his Lecture on "Judaism considered as a Race
and a Religion," Revue Politique et Littiraire, 3 Feb. 1883.
B

2 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
collection of Spanish Reformers,^ and the sale in Italy of
forty thousand copies of the jBenefizio di Gesu Crista,^ are
evidences of the enthusiastic reception won by the gospel,
when offered to the Christian public in those very countries
which certain writers beyond the Rhine would fain represent
as effete, and unamenable to all moral and religious progress.
Yet more, the long and still inexhaustive list of martyrs for
the gospel in Italy and Spain proves that the populations of
those countries had strongly felt the influence of the Reform
movement ; so much so, that the Inquisition was obliged to
have recourse to a veritable reign of terror and atrocious
severities to avoid being vanquished.
Moreover, the Reformation had its precursors in those
countries also. In Spain, the Waldenses or Leottistas^ (men
of Lyons), and the Alumbrados (enlightened), had reinstated
evangelical worship ; in Italy, the principles of the Arnoldists
and of the Abbot Joachim, and the austere and prophetic
voice of Savonarola, still found an echo in believing souls.
In these two countries the labours of the writers of the
Renascence, especially those of Pico della Mirandola and
Erasmus, had caused an awakening of philosophic thought
which was sure, sooner or later, to issue in a re-casting of
dogma. Everything leads to the belief that if the secular
arm had not supported the Roman Church by physical force,
the latter would never have attained its end of re-consolidat
ing its power, which had been so signally shaken. That
power was, in fact, undermined by the writings of Valdes^
Servetus, Ochino, and the Sozzini.
^ Los Reformistas Antiguos Espanolcs. Edited by Usoz i Rio and
Benjamin Wiffen. 20 vols. Svo. London, i860 fi".
¦* Lichtenberger's E-ncyclopidie, art. Italie (Long). The Benefizio di
Gesu Crista, of which only two or three copies escaped the flames of the
Inquisition, has been reprinted by Dr. Babington, Cambridge, 1855.
* [Leonistas = Lyonists, i. e. poor men of Lyons, from Leona, the
Spanish name of the city. — Trans. ]

INTRODUCTION. 3
Had they come victorious out of the period of agitations
and conflicts, the Spanish and Italian Protestants would have
provided themselves with an ecclesiastical organization and a
form of worship suitable to their national genius and satisfying
all their religious needs, just as we see them doing nowadays
under the regime of a legal toleration. This is no gratuitous
assumption. What we shall have to say hereafter concerning
the churches of the Spanish and Italian exiles in various
countries of Europe will complete the proof of our thesis,
namely, that the Latin races were neither less desirous nor
less capable of a religious reformation than the nations of
the North ; and that they have been kept within the pabe of
the Roman Church far less by attachment to theatrical forms
of worship than by the terror of the Inquisition, and by the
constraint of the civil power allied with the Holy See. The
fact is that, after the failure of the three professedly reform
ing Councils, Constanz, Basel and Pisa, a failure due in great
part to the unconciliatory conduct ofthe Popes, all the nations
of AVestern "Europe were disgusted with the moral abuses and
fiscal exactions of the Roman Church, and were ready to
shake off in concert the yoke of the " modern Babylon." To
save her supremacy in the South, Catholic Rome had to
adopt the old device of Pagan Rome, Divide et impera. Like
fire, she played a self-consuming part, and, at the cost of
great pecuniary sacrifices, purchased the co-operation of the
French and Italian princes in her work of exterminating
heresy. The Protestants early opposed the principle of union amid
diversity to the Catholic tenet of absolute unity. Protest
against the abuses and errors of the Church of Rome was
universal in Europe; but it assumed various forms, according
to the character and composition of the races which divided
the West. One may even refer the varieties of Protestantism
to three principal types : the Saxo-Scandinavian type, repre
sented by Luther, Melanchthon, Bucer, Bugenhagen, and-
B 2

4 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Cranmer; the Franco-Helvetic type, which appears in Calvm
and Zwingli ; and the Hispano-Italian type, impersonated in
Servetus, Ochino, and the Sozzini.
With the Lutherans, the protest was dictated by the
requirements of the heart and conscience much more than
by the claims of reason. It was in the name of conscience,
outraged by the abuse which was being made of indulgences,
that Luther affixed his theses to the Wittenberg Schloss-
kirche ; but he still retained the cultus of the Virgin and the
Saints. So also the Enghsh divines, when once they had
secured pre-eminence to the principles of Paul and of
Augustine in the dogmata of grace and redemption, accepted
all the Catholic dogmata, whatever they were, which did not
injure the arteries of religious life'.^
The Hispano-Italian school proceeds, on the contrary,
from reason and from legal ideas, rather than from moral
and mystical feeling. It combats the errors and abuses of
the Roman Churcl) by appealing to a legal text. It adopts,
as its test of dogma, conformity with Holy Scripture, con
sidered as the inspired code of moral and religious law, and
interpreted by sound reason. All doctrine which is not
expressly authorised by the word of God, ought to be eli
minated, even though resting on the tradition of many
centuries, the teaching of the Fathers, and the canons of'
CEcumenical Councils. .
Between these two types, which may be called the Lutheran
and the Socinian, we find a third, the Zwinglio-Calvinian,
which shares some of the characteristics of each. Holding
with the first that mystical tendency which can respect the
merest doctrinal quibbles about the Lord's Supper and the
two natures in Jesus Christ, it nevertheless has, in common
with the second, that dialectical vigour and that juridical

'' J. H. Scholten, De Leer der Hei-z/ormde Kerk in hare Gt
selen. 2 vols. Svo. Leiden, 1862.

INTRODUCTION. 5
power which produced the Institutio ChristiancB Religionis
and the Ordinances of Geneva.
M. R^ville has judiciously remarked that, in the countries
of the centre and the north of Europe, conscience had more
to do with the Reformation than science, while in Italy and
Spain reason took precedence of the moral and religious
sentiment. !_Now it was precisely in^the south that the Anti
trinitarian tendency was most pronounced."^
This Antitrinitarian tendency was indeed the logical result
of the two ideas which were the motive forces of the Refor
mation, one being that the Christian Church and its dogmata
had been radically corrupted by the Roman Catholic system,
and that they must be purified by reduction to the apostolic
norm ; the other, that Christian doctrine, to be of practical
service, must be capable of coinciding with man's actual
conscience, instead of remaining in the condition of abstract
and transcendental formula. Such is the common opinion
of all the extreme parties of the Reformation ; they main
tained that the religion of Jesus had suffered fundamental
changes in its sacraments and its dogmata immediately after
the disappearance of the first generation of Christians, and
that ever3d;hing not authorised by the Bible and the testi
mony of the apostles ought to be abolished. The Ana
baptists, on the strength of this principle, condemned infant
baptism, the images of the Saints, and even that of Christ,
and the special function of the clergy. They even went so
far as to attempt a restoration of the Communism which
prevailed in the Church of Jerusalem. The principle which
the Anabaptists applied in the region of discipline and
liturgy, the Antitrinitarians carried into the domain of

« Albert Reville, Hist, du Dogme de la Di-viniti de Jesus Christ, 1869.
pp. 132, 142. [See English translation by Miss Swaine, pp. 174., 186.
London, 1878.]

6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
dogma.'' These two tendencies set out from a common pomt
of view, namely, the necessity for a radical reform of the
Christian system, paying no heed to tradition or existing
institutions. This is why, at first, they were so often con
founded with one another.
The mere reading of the titles of the works of the first
Unitarians, e.g. Martin Cellarius, Campanus and Servetus,
is sufficient to convince us that they were thoroughly in
earnest in taking in hand a radical regeneration of the
Church. In 1527, Cellarius published his book De Operibus
Dei ; Servetus in 1553 gave to his great work the title
Christianismi Restitutio ; Campanus had already chosen for
one of his works the significant title. Contra totum post
Apostolos mundum {it, -^tl); for another, that of Gottlicher
und heiliger Schrifft, vor vielen J^aren verdunkelt, und durch
unheilsame Leer und Lerer (aus Gottes Zulassung) verfinstert.
Restitution und Bessa-ung. (Restitution and Renovation of
Divine and Holy Writ, many years obscured, and, by sufferance
of God, darkened through unsalutary doctrine and teachers,
1532.) Not meeting in the Bible with the terms "Trinity,"
" homoousia" (consubstantiality), " eternal generation of the
,Son," "procession of the Holy Spirit," they thence con
cluded that all these dogmata were of Jiuman invention, and
consequently hurtful to Christian faith. The notion of a
complete purification of Catholic doctrine, distinguished
from the outset the Unitarian radicals from the orthodox
Trinitarians, who professed to conserve all that did not
directly relate to the doctrine of Redemption. This clearly
appears in a letter addressed, on 14 Sept. 1564, by Prince
Mikolaj (Nicholas) Radziwill^ to Calvin, whom he did not

' F. Trechsel, Die Protestaniischen Antitrinita-riervor F. Socin. vol. i.
8, 9. Heidelberg, 1S44.
8 This prince, brother-in-law to Sigismund Augustus, King of Poland,
and Palatine of Wilna, was one of the promoters of the Reformation in

INTRODUCTION. 7
know to be already dead (24 May) : " Ex his et similibus
doctrinis inferre et concludere conantur [Antitrinitarii], totam
doctrinam in Papatu, etiam de hoc fidei nostrae fundamento,
fuisse corruptam ; nihilque intactum reliquisse Antichristum,
quod tetris et horrendis ille abominationibus non con-
taminaret, non poUueret, non profanaret. Trinitarii contra
concedunt quidem reliqua omnia pessumdata fuisse in
Papatu ; haec vero de primario fidei nostrje fundamento,
singulari Dei beneficio, illibata et inviolata permansisse."''
Alarmed at these extreme consequences, and fearing the
loss of the support of the Princes if the very basis of the
Church were upset, the Reformers appealed to the secular
arm to repress the extravagances of the Anabaptists and
Antitrinitarians. Hatzer at Constanz, Servetus at Geneva,
Georg van Parris in London, were the first victims of this
policy of repression.
The appeal to the secular arm was, as Trechsel acknow
ledges, an inconsistency on the part ofthe Reformers, i" I
will add that the retention of the so-called_AthaDasian Creed,
pure and simple, as the basis of the Protestant theodicy, was
Poland. He was the protector of Lismanini, Biandrata, and Stancaro,
which did not, however, prevent his keeping up a friendly correspondence
with Calvin. Cal-vini Opera, ed. Baum, Cunitz and Reuss, vol. xv.
2113, 2227, 2366 — 2371; vol. xvii. 2876, 3019; vol. xviii. 3232, 323S,
3443; vol. xix. 3562, 3565; vol. xx. 4125. The letter quoted above is
found in the archives of the Church of Zurich, Simler'' sche Sammlung,
vol. ii. fol. no.
* [" From these and kindred doctrines [the Antitrinitarians] do their
best to draw the inference and conclusion that the whole body of doc
trine, even as regards the foundation of our faith, was corrupted under
the Papacy ; and that Antichrist left nothing untouched by the contami
nations, pollutions and profanations of its foul and horrible abominations.
The Trinitarians, on the other hand, while admitting that everything
else was altered for the worse under the Papacy, nevertheless contend
that this primary article and foundation of our faith was, by the singular
providence of God, preserved unimpaired and inviolate."]
'" Trechsel, ut sup.,ya\. i. 11.

8 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
another. As this Creed served as target for all the Anti
trinitarian batteries, it is right for us to reproduce here, m
extenso, that portion of it which relates to the doctrine' of the
Trinity. Quicumque Vult.
" Whosoever will be saved : before all things it is necessary
that he hold the Catholic Faith.
" Which Faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled :
without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.
" And the Catholic Faith is this : That we worship one God
in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity ;
" Neither confounding the Persons : nor dividing the Sub
stance. " For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son :
and another ofthe Holy Ghost.
"But the Godhead ofthe Father, ofthe Son, and ofthe Holy
Ghost, is all one : the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal.
" Such as the Father is, such is the Son : and such is the Holy
Ghost. " The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate : and the Holy Ghost
uncreate. " The Father incomprehensible (immensus), the Son incom
prehensible: and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible.
" The Father eternal, the Son eternal : and the Holy Ghost
eternal. •' And yet they are not three eternals : but one eternal.
"As also there are not three incompreliensibles, nor three
uncreated : but one uncreated, and one incomprehensible.
" So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty : and
the Holy Ghost Almighty.
" And yet they are not three Almighties : but one Almighty.
" So the Father is God, the Son is God: and the Holy Ghost
is God.
" And yet they are not three Gods : but one God.
" So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord : and the Holy
Ghost Lord.
" And yet not three Lords : but one Lord.

INTRODUCTION. 9
" For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity : to
acknowledge every Person by himself to be God and Lord ;
" So are we forbidden by the Catholic Religion : to say. There
be three Gods, or three Lords.
" The Father is made of none : neither created, nor begotten.
• " Th? Son is of the Father alone : not made, nor created, but
begotten. " The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son : neither
made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding.
" So there is one Father, not three Fathers ; one Son, not three
Sons: one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts.
"And in this Trinity none is afore, or after other: none is
greater, or less than another ;
" But the whole three Persons are co-eternal together : and
co-equal. " So that in all things, as is aforesaid : the Unity in Trinity,
and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped.
"He therefore that will be saved : must thus think of the
Trinity." This confession of faith, attributed to Athanasius, but which
did not bear his name at the outset, and was originally
drafted in Gaul, towards the middle of the eighth century,
jarred so harshly with the whole system of biblical theology,
that the Reformers would willingly have abandoned it, had
they not seen in it an effective bulwark against the attacks
of what they called the fanatical, or as we should now say,
the radical party in Protestantism, namely, the Anabaptists
and Antitrinitarians. Luther, in his Sermon for Trinity
Sunday, and Melanchthon, in his correspondence, make
some significant admissions on this subject.
The importance they attached to individual opinion, led
them to qualify the Athanasian formula in an Arian sense ;
so that it has been justly said that they themselves brought
on the decline of the Trinitarian dogma. In fact, from their
point of view, man could neither be saved by the efficacy of
sacraments, nor in virtue of a passive adhesion to revealed

IO SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
dogma. To have saving power, it was indispensable that
Christian truth should enter a man's own soul, and should,
so to speak, become incarnate in his conscience. In other
words, it was incumbent upon the initiators of the Reforma
tion to do away with every mediator, divine or human, save
one, and so to place man in direct relations with God. But
if God be the complex and unintelligible Being who is offered
to us in the Symbolum Qtiicumque, and Jesus Christ a hypos
tasis (constituent personality) of that Being, it may well be
asked how the faith and love ofthe sinner could fasten upon
such a Deity. What confidence, what sympathy, what per
sonal affection can be inspired by a Being who is neither
Single nor Three ? Accordingly the Reformers insisted upon
the human character of Christ.
And it is this which justifies the remark of F. C. Baur,
paradoxical as it may almost appear, that " Melanchthon,
Servetus, and Fausto Sozzini, notwithstanding their diver
gent tendencies, resembled each other in the attitude which
they assumed towards the traditional dogma of the Trinity. "^^
Only, what in Melanchthon is simple indifference, becomes
positive criticism in Servetus, and reaches the stage of nega
tive and radical criticism in the Fratres Poloni. We have
here a veritable process of decomposition of the Trinity;
and it is worth while to enter into details, in order to explain
the share which the most orthodox Reformers took in the
work. In the first place we are struck with the circumstance that
Melanchthon, both in the original draft and in the primary
edition (152 1) of his Loci Coinmunes, the first systematic
exhibition of Protestant dogma, accords to the Trinity no
further treatment than this short rubric in the list of topics :
" Deus, Unus, Trinus." Was this an inadvertence ? Assur-

11 Baur, Die Christliche Lehre der Dreieinigkeil, vol. ii. 33, note.

INTRODUCTION. 1 1
edly not. As he deals in a similar way with other dogmata
of like nature, e.g. the Creation and the Incarnation,
Melanchthon makes it evident that, to his mind, all these
dogmata on which the schoolmen had so perseveringly
exercised the subtleties of their dialectic, were but mysteries,
no doubt worthy of respect, but which we ought not to
scrutinise too closely for fear of obscuring the evidence for
the Redemption. "Did Paul," says he, "in that compendium
of Christian doctrine which he addressed to the Romans,
take to philosophising on the mysteries ofthe Trinity, the
modus of the Incarnation, or on active and passive creation ?
No, he occupies himself with Law, Sin and Grace, funda
mental topics, on which alone the knowledge of Christ
depends. "^2 Such a passage savours of a reminiscence of
this practical maxim from the De Imitatione : "What doth
it profit thee to reason profoundly concerning the Trinity,

'^ " Proinde, non est cur multum operse ponamus in locis illis supre-
mis : de Deo, de Unitate, de Trinitate Dei, de mysterio Creationis, de
modo Incamationis. Qukso te, quid adsecuti sunt jam tot saeculis
scholastici theologistae, cum in his locis versarentur? .... Paulus, in
epistola quam Romanis dicavit, cum doctrinse Christianse compendium
conscriberet, num de mysteriis Trinitatis, de modo Incamationis, de
Creatione activa et Creatione passiva philosophabatur ? At, quid agit ?
Certe de lege, peccato, gratia, quibus locis solis Christi cognitio pendet."
Melanchthon, Lod Communes rerum theologicarum seu Hypotyposes
Theologices, in Opp. edit. Bretschneider, vol. xxi. 84, 85. ["Accord
ingly, we are not called upon to expend much labour upon those
supreme topics, viz. concerning God, his Unity, his Trinity, the mys
tery of Creation, the modus of the Incarnation. I ask what has been
gained by the scholastic theologians, though they have been employed
upon these topics for so many centuries? .... When Paul, in the
Epistle which he addressed to the Romans, wrote a compend of the
Christian doctrine, did he philosophise about the mysteries of the Trinity,
the modus ofthe Incarnation, Creation active and Creation passive?
No. But of what does he actually treat ? Assuredly of law, sin, grace,
topics on which alone the knowledge of Christ depends."]

12 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
if thou be void of humility, and thereby displeasing to the
Trinity?"i8 True it is that afterwards, influenced by the overflow of
extreme opinions, Melanchthon felt himself forced as a
matter of duty into reaction against the Antitrinitarians,
Thus, from the time of the first edition of the Augsburg
Confession (1530), he condemned the doctrine ofthe new
fangled {neoterici) as well as of the ancient disciples of
Paul of Samosata ; and, later, in a letter addressed to the
Venetian Senate (1539), he utters an energetic warning
against the ideas of Michael Servetus, and undertakes a new
proof of the Trinitarian dogma.
Yet, in his earlier corre'spondence, it is easy to see that
he approached these questions with misgiving rather than
with zest. For example, he writes (1533) to Camerarius:
" Concerning the Trinity, you know that I have always
feared lest these controversies should some day break out.
Good heavens ! what tragedies will these questions excite,
when put to those who come after us : Is the Word a hypos
tasis ? Is the Spirit a hypostasis ? For my part," he con
cludes, " I rely on those express declarations of the Scripture
which command us to invoke Christ, for this is to assign
to him the honours of Divinity, and it is a practice full of
comfort."" Luther, with his practical good sense, could not fail to
share the gentle Melanchthon's antipathy to these irritating
" De Imit. J. C. lib. i. cap. i.
^* " Jlfpi T-^e Tpta^oe scis me semper veritum esse, fore ut hsec ali
quando erumperent. Bone Deus ! quales tragoedias excitabit hsec
qusestio ad posteros, li iarXv v-Trdaraaic 0 Ao-yoq ; it tarlv -vnoaraaig to
Ilvtviia ; Ego me refero ad illas Scripturee voces, quse jubent invocare
Christum, quod est ei honorem divinitatis tribuere, et plenum consola-
tionis est." Melanchthon to Joachim Kammermeister, 9 Feb. 1533. —
Bretschneider, vol. ii. 629, 630. Cf, vol. iii. 745.

INTRODUCTION. 1 3
problems. In two curious Sermons, preached on Trinity
Sunday, the Wittenberg doctor, while adhering to the doc
trine of the three-fold personality of God, confesses that
there is here an unfathomable mystery ; and, as regards its
dogmatic expression, we must be content with Scripture
terms, for God alone knows His own nature,-, or how it is
right to speak on this matter. As for the personality of the
Holy Spirit, Luther had no clear conception of it.^^ In his
reply to Latomus, Luther went so far as to declare that the
word homoousios was nowhere to be found in the Scriptures,
that it was a hateful word to him, and that it would be much
better to invoke the Deity under the name of God than
under that of Trinity.^^ What confirms our suspicions is
that, in his translation of the Bible, Luther omits, as being

'^ " Man diesen Namen, Dreifaltigkeit, nirgend findet in der Schrift,
sondem die Menschen haben ihn erdacht. . . . Datum . . . viel besser
spraehe man, Gott, denn die Dreifaltigkeit. Diess Wort bedeutet aber,
dass Gott dreifaltig ist in den Personen." " Er [der heilige Geist] ist das
damit der Vater durch Christum und in Christo AUes wirkt und lebendig
macht." Luther's Werke, Erlangen edit, vol. xii. 378, xxii. 20. Cf.
Maurice Schwalb, Luther, ses Opinions religieuses et morales dans la
Premiere Periode de la Reformation. Strassburg, 1866. ["This name
Trinity is nowhere found in Scripture, but is the invention of men. . . .
Therefore ... it were much better to say ' God ' than ' Trinity.' This
word signifies, however, that God is tri-personal." " He (the Holy Ghost)
is that whereby the Father worketh and quickeneth all things, through
Christ and in Christ."]
'^ Paulus prsecipit . . . ut vitares prophanas vocum novitates . . . et sacris
vocum antiquitatibus inhsereres  Nee est quod mihi 'homoousion' illud
objectes, adversus Arrianos receptum. Non fuit receptum a multis. Usque
prseclarissimis, quod et Hieronymus optavit aboleri. . . . Nee Hilarius hie
aliud habuit quod responderet, quam quod idem per id vocabuli signifi-
caretur, quod res esset; et tota Scriptura haberet id, quod in prassenti
non datur. . . . Quod si odit anima mea vocem 'homoousion' et nolim ea
uti, non ero haereticus. . . . Scripturse enim synceritas custodienda est, nee
prsesumat homo suo ore eloqui, aut clarius, aut syncerius, quam Deus
elocutus est ore suo.'' — M. Lutheri Opera Omnia, ed. Amsdorf, Jena,

14 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
an interpolation, the passage on the Trinity in the First
Epistle of John, chap. v. ver. 7 ; and in the Litany he gets
rid ofthe invocation, "Sancta Trinitas, tenus Deus : fniserere
nobis''' These two suppressions, it must be acknowledged,
were altogether in favour of the Antitrinitarians."
If, from the German, we now pass to tbe French branch
of the Reformation, we shall observe the same indifference
at the outset in regard to the Trinity. This coldness, then,
towards the dogma of a tri-personal God is no isolated fact,
vol. ii. 1560, p. 407; Epistola M. L. ; Rationis Latomiana, proincen-
diariis Lovaniensis Schola Sophistis redditce, Lutherana Confutatio. [" Paul
exhorts ... to avoid profane novelties of words, . . . and cleave to the
ancient sacred forms of speech. . . .. Nor may you bring up against me
that word homoousios, received in opposition to the Arians. Received it
was not, by many, and those of the first mark ; and even Jerome wished
it well away. . . . Nor had Hilary any defence to make for it, except that
what was denoted by this vocable answered to the fact ; and that the
whole run of Scripture had the idea, which is not expressly set forth. . . .
But if my soul hateth the word homoousios, and I be unwilling to use it, I
shall not therefore be a heretic. . . . For we must guard the soundness of '
the Scripture ; and let not man presume to speak more clearly or more
soundly than God hath spoken with His own mouth."]
^' Catholic Litany of the Holy Virgin.
Kyrie eleison ! Christe eleison !
Christe audi nos ! Christe exaudi nos !
Pater de coelis Deus : miserere nobis !
Fili redemptor mundi Deus : miserere nobis !
Spiritus Sancte Deus : miserere nobis !
Sancta Trinitas, unus Deus : miserere nobis !
Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis !
Litany, corrected by Luther.
Kyrie : Eleison.
Christe : Eleison.
Pater de coelis Deus :
Fili redemptor mundi Deus :
Spiritus sancte Deus :
Miserere nobis !
Luther's Werke, edit. De Wette, vol. Ivi. 362.

INTRODUCTION. 1 5
it is a phenomenon naturally arising from the two-fold
principle of the Reformation, the authority of Scripture and
justification by faith. Let us now open Farel's Sommaire et
brieve Declaration d'aucuns lieux fort nkessaires a ung chacun
Chretien (Brief Summary of topics very needful for every
Chnstian), that excellent manual of evangelical doctrine,
which, by its conciseness of form and freshness of expression,
contributed so much to make the Reformation popular in
the French-speaking countries. In vain we look in it for
the topics of the Trinity, the personality of the Holy Spirit,
or even the divinity of Jesus.- Christ is thus defined : " true
Son of God, the arm, power, word, and wisdom of the
Father, whom, as man, God has chosen as His holy temple
and tabernacle, wherein dwelleth all the Godhead, not
figuratively, but bodily and in' truth." And, as if to justify
his omissions, Farel says expressly : "All that has not clear
and firm foundation in the Scripture is to be rejected in
deaUng with salvation and the nature of God, which are
spiritual and heavenly things. "^^
Accused, on this account, of leaguing with the Anabaptists
and Servetans, Farel felt bound to add an explicit adhesion
to the doctrine of the Trinity in his edition of 1552, pub
lished at Geneva during the year before the trial of Michael
Servetus.!" Finally, not even Calvin, that implacable adversary of
^^ Edition of 1532, reprinted by J. G. Fick, with Preface by Professor
Baum. Geneva, 1867.
^' On23 Aug. 1534, JohannZwick, pastor at Constanz, wrote to Vadian,
of Claude Aliodi (of Savoy), who a short time before had been pastor at
Neuchatel : "Collegam se habere testatur qui paria secum opinatur, Farel-
lum scilicet, si modo non est falsus in ilium." [" He affirms that he has a
colleague whose opinions are on a par with his own, Farel to wit, if he
be not a false witness against him."] Now, that Claude (of Savoy) had
made in the church of Constanz profession of Antitrinitarianism, see
Herminjard, Correspondance des Reformateurs, iii. 173, 174, n. 2 and 7.

I6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Michael Servetus and Gentile, could keep free of the move
ment directed against the doctrine of the Trinity.^" This is
seen even in his writings against Servetus, and in his letters
to the Polish Brethren against Stancaro, ^^ in which he
acknowledges that the terms Trinitas and homoousia savour
^'i See his Disputation with Caroli, first Doctor of the Sorbonne, then
pastor at Lausanne, who charged Calvin with Arianism. " ' Facessant,'
[aiebat Caroli] ' novas Confessiones, ac tribus symbolis potius subscriba-
mus.' Ad h£ec Calvinus, ^ Nos in Dei unius fidem jurasse,' respondit,
• tion Athanasii, cujus symbolum nulla unquam legitima Ecclesia appro-
basset.'" Herminjard, «^j«/., iv. 185, Letter of Feb. 1537. ['"Away
with new Confessions,' said Caroli, ' and let us rather subscribe to the
three Creeds.' Calvin replied, ' We have pledged ourselves to faith in the
One God, not to faith in Athanasius, whose Creed has never received
the approbation of any rightful Church.' "]
21 Calvini Opera, ed. Baum, Cunitz and Reuss, vol. ix. 332 — 358.
(Cf. Letter from Prince Radziwill to Calvin, on the Trinity, 6 July, 1564,
xx. 4125.)
I. Responsum ad Fratres Polonos, quomodo mediator sit Christus, contra
Stancarum (1560).
2. Ministrorum Ecclesice Genevensis Responsio, ad Nobiles Polonos, et
Franciscum Stancarum (March, 1561).
3. Bre-vis Admonitio (l$6-^).
4. Epistola Joannis Cal-oini, qua fidem Admonitionis nuper edita
apud Polonos confirmat (it,6-i). In this he says ; " Tenenda quoque est'
loquendi ratio Scripturse trita, dum Christus, quatenus mediator est, infe
rior Patre statuitur. . . . Utile . . . supersedere a formulis loquendi ... a
Scripturse usu remotis. . . . Precatio vulgo trita : ' Sancta Trinitas unus
Deus: miserere nostri,' mihi non placet, ac omnino barbariem sapit.
Nolim igitur vos de rebus supervacuis litigate, modo illibatum maneat
quod dixi de tribus in una essentia personis. " [" Moreover, we must
adhere to the usual phraseology of Scripture, by which Christ, as mediator,
is made inferior to the Father. ... It is well ... to set aside fonns of
speech . . . diverging from Scriptural usage. . . . The hackneyed prayer
in common use, ' Holy Trinity one God : have mercy on us,' does not
commend itself to ihe, and altogether savours of barbarism. Therefore
I would not have you stickle for things of no consequence, provided
you keep unimpaired the doctrine I have laid down respecting the three
Persons in one Essence."]
Cf. supra, p. 14, the Litany of the 'Virgin, as corrected by Luther.

INTRODUCTION. 1 7
of the barbarism of the Schools. This is especially evident
in his Harmony based on the Gospel according to St.
Matthew, and in his Commentaries on the Fourth Gospel.
Of all the passages quoted by orthodoxy in favour of the
Trinity, Calvin does not admit a single one in the sense
attached to it by the Catholics. And, in his exegesis of the
passages, John v. 19, x. 30, xvii. 21, he explicitly distin
guishes Jesus Christ, as the Son, from the eternal Logos, a
hypostasis of the Divinity, by insisting that Christ speaks
here in his human nature. In respect of his divine nature,
he declares Christ to be inferior to God the Father.^^
Hence, by a logical consequence, Calvin, in his catechisms
and prayers, never addresses either the Son or the Holy
Spirit, but God alone,'^ in which he shows himself more
consistent than Fausto Sozzini, who admits the invocation
of Jesus Christ as God.
This brief review of the teachings ofthe Reformers respect
ing the Trinity suffices to prove that the Antitrinitarian
movement was in reality the logical development of the Pro
testant principle, and that, when they unreservedly adopted
the Athanasian Creed, they fell into an inconsistency.^*
^ Scholten, ut sup., vol. ii. 231, 233.
^' [Note also that Calvin particularly resented the term Trinitarian,
first applied to its present use by Servetus, and made it a count in his
indictment that Servetus had called believers in a tripersonal God
Trinitaires.l -* Hulderich Zwingli expresses himself in a Sabellian sense. About
1525, he states his doctrine in these terms : " Nos enim sic Deum agnoscen-
dum . . . docemus, ut sive Patrem eum nomines, sive Filium, sive Spiritum
Sanctum, perpetuo tamen eum inteliigas, qui solus bonus, Justus . . . est.
Contra, cum Filio omnia tribuimus, ei tribuimus qui id est quod Pater,
quod Spiritus Sanctus; cujus regnum est, cujus potentia, eodem jure quo
Patris et Spiritus Sancti : ipse enim hoc ipsum est quod Pater, quod
Spiritus Sanctus, servato nihilominus notionum, ut vocant, discrimine."
De Vera et Falsa Religione. [" For we teach that God is in such wise to
be acknowledged . • ¦ that whether you call him Father, or Son, or Holy
C

1 8 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
By degrees, a separation was realised between the radical
parties of the Reformation. The Antitrinitarians, repulsed
by all the churches, Calvinist, Zwinglian or Lutheran, as a
new sort of Arians, who insulted the divinity of Christ,
and even as Atheists, who demolished the edifice of Reve
lation, learned the necessity of declining all corporateuinjflp
'tvith_^abaptists and Panth.£iatB. It is the merit of Fausto
Sozzini and his co-workers that they reached the conception
of a theological system of which the Divine Unity and the
life eternal were the fundamental positions, and founded a
church with intelligible sacraments and a rational form of
worship. Hence it is with justice that the name of this
Reformer has been attached to the form of Unitarian Chris
tianity which we have just defined. We must, however,
beware of believing, on the testimony of his virulent oppo
nents that Fausto Sozzini impugned the divine majesty of
Christ. If, relying on certain texts of Scripture, he refused
to attribute to Jesus participation in the Divine essence, on
the other hand he proclaimed him to be God, in virtue of
his office of Redeemer and his immaculate sanctity. In his
eyes, the supreme end of the Christian religion was to secure
man's admission to eternal life ; and it was to this end that
Jesus died and rose again. ^^ And in this, Sozzini's ideas
much resemble the Scriptural view adopted by Melanchthon
in his letter to Camerarius. The obligatory adoration of

Spirit, you are still to understand that Being who alone is good and
just. . . . And, vice versd, when we attribute all to the Son, it is to that
Being who is identical with the Father and the Holy Spirit, whose
kingdom and power belong to him by the same right by which they
belong to the Father and to the Holy Spirit: for he is the self-same
Being as the Father and the Holy Spirit ; the three conceptions are
notwithstanding to be kept distinct."] Zwinglii Opp. iii. 179, 180.
25 Cf. F. Socini Opera, 2 vols, folio, in the Bibliotheca Fratrum Polo-
rmrum, Irenopolis (Amsterdam), "post annum Domini 1656," i.e. 1665
(Sand).

INTRODUCTION. ig
Christ even became the cause of serious conflict among the
Transylvanian brethren, Ferencz (Francis) Ddvid openly re
fusing divine honours to Jesus ; a course which was followed
in Poland by the Arians, and in Lithuania by Szymon Budny.
As for the Holy Spirit, in the Socinian system it was but
an alter ego of the ascended Christ, without distinct person
ality ; a moral influence of the grace of God, to achieve the
work of sanctification. Such is, with some modifications,
the official doctrine which still binds the Unitarian churches
of Transylvania ; a doctrine which may be accused of a cold
Deism and of a purely juridical conception of justification,
but which cannot be denied the merits of a penetrating
criticism, and great logical and moral strength. If the
Socinians have distanced Christ from God, they have, on the
other hand, brought him nearer to man, by representing him
as being like unto us in all things, sin excepted ; and thus
they are truly, whatever may be said to the contrary, legiti
mate sons of that Reformation of which the capital aim was
to place the sinner in immediate relations with his Saviour.
It was reserved for the English to complete the work
begun by the Polish brethren, and to free the Unitarian
system from the inconsistencies which Fausto Sozzini had
permitted to remain in it. The Anglo-Saxon race brought
to the examination of this theological problem those superior
qualities which have made it at the present date the advanced
guard of civilisation in the world — great critical sagacity,
rare straightforwardness of mind, and an inflexible morality.
Reverting with Calvin to the old apostolical tradition, the
later English Unitarians have reserved to God alone the
tribute of their addresses in prayer. But instead of con
ceiving Him as a cold and abstract causality, governing the
moral as well as the physical world by- inexorable law, they
have grasped the conception of God as Ruler of consciences
and Father of spirits ; the unipersonal and life-giving Spirit,
whose essential attribute is love, and who desires the happi-
c 2

20 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
ness of every soul, made in His image. Christ, in their eyes,
is the supreme revealer of the truths essential to salvation,
and the living word of God ; by nature. Son of man, in his
goodness and perfect holiness he has a right to the titie. Son
of God ; but he never claimed the worship reserved to the
Father, who is the only true God. As for man, he is truly
free and responsible before God ; not a slave of sin, inca
pable of doing any good. Endowed with an immortal soul
of divine extraction, he communicates with God through the
Holy Spirit; and in another life he will be treated in
accordance with his moral efforts, not according to his
dogmatic opinions. Finally, the Bible is the treasure which
contains the revelations of God in the Old and New Testa
ments ; but this revelation is not all, and the Bible must be
supplemented by the revelations of God in nature, in histoiy,
and in conscience.
Such are the principal elements ofthe Unitarian Chris
tianity held in the seventeenth century by Bidle. N^llnr """^
Locke : by Newton, Priestley and Lindsey ^^ in the eighteenth
century; and in the nineteenth by Channing, Martineau and
Parker. Everybody now knows that it is with good reason that
Locke and Newton are classed as Unitarians. Still more
certain is it that the immortal author of Paradise Lost held
ideas that were clearly Antitrinitarian.^" In our own century
two distinguished American thinkers have shed the brighest
lustre on the Unitarian Christianity of the Anglo-Saxon
race : Channing, by his admirable simplicity of heart and
his inteUigent sympathy with the sons of toil, and Theodore

-" A. Reville, ul sup., p. 154. Cf. Dr. Martineau, Three Stages of
Unitarian Theology ; W. Gaskell, Strong Points of Unitarian Chris
tianity. London: British and Foreign Unitarian Association, 1869-70.
"" R. Wallace, Antitrinitarian Biography, art. Milton. 3 vols. Svo.
London, 1850.

INTRODUCTION. 21
Parker, by his noble vindication of freedom for the slave
and his nobility of character, have given to Unitarianism
that which it lacked in its Socinian stage, as regards the life
of the heart and knowledge of the soul's needs. It may be
said that in Channing Unitarian Christianity attained the
apogee of its development, and manifested all the power of
its social and emancipating activity. The Christianity of
Channing appears to us a synthesis of revelation and reason,
brought within the comprehension of all. -^
If we have made sure our ground so far, the question
which now faces' us is the following : Unitarian Christianity
being the boldest expression of Protestantism, the extreme
term of the development of the scriptural and rational prin
ciples of the Reformation, how comes it that it has attained
its fullest development among a people so conservative and
so wedded to established forms as the English ? What are
the causes, external or internal, which have produced in
such a country the opposite extremes of Protestantism — on
the one hand Unitarianism, and on the other Ritualism?
How has the same soil given birth to a John Bidle and a
Dr. Pusey? Several solutions present themselves at once
to the mind. It might be possible, for example, to view
Unitarianism as a direct graft of Polish Socinianism on the
venerable trunkpi—the Anglican Church. Sorne, on the
contrary, insist that it is an importation of Dutch Anabap-
tismj and this belief has obtained credence with one of the
most serious historians of Socinianism.^^ Finally, others
have thought that, like Puritanism, Unitarianism has only
been an attempt to acclimatise in England the ideas of cer-

-' Laboulaye, Preface to the French translation of Channing's Works
(CEuvres de Channing: Paris, 1854), Renan, Etudes Religieuses (Chan
ning). "'^ Pere Louis Anastase Guichard, Histoire du Socinianisme : Paris,;
1723, 4to (anonymous).

22 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
tain Swiss Reformers. As generally happens in the case of
such opposite solutions, there is a certain amount of truth
in each of these views, although not one of them seems to
us entirely adequate. However this may be, there is a pre
liminary problem to be solved. "We must first ascertain
whether English Unitarian Christianity is or is not of purely
English origin. It is with the consideration of this question
that our investigations will begin.

CHAPTER I.
Was Unitarian Christianity of English origin?— Its relation to Wiclif
and the Lollards; to Reginald Pecock ; to the Nonconformists.— The
Anglican Church.
The essential principles of Unitarian Christianity may be
reduced to the following two. First stands the principle
that God is a simple, individual substance, whose leading
attribute is love. Whence it follows that Jesus Christ could
not be a hypostasis (constituent personality) of the Godhead,
but is man created in God's image, and realising in perfec
tion the spiritual ideal of which the first Adam fell short.
Or, in other words, God is unipersonal ; and Jesus Christ
the unique Mediator between God and man. The second
principle is, that the revelation contained in the Holy
Scriptures harmonises with the testimony of conscience and
reason ; and consequently that the sole rightful authority in
matters of faith is the Bible, checked by free criticism. ^
This being the definition with which we start, let us
try to discover whether Unitarianism may not have had its
original roots in the religious soil of England. It would be
useless to go further back than Wiclif. Before his time, the
Anglican Church was the most catholic, the most orthodox,
fhe most ultramontane in Europe.^ Everybody knows at
^ Laboulaye, ui sup., 9 ff.
^ G. Lechler, J. von Wiclif und die Vorgeschichte der Reformation,
vol. i. 213 : Leipz. 1873. [A portion of this work, under the title, John
Wiclif atid his English Precursors, has been translated by Peter Lorimer,
D.D. (London: Kegan Paul and Co., 1881). See pp. 17, 18, 51 53.]

24 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
what price John Lackland redeemed his crown ; but no one
will ever know what Peter's pence cost the English, in the
three centuries during which they were obliged to pay that
tribute to the Holy See. After the annihilation of the sect
of the Culdees, the last relic of Eastern Chrisrianity, the
Romau'Church reigned absolute mistress over the churches
of Great Britain ; and, thanks to their insular position, had
been able to keep them from the infiltration of any conti
nental heresies. The Waldenses appear never to have had
any disciples here.
John Wiclif (b. circ. 1324, d. 1384) is the first heretic of
modern times in England. Was he unorthodox as regards
the doctrines of the Trinity, and of the divinity of Jesus
Christ ? Not so. A mere glance at his chief work, the
Trialogus^ shows us that Wiclif adopted the doctrine of the
Trinity as it had been elaborated by Tertullian, Athanasius
and Augustine, and brought to its complete development
in the Symbolum Quicumque. Although Holy Scripture was
in his eyes " Goddis lawe," that is to say the normal and
sufficient authority in matters of faith, the Gospel Doctor
{Doctor Evangelicus) does not appear to have dreamed of
seeking there the grounds of the doctrine of the Trinity.
He prefers to study it from a speculative point of view.
Borrowing from St. Augustine his Platonic ideas, Wiclif sees,
in the Father, the power which God has of knowing Himself
and the world ; in the Son, the actual consciousness which
God necessarily possesses of Himself; and in the Holy
Spirit, the consequent return of God to rest upon Himself in
divine repose.* From the point of view of the Realist school

" Jeremy Collier, Eccl. Hist. ofGr. Brit. (edit. Barham, 1840), iii. 143.
^ See F. C. Baur, ut sup., ii. 901. Cf. Wiclif, Trialogus, lib. i. cap. 6.
" Certum est quod [Deus] habet potentiam ad se et ad alia cognoscendum,
et ilia potentia dicitur Deus Pater. Et quantum potest se ipsum cognos-
cere, tantum se ipsum necessario cognoscit, et IUa notitia dicitur Deus
Filius. Et sicut non potest esse quod sic posset se ipsum cognoscere.

CHAPTER L 25
to which he belonged, the Rector of Lutterworth sees in
all these ideas real and living objects. He especially clings
to the conception of God the Son as the Logos, that is to
say; at once the Consciousness and the Reason, whereby
God enters into relations with the worid. To him, this
Logos is the true Mediator. It will be seen that, in this
system, the humanity of Christ completely disappears ; the
human mask drops off, the God abides in his redeeming
but absolutely transcendent majesty. We are a long way
from the fundamental principle of Unitarianism.
Nevertheless, on a closer scrutiny it will be seen that
Wiclif opens the way for the later theology by his theory of
the sources of knowledge. In the main, Wiclif puts Scrip
ture in the place of the second of the two sources allowed
by the scholastic doctors, which were, reason {ratio) and the
tradition of the Church {auctoritas). The Bible is in his
eyes the Magna Charta of the Church, in the same way as
the Charter of 12 15 is the safeguard of the English State.
As regards exegesis, it is the Holy Spirit, not the tradition
of the Fathers or the voice of the Pope, that reveals to us
the meaning of the inspired word. Further, the divine law
revealed in the Bible did not come to abolish,, but to fulfil,
the natural law written in the consciousness of mankind
by the same God. Far from being impotent or contrary to
Revelation, this "natural light" is its best auxiliary. This

nisi cognoscat actualiter quantum potest ; sic non potest esse, quod sic
actualiter se cognoscat, nisi in seipso finaliter quietetur ; et ilia quietatio
est Spiritus Sanctus." [" Certain is it that [God] hath a potency whereby
He may know Himself and other matters ; and that potency is called
God the Father. And as He can know Himself, so doth He of necessity
know Himself, and that knowing is called God the Son. ^nd like as it
cannot be that He could thus know Himself, without that He do actually
know Himself, as He' can ; so can it not be that thus He actually doth
know Himself, without that in Himself He finally do take rest; and
that taking of rest is the Holy Spirit."]

26 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
it was that enlightened the pagan philosophers before the
advent of Jesus Christ, and by its aid Plato was able to dis
cover that the Godhead is three-fold and at the same time
one. Yet faith alone, aided by divine grace and illumina
tion, can attain a meritorious, that is to say, a saving, know
ledge ofthe mystery of the Trinity. ' Thus Wiclif is really
a rationalist as regards his method ; and if he retained the
Trinitarian dogma, it was because he did not take the trouble
of checking it by a more thorough criticism of the Gospels.
He admits the essential harmony of Reason and Revelation,
and thereby he is truly one of the forerunners of the "rea
sonable" Christianity of Locke and Channing.
Had not Wiclif himself a glimpse of better days when he
penned these prophetic words : " I look forward to the time
when some brethren whom God shall condescend to teach
will be thoroughly converted to the primitive religion of
Christ ; and that such persons, after they have gained, their
liberty from Antichrist, will return freely to the original doc
trine of Jesus ; and then they will edify the Church, as did
Paul"? 6
It is only given to superior minds to reconcile the anti
nomies of religious thought. After Wiclif, divorce was pro
claimed between the two great witnesses of divine truth.
The Lollards, heirs of the piety but not of the science of
the Gospel Doctor, exaggerated the principle of Scriptural
authority, while Reginald Pecock, their antagonist, goes so
far as to make reason the guiding principle in matters of
faith. The Lollards, who at the outset counted in their
ranks several distinguished representatives of the English
clergy and of the University of Oxford — Nicholas Hereford,
' G. Lechler, ut sup., cap. viii. sec. iii. 262 ff. : The Source of Christian
Truth. ^ See title-page to A Historical Sketch ofthe Rise and Progress ofthe
Unitarian Christian Doctrine in Modern Times, with Preface by Robert
Spears, London, 1877,

CHAPTER L 27
John Purvey, John Ashton and William Thorpe— became,
after the lapse of a generation, a religious society of laymen—
" Bible-men," as they were often called. We must not, then,
expect on their part much theological culfure; what they
demanded, above anything else, was the reformation of the
institutions and the priesthood of the Church, on the footing
and by the agency of Biblical preaching. Everything that
was not founded on the written Word was bad and must be
abolished. Thus they inveighed against plurality of livings ;
against the absenteeism and the dumbness of the bishops,
whose preaching was done by ignorant monks ; against the
mendicant orders, and against tithes. They pleaded against
warfare, and indeed against the taking of human life in any
form. Their boldest step was to call in question the miracle
of the Mass. They demanded communion in both kinds,
and the abolition of auricular confession. They rejected
prayers for the dead. The remaining dogmata and sacra
ments they, like Wiclif, retained in their integrity.^
Reginald Pecock, Bishop of St. Asaph and afterwards of
Chichester (b. 1398, d. about 1460), is one of the most
remarkable figures of the fifteenth century. He exhibits the
curious spectacle of a representative of the Catholic hierarchy
who, while desirous of defending it against the attacks of
the Lollards, himself fell into heresy, and was mercilessly
deprived by his Metropolitan. Nothing was wanting to make
him a martyr for the truth, except a firmer resolution and
the courage to face the tortures of the stake. Yet it is not
by us that his retractation shall be set down as a crime. It
is not given to all men to become martyrs to their convic
tions. By the side of a John Hus and a Jerome of Prag,
there is room for a Galileo. Pecock was pre-eminently a '
man of sincere and generous spirit, of clear and moderate
mind. He was perhaps the only man of his century who
' G. Lechler, ut sup., vol. i. 213.

28 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
thought, with John Hus, that it is far better to persuade a
heretic than to burn him ; and that God alone, who reads
the inmost recesses of the soul, has the right to pass sentence
of damnation. Accordingly, being persuaded that the Lol
lards went too far in their criticisms of ecclesiastical insti
tutions and the priesthood, he devoted all the powers of his
mind to bring them back again within the fold of the Esta
blished Church. In London, where for thirteen years he
was Master of Whittington College (the College of the Holy
Spirit and St. Mary, founded by Sir Richard Whittington)
and Rector of St. Michael Royal, he entered into relations
with those who were still called "knowen men"^ (that is to
say, those whom God has predestined to salvation, and who
have come to know it by the understanding of His Word).
Having become later on Bishop of St. Asaph, and ultimately
of Chichester, he published in succession three books ad
dressed to the Lollards : The Repj-essing of over much Wiling
the Clei-gie (1449 Latin, 1456 EngHsh), the Boolk of Faith
(1450 Latin, 1456 English), and the Donat.
In these several works, Pecock endeavours to demonstrate
the falsity of the Lollard principle, " There is nothing true
outside ofthe Scripture." He reminds them that, shortly
before the coming of Jesus Christ, the light of truth, aug
mented by philosophy, had enlightened the pagans, in so
much that the greater part of them had become emancipated
from the worship of idols ; and he specifies several institu
tions of the Church, such as baptism and the apostolate,
which had been founded long before the sacred collection
was formed. On the other hand, the Bishop of Chichester
frankly acknowledges the errors of tradition, and the abuses

^ Pecock's Repressor, Part i. cap. 11, p. 53. Cf. Foxe, Actes and
Monuments, vol. iv. 221. [Cf. i Cor. xi. 19: "It bihoueth eresies fo be
that thei that ben preued ben openli knowen in ghou " (Wicllf's trans
lation). Cf. also " the Men," in the Highlands of Scotland to-day.]

CHAPTER I. 29

to which certain institutions, such as monachism, had

rise.'

given

In the last resort, Pecock declares that Christians are
only bound by the canons of the Church in so far as they are
conformable to common sense. Thus he proclaims reason
as the highest source of knowledge. This was too much for
the hierarchy of the fifteenth century. The restoration of
the Lollards to the Church appeared to the Archbishop of
Canterbury too deariy bought at the sacrifice of infallibility
and tradition. The unfortunate Bishop of Chichester, after
a career of a half century devoted to the search for truth and
peace, was condemned to a humiliating retractation, which
he had to make (4th Dec. 1457) at St. Paurs_CrosSj_the very
place where.,be ha'3'preached his first sermon jn_ 1447. He
was shut up in Thorney Abbey for the remainder of his days,
and did not long survive this double punishment.
Throughout this controversy between Pecock and the
Lollards, the Trinity was not called in question, so far as we
know. The matters at stake were the two contrasted prin
ciples of Reason and Scripture. Each of these principles
possessed a strong vitality ; and they survived the conflict,
while the infallibility of the Church, denied by them both,
was seriously shaken. Reginald Pecock was the father of
English Rationalism, which broke out in the seventeenth
century with Herbert of Cherbury ; while the scupturaLpiiiJ;:-
Qigle of the J^Uards, pushed as far as it would go, was sure
to give Birth to the Anabaptist and Antitrinitarian tendencies
of the sixteenth century.
Following the movement of the Lollards, we are brought
to the threshold of that great religious revolution which
marked the sixteenth century, and which the Roman Catholic
Church in England could not escape. Historians of the
two rival confessions have been very unjust toward the
^ G. Lechler, ut sup., vol. ii. 369 — 415.

30 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Anglican Reformation. Catholics are resolved to see nothing
in it but the caprices of the royal Bluebeard ; and Protes
tants affect to treat it as a bastard daughter of Catholicism.
A few, however, as recently Professor Nippold, of Berne,
have set themselves to do away with this prejudice, and to
extol the eminent services rendered by this Church to the
interests of religious life in England. " The Nonconformists,"
he observes, "gathered into their barns the best ofthe har
vest prepared by the sowers of the Episcopal Church. "i<>
In our opinion, too, the violent and arbitrary acts of
Henry VIII. represent only the preliminary process which
emancipated the Church of England from the crushing
supremacy of the Holy See, and rendered possible a real
reformation of religious and of ecclesiastical life. These
acts, however, would not have been possible, even to an
all-powerful despot, had they not been sustained by the
opinion of the majority in the Commons. It is too fre
quently forgotten that, since the reign of Edward III. (1327
— 1377)1 th£ English Crown had struggled for the- indepen
dence of the civil power, and for the abolition of the fiscal
spoliation practised by the Holy See.^^ Wiclif had been
the adviser of the Crown in this legal resistance, and one of
the negociators at the Convention of Bruges. Since then
there had been alternations of resistance and weakness in
the English attitude towards the Court of Rome ; but the
policy of emancipation from clerical thraldom was always
popular in England, and this it was which gave Henry VIII.
liberty to act so vigorously.
The aristocratic and hierarchical tendency of a reform
effected by the upper stratum is represented in the English

" F. Nippold, Handbuch der neuesten Kirchengeschichte, 31-d edit.
vol. i. 71: Elberfeld, 1880.
" See Montagu Burrows, Wiclif s Place in History, pp. 42 ff.: London,
18S2.

CHAPTER I.

31

Reformation by Thomas Cromwell, Keeper of the Privy Seal,
the minion of Henry VIIL, and pre-eminently by Cranmer,
Archbishop of Canterbury. Cranmer was a thorough poli
tician, a typical English Tory, conservative, but too intelli
gent not to carry out indispensable reforms just in time.
His principle was, to take steps with a sagacious slowness.
He began by signing and obtaining the Convocation's
acceptance of certain " Articles devised by the Kinges
Highnes Majestie, to stablyshe Christen quietnes and unitie.
among us, and to avoyde contentious opinions" (1536).
These Articles of Reformation stipulated that the books
contained in the complete canon of the Bible, with the three
Creeds, namely, the Apostles', the Nicene and the Atha
nasian, all interpreted according to the sense of " the holy
approyed Doctors of the Church,'' were to be made the
foundation of the Christian faith. Cranmer's idea was to
accomplish the reformation of dogma and ritual slowly and
prudently, in order not to provoke violent reactions. This
did not commend itself to the partisans of reform in the
popular sense, who, without taking into account the worldly
interests of those in place and power, would have put down
at one stroke Catholic institutions and Catholic rites, as the
sources of many an abuse. These partisans, recruitedjargely
frQpi tViQ ranks of the Lxillards^though depiiyed^qf the .serr_
vices pf Jii£.-traKelling-^reacliers of earlier days, had stiU
itinerant ^eaders^ jsho wejit, from place to place holding
sea^t assembhes, in which were read the English Bible, and
other popular writings of Wiclif, especially the Wicket Gene
rally they had large portions of the Scriptures by heart, and
went among themselves by those same titles of Bible-men,
or "knowen men,"!^ which we have already met with in the
writings of Pecock a century and a half before.
Between these two tendencies, which F. Guizot was the
^2 G. Lechler, ut sup., vol. ii. 45^ ^-

32 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
first to denote with precision in his History of the EngUsh
Revolution,^'^ and which we will designate as Reformation
and Revolution, the struggle soon broke out. Henry VIIL,
declared by statute " the only supreme head on earth of the
Church of England" (1532), and being already Defender of
the Catholic Faith, abused the royal prerogative to pass the
Six Articles of 1539, which re-estabhshed the dogma ofthe
Real Presence, communion in one kind, the celibacy of the
.clergy, vows, private masses, and auricular confession. These
Articles, and the severities with which the king chastised tlie
Nonconformists, excited general protest. The Act could
not survive its author, and was withdrawn on the accession
of the pious Edward VI.
It is from this too short reign (1547 — 1553) that the
birth of the Anglican Church really dates. A third element
arose to co-operate in its formation, the influence of the
Lutheran Reformation, exerted in part by the books of
Luther, in part by the letters of Melanchthon (Schwartzerde)
and Osiander (Hosmann), Justly in pari by the presenf'p nf
the numerous refugees who sought in Great Britain an asylum
from the persecution which _jag£il_Dn the continent. The
influence of" the wrifirrgs of the Doctor of Wittenberg 'is in
contestable. It transpires in the very violence of the refuta
tions of Henry VIII. Still the theologians of Great Britain
could never accept the doctrine of a servum arbitrium (com
pulsory choice) and a radical powerlessness of the human
will ; hence they felt themselves more drawn towards the
synergistic principle of Melanchthon (consent of the will).
Cranmer even invited Melanchthon to visit England. This
step was no more successful than the like invitation of
Francis I. had been, and it was more especially with Osiander
of Niirnberg that Cranmer kept up a correspondence.
It is a remarkable fact that the Augustinian cloister in

1' Guizot, Hist, de la Rhjol. d' Angleterre (introductory Discours).

CHAPTER L 33
London was the spot which became the point of contact
for these two last-named tendencies. There it was that the
descendants of the Lollards, the Bible-men, met the followers
of the rule of St. Augustine, who had embraced the doc
trines of their illustrious brother of Erfurt. This^rapid di^
semination ofthe writmgs__of_Luther,among^th£- principal
Augustinian convents in Europe was truly providentiaL _ The
fraternal bona,^in this instance, served the cause of liberty.
In Antwerp, in Turin, and in London, the Austin friars were
the agents in causing the first sparks of evangelical truth to
flash from amid the darkness of the reigning scholasticism.
A curious document shows us two of these Bible-readers
going under cover " to Frear Barons, then being at the Freers
Augustines in London, to buy a New Testament in Englishe"
as newly printed, and showing him some old manuscripts of
the Gospels, and " certayne Epistles of Peter and Poule in
Englishe." They spoke with him about the religious pro
gress of their parish priest at Steeple Bumpstead (Essex), and
carried back for him a letter of exhortation from the Augustine
monk.^* From 1547, Bucer (Kuhhorn) and Fagius (Buchlein),
Ochino (Tomassini) and Vermigli, came into close relations
with Ridley and Latimer, the representatives of the spirit of
WicHf. These picked theologians of the continent, welcomed
by Archbishop Cranmer, and placed in the principal chairs
of Oxford and Cambridge Universities, helped to make the
Anglican Church the most cosmopolitan and, in certain
respects, the most synthetic body that one can conceive.
The first Book of Common Prayer, published in 1549 and in
cluding the new Liturgy of 1548, the Reformatio legum eccle-
siasticarum of 1553, and the Thirty-nine Articles of 1563, are
the products of this conjoint elaboration. Let us see if we
can find any traces of Unitarianism in them.  ¦_^
" Strype, Eccles. Memorials, vol. i. part 2, app. No. 17. See Appen
dix L

34 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
We open the Prayer Book of 1549, and here, "at Morning
Prayer," we find the following rubric : " In the feasts of
Christmas, the Epiphany, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, and
upon Trinity Sunday, shall be sung or said, immediately
after Benedictus, this confession of our Christian faith." Then
follows the Quicumque vult.^^ A few pages further on we
read the following Litany :
" O God the Father of heaven : have mercy on us, &c.
O God the Son, Redeemer of the world, &c.
O God the Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the
Son, &c.
O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, three Persons and one
God, have mercy upon us," &c.
Thus it is clear that the English reformers retained, in their
vernacular rendering, that invocation of the Holy Trinity
which Luther had deemed it right to suppress. Further
more, they inscribed at the head of the list of the Thirty-
nine Articles, passed by the Convocation in 1563, these
words : " I. — Of Faith in the Holy Trinity.
" There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without
body, parts, or passions ; of infinite power, wisdom, and good
ness ; the Maker and Preserver of all things both visible and
invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there be three Persons,
of one substance, power, and eternity ; the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Ghost." '8
Such to this day is the official doctrine of the Anglican
Church, a doctrine Calvinian and Trinitarian. This Church,
of which it has been said that it is Catholic in its hierarchy,
Calvinistic in its doctrine, and Zwinglian in its Eucharistic
" [It was, however, retained only on the above days. On ordinary
occasions the Apostles' Creed was now for the first time substituted for
it.] 1" See Book of Common Prayer (Articles of Religion). [Cf. Hardwick,
Histor-y of the Articles, Appendix iii. : London, 1851.]

CHAPTER L 35
liturgy,!^ was definitively established, and became the national
Church of England, under the glorious reign of Elizabeth.
Compromises in religion are, in their very nature, even
more ephemeral than compromises in politics, because the
religious conscience is more exacting than political convic
tion even the most decided. For a time they may satisfy
the needs of the multitude ; but, to the honour of human
nature, there ever remains a certain number of consciences
who tamper not with their convictions, and maintain them
in spite and in face of all persecutions. It was the glory
of the Anglican Church that, at a crisis in the reign of Eli
zabeth, it identified itself with the cause of national inde
pendence, in face of the menacing claims of Sisto V. and
Philip II. The secret of its decadence is that it completely
satisfies none of the tendencies of the Christian conscience,
roused by the thunder-clap of Wittenberg. The remnants
of Catholicism which it has retained provoked the Puritan
revolt, its sacramental ejement was rejected by the^Ajiahafi-
tists and the Quakers, and finally its scholastic Christology
gave nse to the protest of the Unitarians.
In subsequent chapters we shall study in detail Anabap-
tism and Puritanism, in their relation to Unitarian ideas.
We may, however, be permitted at once to explain the
genesis of these contrasted sects. Anabaptisnyand Quaker-
ism, though they sprang up in England at the distance_of a

centtiryfrom each_other, exhibit great affinities both of prin-
ciple and of j^aracter. Both proceed from a violent reaction,
in the name of Scripture and the Holy Spirit, against for-
malisin in worship. Batiijimed at a radical^reform of such
ecclesiasticaT rites, and .even of such social institutions as
*a^eared~t6 them oggosed to the true idea of the Church,
such as military service, episcopacy, oaths, &c. George Fox,

'" [It was Lord Chatham, on the other hand, who said : " We have a
Calvmistic Creed, a Popish liturgy, and an Arminian clergy."]
D 2

36 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
in this regard, is the worthy counterpart of Menno Simons.
On the other hand, they differ in the origin and tendency
of their doctrines. Thg^Apabaptists have al]_preserved,
more or less, a reflex of the speculative mx^3tiaim[ot_Ge^
many, the country of their" origin ;__while the Queers, in
s.^te of their pretensions To a mystic'aT illumination, nave"
never"lost the practicaTcharacter of the Anglo-Saxon race.
However, in the sphere" oT tlieodicy, the Quakers share
the principle, common to all mystics, that the relation of
man with God is not merely accidental and intermittent, but
essential and permanent. They take for granted, to begin
with, that God is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, without
going into details respecting the relations of the Persons to
one another. God is pre-eminently, in their view, a self
revealing Being ; in such wise that there is no way of know
ing the Father without the Son, nor the Son without the
Holy Spirit. Again, there is in man an organ of immediate
revelation, in intimate connection with the' Holy Spirit ;
and this they term "- semen," "lumen," " verbum Dei." From
this rapid sketch, it is manifest that it is not among the
English Mystics that we are to seek the origin of the Unita
rian idea.i^ These fall rather into a kind of Sabellianism.
As for Puritanism, it is, first and foremost, a thorough
going protest against the Episcopal hierarchy and Catholic
ritual retained in the Anglican Church ; a protest on behalf
of the constitution of the Apostolic Church. In other words,
it is, as Schoell remarks, an attempt to acclimatise in England
" the ideas and practices of the Swiss Reformers." Of the
three contrasted religious parties, this one it was which
played the most important part in opposition to the Esta
blished Church. Its mouthpieces were, under Edward VI. ,
John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester, a friend of Bullinger,
1^ See Robert Barclay,' Theologice vere Christiance Apologia : Amster
dam, 1676, 4to. Quoted by Baur, ut sup., vol. iii. 295.

CHAPTER I. 07
who perisTied during the bloody reaction under Mary Tudor
(1555); and, afterwards, John Knox, a disciple of Calvin,
and the Reformer of Scotiand. The two parties, brought
together for the moment by a common persecution, found
themselves more antagonistic than ever under Ehzabeth ; so
much so, that the Puritans broke into schism in 1566, and
declared, twenty years afterwards, in the foundation charter
of the Presbyterian Church, that they could dispense with
the help of the Government in the reformation of discipline.
Notwithstanding- all the vexations to which they were sub
jected, they adopted pretty closely the confession of faith
of the Anglican Church, and, among other articles, the first
one concerning the Trinity.
But the more animated and even savage grew the conflict
between the Anglican and Presbyterian parties, the more
did calm and reflective minds and gentle hearts feel the
need of discovering, beyond and above all parties, some
neutral ground where they could re-unite on a basis of
reason and piety. It was this need which gave birth in
philosophy to the theism„fif Herbierf„of Cherbiiry,i^ and in
religion to the Latitudinarianism of ChiUingworth and the
Unitarianism of Bidle.
"Before Bidle," vnrites Alexander Gordon, in a letter
which we have received from him, " I am not aware of any
Antitrinitarian author who vsrrote in English, or who was of
English origin. But Antitrinitarian works, written in Latin,
came over from Holland." Let us therefore see if Unita
rianism can be considered a Dutch importation.
'' G. Lechler, Geschichte des Englischen Deismus, chap. i. : Stuttgart
and Tiibingen, 1841, Svo. Cf. E. Sayous, Les DHstes Anglais . Paris,
18S2.

CHAPTER II.
Was Unitarian Christianity imported into England from the Low
Countries?— Its relation to Erasmus and the Anabaptists.
The assertion just quoted corresponds with that of Pfere
Guichard. He tells us that what allowed Socinianism
to gain an entry into England was the indulgence shown
(in 1535) towards certain Dutch Anabaptists, exiled on the
death of Jan van Geelen.i Strype, again, the exact but
desultory chronicler of the annals of the Reformation in
Great Britain, relates that in the year 1548 Arian and Ana
baptist heresies began to make their appearance. These
denied psedo-baptism, the incarnation of Jesus Christ, the
authority of magistrates, the lawfulness of oaths, and the
rights of individual proprietorship. They pretended also
that Jesus must have been really man, since he shared the
attributes of human nature, such as hunger, thirst, and a
visible body ; and they declared that the real service ren
dered by Christ was, that he led mankind to the accurate
knowledge of God.^ In this class are to be reckoned John
Assheton, an English priest (who afterwards recanted), and
the celebrated Joan Bocher, known by the name of Joan of
Kent, who spread the Scriptures abroad, and who underwent
martyrdom with great courage.*
' Guichard, ut sup., p. 126.
' Strype, Cranmer's Memorials, vol. i. book ii. chap. viii. (1548).
' 'S.ohtrfN&W&ce, Antitrinitarian Biography. 3 vols. London, 1850.
(Introduction, p. 6.)

CHAPTER II. 39
If we now turn to M. de La Roche's abridgment of Brandt's
History of i/ie Reformation in ihe Low Countries, we shall
light on a significant document.* This is the judicial exami
nation to which an Anabaptist preacher in the province of
Flanders, Herman van Flekwijk (burnt at Bruges, lo June,
1569), was subjected by Cornells Adriaans, ofthe Franciscan
convent at Dordrecht, and inquisitor at Bruges, in presence
of the Secretary and of the Clerk of the Inquisition :
Inquisitor. " WTiat ! Don't you believe that Christ is the
second person ofthe Holy Trinity?"
Anabaptist. " We never call things but as they are called in
Scripture  The Scripture speaks of One God, the Son of
God, and the Holy Spirit."
Inq. " If you had read the Creed of St. Athanasius, you would
have found in it ' God the Father, God the Son, and God the
Holy Spirit'"
Anab. " I am a stranger to the Creed of St. Athanasius. It
is sufficient for me to believe in the living God, and that Christ
is the Son of the living God, as Peter believed ; and to believe
in the Holy Spirit, which the Father hath poured out upon us
through Jesus Christ our Lord, as Paul says."
Inq. " You are an impertinent fellow, to fancy that God pours
out His Spirit upon you, who do not believe that the Holy Spirit
is God ! You have borrowed those heretical opinions from the
diaboHcal books of the cursed Erasmus, of Rotterdam, who, in
his Preface to the Works of St Hilary, pretends that this holy
man says, at the end of his twelfth Book, 'That the Holy Spirit
is not called God in any part of the Scripture ; and that we are
so bold as to call Him so, though the Fathers of the Church
scrupled to give Him that name.' Will you be a follower of that
Antitrinitarian ?"....

* G Brandt, Histoire abrege'e de la Riformation aux Pays-Bas, 3 vols. :
The Hague, 1726, vol. i. 178. [The original, in Dutch, was pubhshed
at Amsterdam, 1671-1674. 4 vols. 4to, plates. It has been translated
mto Latin and English. Dr. Touhnin published, 1784. Flekwijk s
Examination, as A Dialogue behveen a Dutch Protestant and a Franascan
Friar. See Wallace, ut sup., ii. 273.]

46 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Anab. " God forbid I should deny the divinity of Christ ! We
believe that he is a divine and heavenly person ;....! call him
' the Son of the living God,' as Peter does, and ' the Lord,' as the
other Apostles call him. He is called in the Acts of the Apostles,
' Jesus of Nazareth, whom God raised from the dead.' And Paul
calls him ' that man by whom God shall judge the worid in
righteousness.'" Ing. " These are the wretched arguments of the cursed Eras
mus, in his small treatise ' On Prayer,' and in his 'Apology to
the Bishop of Seville.' If you are contented to call Christ the
' Son of God,' you do not give him a more eminent title than that
which St. Luke gives to Adam." ....
Anab. "God forbid! We believe that the body of Christ is
not earthly, like that of Adam, but that he is a heavenly man,
as Paul says." ....
Inq. "But St. John says .... 'There are three that bear
record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit,
and these three are one.'"
Anab. " I have often heard that Erasmus, in his Annotations
upon that passage, shows that this text is not in the Greek
original." " Thereupon Broer Cornells, turning to the Secretary and the
Clerk of the Inquisition, said : ' Sirs, what think you of this ?
Am I to blame because I attack so frequently in my semions
Erasmus, that cursed Antitrinitarian ? Erasmus has done worse
still. He says in his 'Annotations upon the Gospel according
to St. Luke,' chapter iv. ver. 22, that a strange falsification has
crept into the holy Scripture, by interpolating some words, on
account of the heretics  Nay, this Antitrinitarian whom you
see here, and the arch-heretic Erasmus, reproach us with having
added these words, 'Who is over all, God blessed for ever.
Amen,' in Rom. ix. 5. Or else they pretend that this doxology
ought to be translated thus : ' Of whom, as concerning the flesh,
Christ came, who is over all. God be blessed for ever. Amen.'"
We have reproduced this lengthy extract from an Inqui
sitorial report of 1569, because it exhibits a lively picture
of the extent to which Anabaptism was saturated with Anti
trinitarian ideas, as well as of the degree of influence exer-

CHAPTER IL

41

cised by the exegesis of Erasmus on the Christology of the
Reformers. It is not difficult to recognise traces of this
influence in Luther's Bible and in Calvin's Commentaries.
Still more decidedly was it felt in England, where Erasmus'
Annotations and his Paraphrases upon the New Testament
were officially introduced into every parish (1547). More
over, the great missionary of the Renascence had resided at
Oxford for several years (1498— 1500), had been professor
at Cambridge (1509), and had lived in intimate relations
with the leaders of the new learning in England, John Colet,
Linacre and Latimer. It is worth while, therefore, to inves
tigate the measure of his own approach to Unitarian Chris
tianity. If we examine the passages in the writings of Erasmus
bearing upon the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus Christ,
we find ourselves confronted by two sets of utterances in
direct opposition to each other. Those in the one set tend
to destroy the chief Scriptural arguments invoked in aid of
these dogmata ; those in the other, on the contrary, protest
with animation against accusations of Arianism, and display
the official dogma. The passages coming under the former
category are in general to be met with in his Annotations
and in his Preface to the Works of St Hilary.^
One of the most remarkable is the note upon the cele
brated verse i John v. 7. Having justified his omission of
this gloss by the testimony of the Fathers and of the oldest
manuscripts, Erasmus adds {Opp. v. 1080):
" But some will say that this verse is an effective weapon
against the Arians. Very true. But the moment it is proved
that the reading did not exist of old, either among the Greeks
or among the Latins, this weapon is no longer worth anything. . . .
' Cf. Erasmi Opera, edit. Leclerc, vol. vi., 10 vols, foho : Leyden,
1706. Annotationes ad Rom. ix. 5; ad Ephes. v. 5; ad Philipp. ii. 6;
ad I Johan. v. 7, &c. Cf. Di-vi Hilarii, Pictavorum Episcopi, Lucubra-
tiones, per Erasmum emendaice : Basle, 1523. See Appendix II.

42 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Even admitting it were undisputed, do we think the Arians such
blockheads as not to have applied the same interpretation [as in
the previous verse] to the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit?
. . . Such performances rather compromise than strengthen the
faith. . . . Far better is it to employ our pious studies in endeavour
ing to resemble God, than in indiscreet discussion with a view to
ascertain wherein the Son is distinguished from the Father, and
wherein the Holy Spirit differs from the other two."
On the other hand, in his Explication of the Aposties'
Creed, and in his Apology, addressed to Alfonso Manrico,
Archbishop of Seville, against the heretical articles extracted
from his works by certain Spanish monks,^ Erasmus expresses
his adhesion to the Trinitarian dogma in th'ese terms :
"All my studies, in innumerable places, cleariy proclaim agree
ment with the definition of the Trinity handed down by the
Catholic Church, namely, the equality of the Divine nature in
three persons ; or better still, the same undivided essence in three
persons, distinct in that which is peculiar to each (proprietates),
but not in nature."
This contradiction is not merely apparent, but real. It
results from the false attitude which Erasmus had assumed
towards the Roman Church, opposing the ignorant and fana
tical monks in behoof of the rights of philology and criti
cism, but in the last resort subordinating — we were going to
say sacrificing — the results of his inquiry to the authority of
the Church. Erasmus resembles an astronomer who should
come and tell you, "All my observations lead me to think
that there is but one sphere in the sun ; but the Church
teaches that there are three, so I bow to its decision." He
makes this avowal in his letter to Wilibald Pirckheimer, when
he says, "The Church has so much authority in my eyes,
' Apologia adversus artieulos aliquos per monachos quosdam in Hispania
exhibitos, Reverendiss. Alfonso Manrico, archiepiscopo Hispalensi: Basle,
14 March, 1528. Erasmi Opera, ix. 1023. Cf. Explication of the Apostles'
Creed, vol. v. 1 1 39.

CHAPTER II. 43
that I would subscribe to Arianism and to Pelagianism, if
these doctrines were approved by the Church."'^
If Erasmus was not Unitarian, in the proper sense of the
term, he at any rate, by his strictly philological exegesis,
supplied weapons to the adversaries of the Trinity, particu
larly to the Anabaptists of the Low Countries. What is
more, this most moderate of the initiators of the Reforma
tion, with his strong good sense, and a spirit of tolerance
almost unknown in that age, pleaded the cause of these
radicals against the magistrates of Ziirich, who mercilessly
carried out Zwingli's cruel jest upon the Anabaptists : " Qui
iterum mergunt, mergantur ipsi" (Dip the twice dippers,
and drown them).
" "What," cries he, speaking of the people of Ziirich, " they
maintain that their own friends ought not to be punished with
death as heretics, and yet they put to death the Anabaptists,
though these are people against whom hardly a reproach can be
cast, yea, though many of them have given up a veiy bad, and
taken to a very \-irtuous life. Mistakes they may commit, but
never have they laid siege to towns and churches."^
It here devolves upon us to determine by investigation
' Erasmus Roterodamus Bilibaldo Pirckhei-mero (Basle, 19 Oct 1527) '¦
" Ecclesiam autem voco totius populi christiani consensum. . . . Quantum
apud alios valeat auctoritas Ecclesiae, nescio ; certe apud me tantum valet,
ut cum Arianis et Pelagianis sentiri possim, si probasset Ecclesia quod
illi docuerunt. Nee mihi non sufficiunt verba Christi, sed mirum videri
non debet, si sequor interpretem Ecclesiam, cujus auctoritate persuasus
credo Scripturis Canonicis." (Erasmi Opp. iii. part i. 1028, letter 905.)
[" By the Church I mean the consentient voice of the entire Christian
community  What value may be attached by others to the authority of
the Church, I cannot say. Certainly with me it is so strong that I can
think with the Arians and Pelagians if the Church had approved what
they have taught. It is not that the words of Christ are insufficient for
me ; but it ought not to seem strange if I foUow the Church in her inter
pretation of them, since it is on the persuasion of her authority that I
believe the Canonical Scriptures."]
* Brandt, ul sup., voL i. 33 ff.

44 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
what are the points in common between Anabaptism and
Unitarian Christianity, and wherein they differ. In con
ducting this investigation, we shall leave aside the German
Anabaptists, such as Johann Denk (d. 1527) and Ludwig
Hatzer (d. 1529), Martin Cellarius, or Borhaus (d. 1564),
and Melchior Hofmann (d. 15 Jo),-' as not directiy belonging
to our subject. We shall deal specifically with the Nether-
land Anabaptists, inasmuch as in them the Baptist ideas of
the continent found the vehicle of their transmission into
England. Such were Jan van Geelen, David Joris, Adam
Pastoris and others.
^ Anabaptism made its appearance in the Low Countries
almost as soon as it did in Germany. One may say of this
region what Professor Ch. Schmidt has said of the Rhine
Provinces in the middle ages, that it was the classic ground
of heresy. From Leiden and Haarlem came the leaders
of the Miinster Anabaptist movement, Jan Bocholdt (or
rather Beukelszoon) and Jan Matthias, or Matthisson, of
Haarlem ; and we must do these men the justice to observe
that, if they had recourse to revolutionary proceedings by
way of reforming the Church and society, they bore with
courage the terrible measures of repression of which they
were the victims. The two first agents of the sect were Jan
^Vaaden and Jan Trijpmaaker (i. e. plush-maker). The latter,
a friend and representative of Melchior Hofmann, had re-
baptised many citizens of Amsterdam. Both were arrested,
put to torture, and burnt alive at The Hague (1527 and
1533)- The year following, Jan Van Geelen, one of the
followers of the Prophet of Miinster, provoked a species of
riot at Amsterdam (March, 1534). One fine morning, the

" [This exclusion of Hofmann is qualified in the next paragraph. His
personal relations with Holland were very close ; and the influence of
his opinions in England was direct. See Robert Barclay, Inner Life of
Religious Societies ofthe Common-wealth, 3rd ed. p. 14: London, 1879.]

CHAPTER II.

45

citizens of the great city were startled out of their sleep by
a hundred or so of Anabaptists, who, divested of every gar
ment and brandishing naked swords, ran through the streets
crying out. " We are the nakecl truth ! Woe to the wicked !
Repent, and the blessing of the Lord shall rest upon the
city!" They were arrested and sent to the stake. Two
years later, Anabaptism had made such progress, that van
Geelen succeeded in surprising and taking the Town-hall of
Amsterdam, and fortified himself in it with two or three
hundred of his partisans. Artillery had to be employed to
force them to yield. Van Geelen himself was killed during
the assault (lo May, 1535). The survivors were quartered,
and their hearts, still palpitating, torn out
Among the Anabaptists of the first raw stage, socialistic
and revolutionary instincts took precedence of religious
wants and theological systems. But we now come into
contact with an original thinker, the author of nearly three
hundred treatises, some of them of great length, and by his
correspondence brought into relations with nearly every
country in Europe. David Joris,!" born at Delft (i 501) of
poor parents, learned the profession of glass-painter ; but,
endowed with an ambitious and turbulent character, and a
teeming imagination, he began publicly to declaim against
the idolatrous pageantries of the Catholic worship, and was
a first time expelled from his native town, after having had
bis tongue pierced. Having been re-baptised by Obbe
Philips, he went back to Delft ; and persuading himself, as
the result of certain -visions, that he was the first-born of the
Spirit, the new Adam, he began an active propagandism.
He soon acquired such influence that, at the Conference

^^ [His baptismal name was Jan ; his father's name was Georgius Joris,
and hence he had the patronymic of Joris, or Joriszoon. He is said to
have got the name of David from his playing that part as assistant to his
father, a travelling mountebank.]

46 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
held (August, 1536) near Buckholdt, in the diocese of
Munster, he succeeded in reconciling the four branches
of the Anabaptist sect : the Hofmannites, the Miinsterians,
the Battenburgians, and the Mennonites." However, the
magistrates of Delft having been informed that Joris and his
assistant, Mainard van Emden, held assemblies day and
night, ordered (2 January, 1538) all Anabaptists to leave the
town in eight days, and set a price on the heads of the two
preachers. The Anabaptists having allowed the time to
expire, in expectation of miraculous aid, thirty-five were
seized and executed. Among these was Mary, the mother
of David Joris. The persecution spread to the towns of
Haariem, Amsterdam, Leiden and Rotterdam. Following
these bloody deeds of repression, in 1535 and 1538, came
the first emigrations of Anabaptists to England ; where, on
.the contrary, the laws against heretics had lately been some
what relaxed.
After wandering about for many years, and having vainly
appealed to the Landgrave Philip of Hesse (about 1543),
Joris retired to the neighbourhood of Emden, in East Fries-
land, where he gathered a little community around him.
This town, which is now only known as a commercial port,
vifas then the focus of a great religious agitation. The
different parties, Lutheran, Calvinist and Catholic, there
fought for souls, and gave themselves up to polemics. The
Anabaptists, under the guidance of Obbe and Dirk Philips,
sons of a Catholic priest of Leeuwaarden, had formed nume
rous societies. When John k Lasco (Jan Laski) was charged
^^ ["A certain Englishman of the name of ' Henry' was very active in
promoting this meeting, and himself paid the travelling expenses of the
deputies. England was represented by John Mathias, of Middleburg
(who was afterwards burnt at London for his adhesion to the tenets of
Melchior Hofman). It is interesting to notice that the representatives of
England were very indignant at the loose views of the Miinster party."
Barclay, Inner Life, p. 77, his authority being Nippold's Life of Joris.]

CHAPTER IL 47
by the reigning Countess Anna of Oldenburg to introduce
the Reformation into her states, and to give a regular orga
nisation to the Church (1540 — 1548), the noble Pole had
particularly to contend against the Anabaptist societies of
Menno Simons and David Joris. For example, he main
tained, about 1543-44, a very curious controversy in vtriting
with Joris,!'^ but did not succeed in disabusing him of his
belief in a "supernatural vocation."
The ideas of Joris, as expounded in his T' Wonderboeck
(Book of Wonders), and in his Explication of the Creation,
are reducible to this fundamental principle, " that the true
Word of God does not consist in the outward letter of the
Bible, but in the inner voice which is audible to a humble
and believing heart." As for the Trinity, he thought it a
useless problem, and one which concerns only those who
are well prepared for meditation on celestial things. He
explains himself, however, on this point in his Wo?iderbook.
Joris declares that there is but " one God, sole and indi
visible, and that it is contrary to the operation of God
throughout creation to admit a God in three persons, or
that the three make but one, as taught in the Athanasian
Creed." Nevertheless, resuming the old theory of Joachim
of Flora (d. 1202), he admits that God has revealed himself
in three human persons, Moses, Christ and David (doubtless
David Joris), who preside over three great periods of history.
Joris was excommunicated by the disciples of Melchior Hof
mann at Strassburg, and by those of Menno Simons in Fries-
land, on account of his Antitrinitarian opinions. He took
refuge in Basle, where, under the name of Johann von
Briigge, or von Binningen, he lived in comfort and with
security, in the society of two wives. He died on the 2nd
August, 1556. 
^ See the learned monograph of Prof. Nippold,, of Berne, on David
Joris, in the Zeitschrift fiir Historische Theologie, 1863, 1864, 186S; 3rd
article, p. 575.

48 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Around this same church of Emden flits the figure of
another Anabaptist teacher, AdaQuEaslor, who had also
been excommunicated by the Mennonites for his Antitrini
tarian opinions. In the view of Pastor, as in that of Joris,
the Deity is one and indivisible ; Christ is, it is true, pre
existent as regards the world, but not co-eternal with God ;
he holds with the Father a community of will, but not of
essence ; and the Holy Spirit is but an impersonal power, a
gift of God. Persecuted by Catholic magistrates, repulsed
by the Anabaptists, Pastoris led a wayfaring life, and con
cealed his identity under various pseudonyms, among others
that of Rudolph Martlnh'' According to a very probable
conjecture, he it was who first carried Unitarian ideas into
Poland, under the name of Spiritus Belga ; but he returned
to finish his days at Emden about 1552.'*
Among the friends of David Joris was a certain Hendrik
Niclaes (d. about 1570), originally of Miinster, in West
phalia (b. 1502), who separated himself from the rest ofthe
Anabaptists in order to found a secret society of mystics
at Emden, called the Family of Love {Hiisgesin der Lieften).
He taught that the Bible was only an imprint on paper
of the Word of God, but that the true Word is spirit
and life ; that this Spirit manifests itself by revelations in
every regenerate man ; and, finally, that the criterion of the
presence of the Spirit in us is peace and love. Like his
master, Joris, he denied the ontological Trinity. This sect
was distinguished from the rest by being secret, and by pos
sessing a hierarchy similar to that of the Church of Rome.
As early as 1555, Hendrik Niclaes sent one of his disciples,
Christopher Vitells (or Virst), from Delft to Colchester to

^' [This was probably his real name.]
^* See Trechsel, ut sup., i. 36. Cf. Wallace, Antitr. Biog. ii. 163 ff.
[Spiritus, in Ochino's Thirty Dialogues (1^6-3,), sustains the part of the
Antitrinitarian.]

CHAPTER II. 49
make proselytes. Vitells denied the divinity of Christ, and
treated Trinitarians as tritheists. He having recanted, about
i562j^Niclaes visited England in person ; and it seems that
he left numerous proselytes there, for ten years afterwards
the Familists and their writings swarmed in England, and
became the subject of severe edicts on the part of Queen
Elizabeth. 15
We have seen that the bloody persecution, which followed
the exploits of Jan van Geelen at Amsterdam and the
preaching of Joris at Delft, had led to the first immigrations
of Anabaptists into England, 1535 — -1538. The application
of the Interim of Augsburg to all the Rhenish Provinces,
and in particular to the County of East Friesland, compelled
many thousand Protestants of Germany, Alsace and the
Low Countries, to take refuge in England.'-^ Then it was 1
that John a Lasco left Emden (1549). Among the refugees '
were a great number of Anabaptists, but these latter did
not long profit by the generous hospitality of Edward VI.
As early as 155 1, we encounter, among the victims of
the intolerance of the English hierarchy, a surgeon named
Georg van Parris, who was originally from Mainz, and
had become a member of the Strangers' Church in London,
where he won esteem by his piety, his temperance, and his
charity. This medical practitioner, perhaps a disciple of^
David Joris, forcibly denounced infant baptism, and also
the dogma of the Trinity. He acknowledged the Father as
the only true God, and Jesus Christ as his supernatural and
perfect Son. Not choosing to recant, he was condemned
to the torments of fire, and suffered martyrdom at Smithfield
(25 April, 155 1) with a constancy that drew tears from his
executioners. Unquestionably he was not the only one
^^ See the article of M. Nippold, in the Zeitschrift fiir historische
Theologie, 1862, p. 543. Cf. Barclay, Inner Life, pp. 25, 35.
^° See Zurich Letters, 3 ser,. Letters 161 and 162 (Ochino to Musculus).
E

so SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
among these Anabaptist refugees" who professed Antitrini
tarian opinions. For it is precisely in this Strangers' Church
that, a few years later, as we shall see, the first controversies
on this question broke out.'^
It results from the inquiry we have undertaken, that in
this fermentation period of the Reformation the Anabaptists
had many features of concurrence with Unitarians. These
two parties, placing the Word of God above human tradition,
represented by the Papacy, contemplated a radical reform
of the Church, and would have suppressed every rite or
dogma which was not expressly set forth in the Bible : for
example, paedobaptism, the hierarchy, judicial oaths, military
service, &c. They entertained a kindred antipathy for meta
physical discussions, a kindred predilection for moral and
practical questions. In their eyes, what makes the Christian
is his life and not his dogma ; and hence the real Chris
tian faith dates only from conversion. ^^ In fine, most of
the Anabaptists denied, in common with Unitarians, the
orthodox dogma of the Incarnation,^" although several of
1' See Ziirich Letters, 3 ser., Letter 33 (Hooper to Bullinger).
'^ We must also reckon in the number of these Antitrinitarians from
Holland a certain Justus 'Velsius, from The Hague. He published at
London, about 1563, a book entitled Christiani Hominis Norma, in
which he held Jesus Christ to be "God in man," or rather Man-God,
and that every Christian may, like his exemplar, become by faith " man-
God." See Strype, Life of Grindal, pp. 135, 138.
'' Such seems to us the tendency of an anonymous book entided
Summa der godliker Scrifturen, published 1523 in Holland, soon trans
lated into French, English and Italian, and lately reprinted in Gennan
under the auspices of Dr. Benrath, Leipzig, iSSo. In this little book,
derived at once from the Theologia Germanica and the Sum-mary of
Farel, there is no mention of the Trinity.
2° Ziirich Letters, 3 ser., Letter 33 (Hooper to Bullinger) ; letter 265
(Micronius to Bullinger). [The doctrines gibbeted in these two letters
are diametrically opposed. Hooper says the Anabaptists " deny altoge
ther that Christ was bom of the Virgin Mary according to the flesh," i.e.

CHAPTER IL 51
them, Melchior Hofmann and Menno Simons, for example,
remained Trinitarians.''^^
But what distinguished the Anabaptists is, that for the
interpretation of Scripture they resorted to the testimony of
the Holy Spirit ; and that, by degrees .reducing the written
Word to a lower level than the inner Voice, they confounded
the latter with sensual and selfish instincts, and fell into
antinomian and millenarian mysticism. The Unitarians, on
the contrary, by proclaiming Reason as the sovran inter
preter of the Bible, ran the risk of grounding on the reef of
Rationalism ; yet, in virtue of their very spirituality, they
did not insist upon a radical change in sacramental forms
and church government, but devoted themselves, above
everything, to the reformation of dogma and character.
The Anabaptists reached their logical issue in mystical
fanaticism ; the Unitarians, in rationalism and toleration.
they held the Valentinian view, that the heavenly manhood of Jesus
came into the world through the Virgin, taking nothing of her substance.
Microen says that those whom he calls Arians " deny the conception of
Christ by the Virgin," i.e. they regard Christ as a purely human birth.]
^^ [But not orthodox Trinitarians, since both were Valentinians.
Simons expressly objected to the terms "Trinity" aud "person."]

E 2

CHAPTER III.
Is Unitarian Christianity of Alsatian or of Swiss Origin?— Capito—
Hooper and Puritanism — Cranmer and the Strangers' Church.
i We have alreadmoticed^the.influence exerted by certam
' writings ofErasmus.upon the devejopment of Antitrinitarian
ideas ^ong the Anabaptists; no^less__marked was~tEeir
effect upon the revival of theological studies in England.
Not only were his Biblical works, his Annotations, and his
Paraphrases of the New Testament, in the hands of the
most obscure of the country incumbents, but his presence
at Basel attracted thither all those of the English clergy
whose hearts were set on shaking off the intellectual lethargy
into which they were thrown by formalism. Ere long, when
Erasmus shrank from a schism with Rome, another group of
theologians, following the Zwinglian impulse, and including
the names of CEcolampadius (Hausschein), Simon Grynaeus
(Gryner) and Oswald Myconius (Geisshauser), formed itself
at Basel side by side with the party of Erasmus, yet not
altogether holding aloof from him. On the other hand,
Strassburg, with its learned philologists, Sturm and Fagius,
and its moderate theologians, Bucer and Capito (Kopstein),
kept up with Basel and Ziirich an interchange of ideas. But
for a long period, subsequent even to the death of Zwingli,
and lasting till the advent of Calvin, Ziirich was the head
quarters of the directing group. It was there that Henry
Bullinger, Bibliander (Buchmann), Leo Judae (Jud), Pellican
(Kurschner) and others taught.
England soon entered into relations with these Reformers

CHAPTER III. 5

J

in German Switzeriand. She had then at her head a kingi
who plumed himself on being a theologian, and did not fear
to measure swords with Luther. It was in connection with
the affair of the divorce of Henry VIIL from Catherine of
Arragon (1531— 1534), that the first letters were exchanged
between the theologians of the two countries.
The despotic king, impatient of the delays of Pope Cle
mente VII. and of Cardinal Wolsey's tergiversations, had
eagerly accepted the idea suggested by Dr. Cranmer, then
but a Fellow at Cambridge, that the principal Universities
of Europe should be consulted on the question of the valid
ity of his marriage with his brother's widow, in order to
impose the decision of the majority upon the Holy See.
Simon Grynaeus, Professor of Philosophy and Theology, who
had visited England in 1531, had been specially charged by
the king to collect the opinions of his colleagues at Basel,
Ziirich and Strassburg ; and in his letter to the king of roth
September, 15 31, he was already able to forward him those
of CEcolampadius and Zwingli, which were favourable to the
divorce, while Melanchthon's was opposed to it^ Such a
result was well calculated to augment the mutual good feel
ing. Hence, when Cranmer had obtained the metropolitan
see of Canterbury (1534), he gave the preference to the
Swiss Universities when sending young Englishmen abroad
to study for the Church. Between 1536 and 1539, we find at
Ziirich and Geneva four English theological students — John
Butler, of a rich and noble family; Nicolas Partridge, from
Kent ; Nicolas Eliot, also a law student ; and Bartholomew
Traheron (a writer against the Arians, 1557), who had suf
fered persecution at Oxford in the cause of the gospel.
Already, in fact, the reputation for learning and piety of
the young author of the Institution of the Christian Religion
was attracting to Geneva all minds athirst for truth. The
1 Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 255 to 259.

54 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
letter to Calvin from two of these students, which constitutes,
as it were, the first salutation of England to the great French
Reformer, testifies to the enthusiasm with which Calvin's
"most amiable and most learned" teaching, and Farel's
"truly heroic spirit" had inspired them.^
For the moment, however, it was still Alsace and German
Switzeriand that obtained the highest repute among the
English. In return for the students which were sent to
them, the professors of Strassburg and Ziirich forwarded
their books to England. Wolfgang F. Capito dedicated to
Henry VIII. his treatise entitled Responsum de Missa, Matri
monio et yure Magistratus in Religione, and received a
hundred crowns as a present from the king.^ Soon after
wards, his colleague, Martin Bucer, dedicated to Cranmer
his Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, compHmenting
him on lending an increasingly active support to the efforts
of Latimer and Foxe, and penning these significant counsels :
"There are too many things still wanting to us, unless it be
enough to have shaken off the yoke of the Pope, and to be
unwilling to take upon us the yoke of Christ  But if
God be for us, who can be against us ? And Christianity is
a warfare."* Finally, Zwingli's true successor at Ziirich and
in all the eastern parts of Switzerland, Henry BuUinger, dedi
cated to Henry VIII. his two books published under the
title, De Scripturce Sane tee Authoritate, Certitudine, Firmitate
et absoluta Peifectione, deque Episcoporu?n . . . Institutione et
Functione, &'c. (1538). These were wonderfully well received,
not only by the king, but also by Thomas, Baron Cromwell
(afterwards Earl of Essex), Keeper of the Privy Seal, and
Vicar-General ofthe Church of England.* Bullinger subse-
- Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 285.
^ IHd., 3 ser.. Letter 8 (Cranmer to Capito).
* Ibid., 3 ser., Letter 244 (Bucer to Cranmer).
" Ibid., 3 ser., Letters 280 and 284 (Partridge and Eliot to Bullinger) ;
Letter 260 (Micronius to Bullinger).

CHAPTER IH. 55
quently dedicated Book iii. and a part of Book iv. of his
Decades to Edward VL
Furnished with this stamp of royal favour, Bullinger's
books speedily circulated among all ranks of the clergy, and
went off so well in an English dress that many booksellers
were enriched by their sale. Their readers especially appre
ciated the Commentaries on the Epistles of St Paul and the
Decades, which, almost as much as the Paraphrases of Eras
mus, helped to restore evangelical preaching in England.
Bullinger's Epistle on the Mass and his Treatise on Obedience
to Magistrates were also translated.^
Such, from 1531 to 1540, were the sympathetic relations
between Reformed Switzerland and England, still three parts
Catholic. Do we find in this first period any traces of
Antitrinitarianism? At first sight it would seem scarcely
probable. We have cited above" the categorical declaration
of Zwingli in favour of the Athanasian dogma in his De 'Vera
et Falsa Religione. Faithful to Zwingli's teaching, the first
Helvetic Confession, drawn up by Henry Bullinger in con
cert with Grynaeus and Myconius, contains the following
expressions :
Art VI. Of God. — " These are the ideas we have of God :
That there is one only true, living, and omnipotent God,
unique in essence, and who, in this unity, has three persons ;
who has created all things from nothing by His Word, that
is to say, by His Son." Article XI. acknowledges no less
explicitly that Jesus Christ is "very God and very Man."^
^ Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 1S9 (Johannes ab Ulmis to Bullinger
{fostscript). ' Zwingli and CEcolampadius, to meet the accusations of Luther and
Melanchthon, who reproached them with encouraging the denial of the
Trinity, signed a Trinitarian Confession of Faith at Marburg. See Erich-
son : art. on the Colloquy of Marburg in Lichtenberger's Encyclopedic,
and Zwinglii Opera, ed. Schuler and Schulthess, viii. 118 (Zwingli to the
Magistrates of Zurich).
' Ruchat, Histoire de la Reformation en Suisse, vol. v. (1728), 511.

S6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Further, the severity with which the magistrates of Zurich
(1525; and of Strassburg (1527) repressed the Anabaptist
movements is well known ; and the letter from the English
students to Calvin indicates that, in 1537, the authorities
of Geneva were not less busy with precautionary measures
against these radicals of the Reformation.
Yet one result of these theological conflicts, as of the
struggle between two civilisations, is that the ideas of the
vanquished make in their turn an impression upon the
victors. It is thus that Calvin himself felt the influence of
Servetus and of Lelio Sozini." An analogous phenomenon
is presented, at the same period, by the mental history of
W. F. Capito, one of the three Reformers of Strassburg.
Capito, originally from Hagenau, and some time Provost
of St Thomas at Strassburg, had (subsequently to 1523)
entered into close relations with several Antitrinitarian Ana
baptists ; among others, with Ludwig Hatzer (from Thurgau)
and with Martin Cellarius (d. 1564).^"
Hatzer (d. 1529), who was for a considerable time the
guest of Capito, associated himself with John Denk in the
propaganda of a species of pantheism ; and openly pro
claimed the personal unity of God and the humanity of
Christ Martin Cellarius, perhaps chronologically the first
ofthe Antitrinitarians (if we except Erasmus), published at
Strassburg his book, De Operibus Dei (1527), in which he
accords to Jesus the title of God, in the sense that the Holy
Spirit dwelt in him without measure ; but in which he also
says that we are all likewise gods, and sons ofthe Most High,
by participation in the same Spirit, and according to the
measure of the gift of Jesus Christ Capito did not scruple
" [The power of Servetus as a Christian thinker is recognised in the
very energy with which Calvin set himself to crush his influence; the
attraction of L. Sozini as <i Christian man Calvin owned in the easy
terms on which he recognised his soundness in the faith.]
^'' Trechsel, ut sup., vol. i. 17, 24.

CHAPTER III. 57
to \vrite a Preface for this book," in which he eulogises the
spiritual gifts of the author ; mentions many topics on which
he had conversed with him, among others the knowledge of
one only God, of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit ; and recog
nises the incomplete and transitory character of the Refor
mation in which they are both of them engaged. Less than
this would have sufficed to bring Capito under suspicion of
heresy ; and this is the explanation of the following passage
in a letter from Dionysius Melander to Capito.
" For there are false brethren who say, both in writing and
by word of mouth, that you to begin with, and further that the
Strassburg Protestants in general, entertain wrong opinions con
cerning the Trinitj', and concerning Christ's Divinity. . . . But
I made excuse in the mean time for you and your townsmen,
whom I hold second to none in my affection. I said you hold
sound views; that perhaps you had said this word 'Trinity' is
not in the Scriptures ; but that it does nof follow that you hold
wrong opinions concerning God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit."^^
Suspicions such as these, based on gossip, do not appear
to us to warrant the classing of Capito among the Antitri
nitarian teachers who have contributed to the formation of
English Unitarianism.
" Wallace, ut sup., vol. i. art. Cellarius. [This Preface [Epistola
prsliminaria, scripta Argentina, anno 1527) was reprinted, along with
Cellarius' chapter De Restauratione Ecclesice, at the end of the treatise
De Mediatoris Jesu Christi. &c. (by Francis David, the Unitarian Bishop),
published in 1568 at Alba Julia (Gyula Fehervar, now Karoly Fehervar
or Karlsburg, in Transylvania).]
^- Wallace, ut sup., vol. iii. app. II. " Sunt enim falsi fratres, qui te
primum, deinde Argentoratenses male sentire de Trinitate, deque Christi
divinitate et scribunt et dicunt  Excusavi tamen interim te atque
tuos, quos in primis charos habeo  Dixi bene sentire vos, fortasse
voculam hanc 'Trinitas' non esse in Scripturis dixisse vos; non tamen
propterea male sentire de Deo, Christo et Sp. S." — This letter was
extracted by Trechsel (I. 25, 26) from a manuscript in the Frey-Grynaische
Bibliothek at Basel, i. 19, No, 47,

58 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
But let us pursue our investigation into the relations of
England with Switzerland.
In 1539, there was a marked coolness between the two
countries, in consequence of the Act of the Six Articles,
imposed on the English clergy by the caprice of Henry VIII.
The effect of these Articles was to re-establish the Mass, the
celibacy of the priesthood and auricular confession, and to
tear up the compact arrived at in 1535 between the schismatic
king and the Protestant theologians.'* The Archbishop of
Canterbury, accustomed to bow to the caprices of a sovereign
who was sure to reward submission by promotion, remained
at Lambeth by desire of Henry VIIL, simply sending his
wife and children to Germany. But all those who consti
tuted within the Church of England an element firmly and
decisively pledged to a genuine evangelical Reformation,
protested, each in his own way.
Latimer, Bishop of Worcester, who was chaplain to the
king and had plenty of courage, resigned his see and retired
to the country; but he was soon arrested and shut up in the
Tower, where he remained until the death of Henry. Miles
Coverdale, who shares the palm with William Tyndal as a
translator of the Bible, and who afterwards translated into
German and Latin the Communion Order of Edward VI.
(1548) ;'* John Rogers, chaplain to the Enghsh Church at
Antwerp, and Tyndal's workfellow in the translation of the
Bible ; and, above all, John Hooper (properly Hoper),
chaplain to Sir Thomas Arundel, — left England to take
refuge on the continent.
After having passed several years at Strassburg, where he
contracted a friendship with Girolamo Zanchi, Hooper took
up his residence at Ziirich. Here he gave himself with

13 Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 245 (Bucer to Cranmer).
" Ibid., 3 ser., Letters 19 and 20 (Coverdale to Calvin; Coverdale to
Fagius).

CHAPTER III. 59
ardour to the study of the sacred tongues and to meditation
upon the New Testament, and here, acting on the advice
of Bullinger, who became his friend, he married. Here it
was that Hooper became thoroughly imbued with those
convictions of the exclusive authority of the Bible and the
simplicity of divine worship, which soon made him the father
of Puritanism. In fact, when, two years and a half after the
accession of the pious Edward VI. (1550), he returned to
his native land and was nominated Bishop of Gloucester, he
refused to submit to two formalities which he considered as
remnants of Romish superstition. The first was the wearing
ofthe sacerdotal vestments, which he regarded as a symbolism
keeping up a connection with Antichrist ; the second was the
Oath of Supremacy, tendered in the form, "So help me God,
all Saints, and the holy Evangelists."'" This controversy,
which stirred all England for several months, and ended in a
compromise very honourable for Hooper, was not so childish
as it appears to us at the distance of three centuries. It was
the very principle of all reformation that was at stake ; the
principle laid down by the Lord Jesus when he said, " No
man seweth a piece of undressed cloth on an old garment :
else that which should fill it up taketh from it," nor " putteth
new wine into old wine-skins ;" and confirmed by the Apostle
Paul, "Let each man be fully assured in his own mind."
Yes, in this resistance of Hooper to High-church formalism,
the whole Puritan movement was latent in germ.
The too brief reign of Edward VI. saw the fullest develop
ment of the Reformation in England. It Was aided by the
return of the English refugees. Hooper, Coverdale and
Rogers, who had in exile become disciples of Calvin, and
by the influence of a picked band of foreign theologians,

15 Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 260 to 264 (Micronius to Bullinger).
[This was the 1549 Oath; in 1562 it was altered to "So help me God,
through Jesus Christ. "]

6o SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Bucer and John k Lasco, Pietro Martire Vermigli and Ber
nardino Ochino, who had come to seek in Great Britain a
shelter from the vexations of the Interim (after 1547)- To
this period belong two memorable acts of Archbishop Cran
mer, the scheme for convoking " a Synod of the most learned
and excellent persons," with a view to establish a consensus
among all Protestant churches as regards fundamentals,
" and especially for an agreement upon the sacramentarian
controversy," "* and the constitution of the Strangers' Church
in London.'^
In the matter of dogmatic and ritual reforms, Cranmer's
first principle was to stay within the strict limits of apostohc
tradition. Hence his Severity against the Anabaptists, who
aimed at a radical reform, and hence the eighteenth of the
Articles of 1551, which declares those to be heretics "that
presume to saie, that euery man shalbe saued by the Lawe,
or Secte which he professeth, so that he bee diligente to
frame his life according to that Lawe, and the lighte of
Nature."i8 On the other hand, the Primate of all England held a
deeply-rooted feeling for the corporate union of all the Chris
tian churches, and for the triumph of the evangelical Refor
mation in Europe. Hence his second principle, namely, to
prove, when dealing with continental Protestants, very broad
in regard to forms of worship and systems of church govern
ment This double principle of Cranmer, dogmatic strictness
and ecclesiastical breadth, presided over the constitution
1^ Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 9 to 15 (Cranmer to Melanchthon,
Calvin, and J. a Lasco). Cf. Strype, Memorials, vol. ii. part I, .year
1548 (Letter from Melanchthon to Edward VI. ).
" Calvini Opera, ut sup., vol. xiii. 1399, 1409, 1432. Cf. Ziirich
Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 262 to 265.
1' [Hardwick, Hist, of Articles, app. ill.]

chapter: IIL 6i
of the Strangers' Church in London, in which he, with
Sir John Cheke and William Cecil, the Secretary of State,
had the largest share. We may judge of this from a brief
analysis of the Privilege octroye par le Roy [Edouard Sixi^me]
d r Eglise des Estrangers, instituee d, Londres Van 1550.'"
After divers considerations drawn from the duty of princes
towards God's holy gospel and the apostohc religion, and
from the pity inspired by the "Germans and other strangers"
banished on account of religion, and who had no place in
which they could carry on their religious affairs in a language
they understood and according to the custom of their
country, the king orders that henceforth there shall be a
temple in London, called the Temple of the Lord Jesus,
where the holy gospel may be purely interpreted, and the
Sacraments administered according to the Word of God and
the apostoHc ordinance. The further provisions of the
patent may be arranged under four beads.
I. This temple (or maison dediee) shall have a superinten
dent and four ministers of the Word, who shall form a
separate corporation in the city of London, they and their
successors. 2. The king grants them the church formerly belonging
to the Augustins, and all the ground and site of the said
church, the choir excepted, to enjoy in frank-almoin.
3. The king accords them full power to increase the
number of ministers, according as necessity shall arise.
4. Finally and above all, the king commands the mayor,
aldermen and sheriffs of his city of London, the Bishop of
1' Collier, ut sup., vol. ix. app. No. 65. Cf. Joannes Utenhovius
Gandavus, Simplex et fidelis Narratio de instituta ac demiwi dissipata
Belgarum aliorumque Peregrinorum in Anglia Ecclesia, &c. : Basel, 1560.
See Appendix III. [In Edward VI.'s Journal, under date 29 June,
1550, Austin Friars is said to be given " to the Dutch nation in London,
to have their service in, for avoiding all sects of Ana- Baptists and such
like."]

62 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
London, and their successors, " with all others. Archbishops,
bishops, justices, officers, &c., that they permit the aforesaid
superintendent and ministers and their successors, freely
and quietly to indulge, enjoy, use and' exercise their own
rites and ceremonies and proper and particular ecclesiastical
discipline, notwithstanding that these may not agree with
the rites and ceremonies practised in our kingdom."
The Strangers' Church, endowed with so liberal a charter,
was calculated to survive Thomas Cranmer ; but other
events were in store; the Catholic reaction under Mary
Tudor had the effect of violently overturning the noble plan
of an Evangelical Alliance formed by him ; and, by sending
many hundreds of English Protestants to the continent,
hurried on the catastrophe of the crisis which troubled the
Anglican Church. In fact, the exile of five or six hundred
of the most distinguished members of the Anglican Church,
such men as Sir John Cheke, Grindal, Humphrey, Foxe,
Jewel, Parker, Ponet, Sampson and others,^" by bringing
them in contact with the simple worship and organisation of
the Reformed Churches at Frankfurt, Strassburg and Zurich,
could not but foster the tendencies to a more thorough
purification of the Anglican worship.
In its turn, this onward movement would naturally call
forth a resistance, based on that attachment to ecclesiastical
rites and customs which exercises so powerful a sway over
the English character. In this way, two opposite poles of
thought were created in the little world of English refugees
on the continent : the conservative or Episcopal, to be
found at Strassburg and Ziirich ; and the radical or Puritan,
at Geneva and Frankfurt Those attached to the former—
among others. Cox, Coverdale, Grindal, Parker and Ponet—
wished to keep the services and the episcopal system' as
these had been settled under Edward VI. On the other

*° Collier, ut sup., vol. vi. 19.

CHAPTER IIL 63
hand, the representatives of the latter school, such as the
ardent Knox, John Foxe, Humphrey, &c., desired to adopt
a service-book similar to that which Calvin had introduced
at Geneva, and claimed for the Anglican Church the auto
nomy and liturgical simplicity which the patent of Edward
VI. had granted from the very first to the Strangers' Church
in London.^' So long as the English Protestants were drawn
together by common sufferings for the sake of the gospel,
this divergence of opinions only gave rise to liturgical or
personal controversies ; but in accordance with a melancholy
law ofthe human heart, more quickly corrupted by prosperity
than by misfortune, the antagonism became sharper under
the reign of Elizabeth. The Puritans created a schism
(1566), and declared that they would dispense with the help
of the Government, and reform the Church according to this
three-fold principle: i, Aucto?-itas Scripturarum; 2, Sitn-
plicitas ministerii ; 3, Puritas ecclesiarum primarum et opti-
maruTn (1586).
Having witnessed the rise of the Strangers' Church and of
Puritanism from these fruitful relations between England and
Switzerland, the question again presents itself. Was there, in
either of these, any germ of Unitarianism ?
Let us inquire first among the Puritans, and begin with
Hooper, initiator and martyr of Puritanism. Hooper has
lefl: but few works, and the most important are on moral and
liturgical subjects. ^^ But we have a large part of his cor
respondence with Henry Bullinger, ^^ a real treasure of healthy
piety and frank friendship. From this is to be gathered that
Hooper was, in matter of dogma, the disciple of Zwingh and
of Bulhnger; that is to say, he adopted the Athanasian
'^'^ See Herzog's Real- Encyclopcedie, art Puritans, by Schoell.
'* [But see Hooper's Early Writings (Parker Society) for A Declara
tion of Christ and his Office, which is expressly Nicsean in doctrine.]
^' Zurich Letters, 3 ser., Letters 32 to 48 (Hooper to Bullinger).

64 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Creed pure and simple, not dreaming for a moment of veri
fying its authenticity, or even its conformity with the Holy
Scriptures. Thus, in his letter to Bullinger, already quoted.
Hooper complains that the Anabaptists give him "much
trouble, with their opinions respecting the incarnation of the
Lord ; for they deny altogether that Jesus Christ was born
of the Virgin Mary according to the flesh." And further on
he exclaims: "Alas! not only are those heresies reviving
among us which were formerly dead and buried, but new
ones are springing up every day. There are such libertines
and wretches who are daring enough in their conventicles,
not only to deny that Christ is the Messiah and Saviour of
the world, but also to call that blessed Seed a mischievous
fellow and deceiver of the world. "^*
Might there not be an allusion here, in calumnious form,
to the first Antitrinitarians of England ?
John Hooper was one of the first victims of the Catholic
reaction. On ist September, 1553, he was arrested and
consigned to the Fleet prison in Babington's charge, and
after two years' rigorous incarceration was sent to the stake
(1555). While in prison he wrote two books: his Hyper-
aspismus, on the true doctrine and use of the Lord's Supper,
which has been printed; and De vera Ratione inveniendcB
etfugienda Falsce Doctrince, hi-eve Syntagma, which doubtless
referred to the same subject as the above-mentioned letter.
Unhappily, only the Epistle Dedicatory to this last work has
been preserved.-^
According to the. declarations of their principal teachers,
Humphrey and Sampson, who took part in their controversies
with the Established Church (1566 — 1586), the Puritans
were in full accord with the Anglicans in matter of dogma.
°* Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 33.
°^ [See Hooper's Later Writings (Parker Society). In the Hyper-
aspismus. Hooper cites and endorses the Symbolum Quicumque. ]

CHAPTER III. 65
They accepted the Thirty-nine Articles of 1563 ; Bullinger's
Decades ^exe. authoritative for the whole clergy, while Calvin's
Institutio was scarcely read outside the Universities. Still,
little by little, under the influence of strife and schism, a
dogmatic divergence ensued between the Established Church
and the Puritan Nonconformists. While the Puritans pushed
the Calvinistic dogma of predestination to its extreme con
sequences, the Anglican bishops allowed themselves to be
won over by degrees to Arminian ideas. Now it is well
known that the Dutch Arminians were much inclined to
wards Unitarian doctrines. It is therefore in the Episcopal
Church, and nowise among the Presbyterians, that we discern
an open door for Unitarianism.^''
But the Strangers' Church in London offered a field much
more propitious for the introduction of Unitarian tendencies.
Christians of every nation and every denomination met there ;
Germans and Dutch, French and Walloons, Italians and
Spaniards ; Georg van Parris, Adriaans van Hamstede,
Vauville and Utenhoven, Acontius and Corranus; and all
were under the superintendence of a Pole, John k Lasco.
Outwardly, it is true, the Strangers' Church conformed to the
Calvinistic orthodoxy; John k Lasco drew up a Confession
of Faith, which was signed by all the ministers and elders,
and of which he submitted copies for the approbation of
Bullinger and Calvin.^'' But this Confession did not prevent
grave discussions from arising among the laymen, and even
among the pastors, of this Church, as we shall see in Chapter
VII. That we may judge of the notable influence exercised
by this Strangers' Church upon the development of eccle-
^' Schoell, art. Puritans, ut siip. As early as 1590, W. Barrett intro
duced Arminianism at Cambridge, and did not shrink from opposing
the dogmatic systems of Calvin and Beza.
^' Calvini Opera, ut sup., vol. xiv. 1432 (Letter from a Lasco to
Bullinger). r

66 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
siastical and theological ideas in England, we will cite the
testimony of Collier, which is all the more valuable as coming
from a hostile source.
"This indulgence," says he, speaking of the Patent of Edward
VI. , "though going upon motives of generosity and compassion,
proved unserviceable to the English Reformation : for this Ger
man congregation was very remote, both in government and
worship, from our ecclesiastical constitution. The allowing,
therefore, a religious society so widely different from that of the
country, and the exempting these foreigners from the jurisdic
tion of the bishops, was thought, in effect, an encouragement of
schism, and setting up one altar against another. It must be
said, this friendship and correspondence with the reformed of
other nations disturbed our harmony at home, and proved an
occasion of divisions." ^^
To us, on the contrary, it appears that this Ecclesia Pere
grinorum has been, in the body ofthe Church of England, as
the leaven that leavened the whole lump. Without it, and
the Puritan and Unitarian movements to which it gave birth,
the Anglican Church would perhaps have long since fallen
again under the yoke of the Church of Rome.
^' Collier, ut sup., vol. v. 386.

CHAPTER IV.
Is Unitarian Christianity of Italian or Spanish origin ? — Antitrinitarian
tendencies of the Italian Reformation. — Influence of Ju&n de Valdes
and Michael Servetus.
Up to this point of our researches into the origin of
English Unitarianism, we have not quitted the zone of the
Germanic races. We have interrogated, one after another,
the beresiarchs of all the Teutonic lands, Wiclif and the
Lollards, Erasmus and the Anabaptists ; and on putting our
question respecting the Trinity, we have nearly everywhere
been referred in reply to the Symbolum Quicumque. Only
at two or three points have we come upon traces at all
marked of Antitrinitarian criticism ; namely, among the
Anabaptists of Flanders and of Switzerland, and in the
Strangers' Church in London. But among the first-named,
taking Adam Pastoris and Hatzer as samples, the Unitarian
idea is still enveloped in a certain pantheistic and millenarian
mysticism, and complicated with revolutionary aspirations
respecting the Church and society. In the Ecclesia Peregri
norum, on the contrary, it appears in the form of Scriptural
theory, and it is represented by men who respected esta
blished order, such as Acontius and Hamstede, Ochino and
Corranus, Most of these men were Italians or Spaniards, Let us
then turn towards the south of Europe, and ask Italy to
declare her secret.
For a long time England had carried on a literary inter
course with Italy. We know that Chaucer, the creator of
F 2

68 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM,
English poetic diction, is under constant obligation to Boc
caccio and Petrarca ; and, two centuries afterwards, it was
still in that land of hereditary loves and hates that Shakspere
sought the story of his most pathetic dramas. It was not
only for literary models or souvenirs of the past that the
English resorted to Italy ; they were drawn thither by the
renown of her Universities, whose authority was recognised
in the sciences of Law and Medicine.
At the commencement of the sixteenth century, the
English students were so numerous at Ferrara as to form a
distinct "nation" in that University.^
A littie later, Reginald Pole, the last scion of the unfor
tunate house of York, fleeing from the wrath of Henry VIIL,
sought refuge in Italy (July, 1531), and joined the devotional
conferences which the dispersed members of the " Oratory
of Divine Love" held at Venice, under the patronage of the
Cardinals Morone and Contarini. It was with this introduc
tion that he made the acquaintance of several advocates of
an evangehcal reform — Luigi Priuli, Marcantonio Flaminio,
and Aonio Paleario (Antonio della Paglia) — and that he was
chosen in 1537 by Pope Paolo III. to take part in the Com
mission of Reforms.^ Unhappily, Reginald Pole soon went
over to the side of the reaction in favour of Catholic autho
rity, represented by Caraffa, and employed, in opposing the
progress of the gospel in Italy, especially among the ladies
of the Colonna family, all the ardour which shortly before
he had placed at the service of the reforming party.
But, failing the ambitious Pole, the English had, about
the same epoch, 1532 — 1540, a devoted agent in Italy who
served as negociator between the two countries. This was
Baldassare Altieri. Originally from Aquila, in the kingdom
1 M'Crie, Reformation in Italy, p. So, note.
^ F. Meyer, Die Evangelische Gemeinde zu Locarno: Ziirich, 1836,
vol. i. 20 ff.

CHAPTER IV. 69
of Naples, he was, during eight years, accredited as Secretary
to the English Embassy at Venice, and by his intelligence
and activity was well fitted to advance the prestige of the
King of England with the " Queen of the Adriatic." Altieri,
converted to the gospel by the writings of the German
Reformers, placed all his energy at the service of the evan
gelical cause ; he did not consider himself simply as agent
of England, but as envoy of the King of Heaven, Jesus
Christ The English Embassy at Venice became at that
time the focus of an active circulation of the literature of
the Reformation, and an asylum for all who were exiled in
the cause of religion.^
But the very excess of his zeal compromised him in the
eyes of his superior, who was avaricious and a bigot ; and
Altieri, to place himself in safety, was obliged to come with
his wife and children to England (1540 — 1542), where he
was warmly received by the members of the Privy Council,
including Sir AVilliam Paget.*
He afterwards retumed to Italy, as agent of the Elector
of Saxony and of the Landgrave of Hesse. In this capacity
he rendered great services to the cause of the persecuted
Protestants, but was at length obliged to quit Venice and
take refuge in the neighbourhood of Brescia, where he died,
in August, 1550. We make this digression concerning Altieri,
partly because he was in familiar relations with Celio Secondo
Curione and Lelio Sozini, and partly because, by his frequent
correspondence with Luther and Bullinger, we may consider
him the medium of relations between Italy and the northern
Reformers. If England was thus represented in Italy by men of emi
nence and advocates of Reformation — although diametri
cally opposed to each other in regard to methods —there was,
3 M'Crie, Reformation in Italy, p. 106.
* F. Meyer, ut sup., app. pp. 471 ff.

fO SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
on the Other hand, no lack of Italians in England. A num
ber of families had lately established themselves in London
for purposes of commerce, which was then brisk between
the two countries. In the first rank of these were the Brunetti
and the Torriani, held in esteem as much for their probity
as for their business ability. ^ After the establishment of the
Inquisition in Italy and of the Interim in Germany, a great
stream of emigration began, which carried the Italian Pro
testants, by successive stages, first into Switzerland, then to
Alsace and the Low Countries (after 1548), and at length to
the shores of Great Britain. The young king, Edward VI. ,
and his Council of Regency, accorded them a favourable
reception, and furnished them with sufficient funds to enable
them to proceed to the northern counties in search of em
ployment'' Archbishop Cranmer held the learned Italians in particular
esteem ; he gave a chair of theology in the University of
Oxford to Peter Martyr (Pietro Martire Vermigli), and to
Emanuele Tremellio the chair of Hebrew at Cambridge, in
succession to Fagius ; he licensed Bernardino Ochino as
preacher to the Italian congregation in London, We may
further mention among the Italians of distinction who were
included in this first emigration, Giulio Terenziano, the
faithful companion of Peter Martyr, Lelio Sozini of Siena,
and Pietro Bizarri of Perugia. The publications of the
Italian Reformers were in high repute at the court of Edward
VI. , to whom many of them were dedicated. One of the
three copies of the book, Del Benefizio di Gesfi Christo, which
have survived the hecatomb of the Inquisitors, has been
discovered at St. John's College, Cambridge, bearing this

' Gregorio Leti, // Teatro Britannico overo Historia della Grande
Bretagna, 5 vols. i2mo. . Amsterdam, 16S4, vol. i. 316.
^ Calendar of State Papers : Reign of Ed-ward VI. (1549).

CHAPTER IV.

71

truly PauUne motto, " Live to die— Die to live again," in
the handwriting and with the signature of the young king.'
The Italian emigration, interrupted under Mary Tudor,
began once more on the accession of Elizabeth, who was
passionately fond of the Italian language and literature, which
she studied under one of the persecuted exiles. It is to this
second group that Acontius, the Cardoini and the Gentili
belong. So much in proof of the mutual relations between English
Protestants and those of Italy about the middle of the six
teenth century (1530 — 1570). We must now trace in rapid
outline the course of the Italian Reformation, that we may
take our bearings for the investigation of the sources of those
Antitrinitarian opinions which, as we have seen, suddenly
sprang up in 1550 within the Italian congregation ofLondon.
In Italy the Reformation developed new features ; it had no
political character, and nowhere did it bear a stamp more
distinctively literary, humanistic and rational. The prophetic
accents of Savonarola, and the exegetical boldness of Lorenzo
Valla, had re-awakened minds stupefied with the incense of
Romish pageantry. On every hand a fresh demand arose
for a reform of the Church in head and members ; and in
the Council of 1511-12, convened at Pisa at the instance of
Louis XIL, and afterwards transferred to the Lateran, Pope
Julius II. had to listen to the speeches of Egidio di Viterbo,
General of the Eremitani of St. Augustine, and of Giovanni
Francesco Pico della Mirandola, energetically denouncing
abuses in the Church. Ten years afterwards, the letter
addressed by the inhabitants of Bologna, within the Papal
territory, to Johann Planitz, envoy in Italy from the Elector of
Saxony to Charles V., well expresses the sentiment of those
noble-hearted Christians who sighed for a peaceful reforma
tion of the Catholic Church.*
' The Botejit of Christ's Death, edited by Babington : Cambridge
1855. 8 M'Crie, ut sup., pp. 90 ff.

72 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Again, at both extremities of the Italian Peninsula, in the
upper valleys of the Cottian Alps, and in the mountains of
Calabria and Apulia, the Waldenses kept alive the sacred
fire of the Word of God. In Piedmont, after the defeat of
the brutal expedition of Albertus de Cataneis, they enjoyed
some degree of toleration at the hands of the Dukes of Savoy,
including Filiberto VI. and Emanuele Filiberto, who had
married Catherine II. of France, sister to Henry II. and
friend of Renee of Ferrara. They had schools and meeting
houses at Cavour, at Carignano, at Chieri ; and, during the
French occupation, they opened a place of public worship
at Turin."
But it was especially in the kingdom of Naples, where,
since the end of the fourteenth century, the emigrants from
Pragela had founded agricultural colonies and brought under
cultivation a kind of desert, that the Waldenses were treated
with much respect They possessed flourishing churches at
Borgo d'Oltramontani, at Guardia and at Voltatura, which
endured for about forty years (1558 — 1560) after the intro
duction of the Reformation into Italy.
Hence, when the writings of Luther and Melanchthon,
of Bucer and Zwingli, brought out in large editions by the
printers of Basel and Strassburg, reached Italy (under pseudo
nyms, it is true) through the booksellers of Pavia and Venice,
they were read with avidity, and praised even by members
of the Sacred College.'" Add to these causes the interchange
of students which, so soon as the Renascence had penetrated
to the north of Europe (from 1525), became customary
between Oxford and Wittenberg on the one part, and Ferrara
and Padua on the other, and the rapid and simultaneous
outbreak of the Reformation in Italy will become intelligible.

' Muston, Histoire des Vaudois et de leurs Colonies, new Edition, Paris,
1880, vol. i. 267 — 282.
'" M'Crie, ut sup., pp. 6, 39,

CHAPTER IV. 73
To shorten matters, we shall specify three principal centres,
Naples, Tuscany and the Venetian territory.
Naples and Sicily were at that time under Spanish rule,
and .governed by two \"iceroys of Charles V. Every one
knows that this emperor was not indulgent to heretics ; and
during a visit which he paid to Naples he published an Edict
(Feb. 4, 1536) forbidding all intercourse with heretics, under
pain of death and confiscation of property. But in vain did
the puissant emperor set himself to extinguish the light of
the gospel. God had determined otherwise, and it was pre
cisely through the eff'orts of one of his Spanish knights that
the gospel was to make its greatest strides in the district of
Naples. Juan de Valdes, a native of Cuenga in Castille (often
confounded with his twin-brother Alfonso (d. 1532), who
accompanied Charles V. on his German campaigns as
Latin Secretary), had fled from Spain, where his dialogue,
Mercury and Charon, had compromised him with the Holy
Office, to Xaples,ii and to Rome, where he stayed two
years. He was an accomplished man, of gentle birth and of
irreproachable purity of morals, whose countenance, pale and
delicate, and eyes beaming with enthusiasm, seemed to reflect
the brightness of the invisible world, where in heart he lived.
Converted to the evangehcal doctrines by reading St. Paul's
Epistles and the writings of Luther, he thought thenceforward
but of one thing, to win for Christ as many souls as possible.'^
" [Valdes was in Naples in 1530-31, and returning in 1533, remained
there till his death in May, 1541. There is no proof that he was ever
in the Emperor's service, though he was in that of Pope Clemente VII.
His brother's vrill made him independent. See Boehmer's Lives ofthe
Twin-brothers Juan and Alfonso de Valdes, with Belts' Introduaion, 1882.]
^ See the remarkable article of E. Boehmer on Valdes in Spanish
Reformers of T-wo Centuries : Lond. 1874. [The life and works of Valdes
are now rendered available to English readers by the valuable labours
of B. B. Wiffen, and the translations of Belts and others.]

74 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
He never came forward as a public speaker or preacher;
he relied entirely on speech with two or three in form of
dialogue ; and many of his works which have been preserved,
e. g. the Alfabeto Cristiano and the Ziento i Diez Conzidera-
ziones, bear the character of conversations. Indeed, his house,
picturesquely situated on the Chiaja, near Virgil's tomb, soon
became the resort of all the best society the kingdom of
Naples could show, in the way of men and women distin
guished in letters and animated with religious sentiments.
Hither came Vittoria Colonna, Marchioness of Pescara, and
her sister-in-law, Giulia Gonzaga, Duchess of Trajetto, the
most beautiful woman of her time ; Costanza d'Avalos,
Duchess of Amalfi, and Isabella Manriquez, sister of a Car
dinal. And here they met Pietro Carnesecchi, formerly
protonotary to Clement VII. and secretary to the Medici;
Marcantonio Flaminio, one of the translators of the Psalms
into Latin verse; Benedetto of Mantua; Lattanzio Ragnone,
of Siena ; and the young Neapolitan noblemen, Francesco
Caserta and Galeazzo Caracciolo.
The charm of Valdes' evangelical character was also felt
by two ecclesiastics, Giovanni Mollio, a Minorite from Mon-
talcino, who had been removed from Bologna under sus
picion of heresy, and was now Reader at San Lorenzo in
Naples ; and Pietro Martire Vermigli, ex-Abbot of Spoleto,
and now Prior of the Augustinian convent of San Pietro ad
Aram. Finally, to complete the catalogue, let us add the
name of the celebrated Vicar-general of the Capuchins, Ber
nardino Ochino of Siena, who preached his first Lenten
course at Naples in 1 536, and of whom it was said by Charles
v., that he "could draw tears from the very stones !"'^ So
completely did Ochino fall under the spell of Valdes, that
" [This is the expression employed by an eye-witness, Gregorio Rosso,
and has been attributed to Charles V. by a misapprehension. Benrath's
Ochino, 1875, p. 25.]

CHAPTER IV. 75
he would go to him for texts and subjects for his sermons,
and imbibed the inspiration of many of his friend's theolo
gical ideas.'*
Thus, at the time of his death (May, 1541), the number
of Valdes' disciples ^vas considerable at Naples, and from
thence his influence was extended far and wide in the Italian
Peninsula. Benedetto of Locarno, who preached justifica
tion by faith at Palermo and at Milan, and Paolo Ricci, called
Lisia Fileno, who evangelized Modena, were looked upon
as disciples of Valdes.
Whilst the churches of Naples resounded with the evan
gelical tones of Mollio, of Ochino, and of Vermigli, in Flo
rence, the home of Savonarola their precursor, silence was
enforced by the sovereign authority of Cosimo de' Medici.
To the noble outburst of liberty which had marked the last
years of the fifteenth century, had succeeded a reaction both
in politics and religion. Nevertheless, a few faithful friends,
Fra Benedetto, the historian Nardi, and Stefano Vermigli,
father of Peter Martyr, had cherished a reverent regard for
the spirit of their "holy prophet." And, towards 1525, we
behold the rise of a younger generation, who devote them
selves to the examination of the Scriptures, and who under
take the translation of them into classical Italian. In 1530
appeared the first ItaUan translation of the New Testament,'^
by Antonio Bruccioli, with a dedication to Renee of France,
Duchess of Ferrara ; and, some years later, came that of
Massimo Theofilo (Lyons, 1556). Pietro Carnesecchi and
Pietro Martire Vermigli were also Florentines ; but, despair-
" Benrath, Ber-nardino Ochino of Siena, 1875, trans, by Miss Zim-
mem: London, 1S76, pp. 63, 68, 156.
'^ [That is to say, the first Protestant version. The first was that
contained in the Italian Bible edited by Nicol6 di Mallermi (or Mal-
herbi), published at Venice, i Aug. 147 1 ; and there were many editions
of this, as well as of the Italian version of the Bible by Giovanni Rosso
of Vercelli, first published at Venice, 1487.]

•j6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
ing of obtaining liberty in the territory which had given them
birth, they, like Dante, sought in exile freedom of conscience.
Two small Republics in the neighbourhood of Florence,
Siena and Lucca, enjoyed liberty of thought for some time
longer. Siena, the birthplace and home of St. Catherine,
often listened to Ochino's pleadings for reformation, and the
similar appeals of Aonio Paleario, both children of hers. She
gave birth to Lattanzio Ragnone, one of the first pastors of
the Italian Church at Geneva, and to Mino Celsi, the apostle
of toleration. Siena, too, was the cradle of the illustrious
family of the Sozzini.'"
Lucca was the State which furnished the largest contingent
of Italian Protestant emigrants." The flourishing, though
secret, church of this city owed its existence to the combined
exertions of Peter Martyr, who as prior of San Frediano
(about 1540) had founded at Lucca a college or seminary for
the study of the classical languages, and of Aonio Paleario,
who was Professor of Latin Literature in the Academia during
the years 1546 — 1555. It was in Lucca, at San Frediano,
that the Latinists Curione and Lacisio, the Hellenist Marti-
nengo, and the Hebraists Emanuele Tremellio and Giulio
Terenziano, were professors. They almost all embraced the
principles of the evangelical Reformation, and we shall meet
them again on foreign soil.
It is well known that Ferrara, under the generous stimulus
of Alfonso I., rivalled Florence in the cultivation of literature
and philosophy (1527). The young Duke, Ercole IL, hav
ing married Rende, daughter of Louis XIL, who had been
brought to a knowledge of the gospel by Marguerite de

'^ Cantii, Gli Eretici d' Italia (1865 — 1867); see vol. ii., Appendix, for
a genealogy of the Sozzini [which needs some correction]. M'Crie, ut
sup., p. 444.
" Moerikofer, Gesch. d. Prot. Flucht. i. Sch-weiz, chap. v. : Leipzig,
1878

CHAPTER IV, ff
Valois, and by her governess, Madame de Soubise, the court
of Ferrara became the centre of literary reunions, whose
members were not slow to discuss the " one thing needful,"
the question of salvation. Clement Marot and Lyon Jamet,
who were secretaries to the Duchess, Calvin and Hubert
Languet, who were her correspondents, communicated to the
literary circle the influence of Protestant France ; while, on
the part of Italy, Marcantonio Flaminio and Fulvio Pellegrino
Morato, father of the incomparable Olympia Fulvia Morata,
were the brightest gems in this crown of Ferrara. '^'*
But neither Naples, nor Lucca, nor even Ferrara, are to
be compared with Venice and her territory in respect of the
activity and continuance of the evangelical propaganda. It
will be remembered that Altieri, the Secretary to the English
Embassy, was the medium of relations between the Protes
tants of Venice and the Reformers of Germany and Switzer
land.'^" Baldo Lupetino, Provincial of the Franciscans in
the Venetian territory, displayed no less zeal for the conver
sion of souls. He it was who gained over to the cause of
the gospel his cousin, Mattia Flacio Illyrico (Mat. Flach
Francowitz), the chief author of the ecclesiastical history
known as the Centurice Magdeburgicce, and of the Catalogus
Testium Veritatis; but he expiated his zeal by a captivity of
twenty years, crowned at length by martyrdom.
The Bruccioli and the Braccietti were among the founders
of the evangelical church at Venice ; while two brothers,
Pierpaolo Vergerio, Bishop of Capo d'Istria, and Giambattista
Vergerio, Bishop of Pola, carried the light of the gospel into
^8 See the fine work of Jules Bonnet on Olympia Morata.
1' He wrote a letter to Luther on behalf of the Protestants of Venice
(24 Nov. 1542), praying him to 'influence the Gennan princes to inter
vene in their favour ; and it is to him that we may reasonably attribute
the letter to the ministers of Geneva (6 Dec. 1542), written in the name
of all the brethren of the church of Venice, Vicenza and Treviso.—
Calvini Opera, vol. xi. 438.

78 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Istria and the district of Trent. Furthermore, the numerous
printers and merchants of Venice, among others the brothers
Bruccioli, disseminated throughout the peninsula the Italian
version of the New Testament and of the other books of the
Bible, as well as the Latin writings of the Reformers. The
Council of Ten, zealous for the independence of Venice,
closed her gates against the Inquisitors, at the same time
opening them to refugees in the cause of religion. Under
favour of this toleration, secret congregations of Protestants
were formed in Treviso and Vicenza. The University of
Padua, in its turn, saw its students and many of its professors
won over to the gospel ; Antonio della Paglia (Paleario) and
Matteo Gribaldo taught there for many years.
If now we take our stand on a height above these particular
phenomena, to contemplate, as in a bird's-eye view, the
general movement of the Reformation in Italy, we shall
have no difficulty in perceiving the principal causes which
could not but impress upon it an Antitrinitarian bias. What
strikes us, on the first glance, is the absence of any great
personality, like that of Luther, Zwingli or Calvin, concen
trating in itself the aspirations of all, and furnishing them,
by the force of its genius, with a common expression and a
common organization. It is not that the Italians were de
ficient in the raw material of genius; assuredly Pietro Martire
Vermigli is to the full as keen a theologian as Calvin, and
Bernardino Ochino bears the palm from Luther for power
of oratory ; but, whether because they were too near Rome,
or because they could count on no adequate support from
their princes, they were unable to assume the direction of
the movement. Besides, the repressive force exerted by the
Holy See was so strong at the outset, even within the free
republic of Venice, that the churches, placed under a ban
which compelled them to assemble in secret, were from this
circumstance unable to provide themselves with a regular
organisation. They remained in the condition of kglises

CHAPTER IV. 79
plantks (stick-fast churches), as Theodore Beza calls them ;
not having minister, liturgy or discipline, still less any con
fession of faith, to set bounds to the rationalism of individual
members. To these causes add, lastly, the feeling which
leads the oppressed to take in every respect a line opposed
to that of their persecutors, and it will be easy to understand
how it was that Italy presented a favourable soil for the unre
stricted exertion of free inquiry, and for the development of
the most anti-catholic and anti-clerical opinions.^"
If circumstances fostered this tendency, no less true is it
that the natural temperament of the Italians led them in the
direction of critical discussion and scepticism. The revival
of classical literature had brought back the study of the
ancient philosophers, Plato and Aristotle, and had emanci
pated the human mind from the yoke of scholastic rules.
No sooner was the penetrating and subtle intellect of the
Italians set free, than it applied its solvent to traditions that
seemed most soundly established. Lorenzo Valla (d. 1457),
the true precursor of Erasmus, by application of the rules of
historical criticism, had demonstrated the falsity of the pre
tended Donation of Constantine, and the legend of the origin
of the so-called Apostles' Creed. And, later, Pietro Pom
ponazzi, Professor of Philosophy at Padua and at Bologna
(1488 — 1525), did not hesitate to declare that, according to
Aristotle's doctrine, the human soul is mortal ; that is to say,
it participates in immortality only so far as it has a know
ledge of the Universal.^' It was Pomponazzi who, doubtless
to shelter himself from the censures of the Church, drew that
imaginary distinction between the domain of Faith and that

^'^ The Universities of Bologna and Padua were at that time centres
of daring speculation and free thought. See Lecky, Hislory ofthe Rise
and Influence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe, vol. i. 370 ff. :
London, 1882.
^ See Trechsel, ut sup., vol. ii. 10—12. Cf. Lecky, ut sup.

8o SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
of Reason, which is convenient perhaps for weak natures,
but fatal to religious sentiment and sincerity of conscience.
But, above all, the study of Cicero's writings had dissemi
nated in most literary circles a sort of eclectic philosophy,
content to acknowledge the data of the universal conscious
ness {consensus generis humani), such as the existence of a
God, the immortality of the soul, and the duties of man,
without probing the problems of metaphysics.
Further, the science of Law, held in such great esteem at
the Universities of Bologna and Padua, and conferring a
hereditary glory upon the Alciati, the Gentili and the Sozzini,
developed among the Italians a demand for equity, and, so
to speak, a geometrical method of reasoning, which would
ill adapt themselves to the dogmata of the Trinity, the two
natures in Christ, and the vicarious atonement
Lastly, among the general causes of the Antitrinitarian
movement in Italy, we have hitherto omitted to notice the
influencewhich the monotheism of the Jewish doctors was sure
to exert on the Hebraists who studied under them. The truth
is, the Jews played a very important part in the revival of the
study of Oriental languages in Italy. Since the end of the
fifteenth century, the family of the Soncinati, from Soncino
near Cremona, had established printing-presses in the prin
cipal cities of southern Europe; and, in 1518, Daniel Bom-
berg brought out at Venice a magnificent edition of the
Hebrew Bible, with rabbinical commentaries. The first
Hebraists of Italy, Pico della Mirandola, uncle and nephew,
Agathias Guidaccerio (the first Professor of Hebrew at the
College of France) and Egidio of Viterbo, had been pupils
of Jewish doctors. And if, in the contact of the two reli
gions, we note some conversions from the old to the new, as
was the case with Felice of Prato and Emanuele Tremellio,
who were of Israelitish origin, and became professors of
Hebrew at Rome and Oxford, — on the other hand we must
acknowledge the marked influence of Judaism, in an Anti-

CHAPTER IV. 8 1
trinitarian direction, upon the Hebraist, Francesco Stancaro,
of Mantua. 22
We are by this time in a position to resume our funda
mental question. Did there exist, in the Italy of the sixteenth
century, any Unitarian tendencies ? And if so, within what
circles, and in the case of what individuals, were they brought
out? The result of our scrutiny of the general conditions
of ItaHan Protestantism is, that everything bore in this direc
tion. But have we come across the name of any one who
should disengage the consequent of all these aspirations, and
discover the formula of Antitrinitarianism ?
Yes, two men proved the awakeners of the theological
intellect in the Italy of the sixteenth century, and these two,
strange to say, were not Italians, but Spaniards — Miguel
Serveto y Reves and Juan de Valdes. It was as though
Providence had willed that the spark of truth should flash
from the contact of the two pre-eminently Latin races.
Gentile and Gribaldo, Acontius and the Sozzini, have the
same title to be reckoned disciples of Servetus, that Ochino,
Vermigli and Curione have to be deemed heirs of the spirit
of Valdes. 2^ Even as the influence of the translated Con-
siderazioni of Valdes is felt in Ochino's Dialogi Sette,^ so do
we find the writings of Servetus ^^ current, during the period
IS33 — 1544, in the circles of Padua, Vicenza and Venice.
Let us, then, seek to determine how far this pair of gifted
pioneers contributed to the formation of Italian Unitarianism.
"^ M'Crie, ut sup., pp. 42 ff. Trechsel, ut sup., vol. ii. 76.
''¦'^ [The names of Acontius and Curione might perhaps be transposed.]
^* [The Six Dialogues of 1539; not to be confounded with his more
famous Dialogi XXX. of 1563.]
'° [The reader must carefully bear in mind that this refers to the
eariiest publications of Servetus, the De Trinitatis Erroribus, 1531, and
At Dialogi de Trinitate, &c., 1532; not to his mature work, the Chris
tianismi Restitutio, 1553.] G

82 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
We will begin with Valdes, who is catalogued by Christoph
.Sand as second in his chronological series of Antitrinitarians.
What gave rise to this presumption was doubtiess a letter of
Theodore de Beza (2 Sept i566).2" In this circular to the
Churches of East Friesland, Beza smartly scolds a minister
of the French Church at Emden for having had the CX.
Considerations of Valdes translated into Flemish. From this
book, he says, Ochino had imbibed his profane speculations ;
and he points out that the work of the Spanish knight con
tains several Anabaptist errors and blasphemies against the
Holy Scriptures ; among others, the following, derived from
Considerations 32, 46 and 63.
I. "The Holy Spirit, being the source of Scripture, is
superior to it, and can alone give the key to its interpreta
tion. The Spirit has retained the power of revealing divine
truth to the heart of man, as in the days of the Aposties ;
and this inward and present revelation is more fresh and
vital than the written Revelation."
2. Moreover, on the question of free-will and grace, Valdes
admits, with Erasmus and Melanchthon, and contrary to the
opinion of Luther and Calvin, that the human will has re
tained the faculty of appropriating the divine grace {Prcece-
dente gratia, comitante voluntate).
It will be observed at once that Beza brings no charge
against Valdes in the matter of the Trinity. And, moreover,
if we turn to the actual works of the Spanish thinker at
Naples, we shall there meet with categorical declarations
such as the following : " Christ is no mere man, but one and
the same thing with God. The understanding of the rela
tions of the Father with the Son and the Holy Spirit is

'^ Beza, CEuvres, vol. iii. ep. 4. See Appendix IV. [Sand gives
as his authority for Valdes' antitrinitarianism a rare work by Francis
David, De Falsa et Vera Unius Dei Cognitione, 1567, bk. i. chap. 3.]

CHAPTER IV. 83
above my comprehension ; may God be pleased some day
to clear up this mystery to me."'-'^
Thus we see that Valdes, like the sage Melanchthon and
the prudent Erasmus, kept to the declarations of the Scrip
ture on this point. As regards the Athanasian dogma, he
pronounced neither for nor against it. This of itself does
not afford sufficient grounds for classing him among the
Antitrinitarians. Still, if the gracious and mystic master kept this reserve, it
is very probable that several of his immediate disciples went
to greater lengths. Balbani expressly notes in Valdes' com
pany "a band of Anabaptists and abominable Arians, whose
brood had swarmed in Naples and throughout the kingdom,
and put in peril the faith ofthe Evangelicals. "^^ Again, we
shall find among the Antitrinitarian refugees in Switzerland
and the Val Tellina many Neapolitans and Sicilians who had
been within the circle of Valdes' influence, including Valen-
^ Boehmer's art. on Valdes in Herzog's Encyclof. [Without its con
text, the expression above (suggested by the 'iv of John x. 30) is some
what misleading. Valdes was no Sabellian. Readers of his works will
observe a distinction between what he says when he is dealing with
essentials, and what he gives as his own fuller opinion. Thus, in the
Latte Spiriiuate, written for the instruction of children, tbe doctrine pre
sented, though not technically Arian, does not get beyond what is best
known as the Clarkean scheme, and the Trinity is expressly reserved as
a topic for advanced Christians. The Trinity is not a topic with which
Valdes anywhere deals. He avoids it even in commenting upon Matt.
xxviii. 19. But he frequently expresses his behef in the consubstantiality
ofthe Father and the Son, offers doxologies to Christ, and once (Opisc.
P- 145) gives glory and honour to him "with the Father and the Holy
Spirit." As regards the personality of the Spirit, the Latte Spirituale
tells us that "this Holy Spirit is a divine favour, by which God vivifies
our minds, maintaining them in spiritual life," just as the air we breathe
vivifies the body.]
"^ Balbani, Vie du Marquis Galeace Caracciolo, Geneva, 1587, l2mo.
[Originally published in Italian, 1581 ; the English translation, 1608, by
W. Crashaw (who ascribes it to Beza), has been often reprinted.]
G 2

84 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
tino Gentile of Cosenza, Francesco of Calabria, and Camillo
Renato of Sicily.
While Valdes limited himself to placing the testimony of
the Holy Spirit above Holy Scripture, and declaring the
dogma of the Trinity to be incomprehensible, Servetus did
not hesitate boldly to attack this dogma, in the name of the
Bible and of Reason. Although Spanish by birth (1511),^"
the education of Servetus was chiefly French. It was at
Paris that he studied medicine, and in France that he made
his splendid discovery of the (pulmonary) circulation of the
blood. But in his nineteenth year he had, as page ofthe con
fessor Quintana, been present at the coronation of Charles V.
at Bologna. His two earlier works on the Trinity (1531,
1532) were no sooner printed at Hagenau in Alsace by
Setzer, than they got into circulation throughout northern
Italy, and recruited his cause with numerous partisans. A
shrewd suspicion of this transpires in Melanchthon's letter
to the Venetians (1539), in the judicial examination of Ser
vetus at Geneva, and in the miserable apology for his con
duct which Calvin felt called upon to publish after the death
of his victim.^"
What then were the ideas propounded by Servetus ? On
the question of the Trinity, Servetus sets out with these two
axioms: i. That the nature of God is one and indivisible;
2. That the nature of God can only be subject to dispositiones
(modes of relation) and not to divisions. It follows that the
'° [There are two possible dates for the birth of Servetus at Tudela in
Navarre, 1509 aud 1511, each depending on his own sworn testimony;
but the evidence for 1 5 1 1 is cumulative and irresistible. His education
was Spanish and French (at Saragossa, Toulouse, Lyons, Paris and
Montpellier) ; none of it was Italian, excepting the education of travel,
in his pre-scientific period, to which also belong his brief residences at
Basel and Strassburg.]
3° Henri ToUin, Das Characterbild M. Servet's (1876). See Appendix
to the French translation by C. Dardier (1879), pp. 64, 65.

CHAPTER IV. 85
Persons of the Trinity are, in his view, only metamorphoses
of one and the same God. The Son is no other than the
Word of God, manifested in time, and not from all eternity.
The Holy Spirit is again God, communicating himself to
men by the ministry of angels.
With regard to Jesus of Nazareth, Servetus starts from the
point of view adopted by the English Unitarians, that his
humanity was in the strict sense real and historical ; and he
proves from the express words of Scripture, that the man
Jesus was at one and the same time the Christ or Messiah,
anointed with the Holy Spirit ; the Son of God, begotten in
time ; and God, by the fulness of the divine life which was
in him.
Thus, from the point of view of Servetus, it was not God
who had, so to speak, split and abased Himself in a hypos
tasis, of human form, called Jesus, which would be incom
patible with the unity of the Divine nature ; but it was the
raan Jesus who had been exalted and associated, on the
ground of his merits, with the Majesty Divine. In two
words, Christ is man by nature, God by the grace of the
Father. The whole of the Socinian Christology exists in
germ in this formula of Servetus.^^
These ideas, spread abroad by his books and by an active
correspondence, were rapidly disseminated at Mantua, Padua,
Vicenza, Venice, in the valleys of the Grisons, the Val Tel
lina, the Val Bregaglia or Bergell, and the Val di Poschiavo,
where numbers of exiled Italians had taken refuge. They
'^ Baur, Lehre von der Dreieinigkeil, vol. iii. 54 — 62 ff. [This account
of the Christology of Servetus must be received with some caution. It
is based, not on his riper teaching in the Christ. Rest. (1553), but solely
on the first (1531) stage of his opinions. And into this it imports
inferences which, so soon as they were drawn by his critics, Servetus
expressly rejected. F. P. Sozzini himself, who knew the early writings
of Servetus well, distinctly says : "Negamus Servetum fuisse progeni-
torem nostrum" {Opp. ii. 535), and gives good grounds for his denial.]

86 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
certainly were the subject of frequent discussions in those
secret conferences at Vicenza, which brought together in
1545— 1555 the ilite of Venetian Protestantism, and were
the cradle of modern Unitarianism.^^ So, on learning that
the author of the Dialogues on the Trinity (1532) and the
Christianismi Restitutio (1553) had, in 1553, been delivered
to the flames and burned at the stake by his pitiless adver
sary, nothing was heard throughout the camp of the Italian
Unitarians but a cry of indignation against Calvin. Gribaldo,
who had been unable to obtain audience of the " Pope of
Geneva," wrote a letter on the heroic martyr to the brethren
at Vicenza. Lelio Sozini did not conceal his grief; and
Camillo Renato addressed Calvin, in his beautiful Latin
poem, on the unjust burning of Servetus.'^ When their
turn came, the disciples of Servetus, tracked by the spies of
the Inquisition, had to leave Italy and take refuge in Swit
zerland (some time after 1547-48). But this very exile was
favourable to the development of Unitarian Christianity. Till
then, never knowing when the stroke of persecution might
fall, the Italian Unitarians had been content with vague
aspirations and with negations of established dogma. Hence
forth, in the freer air of the Alps, they will give precision to
their arguments and formulate their systems. We emerge
from the period of sterile agitations, to enter upon that of
rational conceptions.
^' Trechsel, vol. ii. app. i. [But in this Appendix, Trechsel, so far
from supporting, conclusively disproves the whole myth of these Vicenza
conferences.] '^ Trechsel, vol. i. app. iv.

CHAPTER V.
The Italian Reformed Churches in Switzerland. — Antitrinitarian
Controversies. — Relations with England.
I. The Reformation in the Italian Bailiwicks.
On the way from Italy into Switzerland, high up the
mountain beds of the Adda and the Ticino, beyond those
azure mirrors known as the Lago di Como and Lago Mag-
giore, on the southem slope of the Rhaetian Alps, we come
across the valleys known as the Val Tellina, Val Bregaglia,
Val di Lugano and Val Maggia. This region, exposed to
the rays of the southern sun, and sheltered from the winds
of the north by a screen of mountain peaks, suggests, by the
mildness of its climate and the richness of its productions,
a dream of the garden of Eden. In the hollow of the
vaUey are yet, as formerly, to be seen numerous flocks feed
ing in the verdant meadows. Half way up the mountain
sides, roads bordered by pomegranate and fig trees, inter
laced with vine branches, lead to the fertile fields which often
yield in one season two crops of barley, wheat or maize.
Higher still, laurels, Cyprus and chesnuts crown the amphi
theatre with their different shades of verdure. In the six
teenth century, this favoured region was inhabited by a
commercial and industrious population, of Latin race and
language, subject to the Bishopric of Como and the Duchy
of Milan. Here were a great number of Franciscan and
Dominican convents. Notwithstanding, from the remote
ness of the situation, a great number of heretics were also to
be found here, from the eighth to the eleventh century.

88 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
including the Waldenses, or " Poor men of Lyons," as they
were then often called.
At the opening of the sixteenth century, this privileged
district, which possessed, moreover, a high strategic import
ance as the key to communications between Germany and
Italy, fell into the hands of the Swiss, as if Providence had
resolved to prepare a refuge in time to come for exiles in
the cause of the gospel, fleeing from the bloodhounds of the
Roman Inquisition. The Grey League (Grisons), allied with
Massimihano Sforza against France, took from the latter the
counties of Bormio, Chiavenna and Val Telhna (vale of the
Upper Adda) ; while the twelve Swiss cantons received from
Sforza, as remuneration for the keys of his capital which
they had retaken (Oct 1512), the lordships of Lugano,
Locarno and Domo d'Ossola (vale of the Upper Ticino).
This last, it is true, was lost by the Swiss after the battle of
Marignano. Thus these Italian bailiwicks fell under two
different governments. The bailiwicks of the Upper Adda
were dependent on the three Grey Leagues, and were admi
nistered by Syndics or Podestas appointed by the general
Diet, which sat every two years, alternately at Curia (Chur
or Coire, chief town of the Lia da Ca De, House of God
League), at Davos (Tavau, chief town of the Lia Grischa or
Alta, Grey or Upper League), and at Glion (Ilanz, chief
town of the Lia deltas Desch Drettu7-as, Ten Jurisdictions'
League). On the other hand, the bailiwicks of the Upper
Ticino were governed by bailiffs or commissioners sent every
second year by the twelve cantons of Switzerland in turn.'
It had been expressly stipulated at the time of the transfer,
that the bailiwicks should retain their separate laws and
usages, and remain under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of
the Bishop of Como. These conditions were religiously

' Rosio de Porta, Historia Ecclesiarum Reformatarum Rhceticai-um:
Chur, 1770 — 1774.

CHAPTER V. 89
observed by the bailiffs, whether Swiss or Grison, who con
tented themselves with levying an annual tribute on the
revenues of these rich valleys. But it was impossible .to
prevent the Reformation ideas, when they had broken out
in Switzerland, from penetrating into these Italian bailiwicks
by the assistance of a more liberal legislation on the subject
of religion.
It was at the Diet of Ilanz (1526) and that of Davos (1544)
that the statutes were passed which determined the Grison
legislation on the subject of worship, and favoured the deve
lopment of the Reformation in the Italian bailiwicks, while
at the same time guarding its development from the divarica
tions inseparable from every political or religious crisis. At
Ilanz, it was enacted that every individual of either sex and
every condition, in the territory of the Confederation of the
Three Leagues, should be permitted to choose and profess
either the Catholic or the Evangelical creed, and that no
one should be allowed, under severe penalties, to reproach
another on account of his religion, whether in private or in
public. Furthermore, an old law was revived and enforced,
according to which ministers were forbidden to teach any
thing except what was contained in the Old and New Tes
taments, or could be proved thence ; and the parish priests
were enjoined to devote themselves assiduously to the study
ofthe Holy Scriptures, the only rule of faith and morals. ^
Later on, at Davos, it was decreed that the Protestants of
the Italian bailiwicks should have the right of maintaining
pastors for themselves and their families at their own charge ;
and free right of asylum was accorded to exiles in the cause
of religion, on condition that they paid caution money, and
conformed to the faith of the national Church.
These arrangements, liberally conceived for the sixteenth
century, were highly honourable to the deputies of the Grison
2 M'Crie, utsup., pp. 357, 368.

90 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Republic, and powerfully assisted in the dissemination of the
gospel, effected by the exertions of Biveroni (Tutschet) and
Comander (Dorfmann), Fabriz and Saluz, the Reformers of
the Grisons.
On the other hand, in the Ticinese bailiwicks, depending
on the Twelve Cantons (seven Catholic and five Protestant),
the administration of the law of public worship was more
arbitrary and variable, in consequence of the biennial charge
of bailiffs, delegated now by a Catholic, now by a Protestant
canton. Nevertheless, the influence of magistrates so devoted
to the gospel as Jakob Werdmiiller of Ziirich (1530 — 1532),
and Joachim Baeldi of Glarus(iS42), the distributor of Bibles,
could not be effaced by all the Inquisitors in the world.
The great obstacle, however, to the Evangelical propaganda
in these districts was the difference of language. The people
spoke an Italian dialect, of which the Swiss commissioners
and preachers knew not a word. In the Grisons the difficulty
was still greater, for here four different tongues were spoken,
German, Italian, Latin and Romani. A further difficulty
was the lack of candidates for the ministry. Hence the
arrival of the Protestant refugees from Italy was hailed with
an enthusiasm such as would have greeted a reinforcement
of picked troops at the critical moment of a battie. With
good reason were these refugees from the Roman Inquisition
received with open arms. For it was theirs to be the true
missionaries of Protestantism in Latin Switzerland ; yea
more, in their religious consciousness they bore with them
two prophetic principles — the one, the Personal Unity of
God ; the other, salvation, not by faith in book or rite, but
by the spirit of Christ that maketh alive.
The road which the greater part of these exiles followed
passed through Chiavenna, a small town situated at the
entrance of the Val Bregaglia (formeriy Praegallia) ; thence
they reached the Engadine, arriving at Chur by the Julier-
Alp, and at Ziirich by the valleys of the Rhine and the Seez.

CHAPTER V. 91
Between 1542 and 1550, these wild gorges saw more than
two hundred refugees passing on their way. By 1559, their
number had risen to eight hundred, and it continued to
increase up to the closing years of the sixteenth century.
The first Italian evangelist of the Val Bregaglia was a
certain Bartolommeo Maturo, formerly prior of a convent of
Dominicans at Cremona, who had been led to the gospel by
witnessing the secret vices of the cloister, and the sham
miracles performed by his fellow-monks. He was preacher
during eighteen years (1530 — 1547) at Vicosoprano, where
he was succeeded by the restless Pierpaolo A'ergerio. This
man, who had been Bishop of Capo d'Istria and Papal
legate in Germany, could never tie himself to any settled
abode. We find him by turns at Chiavenna, at Zurich, at
Basel, and at length at Tubingen, preaching in season and
out of season, crying up one set of people, blackening ano
ther, and holding but one fixed idea, namely, to make war
on Antichrist, that is to say the Pope, with volleys of pam
phlets, which he got printed at Basel or at Poschiavo, and
spread throughout the Milanese territory by means of his
friends at Locarno and Chiavenna.^
The Val di Poschiavo, which unites the "\"al Tellina to
the Engadine by the Bemina Pass, had as its missionary,
between 1540 and 1570, Giulio di Milano, a doctor of theo
logy and distinguished preacher, converted by Valdes. He
had been thrown into the dungeons of the Inquisition at
Venice. It was on his behalf that Bernardino Ochino up
lifted his voice, in a Predica delivered in that city in 1542.*
He had been so fortunate as to make his escape, and
devoted all his talents and the remainder of his life to the
' Meyer, utsup., vol. i. 51, 61.
¦* He must be carefiilly distinguished from Giulio Terenziano, who was
from Florence, and the faithful companion of Pietro Martire Vermigli at
Strassburg, London and Zinich.

92 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
evangelisation of Poschiavo and the adjacent towns, Tirano
and Teglio, in the Val Tellina. Through his aid, Rodolfo
Landolfi established a printing-press at Poschiavo, which
rendered great .services to the cause of the evangelisation of
the Grisons, and to that of the antipapal polemic in Italy.
From this press came the first Protestant works issued in
the Romani language, namely, Biveroni's translations of
Comander's German Catechism and of the New Testament,
with the Psalms in verse. So much dreaded was this print
ing establishment by the Roman Catholics, that, during the
negociations entered into by Spain and the Holy See with
the Grey Leagues on the subject of the passage of the allied
forces through the Val Tellina (1561), the envoys of the
Pope demanded its suppression.^
Chiavenna, as we have seen, was the head-quarters of the
Italian refugees. Situated a little to the north-east of the
Lago di Como, on the Mera, a tributary of the Adda, and at
the entrance of the Val Bregaglia, this town was the nearest
haven of refuge out of Italy, and offered a safe shelter to
those shipwrecked in the great storm of persecution. From
about 1539, we find there Agostino Mainardo, an ex- Augus
tinian of Saluzzo and Doctor of Theology, whose preaching
had made him suspected of a Lutheran tendency. He had
been heartily welcomed by the Pestalozzi and de Salis fami
hes, who were already in sympathy with the Reformation.
Around him soon gathered about a hundred Protestants,
among whom were such men as Camillo Renato, Lodovico
Castelvetro, the brothers Leho and Camillo Sozini, Francesco
Negri and Lodovico Fieri. In 1544, thanks to the Statute
of Davos, the little community was enabled to establish
itself in the chapel of Santa Maria del Paterino, granted by
the proprietor of the soil, Ercole de Salis. The church con
tinued to grow, in spite of a good many quarrels, partiy due

^ M'Crie, p. 3S2.

CHAPTER V.

93

to Mainardo's negligence, and his susceptibility of temper.
He remained its pastor until his death in 1563, and was
succeeded by Girolamo Zanchi, the Hebraist.
While thus at Chiavenna the Reformed Church enjoyed
the protection of the Grison laws, that of Locarno was ex
posed to all the mischief-making of the bailiffs delegated by
Catholic cantons. A certain Giovanni Beccaria, no more
than a schoolmaster of the Franciscans at Locarno, became
the modest and indefatigable instrument of the Evangelical
movement in that town. Converted by reading the Bible
and the writings of Zwingli and Bullinger, he entered, about
1544, into correspondence with Conrad Pellican, who had
also belonged to the Order of St Francis. He had procured,
too, the delivery of some evangelical sermons, the preacher
being a compatriot and brother monk, Benedetto, rector 01
the Franciscans at Bologna. Through the affection he in
spired in his pupils, quite as much as by his private converse,
he had won many souls for Christ. Among his more dis
tinguished pupils were Lodovico Ronco, student of law,
and his friend Taddeo Duno, student of medicine ; and
among the friends of the gospel were representatives ot
some ofthe best families, e.g. Giovanni and Martino Muralto,
the one practising as a physician in the town, the other, a
Doctor of Laws and advocate ; with the high-born Milanese
gentlemen, Varnerio Castiglione and Antonio Maria Besozzo,
formerly tutor to the son of Count Filiberto di Masserano."
These evangelical communities, directed in the period
1544 — 1562 by Italian preachers, most of whom had formerly
belonged to religious orders, but who had received no regular
instruction or ordination for their new work, enjoyed a high
degree of independence. In principle they had adopted the
Presbyterian organisation which prevailed in the other parts
of Switzerland. As a final court of appeal they acknowledged
* Meyer, ut sup., p. 388.

94 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
the authority of the General Synod of the Grisons,^ which
met at Chur in the month of June each year, from 1537,
and which had promulgated in 1551 the Rhastic Confession
of Faith. ^ In point of fact, however, the representative
church sessions, set over each separate church, were auto
nomous ; they alone had the right of nominating and dis
missing pastors.* It is easy to see how favourable was this
soil for the development of the Antitrinitarian opposition,
which dates from the same period, 1544 — 1562.'
It was in the Lower Engadine and the Val di Poschiavo
that the first symptoms of it made their appearance. Fran
cesco of Calabria, pastor at Fettan, and Girolamo Marliano
of Milan, pastor of Lavin, who claimed to be disciples of
Ochino, and who, without doubt, had like him belonged to
the Capuchin Order, pushed the doctrine of predestination
to the point of making God the author of evil, and reached
the verge of moral indifferentism. Having to defend himself
in 1544, in a public discussion at Siis, against Philipp Saluz,
professor at the seminary of Chur, Francesco fell into the
other extreme. He made the grace of God the real and
supreme cause of redemption, reducing the work of Christ
to a merely instrumental position, as the secondary cause.
In this there was still only a subordinationist tendency.
But with another preacher, Tiziano, this tendency reached
the verge of the denial of the Trinity and of the divinity of
Jesus Christ. According to Tiziano, the Holy Spirit is the
prime mover in the work of redemption. Jesus was born of

¦^ Trechsel, ut sup., vol. ii. 121. Cf. De Porta, i. 2, p. 197.
8 [The rights of patrons were vested in the church sessions.]
' Nine of these Grisons churches still exist, Brusio, Poschiavo,
Casaccia, Vicosoprano, Stampa, Soglio, Bondo, Castasegna, Bivio. In
1880 they reckoned 23S4 members. They have discarded the Helvetic
Confession, and most of their pastors are liberal. See Free Ch. Monthly,
Dec. 1883.

CHAPTER V. 95
a human father and mother, and became the Saviour of men
only because he was filled with the Spirit of God.'"
Tiziano, who was but an itinerant preacher, and who had
gained several adherents in the Val Tellina and Val di Pos
chiavo, was cited before the Grison Synod, convicted of having
revived the heresies of the Ebionites and of Helvidius,'^
and obliged, under pain of death, to make a humiliating
recantation (June, 1554). Thereafter he was beaten with
rods at the several cross-ways in Chur, and banished for
ever from the territory of the Three Leagues. This sentence,
which to us appears harsh, was very mild in the eyes of the
orthodox of that day, with whom the penalty of death against
heretics was almost an article of faith ; and the good Philipp
Saluz thought himself bound to apologise, in a letter to
Bullinger, for not having burned this emulator of Servetus. '^
It was also in the name of the Holy Spirit that Camillo,
who styled himself Renato, protested against the attribution
of a supernatural character to the Sacraments, and against
the dogma of vicarious satisfaction through the merits of
Jesus Christ. Camillo, by birth a Sicilian, after having
suffered much in Italy in the cause ofthe gospel, 1542, had
taken refuge with his friends Curione and Stancaro in the
Val Tellina, where he filled the office of tutor successively at
Tirano and at Caspan ; where, through his knowledge of
Latin literature, as well as his pious and retiring character,
he stood high in the good graces of the powerful family of
the Pallavicini. Cautious in temperament, he first touched
the discussion in a correspondence with Bullinger on the

1" De Porta, i. 2, pp. 70, 78.
" [A layman at Rome at the end of the fourth century, who taught
that the brethren of Jesus were later-born sons of Mary, and thus denied
her perpetual virginity.]
^^ Trechsel, ut sup., vol. ii. 83, 84.

96 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
meaning of the two Sacraments. In his eyes they had no
value except as a testimony of our faith and of Christian
love. Hence he denied the value of Cathohc baptism ;
questioned whether there was any use in employing in
baptism the triple formula; and expressed a wish for the
revival of communions in the form of agapce (love-feasts).
But, once settled at Chiavenna (from 1545) in a circle
where he was surrounded with more ardent sympathisers,
he openly attacked the doctrine of redemption. With him,
as with Tiziano, Christ possessed no expiatory or sacrificial
merit. He suffered to expiate the original sin in himself,
which made him fallible ; and the service which he did for
us was to reveal to us the way of salvation. But the true
Redeemer is the Holy Spirit of God, working in man and
transforming him into a new creature. Before this new birth,
man is but a miserable being, destitute of reason and even
of immortality ; only after it is he reconciled with God and
destined to eternal hfe.'^ These theories, which tended by
imphcation to the denial of the second person of the Trinity,
and to the Socinian conception of redemption, found a
violent adversary in Mainardo, one of the two pastors of
Chiavenna, who drew up a special Confession of Faith,
which he required every member of his flock to sign, with a
view to exclude Renato and his adherents. After lengthy
controversies, which were carried before the Synod of Chur,
and in which Vergerio did not fail to put in his restiess
finger, Camillo Renato was excommunicated, and withdrew
to Traona, in the Val Tellina. But, keeping up relations
with Curione, Francesco Negri and Stancaro, he continued
to exercise a marked influence over the younger theologians,
including Lelio Sozini, his friend, and Gianandrea Pallavicini,
his pupil (Sept 1554). From Traona it was that he
launched against Calvin that imprecation in Latin verse
'' Trechsel, ut sup., vol. ii. 85 ff.

CHAPTER V. 97
on the subject of the execution of Servetus, which is one of
the most eloquent of pleas for religious toleration, i*
Traces of Camillo Renato's ideas may clearly be discerned
in the last Antitrinitarian controversy which we shall mention
in connection with the Italian bailiwicks. It was started
about 1558 by two ministers of Chiavenna, Pietro Leone
and Lodovico Fieri, in conjunction with Girolamo Turriano,
pastor at Plurs, and Michel-Angelo Florio, aforetime pastor
in London, then at Soglio. These theologians followed
Renato in denying the doctrine of vicarious satisfaction
through the merits of Jesus Christ ; this they did in the
name ofthe Scripture, which says not a word of the doctrine;
and they assigned the leading part in redemption to the
grace of God, who has declared and accepted the sacrifice
of Jesus Christ as a sufficient expiation for our sins. What
contributed yet more to recommend their theory was, that
they professed to know, through the brothers of Lelio Sozini,
members of the church at Chiavenna, that Ochino shared
this way of looking at the matter ; and it is a fact that the
celebrated Capuchin adopted the acceptationist point of
view. Cited by the irritable Mainardo before the Synod at
Chur, these ministers endeavoured to obtain support of the
Ziirich theologians. To this end they addressed to them
(24 May, 1561) a series of twenty-six questions, propounded
with great elevation of sentiment, and rather with the object
of protesting against constraint in matters of faith, than of
setting out a statement of their own peculiar views. The
real tendency of these may be judged by the following
specimens :
"Art. 4. — Whether it will not avail more for the attainment
of eternal salvation, to adore in silence the most holy mystery of
the Trinity, than rashly to speak of it otherwise than the holy
writings teach, and according to the various opinions of men ?
" Trechsel, ut sup., vol. i. app. iv,
h'

98 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM,
" Art. 5.— Whether, for the attainment of etemal life, a clearer
or sharper understanding of the most holy Trinity is necessary
for us, than that which is transmitted to us by the Holy Spirit
in the divine writings ?
" Art 6.— Whether the ministers and teachers of the churches
of God may compel the simple and unskilful, under pain of
deprivation of the Lord's Supper, to employ, when they discuss
the most holy Trinity, other words and terms (by them ill under
stood) than those which, in the sacred writings, the Holy Spirit
uses ?
" Art. 20. — Whether any one should be excommunicated, as
an obstinate and convicted heretic, for simple error in the article
ofthe Trinity (whose most sacred mystery is hardly comprehended
by the angels), however much, in all other respects, he be of
blameless doctrine and life, yea adorned with most laudable
morals, and the greatest charity towards the poor?"i°
It is obvious that the drift of these interrogations was,
without calling in question the dogma of the Trinity, to pass
over the topic in silence, as being external to Scripture, and
as doing more harm than good to the salvation of souls.
But the confession of Lodovico Fieri, at the Synod of
Chur, was quite another thing in the way of explicitness.
He asked for a discussion on Article 20, above; and declared
that, for his part, he differed from the church of Chiavenna
on the three following points. He did not believe (i) that
Jesus was the Eternal Son of the Father; (2) that he was
equal with God ; (3) that he was the creator of the world.
These declarations were undisguisedly Antitrinitarian ; hence
the members of the Synod at Chur, less tolerant than the
theologians of Ziirich, confirmed the excommunication of
Lodovico Fieri and Pietro Leone.^^
But the progress of true ideas is not to be arrested by
excommunication, any more than by martyrdom ; and these
'^ Queestiones Ministrorum Ecclesiarum quce sunt apud Rhatos.
Trechsel, vol. ii. app. v. See Appendix V,
^^ Trechsel, vol. ii. 131.

CHAPTER V, 99
doctrines, banished from the Val Tellina, were destined to
make their way in England.
2. The Italian Church at Geneva.
Picturesque and smiling as were these valleys of Bregaglia,
Tellina, and the Engadine, they did not offer sufficient
intellectual, much less sufficient theological food, to satisfy
that ardent hunger and thirst for religious truth which
animated the Italian Protestants. So, while a majority of
the refugees remained in these localities, the flower of them
only passed through, and proceeded to settle, as far as this
was possible to a race so mercurial and enterprising, in
the great evangelical centres of Switzerland and Alsace, at
Geneva and Ziirich, Basel and Strassburg.'^
It was at Geneva (1542) that the first Italian church was
gathered together. A certain number of Italians, such as
the Lifforti and Delia Riva families, had been domiciled
there for some time back, brought thither by intercourse with
Savoy and the business of commerce.'^ But the first arrestb
of the Roman Inquisition cast as it were a flood of emigrants
on Geneva, bringing introductions to Calvin from the duchess
of Ferrara, or from Aonio Paleario.'" To the city which
had banished him three years previously, Calvin had in fact
gone back as its master ; and his Ecclesiastical Ordinances,
accepted by the vote of 2nd January, 1542, and enforced
with a will of iron, made Geneva a kind of holy city, a new
Zion, where the sound of games and feasts had given place
to sermons, catechising, and singing of psalms.
Geneva beheld the flower of Protestantism thronging
'' Calvini Opera, vol. ix. 441 (Letter from Bullinger to Vadian, 19
December, 1542).
'* Galiffe, Le Refuge Italien de Genhie: Geneva, 1881, p. 56.
¦" J. G. Schelhorn, Amanitates Historice Ecclesiastica et Litterarice :
Frankfort, 1737 — 1740, vol. i. 462. H 2

IGO SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
within her walls, from Piedmont, Tuscany and the Venetian
territory. Among them were Alciati, Castelvetro, the Balbani
and Buriamacchi from Lucca, Caracciolo and Martinengo
(Oct 1542). At their head, towering above them with his
crown of whitened hair, and with the splendour of his
oratorical renown, appeared Bernardino Ochino of Siena.
The eloquent general of the Capuchins, converted by the
gentie and penetrating power of Valdes, had continued to
preach salvation through Christ, under the veil of mysticism.
But his generous protest, at Venice, against the incarceration
of Giulio di Milano, had betrayed him. Summoned before
the fiery tribunal, he had fled ; at the age of fifty-five sacri
ficing everything, glory and fatherland, to the dictates of his
conscience. Calvin received him with the respect due to
his age and character, and supported his application to the
council for the grant of a place of worship for his fellow-
countrymen. The Genevese magistrates granted them, 23rd
Oct 1542, the use of Cardinal Ostia's chapel, called the
Chapel of the Maccabees, adjoining the cathedral of St.
Peter. ^^ From November 1542 to 1545, Ochino had the
joy of preaching the gospel with perfect frankness in his
mother tongue. To this period belong the later volumes
of his Prediche, printed in Italian and Latin at Geneva in
1542— 1544, and continued at Basle, 1544 — 1549- He men
tions also and commends, in one of his letters, an explanation
of the Catechism which was given every Sunday ; and the
congregational service, a sort of conference, in which each
member had the right of bringing forward what the Holy
Spirit suggested to him, after the example of the Apostolic
Church.^' Although there were two other preachers among the Italian
^'' Registers ofthe Cou-ncil, 23 Oct. 1542.
'^ Prediche di Bernardino Ochino da Siena : Geneva, 1542, Sermon i.
§ 10.

CHAPTER V. IOI
refugees, at Geneva, one of whom was named Girolamo di
Melfi, it appears that, after the departure of Ochino for
Basel and Strassburg, public worship in Italian suffered a
temporary interruption. But in 1552, on the arrival of
Galeazzo Caracciolo, Marquis deVico, and under his auspices,
it was resumed, and placed under the direction of Lattanzio
Ragnone, former master in the college of San Frediano at
Lucca, and friend of Vermigli ; with him, soon afterwards,
was joined Count Celso Massimiliano Martinengo of Brescia,
(1553—1579-) At first the Italians held their revived services in the hall
ofthe old College de Rive, and afterwards at the Madeleine.
In 1555 the council granted the Italians the use of the
Madeleine Chapel and that of the Auditoire alternately; and
in the following year, the Italian Church was organised on
the Geneva model. It had a church session {collegio), com
posed of the two pastors, four elders {seniori), and four
deacons {diaconi). The Marquis de Vico was chosen one of
the elders, and during thirty years filled this office, with a
devotedness and fidelity the more remarkable from his being
exposed to many temptations and importunities on the part
of his father, wife and children, who remained at Naples in
the bosom of the Church.'-^ There was also a catechist and
a precentor.^^ This community afforded a rallying-point also for the
Spanish refugees, among whom were Juan Perez de Pineda,
Cassiodoro de Reyna, and Juan Diaz, assassinated in 1546;
they were too few in number to form a separate church.^*
It was during the ministry of Martinengo and Ragnone that
the Antitrinitarian controversy broke out in Geneva. It is
^'^ Bulletin du Protestantisme Franfais, 2 sen, vol. iv., art. by Jules
Bonnet on the Marquis de Vico. Cf. Vincentio Buriamacchi, Memorie
diverse delle Chiese Italiane (1650), MS. in the Archives of Geneva.
^^ Galiffe, ut sup., pp. 37 — 39. ^* Ibid. p. 71.

I02 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
well known that, years before this, the first books of Servetus
on the Trinity had penetrated into Switzerland and Italy,
and had been much read (1539); but when the Spaniard
despatched to Calvin the manuscript (1546) of his forth
coming Clii-istianismi Restitutio, he unconsciously kindled a
conflagration which was not to be extinguished.
In this his last work (printed 1553) the physician of
Vienne sought to reconcile the elements of truth in the
Catholic tradition with the evangelical dogmata. He com
pleted his theory of the Logos, only roughly drafted in his
first two works, and propounded his special views on adult
baptism and the millennial reign. The Logos, in his eyes,
is the ideal Divine Reason, which, after having created the
world, and clothed itself in different forms or masks {persotiis),
found at length its perfect incarnation in Jesus of Nazareth
alone. The Word and the Spirit are two modes of varied
revelation of one and the same divine substance. Thus
Servetus, not daring boldly to substitute the perfect humanity
of Christ for his divinity, fell into Sabellianism.^^
But, in place of meeting it with a courteous return, Calvin
kept the manuscript and sent a harsh rebuke to its author.
Nay, so soon as it was printed, he authorised a French
gentleman, Guillaume de Trye, to communicate extracts
from it to the Inquisitor at Lyons, who had the author
arrested as a suspected heretic. All the world knows what
followed ; how Servetus only escaped from the prison of the
episcopal palace at Vienne, to fall a victim at the pyre of
Champel. He expired in the midst of the flames, invoking
the mercy of "Jesus, Son ofthe Eternal God."
This tragic and undeserved end excited a lively indigna
tion in the bosom of the Italian Church at Geneva, among

^¦' Baur, Die Christliche Lehre von der Dreieinigkeil. Cf. A. Gordon,
Miguel Serveto-y- Reves, in Theological Review, April and July, 1878.
[According to Sen-etus, the perfect humanity of Christ is his divinity.]

CHAPTER V. 103
all the refugees in Switzerland. While David Joris despatched
from Basel his appeal to the Swiss towns in favour of
tolerance, and Camillo Renato directed his apostrophe to
Calvin, Matteo Gribaldo, Bernardino Ochino, and Lelio
Sozini did not conceal their grief. ^^
Matteo Gribaldo, professor of law at the University of
Padua, and lord of Farges in the district of Gex, not having
been able to obtain audience of Calvin, resolved, shortly
after the execution of Servetus, to make reprisal. The
congregational usage of the discussion society, which the
Italian Church had borrowed from the Reformed Church at
Geneva, afforded him an excellent opportunity for pro
pounding his ideas on the Trinity. Maintaining respect for
the objective notion of the Trinity, he conceived of the
three Persons in the following way. The Father, the Son
and the Holy Spirit were, in his eyes, three distinct divine
hypostases (constituent personalities) ; while with Servetus
they were but modes of manifestation of one and the same
Person.^^ There was, however, in Gribaldo's view, no other
relationship between the Persons but that of species ; the
Son and the Holy Spirit were two varieties of the species
God, subordinated to the Father. Gribaldo struck against
the rock directly opposed to the position of Servetus ; he fell
into tritheism ; and even thereby he prepared the way for a
Unitarian Christology.^^
In fact, after the exile of Gribaldo, who was pursued by
the theological hatred of Calvin as far as Tiibingen, where
he had been appointed professor, Gianpaolo Alciati, a Pied
montese officer, and Giorgio Biandrata, a physician from

^ Benrath, ut sup., p. 217.
^' [Say, rather. Being; Servetus never appUes the t&na. persona to the
Deus in se, the unmanifested God. ]
^ Trechsel, vol. ii. 282 — 300. [Gribaldo's own terminology contains
no trace of a doctrine of " varieties of the species God. "]

I04 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Saluzzo, continued the discussion. They maintained that
the traditional dogma of the Trinity was contrary to holy
Scripture and to reason, denied the duality of natures in
Christ, and held, on the authority of the Bible and the
episties of Ignatius, that Jesus Christ, though very God and
very man, experienced death in his whole being on the
cross, and consequently was inferior to the Father.'^"
Valentino Gentile of Cosenza in Calabria, a tutor, and
Silvestro Telio, a refugee from Rome, and friend of Betti,
shared these Antitrinitarian views, and defended them with
a perseverance worthy of a better fate. They found apolo
gists also among several ladies of the Italian congregation.
Now this opposition, stronger in talent than in numbers,
gave much trouble to the two pastors, and one of them,
Martinengo, who had himself, shortly before, given in to
the Sabellian tendencies of Renato and Pallavicini, adjured
Calvin, from his death-bed, to take pity on his flock, and
preserve it from the artifices of these unquiet spirits. So
Calvin, in concert with Lattanzio Ragnone (d. i6 Feb. 1559),
the surviving pastor, compiled on 18 May, 1558, a Confes
sion of Faith, which so defined the dogma of the Trinity
and the divinity of Jesus Christ, as to exclude at the same
time the heresy of Servetus and the error, in the contrary
sense, of Biandrata, Gentile and Gribaldo.'"
This Confession, maturely deliberated, and adopted in
public session, was signed by all the members of the Italian
Church, except perhaps Biandrata, Alciati, and Francesco of
Padua. Six others, Telio, Porcellino, Rustici, Gentile, Pele-
rino and Nicolao Gallo, scrupled at it in the first instance.
These latter, however, after three days' hesitation, decided

'° Trechsel, vol. ii. 303 — 315.
'" Ibid. vol. ii. 312, 313. Cf. M'Crie, Reformation in Spain, pp.
351 ft-

CHAPTER V.

105

to subscribe it without reserve.^' But Valentino Gentile,
secretly encouraged in his heresies by Gribaldo, was arrested
and condemned to death as a heretic and a perjurer. As
he recanted, he was released from the death penalty. He
retired at that time to the district of Gex, afterwards to
Grenoble and Lyons, where he published his Antidoia.
Subsequentiy he went to Poland with Alciati and Biandrata,
who both remained there. But Gentile, having had the
imprudence to return to Switzerland, was retaken at Gex by
the most high and puissant lords of Bern ; and, this time,
refusing to accord absolute divinity to the Son, he was
beheaded (10 Sept 1566). Thus tragically perished the last
mover of the Trinitarian controversies in the Italian Church
at Geneva. 3. The Italian Church at ZiIrich.
From 1525, Ziirich was considered by the Protestants of
the Milanese district as the "city set on a hill" spoken of in
the gospel, from which the light of Jesus Christ was destined
to rise on those who were plunged in darkness. It was to
Zwingh, the valiant chaplain of the Swiss troops in Italy,
that those of the laity or of the religious orders who hungered
and thirsted for truth and liberty, directed their gaze. An
Augustinian of Como, Egidio k Porta, wrote (1525) to
Zwingli, praying him to deliver him from the Pelagian errors
in which he pined, and to teach him the true doctrine
of Christ.'^ Somewhat later, a Carmelite of Locarno, Bal
dassare Fontana, asked the Evangelical Cantons to send him
the writings of the "divine" Zwingli, of Luther, and of
^' Archives of Geneva, Prods Criminels, ist series. No. 746. See
Appendix VI. [See also Fazy, Proces de Valentin Gentilis et de Nicolas
Gallo, 187S.]
^^ Meyer, ut sup., vol. I. 137. Cf. Zwinglii Opera, ut sup., vol. vii.
¦447-

Io6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
CEcolampadius ; supplicating them in a touching manner
" not to refuse him, a poor Lazarus, the crumbs that fell
from the master's table. "=*' Varnerio Castiglione, a high-born
Milanese gentieman, Beccaria, rector of the school at Locarno,
and the members particularly of the Order of St. Francis,
preferred to have recourse to their former fellow-labourer,
Conrad Pellican, as a member of the fraternity who had
been emancipated by Biblical research. The hospitable
abode of this learned Hebrew professor at Ziirich speedily
became a refuge for the most distinguished of these refugees.
^Ve shall find there, in succession, Beccaria and Castiglione,
Lelio Sozini and Pietro Martire Vermigli. ^^ Bullinger, in
his turn, also received several Italian fugitives, including
Ochino' (Dec. 1542).'^ Up to that date they were but few
in number. But, in May 1555, a veritable caravan of
emigrants entered Ziirich. It was the entire church of
Locarno, with scarcely an exception (120 to 180 souls),
which had quitted its sunny home rather than abjure the
faith of the gospel. Vainly had they appealed to the trea
ties which guaranteed a freedom of worship in the Italian
baihwicks ; vainly had they presented a Confession of Faith
in strict conformity with the Apostles' Creed and those of
the Oicumenical Councils. The arbitrary decree passed
(18 Nov. 1554) at Baden in the Aargau must take its course,
and all that the Ziirich bailiff, Johann Rauchlin, had been able
to do, was to allow them the respite necessary for realising
their property, and to recommend them to the Christian
love of his fellow-citizens. The heads of the principal
patrician families of Locarno led the way : Martino Muralto,
33 Meyer, ut sup., vol. i. 127.
'^ Concerning the evangelical tendencies of a great number of Fran
ciscans, see Meyer, vol. i., notes 66 and 72.
^^ Calvini Opera, vol. xi. 441 (Letter from Bullinger to Vadian, already
quoted).

CBAPTER V. 107
doctor of laws, Taddeo Duno, doctor of medicine, Barto
lommeo Orelh, notary public, with their wives. Among
those of the middle class may be mentioned the names of
Appiano, Ronco, and Clara Orella, wife of Besozzo.^'' After
having provided for their material wants, the Ziirich magis
trates granted them the use of the Church of St. Peter for
worship in Italian, and invited them to choose a pastor.
Beccaria having declined their call, on account of insuf
ficient theological culture, their unanimous choice fell upon
Ochino, who had already exercised pastoral functions with
universal acceptance at Geneva (1542 — 1545), at Augsburg
(1545 — 1547), and in London (1548 — 1553), and who had
acquired a great reputation by his writings.
The exiles from Locarno had elected a church session,
composed of four elders (soon afterwards increased to six,
out of respect to Vermigli and another refugee of distinction).
Two of them, Martino Muralto and Lelio Sozini, were deputed
to carry the letter of invitation to Ochino, who was then
with his family at Basel. A few weeks later, Ochino preached
his first sermon at Zurich. The arrival, in the following
year, of his old friend Vermigli, summoned to succeed
Pellican in the chair of Hebrew, was a doubly-prized acces
sion; since it brought to Ochino the counsels of a tried
friendship, and the assistance of a colleague who filled his
place in the pulpit whenever he was absent or ill.^^
During the eight years of Ochino's ministry at Ziirich, he
did more than discharge his pastoral functions with an inde
fatigable devotion, preaching, consoling the afflicted, opening
his house to exiles, including Acontius and Betti (1557), and
36 Meyer, ut sup., vol. ii. passim, and Appendix vii. to vol. i.
'' Benrath, ut sup., pp. 225, 240. It was a Locarnian named Filippo
Appiano who was appointed to fetch Ochino's family, which had remained
at Basel, and to house them at Zurich in the bailiff's residence of the
Riitli convent, which had been allotted as a manse for the minister of
the Italian church.

I08 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM,
visiting widows, for instance Isabella Manriquez and her
son, old friends belonging to the Valdes circle. He dis
played, in addition, a theological productiveness truly mar
veUous, when it is remembered that he was sixty-eight years
of age at the time of his call to Ziirich. It was in this city
that he composed his dialogue on Purgatory (translated into
German by the son of Zwingli) ; his treatise on the Lords
Supper, in answer to the attacks of the Lutheran doctor
^^'estphal on the Sacramentarians ; his Labyrintfu, a disser
tation on free-will and predestination, dedicated to Queen
Elizabeth of England; his Catechism, for the use of his
parishioners; and, finally, his Thirty Dialogues, on the
Messiah, the Trinity, &c. (Basel, 1563)-^^
Since the death of Servetus nothing so bold had appeared
on these burning questions as the last-named work, in two
volumes. In the first, Ochino refutes the various objections
brought against the Messiahship and the redeeming work of
Christ, putting them into the mouth of a Jew named Jacob.
Even at this stage, considering the sharpness with which the
objections are presented, one is tempted to ask if the author
does not rather share the opinion of the Jew than that of
the Christian. But in the second volume, dedicated to
Prince Mikolaj Radziwill, Ochino clearly betrays a tendency
to place the strongest arguments against the Trinity in the
mouth of the opponent, in such wise that the reader may be
led to agree with him.
It required some courage on Ochino's part to propound
his doubts concerning this most sacred dogma, even under
the indirect method of dialogue. The unanimity with which
the Swiss theologians had approved the execution of Servetus,
should have forewarned him that the Athanasian Creed was
not to be lightly treated with impunity. But he knew, as
the motto he placed on the title-page of earlier works
^* Benrath, ut sup., pp. 245, 264.

CHAPTER V. 109
indicates, that " Truth overcometh all" {omnia vincit Veritas,
I Esd. iii. 12) ; and he was ready, like his divine Master, to
suffer persecution in this holy cause.
Denounced to the Zurich magistracy by a merchant of
the town, who had heard the book spoken of at the Basel
fair,^^ and abandoned by his colleagues of the Zwinglian
church, Ochino was condemned to exile, without even being
allowed to defend himself A widower, accompanied by
four children, he set forth on his journey of exile, in the
depth of winter, at the age of seventy-six. After having
been repulsed in succession from Basel, Miihlhausen, Niirn
berg, and even from Krakow, and having lost three children,
owing to sickness and privation, he succumbed beneath the
weight of so many insults and sorrows, and died at Slavkov
in Moravia (1564). His martyrdom had lasted nearly a
year. But, by his preaching and his writings, he had brought
light to the minds of many who entertained his doctrines, at
Geneva, Basel, Augsburg, London, Ziirich, and the Val
Tellina. Among these must be mentioned that devoted
member of the church of Locarno, Antonio Maria Besozzo,
of whom we have so frequently spoken, and who in the
following year was also excommunicated, and expelled from
Ziirich as being tainted with the heresies of Servetus and
Ochino (1565). He raised aloft the banner of Unitarianism
at Basel, which had been struck down by the Trinitarians at
Ziirich.*" ^ [The portion which excited popular clamour was the polygamy
dialogue (xxi.); but, in their second report to the Senate, the Ziirich
ministers specify also the tendency of the book to cast doubts on the
Trinity, the divinity of Christ, and the necessity of atonement. ]
¦"> Trechsel, vol. ii. 272—276. Cf. Meyer, vol. ii. 156—195. Besozzo
was followed to Basel by many Locamese famihes (Appiano, Rosalino,
Versasca).

IIO SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
4. The Italian Church at Basel ; Focus of Anti-
Calvinist Opposition.
The Church of Basel, thanks to the liberty at that time
enjoyed by the imperial cities, had assumed an independent
attitude towards the two opposite poles of Reformed Switzer
land, Geneva and Ziirich. Under the leadership of CEcolam
padius, Oswald Myconius, and above all of Simon Sulzer,
moderator {antistes) of the presbytery, it had entered into
friendly relations with the Lutheran churches of South
Germany, Augsburg and Strassburg. Furthermore, the Uni
versity of Basel, covered with fresh glory by the long
residence of Erasmus, had very extensive privileges ; while
the press, represented by the celebrated printers Froben,
Oporinus (Herbst), Pietro Bizarri of Perugia, and Pietro
Perna of Lucca, enjoyed there an extraordinary freedom.
Thus Basel had been, in good season, a refuge for the
victims of the intolerance of the North and of the South.
David Joris, Jerome Hermas Bolsec, Besozzo, and especiaUy
the eminent Sebastian Castellio (Chateillon), found there a
safe harbour, and established a philosophico-literary centre,
in opposition to Calvin and his alter ego Theodore Beza.
A situation thus privileged was sure to attract the eyes of
the Italian refugees. So, from the early years following the
establishment of the Inquisition, many emigrants of distinc
tion took up their residence at Basel, the d'Annoni and
Curioni of Piedmont, the Grataroli of Bergamo, the Colli k
Collibus of Alessandria, Mino Celsi and A. Socini (with his^
five sons), from Siena, the Betti of Rome, the Zannoni of
Vicenza, and the Balbani, the Diodati and the Micheli of
Lucca.*^ But there were two who echpsed all these; one by his
^1 Moerikofer, ut sup., p. 418. Cf. extract from the Registers ofthe
Freruh Church at Basel, communicated by Pastor Bernus.

CHAPTER V. Ill
eloquence and his controversial ability, the other by his
literary and teaching powers, Ochino and Celio Secondo
Curione. The former only stayed two years, 1553 — 1555) at
Basel, but many of his books were printed there; his sermon
on justification (translated into Latin by Curione (1554),
the five volumes of his Prediche {s ^/^?> — 1562), his dissertation
on the Lord's Supper (1561), his Labyrinths (1561), his
Catechism (1561), and lastiy, his famous Thirty Dialogues
(translated into Latin by CasteUio, 1563).*^
As to Curione, nominated professor of Latin eloquence,
and thus colleague of Castellio at the academy of Basel,
he attracted thither during twenty-three years (1546 — 1569)
a crowd of hearers, as much by his piety and the charm
of his social intercourse as by his literary culture. He
entered, too, into correspondence with all the European
men of letters, including Sir John Cheke, and, following
in the steps of Erasmus, he gathered around him at Basel
a literary and evangelical circle, in which the Italian element
predominated.*^ If we may judge from the dialogues of

¦*- Benrath, ut sup., pp. 219 ff.
¦*'¦' Trechsel, vol. i. 208, 217. Cf. Lecky, ut sup., vol. ii. 46. It appears
from the researches which Pastor Bernus has kindly undertaken for us
in the Archives of Basel, that there was no organised Italian Church in
that city before the middle of the seventeenth century. The refugees
from the Italian peninsula were at first joined to the Evangelical Church
of Basel ; afterwards, from the time of .the formation of the French
Church in 1582, a portion of the Italian refugees attached themselves to it ;
Giovanni Francesco Castiglione, for example, elder ofthe Church at Basel
in 1588. The numbers ofthe refugees being augmented in the first half of
the seventeenth century by the arrival of the families of Pallavicini and
Stuppani from the Engadine, the Fatio family from Chiavenna, and others,
they were authorised to found an independent church. Andrea Costa, ex-
Theatine of Piacenza, doctorof philosophy and theology in the University
of Padua, converted at Basel 1657, was received into the ministry, and
preached with great success in the Italian Church. After him, Giovanni
Toniola (originally from the Grisons) became the pastor of the Italian

112 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Curione, De Amplituditie Beati Regni Dei, and from the
celebrated work of Mino Celsi, In Hcereticis coercendis
quatenus progredi liceat (1577),** long confounded with
another work, sometimes attributed to Lelio Sozini,** there
reigned in this group of refugees a universalist tendency
and a spirit of tolerance, which present a striking contrast to
the particularism and intolerance of the Reformers of the
North. Hence Calvin accused them of " permitting all sorts
of discordant disputations, and of regarding the controversies
on the Trinity and predestination as open questions."*"
But in our eyes this reproach is their glory ; for it proves
that these Christians, without abandoning the gospel founda
tion, had succeeded in rising superior to the dogmatic
prejudice of their age.
It was accordingly through this tendency to set God's
love above His justice, and to regard the gospel as in
harmony with reason, that Castellio, Curione, Celsi, and
their like, prepared the way for the Unitarianism of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
5. Relations of the Italian Refugees in Switzer
land WITH England.
We have already indicated the sympathetic relations which
existed as early as 1531 between the Swiss theologians and
the English Reformers ; and the scheme which Cramner
had entertained of forming at his palace of Lambeth a sort
community, which he served faithfully during thirty years. This Toniola
was the author of Basilea Sepulta, and father of J. Toniola, a celebrated
professor of law at Basel. Cf. Athence Raurica: Basel, 1778.
** [A second edition bore the title, De Hareticis capitali supplicio non
afficiendis (1584).]
*' [This was the De Hcereticis an sint persequendi (1553).]
*^ Calvini Opera, vol. xv. 21 18 (Letter from Calvin to the Church of
Poitiers, 22nd February, 1555).

CHAPTER V. 113
of synod of the most learned divines of the Continent, with
a view to arrive at an agreement concerning the fundamental
points of Christian doctrine.
The heads of the conflicting parties, Calvin and Melanch
thon, having declined the generous invitation of the Arch
bishop of Canterbury, he was desirous at any rate of turning
to account the good-will of other tiieologians, so as to raise
the standard of theological studies, which at Oxford and
Cambridge had fallen very low, and thus to form a nursery
of trained ministers for the Anglican Church. Sir John
Cheke, the learned preceptor of Edward VI. , and the corre
spondent of Erasmus and Curione,*^ was of great assistance
to him in this delicate task, by drawing his attention to men
of mark on the continent.*^
Furthermore, the terror of the Roman Inquisition, and
the severities of the Augsburg Interim, supplied him with
an excellent occasion for carrying out his plan. Then it
was that Bucer and Fagius from Strassburg, and John k
Lasco from Emden, acceded to Cramner's invitation.
Among these guests of the Archbishop, Primate of all
England, a great number, even a majority we think, belonged
to the Italian emigration, and came from Switzerland and
South Germany.
There had been formed at Augsburg, a place of commercial
importance owing to the banking estabhshment ofthe Fugger
family, an Italian congregation, of which Ochino had been
*'' Cheke, professor at St. John's College, Cambridge, was one of the
revivers of classical and Biblical learning in that University, It is to him
that Curione had recommended Ochino ; and further on we shall see
him on friendly terms with John a Lasco. Cf. Olympise Fulvias Moratee
Opera : Basel, 1570. At the end will be found Ccelii S. Curionis Epistolce.
(Seep. 287, "Curio, Johanni Keko:" Basel, Sept. 1547.)
^ Castellio dedicated his Latin version of the Bible to Edward VI.
in 1551, following the example of many Swiss theologians, Bullinger,
Calvin, &c. I

114 SOURCES OF ENGLLSH UNITARIANISM.
pastor after leaving Geneva (1545— 1 547)- Strassburg also
counted its distinguished Italian refugees ; Pietro Martire
Vermigli, professor of Hebrew ; Paolo Lacisio, professor of
Greek; Girolamo Massario, professor of medicine; Girolamo
Zanchi, the Citolini and the Odoni (1553— 1563). Strassburg
was at that time the half-way stage on the road which travellers
followed in going from Basel to London. This will explain
why most of the, Italians halted there in December iS47-*^
It was thence that Ochino and Vermigli, accompanied by
their faithful companion Giulio Terenziano, started on their
journey to England; Lelio Sozini and Pietro Bizarri of
Perugia also passed through in 1548 ; and it was there, on
the other hand, that the English Protestants proscribed by
Mary Tudor, Foxe, Grindal, Ponet and Sampson, pitched
their camp.
The generous offers of the English king, Edward VI. , not
only reached Basel and Ziirich, but also the Val Tellina.
Mainardo and Zanchi, pastors of Chiavenna, Martinengo,
pastor at Geneva, and Vergerio, the ecclesiastical inspector
(visitator) of the Italian churches in the Val Tellina, were
thus invited to cross over to Great Britain, at that time the
citadel of Protestantism in Europe. From Soglio, in the
Val Bregaglia, came the first minister of the Italian Church
in London (1551 — 1553), Michel-Angelo Florio; and thither
he returned in 1558.*"
^ According to a memorandum communicated by M. Rod. Reuss,
librarian at Strassburg, there was not in that city, any more than in
Basel, an organised Italian Church. The refugees of that nationahty,
such as Vermigli and Zanchi, attached themselves to the French Church,
of which those just mentioned soon became elders.
™ Meyer, ut sup., vol. i. 57, 59, note. Cf. Zurich Letters, 3 ser..
Letter 234 (Martyr to Bullinger).

CHAPTER VI.
The Strangers' Church in London. — Birth ofthe Unitarian idea.
The reasons which induced Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop
of London, to invite foreign scholars to come to his aid in
the work of raising the standard of the English Universities,
have already been passed in review. Two other motives,
of a less interested character, influenced him in the same
direction; the project of establishing an agreement among
all the Protestant churches on certain controverted points,
including the question of the Eucharist, and the hope that
when they returned home to their respective countries, these
emigrants would all disseminate the same evangelical doctrine.
From the accession of Edward VI. there was in the policy
of Cranmer an elevation of view, and a catholicity of senti
ment, which prove that his intellect was of a higher order
than his character. Freed from the despotic sway of
Henry VIIL, he threw his energies into the scale of progress
and liberty. The continental theologians who first responded
to his appeal were Italians and Spaniards. On 20 December,
1547, Bernardino Ochino and Pietro Martire Vermigli
arrived in London, after a favourable journey of six and a
half weeks from Basel, and received the Archbishop's hos
pitality at Lambeth palace.^ Peter Martyr was at once
'¦ The memorandum of their traveUing expenses, drawn up by Sir
John Abel, who had been charged to conduct them from Basel, gives
curious details concerning their dress, arms and horses ; unfortunately,
the list of the theological books bought for Ochino at Easel is lost ; for
I 2

II 6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
appointed professor of theology at Oxford, where he was
rejoined by his faithful companion Giulio Terenziano, who,
doubtless, acted as his amanuensis. Vermigli had married
at Strassburg a French lady named Dammartin, a refugee
from Metz. He took an important part in the controversies
on the Lord's Supper, which were evoked by the Bill in
Parliament introducing communion in both kinds into the
Anglican Church, and which excited also much interest in
the Strangers' Church, by whose members he was often
consulted.^ As for Bernardino Ochino, furnished with a recommenda
tion from C. S. Curione to Sir John Cheke, preceptor of
Edward VI. , he was presented to a prebend at Canterbury,
in January 1548, without obligation of residence; and was
commissioned, as at Augsburg, to preach before the Italian
community at London, consisting of merchants and of
refugees. He too was married, and the father of a little
daughter, and he rejoiced in the birth of a son during his
sojourn in England. Cranmer commissioned him to invite
Wolffgang Musculus (Mosel), who had been his neighbour
as pastor of the German Reformed Church at Augsburg,
and was now menaced by the Interim ; but Musculus pre
ferred to withdraw to Bern.^ Ochino did not content
himself with regularly discharging the duties of preaching
and the cure of souls ; he continued to exert his powers as
writer on topics of the day. It was in London that he
composed his Tragxdie (existing only in the English trans
lation, 1549), a kind of dramatic dialogue, directed against
Vermigli were purchased the Basel editions of Augustine, Cyprian, and
Epiphanius. See Zurich Letters, 3 ser., p. 541, note. Cf. Benrath,
Ochino, p. 186.
2 Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 225, 226. Cf. Cranmer's Memorials,
vol. i. 338.
3 Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters l6i— 163 (Ochino to Musculus),

CHAPTER VL I17
the unjust supremacy of the Bishop of Rome ; and the third
volume of his Prediche (1551). While Peter Martyr was of
a calm and peaceful disposition, altogether averse to theo
logical subtleties and discussions of the Byzantine type,
Ochino's temperament was ardent and adventurous, loving
arduous questions and paradoxes, undisturbed by contra
dictions or by calumnies, since he had confidence in the
triumph of truth.*
The year 1548 witnessed the arrival of Francisco de
Enzina, TremeUio, Bizarri and others. The first of these,
born at Burgos in 1520, had taken the name of Dryander
(oakman, from atcina). He was the author of the first
translation of the New Testament into Spanish, dedicated
to Charles V. (1543).^ Having escaped the gaolers of the
Inquisition at Brussels, he had gone to pursue his studies
under Melanchthon. He was the bearer of the answer from
Melanchthon to the letter of Edward VI. , inviting him to
the synod of theologians projected by Cramner; and although
this reply was in the negative, Dryander was well received,
and appointed professor of Greek at Cambridge. He had
also attended several classes at Ziirich, and kept up a
correspondence with Bullinger.^ According to Melanchthon,
he was " a learned man, serious, and endowed with a rare
virtue, displaying a philosophic ardour in all his engage
ments." Emanuele Tremellio, sprung from an Israehtish
family of Ferrara, had already taught Hebrew in the San
* See, in Benrath's Ochino, App. iii., the beautiful device placed at
the head' of his Prediche : " If they have persecuted me, they will also
persecute you ; but truth overcometh all things."
^ [The first published translation. Ju4n de Valdes seems to have
been the first to translate the New Testament from Greek into Spanish.
Portions were published, with commentary, in ISS7-]
^ See Boehmer, Spanish Reformers, yo\. i. 152; Zurich Letters, 3 ser.^
Letters 170, 174. Cf. Strype, Eccles. Memorials, vol. ii. 1st part, pp.
iSS, iSq.

Il8 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Frediano coflege at Lucca, under the auspices of Petei
Martyr; he too was married, and obtained the preferment
of canon of Carlisle, until a professorial chair should fall
vacant. Ultimately he succeeded Fagius."
As for Pietro Bizarri of Perugia, an eloquent humanist,
also exiled from Italy for having professed the gospel faith,
he was for many years secretary to John Russell, Earl of
Bedford (created 1550, d. 1554), and afterwards became
lecturer at St. John's College, Oxford. While there, he
composed in Itahan a curious history of the war in Hungary
between the Emperor and the Turks (1569), and other
histories.^ France and Alsace also furnished their contingent to this
select body of learned refugees in England.
Pierre Alexandre, a native of Brussels, who had already
been " preacher to Queen Mary of Hungary, Governess of
the Low Countries," and professor of theology at Heidelberg,
obtained a prebend at Canterbury, and was commissioned
to lecture to candidates in theology on the Fathers of the
Greek Church, Ignatius, Iren»us, Origen and Epiphanius,
with special reference to the anti-Romish controversy.^
In Canterbury also was placed at the head of the French
and Walloon refugees, Valerand Poullain, a gentleman of
Lille, active and high-souled, but somewhat turbulent and
disputatious. He had succeeded Pierre Brully as minister
of the French Church at Strassburg. Having quarrelled
with some prominent elders of his church, Johann Sturm,
Peter Martyr and Tremellio, he had been obliged to resign
' Strype, Memorials, vol. ii. i. 306 ff. Cf. Haag, La France Protes-
tante, art. Tremellius.
^ Zurich Letters, 3 ser., Letter 164 (Pietro di Perugia to Bullinger).
Cf. Bayle's Dictionary, ed. Birch and Lockman, art. Acontius.
" See Rod. Reuss, Notes sur V Eglise Franeaise de Strasbourg : Strasb.
1880. Zurich Letters, 3 ser., Letter 157. Cf. Biographic Nationale
Belgiqiie, vol. i. 217.

CHAPTER VL II9
in favour of Jean Garnier of Avignon ; he did not suspect
that later on he would see, as second in succession to him
at Strassburg, this same Pierre Alexandre, whom he then
met at Canterbury. 1° In these ways persecution brought
about an interchange of pastors and of good offices between
the various reformed churches of Europe, such as, unhappily,
takes place no longer, under our existing regime of peace
on a war footing.
Precisely as Ochino had been commissioned to invite
Curione and Musculus, was Pierre Alexandre requested to
offer hospitality in England to Bucer and Fagius, who had
been obliged to leave Strassburg on account of the Interim.
He also received from Edward VI. the honourable mission
of going to meet them at Calais with a view to procure them
every facility for tiie cross-channel passage.
These two pastors arrived in London at the end of April,
1549, and were forthwith received at Lambeth Palace,
where Archbishop Cranmer welcomed and entertained them
as brothers, not as subordinates. With delicate attention he
had gathered under his own roof their old Strassburg friends,
to bid them welcome : Peter Martyr and Terenziano, Tremellio
and de Enzina, and some pious Frenchmen as well.^^ Bucer
was entrusted with the teaching of theology at Cambridge,
while Fagius occupied the chair of Hebrew, which, after his
death (Nov. 1549), fell to the lot of Tremelho. His colleague
Bucer scarcely survived him a year, dying in February,
1551 ; but he played a great part in the organization ofthe
Anglican Church.
In the month of March of the same year, 1549, John h
Lasco,^^ reformer of the churches in East Friesland, had
'" See Rod. Reuss, ut sup., pp. 6 ff. Cf Ziirich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter
348 (Poullain to Calvin).
11 Zurich Letters, 3 sen. Letters 157 and 248 (Bucer and Fagius to
the ministers of Strassburg).
^^ For what follows, see Jo. Utenhovius, ut sup.

I20 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
come to London to prepare a refuge for his flock at Emden,
in danger from the Catholic reaction, for which the Augsburg
Interim had given the signal. He was a Polish baron, born
at Warszaw in 1499, of one ofthe richest famihes in that city,
and educated with the greatest care by his uncle, the Arch
bishop of Gniezno, primate of Poland. He had been con
verted to the gospel through intercourse with Erasmus and
the influence of Hardenberg, and inclined towards the school
of Melanchthon in his ideas of dogma. Furnished with a
literary and theological culture of the first order, and endowed
with a conciliating and generous disposition, he awakened
sympathy by an abnegation well-nigh heroic, and commanded
respect by his noble mien. Well received by the Archbishop
of Canterbury and by Sir John Cheke, h Lasco was presented
to the Duke of Somerset, Lord Protector, by his physician,
Dr. Turner, and had Httle trouble in demonstrating the
moral and political advantages of the reception of these
refugees from Flanders and Friesland, the chief economical
gain being the introduction of wool-weaving into England,
After having charged one of his Itahan friends, Signore
Fiorenzio, to give an account of his interview with the
Protector, to Sir William Cecil, Secretary of State, and
having begged Cecil, by letter dated from Yarmouth, to let
him know the result through a certain Robert Legate, an
English merchant established at Emden, k Lasco returned
to his flock. ^^
In his absence, Latimer, the valiant champion of evan
gelical reforms, then living in retirement at Lambeth, warmly
pleaded his cause, and was not afraid to say in a sermon
preached before the young king, that it was pity if John k
Lasco, that most learned man and excellent Christian, had
gone away for want of support ; that the king would do
himself honour, and forward the prosperity of the kingdom,
" See Strype, Cranmer's Memorials, vol. ii. app. 50.

CHAPTER VL 121
in gathering together such men; and he applied to h Lasco's
case the word of the Lord Jesus Christ, " He that receiveth
you receiveth me."
It must not be too hastily imagined that all the English
clergy beheld with a favourable eye the establishment of a
Strangers' Church, enjoying its own government and separate
form of worship. Many bishops, including Ridley, Bishop
of London, whose mouthpiece was the Lord Treasurer, the
same bishop to whose use the choir of the Augustin Church
had been reserved, claimed to subject the Protestant refugees
to the alternative of either adopting the Anglican ritual and
liturgy, or else proving that these were not in harmony with
the Word of God. These tactics were not wanting in clever
ness ; they were foiled by the firmness of Thomas Cranmer,
who to the great surprise of many — for in the affair of Hooper
he had not shown himself so liberal — was the principal
champion ofthe rights and liberties ofthe Strangers' Church.^*
Thanks to him and to the perseverance of J ohn h. Lasco,
the latter obtained the letters-patent from Edward VI. which
we have summarised in the fourth chapter,^^ and which have
remained to this day a charter of freedom for dissenting
worship in England. There were at that time in London at
least three thousand Protestant refugees, for the most part
of Flemish or Walloon origin, and perhaps two or three
hundred Italians and Spaniards. Most of them lived in the
parishes of St. Martins-le- Grand, St. Catherine Coleman,
and St, Martins-in-the-Fields.i«

^* Zurich Letters, 3 sen. Letter 263 and postscript (Microen to Bul
linger). ^° See Appendix III.
^° For statistics of the Protestant refugees in London, see Zurich
Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 162, 163, 172 and 250. Cf. Calendar of State
Papers (Edward VI.), which mentions the passage of two hundred Italians
going northward. We have taken a mean between the exaggerated
figures of Ochino, more than five thousand, and those of Bucer, six to

122 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
The privilege granted by the king was very extensive, as
we have seen above. He conceded to the two nations, the
French and Dutch (the Walloons were ranked under the
former, the Flemings under the latter title), the Church of
the Augustins in perpetuity. Furthermore, full and entire
liberty was granted them to elect their ministers, elders and
deacons, with the single reservation that the successive
superintendents and other ministers should be presented to
and instituted by the king. In good sooth, h Lasco had
obtained more than he had asked for; no English bishop,
not even the Bishop of London or the Primate, had any
supervision in the affairs of the church in Austin Friars, and
the prelates were not at all pleased about it.'''
John a Lasco was appointed Superintendent of the two
branches ofthe church, and the choice ofthe young sovereign
was ratified by general approbation. Richard Fran9ois
(Gallus), otherwise called Vauville, a disciple of Calvin, and
Frangois Martoret du Rivier (Riverius), otherwise called
Perucell, were the first pastors of the French Church. The
Flemings had as ministers Wouter Deloen, or Walter
Delvin (Deloenus), ex-librarian of Henry VIIL, and Marten
Microen, an excehent friend of Bulhnger.'^ As the king
had undertaken the charge of repairing the Augustin Church,
and as the work "was being protracted day after day" to a
eight hundred, which appear to us too few. See also J. S. Eum, Hist.
ofthe French, Walloon, Dutch and other Prot. Refugees settled in England:
London, 1846, pp. 6, 7. [Ochino's figures (23 Uec. 1548) are confirmed
to the letter by Musculus ("more than five thousand," 12 March, 1549),
and corroborated by de Enzina (" four thousand," 5 June, 1549). Bucer's
"six to eight hundred, all godly men" (14 Aug. 1549), were probably
the residue left after successive deportations to the foreign settlements in
the provinces.]
'' Calvini Opera, utsup., vol. xiii. \-i,!)C) ( Utenhovius Calvino).
^^ See Werken van de Maarnix- Vereeniging, part i. Kerkraad's Pro-
tocolten der Hollandsche Gemeente te London (1569 — 1571).

CHAPTER VI. 123
more lengthened period than their religious wants would
allow, the Flemings obtained from "some citizens ofLondon"
the provisional use of another church, where Microen
preached for the first time on the 21st September, 1550,
before a congregation so numerous that the edifice would
not hold them. The French had their place of worship in
the chapel of St. Anthony's Hospital, Threadneedle Street.'^
As soon as he saw things going on smoothly, John a Lasco
gave his mind to furnishing the Strangers' Church with a
regular organization.
He began by drawing up a Confession of Faith and a
Catechism, in accordance with the principles of doctrine
adopted by the church at Emden (1544). These two docu
ments, dedicated to King Edward VI. , were published, in
Latin and in Dutch, for the use of the members of the
community.^" This creed, " founded," as he said, " on the
authority of the voice of God, revealed by angels, the pro
phets and Christ," proclaimed the dogma of the Trinity, in
the sense of three hypostases, distinct and yet united, con
formably to the Baptismal formula.
It was next resolved that each branch of the church should
elect its own church session and diaconate, by plurality of
votes, but subject to the royal sanction. As regards the
church session {eonsistorium or concilium), a Lasco, influenced
by a passage from the first Epistle of St. Paul to the Corin
thians (xii. 28), added to the two classes of pastors {prophetce
or doctores) and elders {seniores, presbyteri), a third class, that
'' Zurich Letters, 3 ser., Letter 264 (Microen to Bullinger). For all
that concerns the organisation of this Church, see the second volume of
Dr. Kuyper's work, entitled, Joannis a Lasco Opera, tam edita quam
inedita, 2 vols. Svo: Amsterdam and The Hague, 1866.
^° Kuyper, utsup., vol. ii. pp. 285 — 339, Compendium de vera unicaque
Dei et Christi Ecclesia, ejusque fide et confessione pura : in qua Peregri
norum Ecclesia Londini instituta est: London, 1551. Cf. Calvini Opera,
vol. xiv. 1432 (Letter from ^ Lasco to Bullinger, London, 7 Jan. 1551).

124 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
of assistants or men of affairs {scni,'rcs subsidarii or politici
viri), who were specially charged to watch over the material
interests, and maintain the rights and hberties of the church
in its relations with the Government.
Another ver}- useful institution of a Lasco was that of
Biblical conferences ypropheti.z). which were held on Tuesday
in the French church, and on Thursday in the Flemish
church, on the model of the congregational usage of Geneva.
In these conferences the laity had the right of discussing
the sermons of the preceding week, while on the ministers
devolved the duty of explaining obscure or doubtful points
in their teaching. -^
The first elections of elders and deacons took place in the
two churches on 5th and 12th October, 1550, and the year
following the Flemings had ahead)- three conferences, two
in Latin, presided over by a Lasco and Deloen, and one in
their mother tongue. -'-
They lacked but one thing, liberty to administer Baptism
and the Lord's Supper, which had been accorded to them
by the king's patent, but was withheld by the ill-will of the
bishops. In spite of a Lasco's exertions, the bishops, by their
intrigues, ended in obtaining an Order in Council which
obliged the Str.ingers to receive the sacraments " fettered by
the English ceremonies," which to them appeared "intolerable
to all godly persons.'"-^ The courageous Superintendent w.as
more successful when he went before the Lord Chancellor
and the Secretary of State to defend those members of his
-' Kuyper, ut sup., vol. ii. 45 — 50, Forma ac Ratio F.cclcsiastici Minis
terii in Peregrinorum Ecclesia : Frankfort, 1551. Cf. T/teological Rcvicn;
Jan. 1S76, art. Gordon on Hook's Dii/d, referring to records of the
Walloon Church at Norwich. See .appendix VII.
" Ziirich Letters, 3 sen, Letters 264 and 265 (Microen to Bullinger).
-^ Il'id. 3 ser., Letter 264, postscript (Microen to BuUinger).

CHAPTER VL 1 25
church whom the churchwardens would have compelled to
resort to their respective parish churches, on pain of fine or
imprisonment.^* To bring to a close what relates to the Flemish and
Walloon Churches, we must mention the organisation and
worship for which John a Lasco was arranging, at the very
time when the Ecclesia Peregrijiorum was again scattered.^'
A Lasco, in a letter to Bullinger, 7 January, 1551, after
having informed him that the " Word" was held forth in
Flemish and in French, in two different places of worship,
and having begged him to forward to Calvin a copy of his
Confession of Faith, added, " The Italians also will soon
have their church ; they have already a place of worship and
a minister of their own, a pious and learned man, gifted with a
rare eloquence, and who has suffered much for Christ's sake.''
Is there a reference in this letter, as seems at the first
glance, to Bernardino Ochino ? We think not, for he was
well known to Buhinger, and were it he, k Lasco need only
have called him Master Bernardine, as in his other letters.
Moreover, Ochino, wholly absorbed in the composition of
his great polemical and metaphysical works, would doubtless
have been unequal to the manifold exigencies of the regular
pastorate. The minister in question can be no one but
Michel-Angelo Florio, a proscribed Florentine, who had
emigrated at the same time, doubtless, as Vermigli and
Terenziano, and hence was already in London, enjoying the
favour of Sir Wifliam Cecil, at the time of ^ Lasco's first
visit. 2^ There were besides in London two or three hundred
''¦* Strype, Cranmer's Memorials, vol. ii. app. 51.
25 Calvini Opera, vol. xiv. 1750 (a Lasco to Bullinger: Lond. 7 June,
1553)- Cf Kuyper, ut sup., vol. ii. i. Forma ac Ratio tota Ecclesiastici
Ministerii, in Peregrinorum, potissimum vero Germanorum Ecclesia,
instituta Londiniin Anglia: Frankfort, 1555-
"^^ M'Crie, Reformation in Spain : Edin. 1S29, pp. 365 ff. Cf. p. 120,
ante, where "Signore Fiorenzio" maybe identical with Florio.

126 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
refugees from Tuscany, Genoa, Milan, the Venetian territory
ai)d Istria, including some Spaniards.
An Italian Church was therefore constituted in the course
ofthe year 1551, by the assiduity of Cranmer and Cecil, and
placed, along with the two preceding churches, under the
superintendence of h, Lasco. Its members enjoyed the same
privileges as the Flemings and Walloons ; that is to say, they
were independent of the English parishes, and exempt from
ecclesiastical dues, but had to furnish by assessment a salary
for their pastor. " The Italian service," says Cantii, " was
held in a church dedicated to St. Cecilia ; " but we suspect
that this learned writer has too hastily confounded St. Cecilia,
patroness of musicians, with Sir William Cecil, patron of the
Protestant refugees. It appears that, outdoing even Ochino,
Florio thundered against the " Antichrist whose seat was at
Rome," and moreover did not carry matters well with those
of his flock who were weak in their new faith ; for in the course
ofthe year 1552, fourteen of them went back to the Mass, and
refused to contribute to his salary. The irascible Florentine,
in place of winning them back by mildness, denounced them
to the severity of the magistrate as apostates, in a letter to
Sir William Cecil, in which he invokes against them the laws
of Moses and those of England.^''
Never was the word of Jesus Christ, " With what judgment
ye judge, ye shall be judged," better verified than in the
case of Florio ; for, in the month of January of the following
year, having committed a scandalous sin, he was deprived
by the Privy Council, expelled from the house of Sir William
Cecil, his protector, and driven to invoke in his own favour
the examples of clemency in the Old and New Testaments
which he ought to have recollected in dealing with his
dissentient parishioners.^^ It was at this juncture that, out of
^ Strype, Cranmer's Memorials, vol. ii. app. 52.
28 Ibid., app. S3, 54.

CHAPTER VL 1 27
spite, he sought to sow in the Strangers' Church the dogmatic
divisions which we shall examine in a subsequent paragraph.
He ended by regaining the favour of the Secretary of State
and the Archbishop of Canterbury ; and composed later on,
doubtless after his retirement to the Val Tellina, that very
rare book entitied, Historia de la Vita e de la Morte de
nilustrissima signora Giovaima Grata, gia Regina eletta
d' Inghilterra (1607).^^
The Italian Church, like the two elder branches of the
Peregrinorum Ecclesia, was dispersed in September 1553, a
little after the triumph of Bloody Mary over the innocent
Jane Grey : as for the Spanish Church, it was not separately
organised until the reign of Elizabeth.
There were, in the reign of Edward VI. , other churches
of refugees outside of London, including the one at Canter
bury (1547), which held its services in the crypt of the cathe
dral.^" The one at Glastonbury in Somersetshire, founded
under the auspices of the Duke of Somerset and the super
intendence of Valerand Poullain, deserves a special mention,
because it was composed of Flemish and Walloon weavers,
who imported into the West of England the manufacture or
broadcloth and blankets.''^
It was in the bosom of the Strangers' Church at London
that the Unitarians, whose tendencies had hitherto been
disconnected, and mixed up with Anabaptism, formulated
for the first time a clear and definite programme. In
Hooper's letter of 25 June, 1549, which we have quoted in
^ [Also an Apologia . . . ne. la quale si tratta de la vera e falsa chiesa,
de Vessere e qualita de la messa . . . scritta contro a un heretico (1557)]-
•"' [This still exists, under the pastorate of the Rev. J. Martin. It
employs in its services the English Prayer-book, translated into French.
The disposition of its endowments was recently revised, under the friendly
supervision of the late Archbishop Tait.]
" Strype, Eccles. Memorials, vol. ii. part i, (1547). Cf. Cranmer's
Memorials, vol. ii. app. 55 to 57.

128 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Ch.apter IIL, p. 64, there was no idea but of " libertines
and wretches, who are daring enough" to deny the Messiah-
ship of Jesus, and to call him a deceiver. Two years
afterwards, Microen writes also to Bullinger, respecting
" pseudo- evangelical " sectaries, whom he expressly dis
tinguishes from the foregoing. The phenomenon is of
sufficient importance to lead us to quote an extract from his
letter (14 Aug. 1551):
" In addition to the ancient errors respecting psedobaptism,
the incarnation of Christ, etc., new ones are rising up every
day, with which we have to contend. The chief opponents,
however, of the divinity of Jesus Christ are the Arians, who are
now beginning to shake our churches with greater violence than
ever, as they deny the conception of Christ by the Virgin.
" Their principal arguments may be reduced under three
heads : The first is respecting the Unity of God, as declared
throughout all the Scriptures both of the Old and New Testa
ments ; and that the doctrine, as well as the name, of the Trinity
is a novel invention, as not being mentioned in any passage of
Scripture. " Their next argument is this : the Scripture, they say, which
everywhere acknowledges one God, admits and professes that
this one God is the Father alone (John xvii. 3), who is also
called the one God by Paul (i Cor. viii. 6).
" Lastly, they so pervert the passages which seem to establish
the divinity of Christ, as to say that none of them refer intrin
sically to Christ himself, but that he has recei\-ed all from
another, namely, from the Father (John v. 19 ; Matt, xxviii. 18) :
and they say that God cannot receive from God, and that Christ
was only in this respect superior to any of mankind, that he
received more gifts from God the Father." ^^
We here retrace, in a form more condensed and more
systematic, many of the objections against the Trinity which
we saw raised by the Anabaptist Herman van Flekwijk in
32 Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 265 (Microen to BuUinger). See
Appendix VIII.

CHAPTER VI. 129
his curious dialogue with the Inquisitor of Bruges (1569).
Now, since this appearance of the Unitarians in London is
eighteen years earlier, and since they allowed paedobaptism,^^
it is impossible to assign to the phenomenon an Anabaptist
origin. It is more likely that the two Antitrinitarian parties,
on either side of the North Sea, borrowed their weapons
from the same arsenal, that is to say, from the Annotations
on the New Testament of the arch-heretic Erasmus.
Microen does not mention the names of those who com-
batted with the above arguments the received dogmata of
the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus Christ. He only says
that John k Lasco helped him to refute them, and that he
found in Bullinger's Decade upon this subject "little or nothing
which may be satisfactorily brought against them," and he
asks the aid of Bullinger's enlightenment. Who could these
"Arians" have been, who shook the Strangers' Church by
" denying the conception of Christ by the Virgin" ?
The date of the execution of Georg Van Parris (25 April,
155 1), and the fact that he was a member of the Strangers'
Church, turn our thoughts to him. He was in truth an able
physician, conspicuous for his temperate habits, who might,
by his practical virtues, have suggested to Microen the term
" pseudo-evangelical," with which he asperses these Anti
trinitarians. It is well known that he was tried by a Royal
Commission, and burned at Smithfield;^* but the fact that
he attacked paedobaptism is sufficient to exclude him from the
Neo-Arians or Unitarians who allowed it.
He was not, however, the only one who shared these
ideas ; and the stir raised about the name of Michel-Angelo
Florio, the second pastor of the Italian Church, leads us to
examine his opinions. We have valuable documents for
this purpose, consisting of a letter from Calvin to the French
'' [This seems a somewhat doubtful inference from Microen's state
ment.] '^* Strype, Cranmer's Memorials, vol. i. book ii. (1548).
K

I30 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Church at London (27 September, 1552), and another from
k Lasco to Bullinger (7 June, 1553). In these two letters a
personage is dealt with, who shows himself more Calvinistic
than Calvin, and who, sheltering himself under the authority
of the Reformer of Geneva, criticises the liturgical rites and
formularies of the Strangers' Church, including the titie
" Mother of God" given to the Virgin Mary, and the prayers
for the Bishop of Rome. A Lasco, on his part, says that
the disturber, when excluded from the ministry because of a
scandal against morals, reproached one of his colleagues
with having said (i) that Adam's sin was not sufficient to
entail the condemnation of the human race ; (2) that it is
possible to be saved without having a knowledge of the Lord
Jesus ; and above all, for having taught (3) a theory of
predestination differing from that of Calvin.^^ If we compare
these allusions with the facts that, four years later, Ochino
was accuse4 by the churches in the Val Tellina of having
depreciated the work of Christ, and that Florio, then pastor
at Soglio, thought it his duty to denounce him to Peter
Martyr, we shall come to the conclusion that already in
1552 the allusion was to a discussion between Ochino and
Florio. ^^ But Florio does not seem to have been suspected
of Antitrinitarian tendencies. There is still Ochino himself.
Undoubtedly, in his works of this epoch, there are as yet no
objections brought, even indirectly, against the doctrine of
the Trinity. But from his whole theory of redemption by
the grace of God — " who has attached acceptableness to the
merits of Jesus Christ" — and from his very silence on the
Trinity dogma, the inference is, that he leaned already
towards what was afterwards known as the Socinian theory of
expiation, and of the subordination of Jesus Christ to God
the Father. If, then, he did not openly fight against the deity
'° Calvini Opera, utsup., vol. xiv. 1653, 1750.
^° Benrath, Ochino, p. 241.

CHAPTER VI. 131
of Christ and the personality of the Holy Spirit, he at least
undermined the dogma of the Trinity by his presentation of
Arianism. Three mpnths after k Lasco's letter, namely, in September
1553) the Strangers' Church was dispersed by the storm of
the Catholic reaction under Mary Tudor; a portion of it,
after having vainly asked asylum from King Christiern of
Denmark, finished its maritime exodus by returning to
Emden, its original point of departure.^''
The wanderings in exile of the members of the Strangers'
Church of London lasted five or six years, during which they
were dispersed along the banks of the Rhine and as far as
Switzerland, fraternising with the most eminent members of
the English episcopate, in exile like themselves. It was
during this period, as we haye seen, that the two tendencies
of the English Church, the Episcopal and the Puritan ten
dency, assumed definite shape. As soon as the accession of
Ehzabeth to the throne of England had given courage to
evangelical Protestants, the Flemings and Dutch once more
assembled in London, and addressed petitions to the Queen
for the restitution of the church in Austin Friars, and for
the confirmation of the charter of Edward VI. They were
already (1559) the most numerous of the foreigners, and
counted some six or seven hundred families, in various parts
of England.^" The year following (1560) the Qiieen, by
sign-manual, allowed them once more the use of Austin
'' Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 182 and 240, n. A Lasco embarked
at Gravesend on 15 Sept. 1553, with 175 members of his flock, resolved
to follow their pastor. Their vessel entered the port of Elsinore in
Denmark. The Danish king accorded them a favourable audience, but,
warped by his chaplain Noviomagus, an ultra-Lutheran, finally declared
that he would rather harbour Papists than them ; so they were forced to
re-embark, notwithstanding the inclemency of the season. See J. Uten-
hove, ut sup.
^^ Greg. Leti, ut sup., vol. i. 323.
K 2

132 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Friars, which she had cleaned and fitted up at her own
expense, " so as no rite nor use be therein observed contrary
or derogatory to our laws." In 1567, in consequence of
complaints of some members of the congregation, the
privileges of the Strangers' Church were confirmed anew ;29
and, in 1573, an Order in Council gave this valuable authori
sation to its governing body :
" We are not ignorant that, from the beginning ofthe Christian
religion, various churches always had various and diverse rites
and ceremonies ; and yet piety and religion is the same, if prayer
be truly directed, and to the true God, and impiety and super
stition, &c. be absent. We do not despise your rites, nor compel
you to ours ; and we approve your ceremonies, as fit and con
venient for you and your nationality {res publica) whence ye are
sprung."*" Notwithstanding all these declarations, whether from the
bishops' jealousy, or from distrust on the part ofthe Govern
ment, which feared the influence of an autonomous body
politic, the Strangers' Church lost at this time its supreme
guarantee of independence. It no longer had a Superin
tendent of its own, but was subjected to the superintendence
of the Bishop of London. It is true that, for the moment,
it had no vexations to fear from this quarter, for the jealous
Ridley had been succeeded by the liberal and concihatory
Grindal, the friend of Peter Martyr and Girolamo Zanchi.*^
If the Ecclesia Peregrinorum lost its caput proprium, on
the other hand it was augmented by an additional branch,
having its own distinct organisation, creed and services,
the Spanish Church (1560). The refugees from that country
had, in fact, for more than a year (beginning in 1558) cele
brated their worship in a private house, a circumstance
which gave occasion to vexatious comments, including a
^' Collier, ut sup., vol. vi. 443. *" Theol. Review, Jan. 1S76.
" Strype, Grindal' s Life, book i. chap. v. 61 ff.

CHAPTER VL 1 33
suspicion on the part of their Catholic fellow-countrymen
that they met to conspire against the King of Spain. Ac
cordingly their pastor, the learned Cassiodoro de Reyna
(Reinius), addressed a strongly-argued request to the Bishop
of London and to the Secretary of State, William Cecil, for
authority to celebrate their worship in public.*^ His suc
cessor was Cipriano de Valera; and, eight years later, in
1568, we find a certain Antonio de Corro (Corranus) of
Seville, surnamed Bellerive, formerly pastor at Antwerp,
head of the Spanish Church in London, stirring up a con
troversy. He became divinity reader at the Temple and at
Oxford; and died canon of St. Paul's, at London, in 1591.
In 1560 appeared the Confession de Fe Christiana (preface
dated 4 Jan. 1559, i.e. 1560) of these Spanish Christians
{hecha por ciertos fieles espaiioles). They counted a member
ship of about sixty, among whom may be mentioned the
names of the " sefiores," Baron, M. de Questa, Marco de la
Palma, and, above all, the celebrated Adriano de Sarravia,
born at Hesdin (Flanders), collaborator with Guy de Brez
in the Confession of Faith of the Walloon churches in the
Low Countries, who became professor of theology at Cam
bridge, after having been at Leiden, 1597.*^
The Italian Church, however, was re-constituted by the
exertions of Sir William Cecil, in whose house it had long
assembled. It comprised a select body of jurisconsults,
*" Strype, Grindal's Life, pp. 69, 71. Cf. Droin, Reformation en
Espagne, vol. ii. 156 — 160. [Respecting Cassiodoro de Reyna and his
undisguised admiration for Servetus, especially the story of his kissing
one of the books of Servetus, and saying " that he never rightly knew
God till he had that book, and that Servetus had alone understood the
mystery of the Trinity," see Tollin, in the Bulletin Historique ei Litteraire
oi the Soc. de I' Hist, du Protestantisme Francais, 15 Sept. 1882; I5june
and 15 July, 1 883.]
*^ M'Crie, Reformation in Spain, p. 370. Cf. Brandt, ut sup., art.
Sarravia.

134 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
engineers and physicians, among whom must be mentioned
Giacomo Contio (Acontius), military engineer, and his friend
Giovanni Battista Castiglione, the Queen's Italian tutor ; the
doctors, Andrea, of Rome, and Giulio Borgarucci, physician
to the Earl of Leicester; the two GentiU, Alberico and
Scipione, sons of Matteo Gentile, a physician of Ancona,
who were jurisconsults of the first class. Girolamo Jerlito had
succeeded, as minister to the Italians, to Florio, who had
returned after the death of Mary Tudor, but who had not
been reinstated by the Bishop of London, on account of
his irascible and vindictive character.**
Finally, the two sections, Flemish and Walloon, had re
turned in greater numbers than before. Instead of two
ministers a-piece, they now had three. The Walloons had
as ministers Jean Cousin, Antoine de Ponchell and Pierre
Chastellain; and the Flemings, Pieter Deloen (son of Wouter),
Govert Wyngins and Cornells Adriaans or Adriaanszoon van
Hamstede. We shall see the last-named taking an important
part in the controversies relating to the humanity of Jesus
Christ.*^ Such was the position of the Strangers' Church in London.
In the provinces, the Netherlanders formed eleven churches,
many of which consisted of two branches, the Flemish and
the WaUoon — for example, at Canterbury, Colchester, Maid
stone, Sandwich, Southampton, Norwich, &c. The Walloon
Church in Norwich assembled at first in the chapel adjoining
the episcopal palace ; afterwards, owing to the bishop's
ilhberahty, it had to change to the church of Little St. Mary.
It was in this Walloon Church at Norwich that the Martineaus,
those ornaments of English Unitarianism, were nurtured.
Accordingly, Lord Chancellor Eldon formally stipulated that
¦" M'Crie, Reformation in Spain, pp. 365—368. Cf. Galiffe, ut sup.,
p. 92.
*^ Strype, Grindal's Life, p. 199.

CHAPTER VL I 35
it should, for the future, never be let to any sect whatever
which denied the Trinity.*"
But no human precaution or barrier can hold its ground
before the expansion of the human intellect and the search
for divine truth. Neither the Confession of Faith imposed
by John k Lasco, nor the vigilant control of Bishop Grindal,
could prevent the ancient Antitrinitarian controversy from
being re-opened in the new church. Only, this time, the
question presented itself in another shape ; it arose out of
the action of some refugees from the Low Countries who
had commissioned their countryman Hamstede to present to
the bishop a petition demanding the free exercise of their
worship. Grindal, recollecting the case of Van Parris, sur
mised them to be Anabaptists, and, as the petition was not
signed, suspected Hamstede of sharing these ideas. The
Flemish minister strenuously repudiated having attacked
paedobaptism or the supernatural conception ;*^ but he dis
puted the propriety of refusing to the Anabaptists the title
of Christian on the ground of their denying these two
dogmata, " which," said he, " are 7iot fundamental articles of
the Christian faith, since they cannot be proved by the Scripture."
Hamstede declared that directly they admitted that Jesus
Christ died and rose again for the remission of their sins,
they believed in the true Redeemer. Throughout this dis
cussion, Hamstede found a stout supporter in Giacomo
Contio (Acontius), the most eminent member of the Italian
Church. Both were cited before the Bishop of London and
excommunicated (Hamstede in November, 1560, Acontius
on 29 April, 1561), along with their adherents, who were
numerous. A year later, 31 July, 1562, Hamstede was
*^ Greg. Leti, ut sup., vol. i. 325 ff. Cf. Theol. Review, Jan. 1876,
Gordon on Hook's Laud.
*'' [They were not accused of attacking the supernatural conception,
but of pressing its supernatural character to the extent of denying that
Christ took flesh of the Virgin.]

136 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
summoned to retract, which he would not do ; Acontius
also held firmly to his opinion, and went so far as to
develope, in an admirable book, the idea, essentially Uni
tarian, that all dogmata which are not instrumental to eternal
life must be dropped from the list of fundamentals.*^
There were, furthermore, two other controversies in the
Strangers' Church ; that of Justus Velsius froni the Hague
(1563), of which we have spoken in Chapter II. (p. 50,
note 18) ; and that of Antonio de Corro (Corranus) with Jean
Cousin and Girolamo JerUto, on predestination and free-will,
which is beyond the field of our discussion.*^ The Unitarian
idea, planted by Ochino and watered by the blood of Georg
Van Parris, was about to be developed by Acontius, and
above all by the genius of the Sozzini.
*8 Strype, Grindal's Life, pp. 64, 66. Cf. app. 52. See Appendk IX.
*9 Ibid. pp. 185—187, 217—222. Cf. Chr. Sepp. Geschiedkundige
Nasporingen, vol. iii., Corranus, dit Bellerive, een " moderaet" Theolog,
Leyden, 1875.

CHAPTER VII.
Bernardino Ochino, his religious development, and his influence on
English theology. — Corranus.
" All will be easy to me in Christ,
For whom I live and hope to die ! "
A GRAND figure is that of Fra Bernardino Ochino, the
grandest, perhaps, that had appeared in Italy since Savo
narola. He must indeed have been a man of more than
ordinary gifts of oratory, personal character and intellectual
power, to have inspired the two-fold testimony of his con
temporaries, both Catholic and Protestant. Passing over
the witness of Aonio Paleario, who might be suspected of
partiality from his relations of fellow-citizenship and friend
ship with Ochino, mark what Cardinal Bembo -wrote of him
to Vittoria Colonna, Marchioness of Pescaro, the year when
he preached his second Lent course at Venice (1539) :
" Ochino is literally adored at Venice. Every one praises
him to the skies." We have cited above the saying of
Charles V.^ Mark now the testimony of Calvin : " This
testimony to the pious and holy man I feel it my duty to
render, that he may be saved from incurring the slightest
unmerited suspicion. For he is a man of eminent learning,
and his manner of life is exemplary."^ But for the Inquisi
tion of 1542, he might have become the Luther of Italy ; as
it was, Ochino rendered to Switzerland and to England the

* iMtere di M. Pietro Bembo: Venezia, 1522; quoted by Benrath,
p. 1 8. Cf. M'Crie, Reformation in Italy, p. 125. See ante, p. 74.
' Calvini Opera, vol. xxxix. 462.

138 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
service which Servetus rendered to France and Italy. He
compelled Protestant dogmatics to emerge from the Catholic
formute in which they were entrenched, and opened the
way for the free development of a more human Christolog}',
and a theodicy (divine polity) at once more rational and
appealing more directly to the heart Ochino, the Italian,
was to England what Servetus, the Spaniard, had been to
Italy, the initiator of the Unitarian movement. As we have
already encountered Ochino at various stages of his career,
we shall do no more than rapidly mention in order the
principal episodes of his life.^
Born at Siena, the home of St. Catherine, in 14S7, four
years after Luther and twenty-two years before Calvin,
Bernardino, son of Domenico Tommasini, a resident in the
contrada dell'oca, received the surname of Ochino (gosling),
which in Italian has the same meaning as Hus (goose) in
Czech. He was ten years old when Girolamo Sa\'onarola
delivered at Florence his prophetic discourses on the freedom
of Italy and the reform of the Church ; and if but an echo
of these, at any rate the noise of Savonarola's catastrophe
must have reached Siena, situated fifteen leagues from
Florence, and in constant relations with it. Yet political
anarchy and the disorders of the Roman Church ran their
course, scandahsed all good men. Such times of public
calamity evoke the call to a religious life. Like Luther, like
Savonarola, Ochino, with his ardent temperament and passion
for divine truth, was soon sick of life in an age when elegance
of manners and literary distinction served as masks for the
most shameful vices; and in 15 14,* at the age of twenty-
' For the details of this biography, we must refer the reader to the
work by Dr. Benrath of Bonn, entitled, Bernardino imi Siena : Leipzig,
1S75. This work, in which the author has made use of inedited and
previously unkno^vn sources, calls Ochino to life again. Our quotations
are from Miss Helen Zimmem's English translation, 1876 (portrait).
¦" [This conjectural date seems several years too late.]

CHAPTER VII. 139
seven, he entered the Franciscan convent of the Osservanza,
near to Siena, ^^'^hat he there sought was the way of gaining
his own salvation, by efforts of abnegation and humility.
Having encountered there only pride and sensuality, twenty
years later he went over (1534 — 1542.) to the Order of
Capuchin Friars, recently founded by Matteo Baschi, a
Franciscan. Like Luther, Ochino said then to himself,
" The more I do pious works, . the nearer shall I be to
heaven ;" and still he was ever disquieted by his conscience
and deceived in his aspirations. Nevertheless, the tv/enty-
eight years of his life under the rule of St. Francis were not
without service to Ochino, and even after his conversion he
never regretted them. If the conventual life did not lead
him to the real source of salvation, at least it carefully
preserved him from the world's temptations ; and it brought
him into relations with two men, one dead, the other living,
who exercised a decisive influence over his mind, Duns
Scotus and Juan de Valdes.
John Duns, called Scotus (d. 8 Nov. 1308), forms along
with the mystical Bonaventura and the daring William of
Ockham, the triad of illustrious theologians of the Order of
St. Francis. From their works it was, rather than from the
Bible, that masters and novices drew their spiritual nourish
ment. But it appears that our author gave the preference
to Duns Scotus ; for, as Mr. Gordon puts it, Ochino " threw
off his Capuchin's garb, but never doffed the Scotist vesture
of his thought."^ The Doctor Subtilis, by the importance he
attaches to free-will, to human worth, and to the perfection
of Christ as man, separated from the rest of humanity through
his immaculate conception by the Virgin — lastly, by the limit
he assigns to divine predestination in the prescience of
° Theological Review, '^-ai-;/ iS-]^, -p. 2^-^. See also A. Gordon's article
(Oct. lS'j6) on Bernardino Tommasini ( Ochino). This article, written
in review of Dr. Benrath's book, gives some particulars as to English
translations of Ochino's works.

I40 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
human actions, appears as the spiritual father of the author
of the Prediche. But it is, above all, by his critical and
analytical method, by his hcecceitates and his quidditates, that
the scholastic doctor of Oxford has stamped his mark on
one who, by a curioys return journey ofideas, was to become,
two and a half centuries later, the awakener of theological
thought in this same England.
Besides this, the general tendency of the Franciscans,
whether Cordeliers or Capuchins, was in Ochino's time singu
larly evangelical. We have already remarked, while treating
of the earliest relations between Italy and Switzerland, how
earnestly the members of this Order sighed for the " bread
of life'' which is in the word of God; e.g. Baldo Lupetino,
Beccaria and Benedetto of Locarno, Francesco Lismanini,
&c.^ This tendency was unquestionably due to the blessed
task, imposed on them by their founder, of preaching
repentance and the gospel of forgiveness to the people. Our
author by no means escaped this influence ; in his mission
preachings he speedily developed a talent for oratory, all the
more efficacious with his hearers, as his life accorded with
his word, and his outward man was but the genuine expres
sion of the attitude of his soul. He was never seen to go
otherwise than on foot, staff in hand, clothed in a woollen
frock; he slept on a plank bed, and eat only bread and
vegetables. His visage pale and wasted, his whitening hair,
his snowy beard, which descended to his breast, all proclaimed
him an ascetic, a worthy emulator of St. Benedict; while
his gleaming eyes, upturned to heaven, revealed the sacred
fire which burned in his heart,^ He was at that time the
* See Chapter V. p. io6, note 34.
' See the fine portrait of Ochino prefixed to Dr. Benrath's book,
[This portrait is in profile, and represents Ochino as a capuchin. For
a front-face likeness of Ochino as a Protestant minister, see the Paris
reprint (1S78) of the old French version of his Dialogue on Purgatory,
where also will be found a brief but admirable memoir.]

CHAPTER VII. 141
most docile, the most humble servant of the Roman Church,
which he believed infallible; nay, historians have even made
him, in error, the confessor of Pope Paolo III.
And yet this was the man whom Providence destined as
the herald of the gospel of love and of free inquiry, in Italy,
and subsequently throughout Europe. Juan de Valdes was
the instrument of Ochino's conversion to the evangelical
doctrines. In 1536, Ochino preached his first Lent course
at Naples, in S. Giovanni Maggiore. There were in his
congregation there two men who were amazed at his talent.
One of these, Charles V., was destined, ten years later, to
demand his head from the magistrates of Augsburg, as that
of a man dangerous to the Church. The other, who was
in the court of the viceroy, Don Pedro de Toledo, was
destined, on the contrary, to lead him captive to the foot of
the cross of Jesus Christ. It is easy to imagine the bright
ness that was sure to flash from the contact of these two
choice natures, — Valdes, a tender and chivalrous soul, a hero
in courage, almost a woman in gentleness, — Ochino, that
volcanic spirit, ever seething -s^-ithin, and on the verge of
eruption. Force was taken captive by gentleness : introduced
to the intimate circle of Valdes, Ochino experienced, in the
society of women who were as virtuous as they were beautiful
and learned, the sweetness of those familiar talks, in which
the one favourite topic was salvation through the love of
God and the merits of Christ ; he read that golden book of
the Itahan Reformation, entitled Del Benefizio di Gesit Crista
crocefisso,^ and he was transformed. From that time he did
not cease to speak out as he believed ; each day he asked
his lay confessor for a subject for his sermon of the morrow ;
and we find in his Predic/ie published at Venice, just as in
' Written in Sicily by Benedetto of Mantua, a Benedictine monk, and
edited by Marcantonio Flaminio.

142 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
those subsequently published at Geneva, reminiscences of
the CX. Considerations of Valdes.^
What Valdes wished, was not to reform the Church by
outward and general measures, but to reform men, the inner
tribunal: to ecclesiastical forms he attached little importance.
In this respect he was the direct heir ofthe reforming mystics
of the fifteenth century, Thomas k Kempis, Gansfort, Geiler
of Keisersberg, and others. Strict Calvinists have not for
given him for continuing to frequent the churches, attend
mass, and take part " with the Papist community, in divers
idolatries," 1" What does this prove but that Valdes had not
the revolutionary temperament, and that he thought, with
many of the wise of his time, that it was better to stay in the
Church with the purpose of transforming it, than to leave it
in order to fight against it ?
Ochino followed this example. During the six years that
he was appointed to preach the Advent courses at Siena and
Modena, and the Lent courses at Naples and Venice, he
had the talent, or let us rather say the infinite patience, to
preach salvation through Christ, while yet putting up with
the invocation of Saints and of the Virgin, and the thousand
puerile practices of the Roman cult. However, little by
little he dropped out of sight the merit of works, the inter
vention of saints ; he went so far as to say, " Christ has done
enough for his elect, and has gained Paradise for them."ii
Above all, he insisted on the grace of God towards us, and
' Compare Part iv. of the Prediche (Basel, 1555) with the Benefizio,
capp. i. iv., and with the Considerazioni, i. and xiii. Mark the analogy
between this mystical influence of Valdes on Ochino and the conversion
of Tauler by the great " Friend of God " in the Oberland. " See Jundt,
I^s Amis de Dieu : Strassburg, 1879, p. 115.
^'' See Balbani, Vie du Marquis Galeace Caracciolo. Cf. Droin, Reforme
en Espagne, vol. ii. 75 — 90.
^^ See his letter to Girolamo Muzio of Capo d'Istria.

CHAPTER VII. 143
the love we owe to Him. Mysticism was the chrysalis in
which he wrapped his thought until its wings were formed,
and it had strength to burst freely into the light of day.
This day arrived when, towards the middle of August, 1542,
he received from Cardinal Caraffa a summons to appear
before the tribunal of the Inquisition, just then instituted.
Three courses now presented themselves to him : to make
open profession of his evangelical faith, and perish like
Savonarola; to submit himself to the judgment of the Church
by abjuring his beliefs ; lastly, to flee far from that Italy
which almost adored him as a divine being, and which
he, for his part, loved as a mother. We can imagine what
conflicts must have raged in his soul ; he did not feel himself
ripe for martyrdom ; had he been pastor of a congregation
that looked up to him as its spiritual head, he might
perhaps, as he avowed later on, have thought it his duty to
give his life as a good shepherd for his sheep. How could
he possibly abjure, without lying to his conscience, without
renouncing all he had preached for six years with the applause
of a whole nation, salvation through Christ alone ? How
bend the knee before that hierarchy, with whom vows were
but the mask for ambition and for adultery ?
He had had interviews with Cardinals Morone and Con
tarini, already suspected of Lutheranism ; he had met Peter
Martyr, his old friend of Naples, himself likewise summoned
before the chapter of his Order at Genoa. Ochino resolved
to escape by flight the alternative of death or disgrace, and to
seek liberty in exile. After having written farewell letters to
his two noble friends, Vittoria Colonna and Caterina Cibo,
and taken leave of the Duchess of Ferrara, Ochino shaped
his course towards Chiavenna ; passed on to the house of
Bullinger at Zurich, where he missed Vermigli by a day ; and
arrived at Geneva towards the middle of September, 1542. ''^
^'¦' Calvini Opera, ut sup., vol. xi. 426, Letter from Calvin to Viret.
Cf. p. 438, Letter from Bullinger to Vadian, already quoted.

144 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
We need not revert to the part filled by Ochino at Geneva
as first pastor of the Italian Church ; but we must indicate
in this place the state of his opinions about that time, on
the two or three points which interest us, — the Trinity,
Redemption, and the Person of the Redeemer.
The fruitful idea which dominates his whole theology is,
that God is Love ; it is through love that He created us in
His own image, and it is also through love that He resolved
to save us, at the price of His unique and well-beloved Son.
This God is unique, eternal, necessary, infinite and immu
table. As Father He is uncreate, but He has procreated
the Son, and has endowed him with all perfections. The
Father and the Son, by the exertion of their wills, have in
their turn produced the Holy Spirit, and have endowed him
also with every perfection. Thus the Father,' the Son, the
Holy Spirit, are one in substance, in person several. ^^
As regards redemption, Ochino explains it in accordance
with Anselm's theory of the " vicarious satisfaction through
the merits of Jesus Christ;" and admits, with St. Paul, that
we are justified solely by faith, independently of works.
Under the influence of Calvin and of Vermigli, he went so
far as to say that man cannot do the least thing for his own
salvation. But already we feel that, with him, the primal
cause of redemption is the infinite love of God for His
creature, not the satisfaction rendered to His justice; and
that the indispensable condition of the realisation of the
Divine plan is living faith, produced in man by the Holy
Spirit." Ochino, after the example ofthe Benefizio, compares
the effects of the union of the soul with Jesus to the fruits
of marriage. But it seems to us that in Ochino's soteriology
the person of Christ is eclipsed by the Holy Spirit ; it is the
Spirit that should be the supreme mle of our life ; it is this
'^ Dialogi Sette, dial, i., analysed by Benrath, p. 75.
" Prediche, part i. sermon I, analysed by Benrath, p. 155.

' CHAPTER VII. 145
inner voice we must obey rather than men and angels, rather
than our own wisdom, rather even than the literal words of
Jesus. Here we recognise the preponderance of the mys
tical principle inherited from Valdes.^^
This brief sketch of Ochino's ideas at that time makes
it intelligible that, when he left Geneva in the middle of
August, 1545, Calvin furnished him with the certificate of
orthodoxy to be found in his letters to Peflican and Myco
nius. But this complete accord was not to last long.
During his first visit to Basel, in the latter half of August,
1545, Ochino met the man whose influence on his mind
was to counterbalance that of Calvin, and who was to
become, as translator of his works into Latin, the accomplice
of his daring flights of criticism. This was Sebastian Castellio.
The Savoyard schoolmaster had quitted Geneva in the
previous year, he having been unjustly 'refused an appoint
ment to the pastoral office, to which he was entitled by his
knowledge of the Scriptures and the purity of his morals. The
reason was, that he could not subscribe to Calvin's opinion
in regard to the mystical sense of the book of Canticles,
and the descent of Jesus Christ into hell. At Basel, Castellio
made a very -wretched living to begin with, by giving private
lessons and correcting the press ; but his merit having
become recognised, he was called to the chair of Greek
Literature in the University, which he filled until his death
(1562 — Dec. 1563). Translator of the Bible, and eminent
as a critic, Castellio opposed the opinion of Calvin respect
ing predestination and free-will. The purpose of doctrines,
said he, is to make men better. Those, then, which do not
contribute to this result, should be discarded as calamitous.
Such, in his eyes, were the doctrines of the Trinity and of
predestination. A mind so broad and practical was sure to
delight Ochino, who was doubtless introduced to him by his
^^ Prediche, part ii. sermon 50;- Benrath, p. 165.
L

146 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
countryman, Curione.!^ Ochino was but passing through'
Basel on his way to Strassburg when he again met Peter
Martyr, and made the acquaintance of Bucer, with whom he
had already corresponded on the subject of the Eucharistic
controversy.^'' Called to Augsburgthroughtheinfluence of XystusBetulejus,
the learned editor of Lactantius, and placed by the municipal
council as pastor (Oct. 1545 — Jan. 1547) over the Itahan
Church in that city, which had a considerable membership,
Ochino there married a French lady, whom he had known
at Geneva, and contracted a close friendship with Francesco
Stancaro of Mantua, and with his co- presbyter Wolfgang
Musculus, minister of the German Church.i^ The sixteen
months of his stay in Augsburg were not barren of exegetical
and hortatory works. There it was that he published, for
example, his Exposition of tfie Epistle to tlie Roma7is and his
Sermons on tfie Epistle to tfie Galatians, as well as three
curious treatises which have only been preserved to us in
German, viz. a Prayer, in which is contained the whole
doctrine of salvation,^^ a Dialogue of the Carnal Reason and
a Spiritual Cfiristian, and lastly, a brilliant treatise On the
Hope of a Christian Heart.
Driven from Augsburg by the victorious Charles V. (23
January, 1547), Ochino passed through Constanz and Zurich,
and took refuge at Basel, where he spent the remainder of
the year, enjoying the society of Castellio and Curione, and
superintending the printing of the second edition of the first

¦'^ Lichtenberger's EncyclopJdie, art. Castalion, by Henri Lutteroth.
Cf. Lecky, ut sup., vol. ii. 44 — 49.
^^ Calvini Opera, vol. ix. 689, Letter from Bucer to Calvin.
1' Schelhorn, Ergotzlichkeifen, Ulm, 1763, vols. v. and vi., pieces 9,
10, II and 12.
" [This exists also in Italian, and is printed with the Prediche.'\

CHAPTER VII. 147
part of the Prediche, and the first edition of the second
part.2» Our rapid narrative of this phase of his career proves an
alibi to the story that Ochino took part in the Vicenza con
ferences of 1 546, as Christoph Sand pretends in his Biblio
theca Antitrinitariorum. Though he carried ever his beautiful '
Italy in his heart — it was for her he wrote his Prediche, as
Vergerio his pamphlets — he turned still northward his wan
dering steps. The invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury
found him at Basel, where Peter Martyr had rejoined him ;
and on 4 November, 1547, he set out for England, furnished
with a letter of introduction from Curione to Sir John Cheke,
the preceptor of Edward VI. ^"^
Ochino's long residence in London (December 1547 —
August 1553), to which we shall recur presently, does not
seem to have produced any appreciable development of his
thought. While this phase lasted, Ochino took in more
than he gave out. At least the development of his ideas
cannot be detected either in his celebrated Tragcedie de
dicated to Edward VI. , a sort of satirical dialogue between
Satan and Christ, Bonifacio VIII. and Henry VIIL, on the
grandeur and decadence of the Papacy ; or in the third part
of his Prediche, which appeared at Basel in 1551. We will
draw attention, however, to a passage which seems to us to •
possess a Unitarian tint : " Even the soul of Christ, before
Thou hadst created it, was not in itself worthy ofthe treasures
with which Thou, in Thy mere grace, hast endowed it. Thou
didst not endow Christ thus on account of his virtuous life,
but it is because Thou hast thus endowed him that he led a
life holy and worthy Thee. What shall I say more? In
Christ Thou hast given us all things, even Thyself, and that
™ Calvini Opera, vol. xl.. Letter from Calvin to Musculus (25 April,
1547); cf. Benrath, p. 182.
^^ Coelii Secundi Curionis Epistolce, lib. ii, 287.
L 2

148 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
is why I have the assurance that Thou wishest to save

"22

me. There is here an evident tendency to subordinate the
person and work of the Son to the sovereign action of the
Father. It appears that Ochino took part with Vermigli,
Cranmer and Melanchthon in the compilation of the Prayer
Book.^s But what occupied him more than anything else
at that time was the question of predestination and free-will,
to which he had already devoted fourteen of his Predicfie. It
seems that after reading them, the pilncess Elizabeth, then
eighteen years of age, wished to confer with him, and asto
nished the veteran dialectician by the penetration of her
thought.^* However, the idea of God's love embracing all
His creatures, and that of an invisible and universal Church
welcoming all children of the Spirit, were always prepon
derant in Ochino's religious consciousness. Never did he
sacrifice God's love to His prescience of human sin.
It is in Switzerland that we shall witness the production
of the capital development of Ochino's thought. He arrived
at Geneva, it is said, on the morrow of the execution (27
Oct. 1553) of Michael Servetus, the first illustrious victim
of the Unitarian cause, and he did not conceal his disap
probation of such a cruelty, a course which rendered him
unpopular with Calvin's hangers-on. ^° While here he pub
lished his Apologhi, or five satires on the abuses and errors
of the Popish Synagogue, 1554, dedicated to Sir Richard
Morison, one ofthe English gentry who had quitted England
on the accession of Mary Tudor. Then, after a flying visit
"^ Prediche, part iii. sermon 30; Benrath, p. 211.
'^'^ Taine, Histoire de la Litterature Anglaise, vol. ii. 316.
^¦^ Preface to the Labyrinths of Ochino, addressed to Queen Elizabeth :
Basel, 1 56 1.
^ Contra libellum Calvini, in quo ostendere conatur hcereticos jure
gladii coercendos esse, 1554.

CHAPTER VIL I49
to Chiavenna, he returned to his much-loved Basel, where he
spent 1554 and the spring of 1555, and published the fourth
part of his Prediche. Note should be taken of the fourth
sermon in this volume, on the Image of God in Man, which
presents striking resemblances to the first ofthe Considerations
of Valdes, which had just (1550) been published at Basel by
Curione, and with the first chapter of the Benefizio di Gesit
Cristo.^^ Ochino was then sixty-eight years old. For fifteen years
he had travelled over land and sea, driven by armies or by
revolutions, battered by tempests and by trials ; nevertheless,
he had succeeded in creating an inner circle of adherents ;
in London he had left behind him devoted friends, and at
Basel he had others, in whose society the veteran disputant
asked nothing more than to spend the remainder of his days
in peace. God had decided otherwise. The voice which at
Florence had cried unto him, " Leave thy country and thy
church to be my witness in the land of the stranger," again
made itself heard. In June, 1555, he received the visit of
Dr. Martino Muralto and the young Lelio Sozini, who
brought him the call to become the pastor of the Locamese
exiles at Ziirich.
"Wliatever his need of repose, Ochino was not long in
deciding between his own interest and duty; he accepted
the summons of the Italians at Zurich. He did not suspect
that, a new Servetus, he was about to encounter another
Calvin.^^ Every one recollects how, after an eight years'
ministry, the publication of his Thirty Dialogues cost him
exile at the age of seventy-six, and how, rejected by all
the churches, he wandered to an out-of-the-way corner of
Moravia, there to die of hunger and sorrow (about December,
1564)- 
^ Compare Benefizio, cap. i with Considerazioni, No. i., and Benef.
cap. iv. with Consid. No. xiii.
"" Calvini Opera, vol. xv. 2355 (Ochino to Calvin, 4 Dec. 1555).

ISO SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Bernardino Ochino — and this is what constitutes him a
figure so original — exhibits, in epitome, by the sweep of his
thought, the whole cur\-e described by Protestant dogmatics
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. All the ques
tions that have since been agitated were revolved in his
brain ; and he threw out a number of heresies which were
to be accepted as truths two centuries after his death. We
may get an idea of this in a detaU of the progress made by
his thought, on the two or three points above referred to,
between the period of his Predicfie at Venice and Geneva
(1539 — 1545) and the publication at Zurich of his Dialogue
on Purgatory (1556), dedicated to Francesco Lismanini
(ex-Provincial of the Franciscans or Minorites in Poland,
and converted to the gospel by Ochino), and his Thirty
Dialogues on the Messiah and the Trinity (1563).
Ochino's first breach with traditional orthodoxy was on
the question of Redemption. Christ, he says in his Dialogue
on Purgatory, made satisfaction for all the elect. Not that
his work, his life, or his suff"erings were in themselves of
infinite merit, for he owed all to God, absolute obedience
included — but because God, of His infinite grace and love
for humanity, determined to confer this expiatory value on
the work of Christ.^*
Here we are very far from Anselm's theory, and much
nearer to that of Duns Scotus, who had said that " the works
of Christ have an infinite value, not in themselves, but
because of mere grace the Father has accepted them for
such." This strongly resembles also the Socinian doctrine
of expiation.
With respect to the person of Christ, it is trae that, in his
Catechisfn (1561), he expresses himself almost in the terms

'^ Ochino, De Purgatorio Dialogus: Zurich, 1556; translated out of
Italian into Latin by Taddeo Duno ; and Dialogi XXX. (Dial. vi.). Cf.
Alex. Schweizer, Die Protestaniischen Centraldogmen : Zurich, 1S54,
vol. i. 309. See Appendix X.

CHAPTER VIL ISI
of the Calvinistic dogmatic theology ; and yet he is careful
to mark the subordination of Jesus to his Father, and to
insist upon his functions as Priest and Revealer. ^^
It is above all in his Thirty Dialogues, de4icated to
the Earl of Bedford and Prince Mikolaj Radziwill, that he
furthest advances the line of his batteries against the formulas
of Trinitarian orthodoxy. The better to veil his attacks,
he puts them under the form of dialogue ; but the theologians
of Ziirich were not thus to be deceived, and they scented
the author's heresy in the strength of the arguments placed
in the mouth of his Antitrinitarian interlocutor. This, for
example, is the way in which, in the nineteenth dialogue,
the author makes the Spirit of Doubt to speak : " Do you
believe that the man Jesus Christ is the Son of God?"
Ochino answers, " Yes ; first because, as man, he received
his existence from God; secondly, because he was conceived
in a diff'erent manner from us; thirdly, because he participates
in the attributes of God." " But," says Doubt, " the Scrip
tures speak of several sons of God." " Christ," responds
Ochino, " is the only begotten Son, in the sense that he
alone, of all the elect, is the highest Prophet, Priest and
King ; that he alone was conceived of the Holy Spirit ; that
to him alone God has given his Spirit without measure."^**
Here we have a Christology which presents singular analogies
with that of Fausto Sozzini.
But the following is weightier still. Spiritus (Doubt)
asks, " How is it possible to conceive the Trinity of hypos-
^ II Catechismo, avero Institutione Christiana, di M. Bernardino
Ochino da Siena : Basel, 1561, Svo, p. 159.
^ &£& Bernardini Ochini Senensis Dialogi XXX.: Basel, 1563; trans
lated into Latin by Castellio (Dialogue xix. De Sancta Trinitate). See
Appendix X. [Taken with what follows, the passage amounts to this,
that Ochino holds, with the common Catholic christology, that Christ is
entitled to the appellation " only begotten Son, " in virtue of his humanity
as well as of his divinity.]

152 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
tases in the Unity of the Divine Being?" "Because,"
responds the author, " these hypostases correspond with the
three functions of the Divine Life, paternity, sonship and
spiration; now these three persons are equal and co-eternal."
" But," objects Doubt, " the idea of Sonship excludes that
of equality, as the idea of proceeding excludes that of co-
eternity. Furthermore, Jesus has said, 'The Father is
greater than I.' Now if it be conceded that the Son is
identical with the Father, it follows that the Father is greater,
not only than the Son, but than Himself, which is absurd."
To this objection the orthodox interlocutor finds no reply.
He contents himself with saying that the Trinity is a subject
above our capacity; and that it is better to adore it in
silence, without overstepping the limitations which God has
imposed on His revelation. ^^
It will now be easy for us to verify the accuracy of the re
mark of Pfere Guichard when he says that Bernardino Ochino
began in England to "preach a refined Arianism, which
awakened the curiosity of lovers of novelty," and that several
of his followers were prosecuted. ^^ How, in fact, could so
ardent a man, whose thought was Hke a steam-engine at high
pressure, and displayed itself at once by word, through the
press, and in act, how could he do other than wake up the
most lethargic? Ochino became the first agitator of theolo
gical thought, which had been slumbering in England since
Wiclif and Pecock ; and he had two powerful instruments of
action at his command, his writings and his disciples.
Ochino spent six years in England, and, according to the
^^ Dialogue xix. Cf. Queestiones Ministrorum. Ecclesiarum quce sunt
apud Rhaetos (May, 1561), quoted above. Chap. V. pp. 97, 98.
'^ L. A. Guichard, ut sup., pt. i. chap, xxviii. p. 127. Varillas, in his
Histoire des Heresies, book xvii. p. 66, also says that, during his sojourn
in London, Ochino secretly promulgated his fancies on the doctrine of
the Trinity, which cost him the displeasure of the Duke of Somerset,
Lord Protector. But his testimony is not always to be depended upon.

CHAPTER VIL I S3
testimony of his friends, never had his life been more happy
and better employed than during that period. " Bernardino,"
writes de Enzina, " employs his whole time in writing, and
this too with a force and rapidity, as he tells me, beyond
what he ever did before." ^^ It was in London that he
composed in Latin that curious Tragxdie, or satire in dialogue
against the Papacy, which was translated into English by
" Master John Ponet, Doctor of divinitie," afterwards Bishop
of Winchester. The printer, John Day, also published
Certayne Sermons of Ochino, translated into English ; among
the rest his' fourteen sermons on Predestination, which went
through several editions.^* Ochino was intimate with all
the distinguished men of England, Sir Richard Morison, the
Eari of Bedford, Sir W. Cecil (Lord Burieigh), Cheke, Sir
Anthony Cooke, Jewel and Sampson. He was soon received
at court, like John k Lasco. It was doubtless from the hand
of Ochino that the pious Edward VI. received the manuscript
copy of the Benefizio di Gesil Cristo, on which he has left his
touching epigraph ; and from the same hand he accepted
the dedication of the Tragaedie.^^
At the restoration of Protestantism under Elizabeth, press
ing overtures were made to Ochino to induce him to resume
his Canterbury prebend, of which he had been deprived
through contumacy.^" He was held in such esteem by the
3' Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letter 173 (Dryander to Bullinger).
^ Mr. Gordon (see Theol. Rev. Oct. 1876, art. Bernardino Tomma
sini) had before him an Svo volume, without date, with the following
title: Sermons of Barnardine Ochyne, concerning the Predestination and
Election of God, translated by A. C. This translation Mr. Gordon attri
butes to Anne, daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke.
^° A Tragoedie or Dialoge of the vniustevsurped primacie of the Bisliop
of Rome, and of all the iust abolishing of the same, made by Master Bar
nardine Ochine, an Italian, Sf translated out of Latine inlo Englishe by
Master John Ponet, Doctor of di-vinitie, &c. : London, 1549.
'' Zurich Inters, I ser.. Letters 16 and 24 (J. Jewel, Bishop of Salis
bury, to Peter Martyr).

1 54 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Virgin Queen, that Thomas Sampson wrote (6 January,
1560) to Peter Martyr: "His authority, I know, has very
great weight with the queen. Should he at any time be
disposed to write to her, to exhort her to persevere with all
diligence in the cause of Christ, I can most cordially testify,
what I certainly know to be the fact, and assert most con
fidently, that she is indeed a child of God. But she has yet
great need of such advisers as himself. She is acquainted,
as you know, with Italian, and also well skilled in Latin and
Greek. If anything is written in these languages either by
yourself or Master Bernardine, I am quite of opinion that
you will not only afford much gratification to her Majesty,
but perform a most useful service to the Church of En
gland." ^^ Ochino was very ill at Ziirich when this letter
arrived, and we do not know whether he carried out Samp
son's wish. But in the following year he dedicated his
Labyrinths to Queen EHzabeth, and in the Preface he ex
presses himself as foHows :
" The question whether or not man has a free-will is one of
the most difficult, because both the affirmative and the negative
are open to the most serious objections. Having observed that
a great many authors, in reflecting on these questions, have only
lost themselves in the most inextricable difficulties, I have for a
long time sought a way of escape. God, at length, has granted
me this favour. And, as I very well remember that your Majesty,
when I was in England, read some of my treatises on pre
destination, and that, when you consulted me on this subject,
you gave me many proofs of the extent and the penetration of
your understanding, as well as of your desire to sound the
mysteries of God, I have concluded that you, before all others,
ought to gather the fruits of my labour. Such are the reasons
that have led me to dedicate this work to you."'^
^ Zurich Letters, i ser.. Letter 27 (Sampson to Peter Martyr).
'8 Labyrintlii, Hoc est de Libero aut servo Arbitrio, de di-vina Prceno-
tione, Destinatione, et Libertate Disputatio. Et quonam pacta sit ex iis
Labyrinthis exeundum. Basel, 1561, Svo.

CHAPTER VIL 155
This royal favour was sure to procure hundreds of readers
for Ochino in the ranks of the aristocracy and the clergy, and
it was among these that his first disciples were formed. Fore
most in their number must be placed his translators ; for
to translate is not always to betray, as the Italian proverb
{traduttore, traditore) has it ; it is often to enrich one's
country with treasures of foreign literature, as we acclimatise
beautiful exotics. Moreover, except in the case of paid
labour, one only translates what one admires, and the work
of translation still further increases the train of sympathy
between the author and his interpreter. This was sure to be
the case with Dr. John Ponet, the translator of the Tragcedie,
and that sensible young gentlewoman who translated the
Sermons of Barnardine Ochyne, concerning tfie Predestination
and Election of God, and piously dedicated them to her
mother, Lady F.^' This young gentlewoman was Anne
Cooke, who became the second wife of Sir Nicholas Bacon,
and the mother of the great Bacon. Through this channel
the critical spirit of Ochino was sure to communicate itself
to the presumed author ofthe Christian Paradoxes (1645).*"
Still more markedly than these interpreters, did two men
of Latin race, one a Spaniard, the other an Italian, become
in England the heirs of the humanitarian and latitudinarian
tendency of Ochino. These were Corranus and Acontius.
Antonio de Corro (Corranus), called Bellerive, born at
Seville in 1527, after having for five' years ministered in the
churches at Saintonge, had been excluded from pastoral
functions by the Synod of Loudun ; and, pursued by the
hatred of the Spanish Catholics to Antwerp, had been unable

39 Theol. Rev. Oct. 1876. Cf. Benrath, Ochino, p. 208. [Lady F. was
the translatress' grandmother. Sir Anthony Cooke married Anne, daugh
ter of Sir William Fitzwilliam.]
*" [It has been proved by Rev. A. B. Grosart that the real author of
the Christian Paradoxes was Rev. Herbert Palmer.]

156 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
to obtain the magistrates' confirmation of the call he had
received from the Walloon Church in that city.
Failing to obtain a pulpit, he at any rate made use of the
press to propound his ideas, and seized the occasion of the
appearance of the Confession of Faith of tlie Lutherans of
Antwerp, published in December, 1567, by Mattia Flacio
Illyrico, to write a letter to his Lutheran colleagues, in
which he exhorted them to concord and moderation in the
Eucharistic controversy, and invoked the authority of John
k Lasco. He reached England then, preceded by a repu
tation for latitudinarianism as regards confessions of faith.
He at once announced his arrival to Archbishop Parker,
sending him two pamphlets, his epistle, afterwards published
in EngHsh (1570), with the titie, A Godly Admonition sent to
the Pastor of tfie Flemish Church in Antwerp, exhorting them
to Concord with other Ministers, and a letter published in
English (1577), with the title, A Supplication to the Kingof
Spain, wfierein is showed the Sum of Religion, &c. They
were originally, published in Latin and French, and Cor
ranus told Parker he thought that they would be useful
reading for his daughters, who were studying the French
language. Thanks to this high protection, he was accepted
as the second minister of the Spanish Church in London,
and filled that charge successfuHy for the space of two years,
conciliating the favour of Sir WiUiam Cecil and the Earl of
Leicester. But in his second year of office (1570), symptoms of
disagreement appeared between Corranus and his co-pres
byter Jerlito, minister of the Italian Church.*^ And when
a tract by Corranus appeared under the title, Tableau de
r CEuvre de Dieu (before 1568), printed at Norwich, and dedi
cated to the most noble Lady Stafford, he was immediately
*i For details of this controversy, see Strype, Life of Grindal, pp.
185 — 187, 217—222.

CHAPTER VIL I 57
denounced in the presbytery common to the two churches,
Italian and Spanish, as tainted with heresy. Very soon
Jean Cousin, the minister of the French Church, mingled in
the fray, taking the part of Jerlito.*^ Corranus, on his side,
defended himself tooth and nail ; he wrote seven letters,
one after the other, to Theodore Beza, who referred the
whole affair to Bishop Grindal, superintendent of the
Strangers' Church. He, after an inquiry, suspended Cor
ranus from his functions. When Corranus applied for the
degree of Doctor of Divinity at the University of Oxford,
he incurred a strong opposition on the part of his fellow-
clergymen in the Strangers' Church in London. They
forwarded to Grindal, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Ed-win
Sandys, then Bishop of London, a list of 138 heretical theses
extracted from the lectures, conversations and works of
Corranus, setting against them as many orthodox theses.*^
However, by favour of his powerful friends, the Spanish ex-
pastor was appointed reader of theology in Latin at the
Temple church in London (1571 — ^1575), and afterwards at
Oxford (1575 — 1586). He was Censor Tfieologicus at Christ
Church, Oxford (1581 — 1585), and prebendary of Harleston
(1586 — 1591) in St. Paul's, London, where he died, 30
March, 1591.
What, then, were the charges of heresy on which Corranus
was incriminated ? The first, beyond doubt, was his not
deferring to the authority of a confession of faith. At Ant
werp, the Lutherans had confronted him with their modifica
tion of the Augsburg Confession ; and now in London the
Calvinists reproached him with not putting himself under
the sanction of Calvin or Theodore Beza. The truth is, the
author of the Tableau de I CEuvre de Dieu had deemed it
^^ Zurich Letters, 2 ser.. Letter 66 (Bis'hop Grindal to Theodore Beza
and others).
^^ Christiaan Sepp, Potemische en Irenische Theologie: Leyden, 1881.

158 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
sufficient to invoke the authority of the Scriptures. Let us
see, then, how on this principle he treats the dogma of the
persons of the Trinity :
Thesis IV. " Deus est unitas et unicus existit ; et manat ab
eo solo, nee tamen de alio, quia ea decresceret fieretque minor.
Ubi sunt duo, fieri potest ut inter ea oriatur discordia."
Thesis V. " Hoc unum, Deus, vult unum, estque omnibus
binis contrarium  "
Thesis X. "Omnium in eo (Christo) perfectissimum . fuit
Integra et omnibus numeris absoluta unitio voluntatis, quffi sibi
non arrogavit a quo erat ipse, unum alioqui decessisset uni."
Thesis XXV. " ^ternus Deus, Jesum ex hoc mundo educens,
misit Spiritum Suum, habitum, flatum, vim, potentiam et ener-
giam in corda filiorum suorum regeneratorum."**
These articles bear evident signs of an extra-trinitarian
bias exactly similar to Ochino's Tliirty Dialogues and Florio's
famous questions to the Ziirich ministers. But the sources
from which all these imbibed their opinions were the Airno-
tations on the New Testament of Erasmus, and the Biblical
works of Castellio, Ochino's translator and friend. Here is
the proof of it : — Corranus, writes William Barlow, son of
*•* [" 4. God is a unity, and exists as unique ; and [this unity] flows from
him alone, and not from any other, because [if so] it would diminish and
become less. Where there are two things, it may happen that discord
may arise between them. — 5. This one [word] God means one thing, and
is opposed to all doubles. — 10. In Christ the most perfect thing of all
was his entire and absolute union of will, which [will] did not arrogate
to itself that from which he himself was, the one would otherwise have
been wanting to the one. — 25. The everlasting God, when withdrawing
Jesus from this world, sent into the hearts of His regenerate children His
own Spirit, a breath, blast, force, potency and energy. "] See Theses
excerptce ex lectionibus, colloquiis, tt maxime e scriptis D. Corrani, in
Dr. Christiaan Sepp's learned monograph, Potemische en Irenische Theo
logie, Leyden, iSSi, pp. 30 ff. [In his Articles of Faith (1574), Corranus
explicitly sets forth the Trinity and the Incarnation; in 1576 he sub
scribed the Thirty-nine Articles, as a condition of obtaining the degree
of D.D. at Oxford.]

CHAPTER VIL 159
the Bishop of that name, in a letter to Josiah Simler, " is a
great admirer of Castalio, of whose version of the Bible he
declares this opinion, that he is a very bad translator, for he
has given anything rather than a literal rendering ; but if
you speak about a paraphrase, then, says he, Castalio excels
all other interpreters by many leagues. I know also," adds
Barlow, " that he made earnest enquiry from a person of
my acquaintance whether or not he had some dialogues on
the Trinity, by an anonymous individual, printed at Basel,
but Castalio, he said, is thought to have been the author of
them ; and he added that he was very anxious to procure
them."*5 Giacomo Contio (Acontius) is sure not to have had so
much trouble in procuring this forbidden book, for an ex
pression in a letter from Bishop Jewel to Peter Martyr
reveals to us the existence of friendly relations between
him and Ochino. " I would not," says Jewel, " that Master
Bernardine should suppose that I have forgotten him. My
influence and exertions have not been wanting . . . The five
Italian crowns which I received from Master Barthol. Com-
pagni in his name, I handed over to Acontius. We are
now exerting ourselves about his canonry, and there is a
good prospect of obtaining it."*^
It may be recollected that Acontius was mixed up in the
Adriaans van Hamstede controversy, and excommunicated
on that ground by Bishop Grindal. In the following chapter
we shall see the decisive part he played in the English Uni-
^^ Zurich Letters, 2 ser., Letters IOI (Corranus to Bullinger) and 105
(W. Barlow to J. Simler). [Barlow's letter, above quoted, bears date
25 Jan. 1575. The Thirty Dialogues of Ochino were not anonymous,
and had made a noise over Europe eleven years before. It may well be
that de Corro had not seen them; but it is strange that he should be
ignorant of their author.ship, if he had heard of them at all. Possibly
the reference is to some other book.]
^ Zurich Letters, i ser.. Letters 16 and 24.

l60 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
tarian movement. We have now to sum up the account of
Ochino's influence exerted in this direction.
The leading idea of Ochino's theology is that God is Love.
His grace does all ; man has but to surrender himself with
confidence to the Spirit of God, which acts and speaks in
him. This inner voice of the Spirit {Dei sermo interior) is
superior even to the written word of the gospel. Starting
from this position, and pursuing the method of Duns Scotus,
Ochino maintains that the work of Christ has an infinite
value for the expiation of our sins, not in itself, but because
God has endowed it with this virtue and accepted it in this
light. Lastly, in his Thirty Dialogues, Ochino betrays the
secret doubts in his own soul which were shaking faith in
the received doctrines of the Trinity and the Deity of Jesus
Christ ; and concludes that the best thing to do is to
prostrate one's self in silence before this mystery, and not
seek on this subject to be wiser than the Scripture. On the
whole, he did not directly attack the doctrine of the Trinity,
and yet no one after Servetus dealt stouter blows against that
doctrine. By his Scotist theory of redemption, he opened
the way for the Socinian Christology; and through his dis
ciples, Acontius and Corranus, he bequeathed to English
Unitarianism these two great ideas, the Divine Love which
respects human liberty, even in a rebellious child, and the
Universal Church, towering above all the particular churches,
each with its own ambition of infallibility.

CHAPTER VIIL
Acontius, his philosophical and religious ideas, and his influence on
English theology.
" Ab omni autem Christiano congressu
prorsus abesse vincendi studium oportet ;
unus enim sit scopus, ut vincat Veritas."
Siratagemata, ii.
Who, then, was this ItaHan whom we have twice noticed
in connection with the Ecclesia Peregrinorum ; first as a
friend of "Master Bernardine'' and Bishop Jewel (1559),
and two years afterwards (1561) as implicated in the con
troversy about Adriaans van Hamstede, one of the Flemish
pastors ? M 'Crie places him at the head of the list of notables
of the Italian Church in London, together with Giambattista
Castiglione, one of Queen Elizabeth's gentlemen of the Privy
Chamber; and we know from another source that he received
a pension from that princess in his quality of military
engineer.^ To him, in fact, is generally attributed one of
the first treatises on fortifications, which appeared at Geneva
under the title Ars Muniendorum Oppidorum (1585). As,
moreover, he published a book entitled Stratagemata Satance,
it looks at first as though we had to do with a soldier or a
diplomatist. But the illusion is of no long duration. In
reading his works, taking care not to neglect the prefaces,
we are soon convinced that we are in the presence of a man
^ M'Crie, Reformation in Spain, p. 366. The real name of Acontius,
as given in Francesco Betti's letter to the Marquis of Pescaro, and in
Pietro Bizarri's History of Hungary, was Giacomo Contio.
M

1 62 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
of eminence in almost' every department; at once engineer
and theologian, philosopher and lawyer, mathematician and
poet. We shaH briefly sketch his biography, from the
materials supplied by the prefaces to his books, which are
the most important documents, and by the clear and accurate
article which M. Charles Waddington has devoted to him
in the second edition of the Dictionnaire des Sciences Philo-
sophiques. A dark veil conceals the dates of his birth and of his death.
AH we know is, that he was born at Trienta (Trent) and died
in London. It may be concluded from his letter to Francesco
Betti (1558) that he was his contemporary; and, from his
letter to Johann Wolff (20 November, 1562), that by this
last date he had passed the meridian of his life, that is to
say, his fortieth year.^ He had spent long years in studying
the works of Bartolo and Baldo (de Ubaldis), jurisconsults
who were then authorities in the law schools, but had little
esteem for " men of that sort" {ejus farince), as he calls
them.* He seems to have had more taste for Aristotle,
Plato and Archimedes, for we find in his works numerous
references to their principles. Taken into the service of
the Marquis of Pescaro,* one of the members of that
d'Avalos family which has given such great generals to
Spain, he there doubtless learned the military art, especially
that branch of it which relates to sieges, and spent several
years at the court of the Spanish viceroy at Milan. Here
he made the acquaintance of Francesco Betti, a Roman
^ Compare also these words from lib. vii. p. 311 (edition of 1610), of
the Stratagemata : " Quid nostra occidit estate ? Sunt jam anni plus
minus quadraginta septem, quum coipit Lutherus contra Romanam eccle
siam docere.'- From these various indications we draw the inference that
Giacomo Contio was born at Trent somewhere about the year 1520.
3 Letter to J. Wolff, in the 1610 edition ofthe Stratagemata [also in
the 1565 duodecimo and the 1653 edition], dated London, 20 Nov. 1562.
^ [He was the husband of Vittoria Colonna.]

CHAPTER VIIL 1 63
knight, son of one of the Marquis's stewards. To use his
own words, " The laborious and anxious employments in
which we have long been engaged together, the similarity
of our studies and inclinations, and, what is above all, our
identity of sentiment in religion," gave rise to " such an inti
mate friendship " between them, that, when residence in Italy
became intolerable for Protestants, even secret ones, they
together made up their minds to go into exile. ^
Betti was the first to set out, and went to Basel. Two
months afterwards (in the middle of October, 1557), he was
rejoined by Acontius, and they both sought refuge at Ziirich,
where they were received with open arms in Ochino's house.
The Italian Church at Ziirich was then at the height of
its prosperity. Peter Martyr, who had succeeded Pellican
in the chair of Hebrew, and who was received by the
Locamese community " as a second father," was the means
of drawing them into close relations with the University.*
Acontius, with his ardour for work and his modest and
conciliatory character, speedily made friends with Josias
Simler, Johann Frisius (Friese), and above all Johann Wolff
who had been put into the place of Bibliander when the
latter was pensioned off {emeritus) on the ground of his
anti-Calvinistic opinions on predestination.^ On the other
hand, he also became acquainted with Lelio Sozini, the
young magician who had succeeded in disarming Calvin
himself* As for Betti, who was perhaps a younger man, he
' See the letter to Francesco Betti, serving as preface to the Methodus
sive recta investigandarum trade-ndarumque Artium ac Scientiarum ratio :
Basel, 1558 (title as reprinted, 165S).
^ Benrath, Ochino, pp. 271 ff.
..' This J. Wolff was pastor of the Fraumiinster at Ziirich, and was a
distinguished Hebraist and theologian ; we meet him again in corre
spondence with Lelio Sozini, and with the English exiles.
* [This seenis barely possible; Lelio Sozini left Ziirich 4 Nov. 1557,
and did not return till August, 1559. See below, p. 174.]
M 2

1 64 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
attached himself more to Fausto, the nephew of Lelio." At
this period Acontius gave proof at once of great maturity
of intellect and remarkable originality by publishing his
essay on Method, dedicated to Francesco Betti. The printing
of this book at Basel, by Peter Perna, took him often to
that city, where he was certainly introduced to Curione, to
Silvestro Telio, and to the elite of the Italian society.
From Basel Acontius proceeded to Strassburg, where he
met with a knot of Italian Protestants, Zanchi, Odone,
Massario and others, and also with a group of English exiles,
Grindal, Jewel, Sampson, &c."
When these latter returned home on the accession of
EHzabeth, Acontius accompanied them, or at any rate he
followed them very shortly, for we have discovered his pre
sence in London in November, 1559-^^
He must have been furnished with letters, of recom
mendation from Ochino to powerful personages, for he was
soon presented to the Queen, and obtained from her a
pension as engineer.
Acontius had not merely material, but also religious wants.
He assiduously frequented the ItaHan services, and took
interest in all that passed in the Strangers' Church. We
have seen him advocating, in the van Hamstede controversy,
the cause of tolerance towards the Anabaptists, and excom
municated on this account by Bishop Grindal. ^^ This did
not prevent Queen Elizabeth, who took a broader view of
things, from continuing her favour to Acontius, or from
accepting the dedication of his Stratagemata Satance. Acon
tius was a man as modest as he was industrious, as pious as
^ [Not at Zurich ; they were warm friends already, but F. Sozzini had
not yet left Italy. They renewed their intercourse at Basel in 1575.] '
^^ M'Crie, Reformation in Italy, pp. 44S ff.
'' Zurich Letters, I ser.. Letters 16 and 24.
" Chap. VI. p. 135.

CH.4PTER VIH. 1 65
he was learned. He enjoyed the general esteem of the
Italian Church, and kept up a correspondence with the
learned men of Europe, including the French philosopher.
Ramus. ^^
He had finished several poems and treatises — one, for
example, on Dialectics — when he was interrupted without
being surprised by death (about 1570). He bequeathed his
papers — all his fortune — to his friend Giovanni Battista
Castiglione, gentleman-in-waiting to her Majesty; who, shortiy
afterwards, published his Essortazione al timor di Dio,
together with some poetical pieces (doubtless hymns), as a
kind of religious bequest,. and an irrefragable testimony to
his evangelical piety.'-* Among his admirers, especially the
Arminians, Acontius left the reputation of " a divine light
of prudence and moderation ;" and even his opponents,
applying to him a judgment passed on Origen, said of his
works, " Ubi bene, -nemo melius ; ubi male, nemo pejus. "^^
There were two individualities in Acontius, the philosopher
and the theologian ; but differing in this respect from Pom
ponazzi, from Bacon, and even from Descartes, who placed
the things of Reason and of Faith in two distinct spheres,
one where everything is submitted to the free investigations
of the human mind, tiie other, where there is nothing for it
'^ See letter from Ramus to Acontius, 15 Dec. 1565. Professor C.
Waddington has proved that he could not have been dead in 1566, as
most of the biographers say, since Ramus addresses him in 1567, at
p. 59 of his Procemium Mathematicum. [There seems no real proof
that Ramus knew him. Jo. Ja. Crasser, who visited Oxford and London
in 1606, was told that Acontius died shortly after the issue of the Strata
gemata in 1565. If so, the letter of Ramus never reached him, and he
may not have heard of his death ; it is plain from his letter to Dee that
his knowledge of English affairs was of the slightest.]
^¦' See article on Acontius in Birch and Lockman's English translation
of Bayle's Dictionary : London, 1 734.
^' Hallam, History of Literature, vol, iii, 75. Cf. EpLscopii Opera,
vol, i. 301 (1665 edition).

1 66 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
but to bow before the dogmata proclaimed by the Church—
Acontius never separated what God has joined ; he made
use of one and the same method, namely, the analytic, for
arriving at the solution both of scientific and of ecclesiastical
problems. If we add that this method was novel in his
time, that it preceded Bacon's Novum Organon by sixty
years, and the Method of Descartes by seventy-five, the
reader will form his own judgment of the profound intuition
of our Italian Protestant.
The philosophical ideas of Acontius were propounded in
three works : (i) De Methodo, hoc est de Recta Investiganda
rum Tradendarumque Scientiarum Ratione (Basel, 1558); (2)
Epistola de Ratione Edendorum Librorum, addressed to J.
Wolff (first printed, 1610); (3) a treatise, De Dialectica, which
remained unfinished in manuscript, and was never published.'"
By method, Acontius means the right way of studying
and teaching the sciences ; and on this ground it forms a
part of logic. Now, the first condition of arriving at the
knowledge of tmth is the possession of a right intelligence,
that is to say, the faculty of discerning the true from the
false. Here Acontius is not an optimist like Descartes; he does
not admit that "good sense is the most generally distributed
possession in the world;" and he recommends us to make sure
of the rightness of our judgment, by comparing our spon
taneous opinions with the judgment of the wisest men
{summorum hominum). As regards the origin of his method,
he, like Descartes, confesses that he has borrowed it from
the mathematicians, who, by their rigorous deductions, attain
certain and incontestable results. He would have us, above
everything, keep a firm hold of a small number of funda
mental points, and define things in clear terms, exact and
concise, in order that they may be precisely distinguished
'8 Letter to J. Wolff (printed at the end ofthe Stratagemata.)

CHAPTER VIII. 167
from everything else : Pauca conare, sed ut perficias. Ad
nimis tnulta, si sapis, animum non adjicies. Here we have,
if not the formula, at any rate the spirit, of the first rule of
the Methodoi Descartes.^'' Acontius does not trouble himself
with the vast multitude of philosophical axioms, or of theo
logical dogmata ; he will admit as true only that small
number of verities which shall appear to him to be in con
formity with reason and Scripture.
After having laid this foundation, he distinguishes between
the two branches of method, that which relates to the search
for truth, and that which consists in propounding truth ;
and he gives, at the outset, the rules which are common
to both. According to Acontius, these rules are: (i) To
investigate, in the first place, the more familiar things, in
order to pass from the better known to the less known
(compare Descartes' third rule). ^^ (2) To begin with
singulars, or things less common, in order to advance from
them to things more universal (for example, from the indi
vidual to the species, from the species to the genus), and
thus to mount from effects to causes in a nearer and nearer
approach.'' (3) Once having learned the genus to which a
thing belongs, to proceed by dividing everything into its
parts, that is to say, genus into its several species, species
into its families (compare Descartes' second rule).^" (4) To
observe such an order in these divisions and sub-divisions,
that no one of the parts constitutes more than half the
'" See Descartes, Discours de la MHhode, edit. Vapereau, p. 19. " Au
lieu de ce grand nombre de preceptes dont la logique est composee, je
crus que j'aurais assez des quatre suivants, pourvu que je prisse la ferme
resolution de ne manquer pas une seule fois de les observer. " [" In
place of the large number of rules of which logic is made up, I think I
should do very well with the four following, provided I took a firm
resolve never once to neglect observing them."] Cf. Letter to Wolff,
p. 409.
'* De Methodo, p. 40, ed. Basel, 1559.
'9 Ibid. pp. 48, 49. 2" Ibid. pp. 50—56.

l68 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
whole; and that no part is omitted (compare Descartes'
fourth rule).-'-
Comparing these precepts with the four rules of Descartes
(1637), we are struck with the analogy, not only of ideas,
but even of expressions ; and knowing, as we do, that the
tx&-A.t\%& De Methodo of Acontius (1558) was reprinted several
times in Switzerland and in Holland, we cannot discard the
idea that Descartes had some knowledge of the essay of
his precursor. Moreover, this resemblance has not escaped
the notice of Descartes' disciples. Hulner, a learned Dutch
Cartesian, -wrote to Pfere Mersenne (19 August, 1641) on the
occasion of the pubHcation of Descartes' Meditations, that
" he approved the preference given by the author to the
analytic method over the synthetic ; that up to that time he
had met with nothing similar, except in the little book on
Metfiod by Acontius, who, in addition to that excellent essay,
had also given a fine example of the analytic method in his
Stratagemata Satance, a work worthy to be read by all lovers
of peace in the Church." -'-
This leads us to the consideration' of Acontius as a theo
logian, the sequel to our examination of him as a philosopher.
What strikes us above everything is the religious character
of this ItaHan, who had sacrificed a considerable position in
his own country in order to obey his conscience. He paints
his own picture, when, in his letter to Wolff, he says that we
must write, not for vain renown, but for the public utility
and for the glory of God ; and that with the help of God,
sought in prayer, all things may be attempted. ^^
Unhappily, the work in which Acontius revealed the
innermost sentiments of his piety, his Essortazione al timor
di Dio, has not come down to us. We can judge of its
^' De Methodo, p. 99.
^'•' A. Baillet, Vic de Descartes : Paris, 1691, vol. ii. 138.
'^ Letter to Wolff, p. 407.

CHAPTER VIH. 169
spirit only from his Stratagemata Satance, and a letter which
has lost its address, designed to refute certain objections
which a friend (doubtless Francesco Betti) had forwarded to
him concerning that work.-* The Stratagemata is a kind of
eirenicon, dealing with the variations of doctrine and morals
in the Christian Church, and the means of remedying them.
The form which Acontius gives to his meditations is very
original and poetic. Like the author of the Apocalypse, he
represents the world as the scene of the conflict between
the kingdom of light, ruled by Christ, and the kingdom of
darkness, governed by Satan. Just as the aim of Satan is
man's death, so the aim and end of Christian doctrine is
eternal life.^*
This first principle, once settled, serves him as a criterion
to distinguish sterile controversies from profitable questions :
all that avails to attain this end is profitable to be known ;
whatever does not, is injurious and to be avoided. What
we have to seek, in profitable discussions, is not the vain
delight of a personal success, but solely the triumph of
truth. 26
It is on the strength of this same principle (drawn from
St. John xvii. 3) that Acontius discriminates between the
articles of faith which are necessary to salvation, and those
which may be abandoned to controversy without risking the
Church's weal.^^
This sorting out of essential truths leads the author to
examine the question of Confessions of Faith. Acontius is
much struck with the reproach, which the Catholics cast
^^ This letter, whose heading has been mutilated by time, was found
and published for the first time by Thomas Crenius, in his Animadver-
siones Philologica et Historicce, Leyden, 1697, 3 vols. Svo, vol. i. part ii.
pp. 30—131.
^¦^ Cf. the argument of Milton's Paradise Lost.
2" Stratagemata, book i. pp. 38 — 40. ''' Ibid, book iii. p. 108.

I70 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
against Protestants, of having almost as many confessions as
they have cities or particular sects ; and he avows that the
tendency of these formularies is to place the authority of
human words above that of the Word of God. Nothing, in
his opinion, would be of greater service to the Reformed
churches, than to abohsh all these confessions, with a view to
replace them by a single creed.^'* He asks himself whether
the so-called Apostles' Creed would attain this end, by its
simplicity and its conciseness; but, having shown that on
the cardinal question of justification its language is inade
quate, and that it makes no mention of Baptism or of the
Lord's Supper, he expresses the wish that pious men may
compose a Confession of Faith which may satisfy aU the
churches. For himself, he is too modest to put forward a
model,^^ but we gather from his book and from his letters
that he only admitted as indispensable the four or five
points following: i. God the Father is the only true God.
2. Jesus Christ is truly the Son of God, and the only
Mediator. 3. Salvation is obtained of free grace through
faith. 4 and 5. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the
necessary sacraments, for admission into the Church, and
the reception of eternal Hfe.
As regards the other dogmata, which, on his principle, it
is not necessary to know, Acontius does not enumerate
^' Stratag. book vii. pp. 331, 332. See Appendix XII.
''^ The editor of the third edition of the Stratagemata, Johann Jakob
Grasser, of Basel, was less modest, and has set forth, as coming from
Acontius, a logical series of essential truths, as well as a Confession of
Faith, in longer and shorter alternative forms. Comparing the 1610
edition with the two editions of 1565, the only ones published during the
author's lifetime, it is probable that the entire contents of pp. 109 — 132,
and 334 — 344, are interpolations. [If this were so, the enumeration of
the five necessary points could no longer be attributed to Acontius, for it
belongs to the second of these passages. But the truth is that both
these sections appear in the duodecimo of 1565, and also in the French
version of 1565, Le Ruzes de Satan.l

CHAPTER VIIL I7I
them ; but in his last letter to Betti he mentions that of the
Trinity as having given rise to irritating controversies, and
as having led Sabellius to slight one of the fundamental
truths of Christianity. " One thing only is required of us,'
he says, " namely, that we believe in Christ as the Son of
God ; that is to say, not that, in thinking or speaking about
him, we make use of this term, but that we admit the notion
which it contains. Now, the notion of a Son can only apply
to one who has really a Father, diff'erent from himself.
Sabellius, therefore, in identifying the Son with the Father,
destroys the notion that Jesus is the true Son of God ; and
so puts himself outside the beliefs essential to salvation."^"
If we compare this declaration with the language of Strype,
who, in his Life of Grindal, relates that Acontius was ex
communicated, along with van Hamstede, by the Bishop of
London, for having denied that Christ's taking flesh ofthe
Virgin Mary was a fundamental article of faith ;^' if, espe
cially, we compare it with the letter which he wrote (156.2)
to Bishop Grindal, claiming to be again allowed to com
municate in the French Church, we shall infer from this
comparison that our engineer was a Unitarian of the first
rank. Van Hamstede retracted a year afterwards ; Acontius
maintained his affirmation of the five points, conformable
to Scripture and alone necessary for salvation ; and, more
fortunate than Servetus and Ochino in his opposition to the
Trinity, he died in favour with the Queen, and in the faith
of the Son of the only God.
Acontius did not wholly die ; and it is not without mean
ing that Francis Cheynell, the ardent defender of the Trinity,
attests that in 1613 he still lived. For his mind and his
^^ Crenius, Animadversiones. ut sup. (Letter, without address, of
7 June, 1566). [Also, almost verbatim, in the Stratagemata, bk. iii.]
^^ Strype's Grindal, pp. 66 ff. See letter of Acontius among MSS.
of the Dutch Church (Ser. 1. pp. 149 — 153) in the Guildhall Library
[printed in Gerdes' Scrinium Antiquarium, vii. i. 123].

172 .SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
method exercised an influence which extended beyond the
limits of his life and the boundaries of England. While he
was yet Hving, the learned Ramus had paid homage to his
mathematical power in a letter dated 15 December, 1565 ;='2
and after him Hulner, in his letter on the Meditations of
Descartes, and John Amos of Komne (Comenius), in the
Preface to his Idea vel Epitome Pfulosophice Naturalis, speak
the praises of his method for the study of philosophy.
With the Arminians, the Stratagemata was one of their
great authorities, as we have seen in the above phrase of
Arminius ; and Episcopius declares that he refrains from
citing the testimonies in favour of Acontius, because all the
Arminian books draw their inspiration from him.^^
But it is especiaHy in England that it is important for us
to pursue traces of the ideas of Acontius. We already know,
from Strype, that he counted numerous admirers in the
bosom of the Strangers' Church. These contested the law
fulness of the excommunication with which, together with his
friend the Flemish pastor, he had been smitten; and several
of them, having refused to retract, were excommunicated
in their turn.^* After his death, his friend CastigHone and,
without any doubt, the Spanish pastor Antonio de Corro
(Corranus), whose moderate and biblical ideas we have
already shown, kept up among the Protestant refugees in
London the eirenic and extra-trinitarian tendency of the
author of the Sti-atagemata.
But his real representatives were his books. His Strata
gemata went through, to our knowledge, five editions in
Latin before 1660; the first two at Basel, printed by Pietro
Perna, 1565, one in octavo, the other in duodecimo; the
third in 16 10 (edited by Grasser); the fourth appeared at
Oxford in 1631, and the fifth at Amsterdam, 1652.^5
'•^ See Appendix XI. -'^ Episcopii Opera, vol. i. 301 . '¦'¦' Strype, utsup.
'^ [There was a sixth at Neomagus (probably Speyer), 1661, a seventh
at Amsterdam, 1674.]

CHAPTER VIH. 1 73
In March, 1648, there was sitting in the Jerusalem
chamber at Westminster a large Assembly of English eccle
siastics, composed of Presbyterians, Episcopalians and
Independents, and busied in endeavouring to discover a
compromise between their several systems of church govern
ment, when, one day, the above-mentioned Cheynell laid
on the table a book which he denounced as containing
pestilent heresy. This was the English translation of the
first four books of the Stratagemata, dedicated to the Lords
and Commons, without the name of the translator (John
Goodwin), but with a letter from John Durie to Samuel
Hartlib, recommending the work.^" Durie, as it happened,
was a member of the Assembly ; he was questioned, stam
mered out vague explanations, and then declared his willing
ness to make a public retractation of his letter.
The Westminster Assembly appointed a committee to
examine the work of Acontius, and Cheynell, deputed to
draw up the report, came to the conclusion that the author
should be condemned as a heretic and the book prohibited :
" I. Because in the Creed which Acontius framed there is
no mention made either of the Godhead of Jesus Christ, or
of the Godhead of the Holy Ghost. 2. Although Acontius
doth acknowledge Jesus Christ to be truly the Son of God,
yet he doth not in his Creed declare him to be the natural
Son of God."3^
^^ [Satan's Stratagems ; or the Devil's Cabinet -Councel discovered,
4to, 1648, with portrait headed, "James Acontius a Reuerend Diiiine.'
Part of the impression was re-issued, 1651, with the title. Darkness
Discovered ; or ihe Devil's secret Stratagems laid open. It is a poor
translation, but Acontius is not a very smooth writer ; he did not,
like Ochino, get his works rendered out of Italian by a classic pen.
Goodwin was an Arminian Independent, a zealous republican and regi
cide. Durie (Durseus), a Scottish divine, once minister of Leith, spent
his life in unwearied endeavours to bring about a reconciliation between
the Lutheran and Calvinist Churches, and died abroad. The Unitarians
of Transylvania were among the few who looked favourably on his scheme.]
2' Wallace, ut sup., vol. i. 108 — no.

174 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
This judgment was ratified by the Assembly, who had
the Stratagems of Acontius suppressed, as if they were in
very deed artifices of Satan. ^^
It was in vain to condemn the memory of Master Acontius;
his ideas could not be prevented from having their course,
and even their conquests, among enlightened minds, who
felt the need of a common ground of reconciliation. Hales
and ChiUingworth, the heads of the Latitudinarian party,
borrowed the method of Acontius, in order to reduce the
truths of the Christian religion to a small number ; and the
finest pages- of Milton's Areopagitica were inspired by the
Stratagemata Satanee.
The heresies for which the Calvinistic vsriters censured
Acontius may be summed up under three heads — indif
ferentism, Socinianism, and Hberalism.^^ So far as the first
is concerned, it does not appear to us to be well founded.
The man who, in the maturity of his age and the zenith of
his career, condemned himself to a voluntary exile in order
to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience, —
the refugee who did not fear to expose himself to excom
munication for having pleaded the cause of tolerance in
the case of poor Anabaptist immigrants, — lastly, the author of
those fine pages of the Stratagemata, whose only aim is the
glory of God, peace on the earth, and the union of the
Protestant churches — this man was no indifferentist.
Is the second reproach better founded ? To judge of
this, no more is needed than a comparison of dates and
places. Acontius left Switzerland in 1558, at the moment
when Lelio Sozini was taking his great journey through
Germany and Poland ; and he does not appear to have had

'* [The Assembly requested Cheynell to publish his views on the sub
ject, but it does not appear that Contio's book was suppressed. The re
issue of unsold copies in 165 1 proves the contrary.]
'¦'^ Struve, Observationes Selectee ad rem literariam spectantes, Halle
and Magdeburg, 1702, vol. vi. obs. 25.

CHAPTER VIIL 1 75
any direct relations with Lelio, who died in 1562. And as
regards Fausto Sozzini, the inheritor of his uncle's ideas, he
did not leave the court of Florence until 1574 or 1575, and
did not publish the first book bearing his name, the De
Jesu Christo Servatore, until 1594, thirty years after the
death of Acontius.*" If, therefore, there are ideas in common
between Acontius and the Sozzini, the priority belongs to
Queen Elizabeth's engineer. Now, the merest comparison
of the two systems proves that they started from the same
principle, namely, that the aim and end of the Christian
religion is eternal Hfe ; and that they followed the same
method, namely, to accept as essential truth only that which
is in conformity with Scripture, and is instrumental in pro
curing this divine life. Both maintained the absolute pre
eminence of God the Father; the moral, not the " essential,"
filiation of Jesus Christ ; and the subordination of the Holy
Spirit to the Father Only Acontius, in denying the funda
mental importance of the dogma of the miraculous birth, ¦"-
lays more stress on the real humanity of Christ ; while
Fausto Sozzini, by admitting that birth and rendering divine
honours to Jesus, makes Christ a creature between heaven
and earth.
Lastly, Acontius has been reproached with having cherished
ideas too lofty and too Hberal for his time. This reproach
we adopt as his title of glory. Yes, Acontius was of that
class of minds so rare in the sixteenth century, who, without
abandoning the foundation of inspired Scripture, protested,
in the name of the very spirit of the gospel, against the
inconsistencies of Calvinism and of Lutheranism, and the
*• [This is true ; but the pseudonyms of F. Sozzini were very transpa-i
rent; he began to pubhsh in 1562; and, through Betti (who sent for
F. Pucci out of England in 1577, for the express purpose of being con
verted by Sozzini), Acontius must have become acquainted with Sozzini's
position.] "'¦ [But see ante, p. 135.]

176 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
use of the secular arm against heretics. Acontius is the
worthy compeer of Castellio and Koornhert, of Curione and
Mino Celsi and weU merited the laudatory judgment which
Hallam has passed upon him as one of those highly gifted
Italians who fled for religion to a Protestant country :
" Without openly assailing the authority of Aristotle, he
endeavoured to frame a new discipline of the faculties for the
discovery of truth. In this little treatise {De Methodo) of
Aconcio, there seem to be the elements of a sounder philosophy,
and a more steady direction of the mind to discover the reality
of things, than belonged to the logic of the age, whether as
taught by the Aristotelians or by Ramus. Acontius had developed
¦ larger principles of toleration than Castalio, Celso and Koorn
hert, distinguishing the fundamental from the accessory doctrines
of the gospel ; which, by weakening the associations of bigotry
prepared the way for a catholic tolerance. His Stratagemata
treatise is perhaps the first wherein the limitation of fundamental
articles of Christianity to a small number is laid down at con
siderable length."*^
Acontius, finally, lifts his voice against the application of
the death penalty in the matter of heresy ; but his reasoning,
Hke that of Castellio, is equally valid against all the lesser
penalties. " There are those," he says, " who think that, if the sword be
allowed to rest, it is over with all religion ; but we do a great
injury to God if we suppose that He sleeps, that He cannot take
care of His people, or that He cannot preserve His gospel with
out the sword ; as though His word were of no effect, but the
whole hope of the Christian were placed in cold steel. Let us
be of good cheer ; the Lord is not asleep, but keepeth watch. If
all our hope be placed in Him, if we do battle with the Word,
and with the spirit of His breath (which is to be besought with
instant prayers), yea, what we fear from heretics will be as
nought." " If ecclesiastics," he continues, " once get the upper hand, if
*2 Hallam, Introd. to Lit. of Europe, 1839, ii. 157, 159; iii. 102; ii. 1 14

CHAPTER VIIL 177
it be conceded to them, that the moment a man shall dare to
open his mouth, the executioner must come and cut all knots
with his blade, what then will become of the grand study of the
Holy Scriptures ? Truly it vs'ill be thought little worth a man's
while to engage in it. For men will be able to force all the
dreams of their imaginations on wretched groundlings, and still
retain their place of dignity. Woe unto us, woe unto our
posterity, if we cast aside this only weapon, with which we may
lawfully fight, and may always be victorious ! We may as well
give over at once."-"
" Stratagemata, lib. iii. pp. 156, 157, 158 (ed. 1610). See Appendix
XII.

CHAPTER IX.
Socinianism ; its two authors, Lelio and Fausto Sozzini ; stages of their
doctrine, and its introduction into England.
It was within the Strangers' Church in London that, as
we have seen, arose the first controversies in England on
the subject ofthe Trinity (i 550 — 1575) ; and here appeared,
as vanguard of the Unitarian party, the Italians Ochino and
Acontius, and the Spaniard Corranus. So far, however,
these questions had scarcely penetrated beyond the precincts
of Austin Friars and the circle of professional theologians.
The engineer Acontius was the first layman who claimed
the right to deal with ecclesiastical subjects ; and, in spite
of the excommunication which smote him, it appears that
his Stratagemata exerted even more influence in England
than Ochino's Thirty Dialogues. Now it was part of the
tactics of Acontius not directly to combat, with arguments
derived from reason, the dogmata of the Trinity and of the
divinity of Jesus Christ, but to relegate them to the class of
questions not essential to salvation. The tendency, then,
of these " pseudo-evangelicals," as Microen calls them, was
rather extra-Trinitarian than anti-Trinitarian.
But Acontius, in applying his fine analytical method to
religious questions, was becoming unawares the promoter of
a revolution in dogma, not less fruitful than the Cartesian
revolution in philosophy later on. We speak of Socinianism.
Acontius and his friend Ochino stand towards So'cinianism
as Scotism stands towards Ochino. The filiation ofideas
and of methods is evident. From the first book of the

CHAPTER IX. 179
Stratagemata is borrowed the criterion, adopted in the Cate-
cfiism of the Fratres Poloni, for the purpose of distinguishing
between truths essential to salvation, and those which are
only useful, viz. the degree of their serviceableness for the
attainment of eternal life. With respect to the doctrine of
redemption by the grace of God, who accepts as expiatory
the merits of Jesus Christ, Fausto Sozzini confesses that his
opinion {sententia) had been " openly expressed and incul
cated in the Dialogi of Ochino." ^ Thus it was again to
Italians that the task was reserved of applying the analytic
and critical method to the theory of the sacraments, and the
dogmata of redemption, of predestination and of the resur
rection; and of opening the pathway of Unitarian Chris
tianity at both extremities of Europe, in Poland and Tran
sylvania on the one hand, in England and the Netherlands
on the other. But first let us see what the Sozzini were.
The .Sozzini (diminutive of Sozzi) were a very ancient
family, originally from Percena, near Buonconvento in Tus
cany, and established at Siena since the beginning of the
fourteenth century. After having become enriched as
bankers and notaries, they had given themselves up to the
study of law. Mariano, the elder (1397 — 1467), was pro
fessor of Canon Law at Padua ; Bartolomeo was the author
oi Socini Solutiones ; and lastly, Mariano, the younger (1482
— 1556), lectured on law with gro-wing success at Pisa,
Padua and Bologna (circa 1540), and received from his
contemporaries the appellation oi Princeps J^urisconsultorum.
This Mariano had thirteen children, eleven sons and two
daughters ; the eldest son, Alessandro, became the father of
Fausto Sozzini (born 5 Dec. 1539); and the sixth son was
^ Theolog. Review, Oct. 1879, A. Gordon's second article on The
Sozzini and their School, p. 546. [It was not the doctrine that Christ's
merits were accepted as. expiatory (Sozzini did not believe this in any
sense), but the doctrine that Christ's work was to influence not God
but man, which Sozzini found in Ochino.] N 2

l80 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Lelio Francesco Maria Sozzini (born 29 Jan. 1525). These
two became the first founders of Socinianism.^ Several other
sons of Mariano the younger were suspected of heresy and
obHged to go into exile ; CamiHo and Cornelio, for example,
who were younger than Lelio, and whom we have already
met with at Chiavenna.^ As to Celso, although at the head
of the party of freethinkers and literary men of Siena, he
retained the favour of the Medici, became a Count, and
gonfaloniere of S. Martino to boot. He was the founder
of the Accademia dei Sizienti, which had for its emblem a
winged Hon on. the summit of a mountain with the motto
Quamdiu sitient? Frequently there were several of these
academies or literary societies in the smaUest towns of Italy,
thirty at least in Siena ;* and, like the societies founded by
Conrad Celtis, at Mainz and at Vienna, by Wimpheling at
Strassburg and Schlestadt, these academies very soon be
came so many centres of religious discussions.
Such was the situation, on one hand men of letters, on
the other hand men of law, in which young Lelio was
brought up. The religious element, however, was not
wanting in his education ; it was represented by his mother,
Camilla Salvetti, a woman as pious as she was enlightened,
and by his sister, Porzia ; and at the age of fifteen he
had opportunities of hearing Bernardino Ochino's sermons,
already saturated with evangelical doctrine. He was, more
over, gifted with a clear and subtle intellect, and a heart
open to the noblest affections, those of friendship and the
religious sentiment. Beginning his law studies at Bologna
^ Cantii, utsup., vol. ii. discourse viii. {The Antitrinitarians), and,
in appendix, the genealogy of the Sozzini.
' The name of A. Socini (with five sons, not named) is found in the
Registers ofthe French Church at Basel for the year 1559.
• [There were no less than forty-six at Siena, of which a few still
exist. Celtes was not the founder, though the chief extender, of the
Rhenish Academy.]

CHAPTER IX. l8l
under his father's auspices, our student was already full of
the idea of seeking in the Divine Law the sources of human
jurisprudence ; he learned Greek, Hebrew, and even Arabic,
with the view of being able to understand the Scriptures in
the original tongues. At twenty-one he set out on his first
tour through Europe, and, from that moment till his death
in May 1562, it may be said that, with the exception of two
sojourns of three years each at Ziirich (1555 — 1557 and
1559 — 1562), his whole life was but the journey of a noble
pilgrim in search of religious truth. As we cannot follow
him through all his peregrinations, we intend simply to mark
the principal stages of his thought, as gathered from his own
correspondence, and that of the Swiss Reformers.
Lelio's halting-place was at Venice, that intense focus of
evangelical ideas, where questions pertaining to the Eucha
rist and the Trinity had already been matter of study for
sixteen years. Here he certainly made the acquaintance of
Baldassare Altieri (who is mentioned in several of his letters),
and he frequented the conferences at Vicenza, where the
dogmata ofthe Trinity and Vicarious Satisfaction were under
discussion.' If we may believe Andrzej Wiszowaty (his nephew's grand
son, who was perhaps a little carried away by ancestral piety
in extolling the early deserts of his great grand-uncle), Lelio,
while reading the Scriptures from the standpoint of Law,
" observed the discrepancies between them and the com
monly-received dogmata of the Church, especially that of
the Trinity, and revived the opinion, then, as it were, smoul
dering in the embers, that the Son of God, Jesus Christ, had
no existence prior to Mary, his mother." Lelio was then
only twenty-one, and some writers have treated Wiszowaty's
narrative as a myth, on the ground of this extreme youth.

° Andrzej 'Wiszowaty of .Szumky, Narratio Compendiosa, at p. 209 of
Sand's Bibliotlieca Antitrin.

l82 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
coupled with various anachronisms. For ourselves, while
altogether rejecting, with Trechsel and A. Gordon,« the addi
tions of Sand and Lubieniecky, we believe in the reality of
these secret re-unions in the neighbourhood of Venice. They
appear to us quite natural, during a time of religious perse
cution, and under such colours that they escaped the search
ofthe Inquisition until about 1562 ; and we are of opinion
that they strengthened Lelio in his doubts.
Far more important changes were produced in his thought
when he had become acquainted with three men whom we
have already encountered in the Antitrinitarian controver
sies, CamiUo Renato the Sicilian, Matteo Gribaldo and Ber
nardino Ochino. It was at Chiavenna, in 1547, that he saw
the scholarly tutor of the Pallavicini family. Camillo so
thoroughly imbued him with his own spiritual conception
of the sacraments, that we find it almost exactiy reproduced
in Lelio's De Sacramentis Dissertatio. He had already met
Gribaldo, as well as Acontius, in his father's lecture-room at
Bologna,'' and with the former he must have been on pretty
intimate terms, since we find him staying several weeks at
his house in Padua on his return from a visit to his family
(Sept., Oct. 1553). As regards Ochino, Lelio met him for
the first time in London during his travels in England in the
first half of 1548. He was afterwards much in his company
from the year 1555, during his two sojourns at Ziirich. So
close was the intimacy, that it has been said that Lelio was
Ochino's evil genius, as if a young man of thirty could wield
any ascendancy over a man of sixty-eight, and of the calibre
of Master Bernardine. It seems to us more likely that the
contrary is the truth, and that the dialectic spirit of Ochino,
" Tlieolog. Rev. July, 1S79, ut sup., pp. 300 ff. Cf. Trechsel, vol. ii.
app. i. , Die sogenannten Collegia Vicentina.
'.[Gribaldo was educated at Padua, where, indeed, Mariano Sozzini
taught from 1526 to 1540. 'Where Acontius studied is unknown.]

CHAPTER IX. 183
in ceaseless quest of arduous problems, was certain to ino
culate Lelio with that qucerendi pruritum for which Calvin
rebuked him in his celebrated letter of ist January, 1552.
In fact, from 1548-49, at which time he was on the move
between Ziirich, Geneva and Basel, Lelio had engaged to
correspond with Calvin, BuHinger and J. Wolff. In his
letters he discloses his thoughts by halves. To Calvin he
submits cases of conscience relating to mixed marriages, the
validity of baptism administered at home, and the nature of
the resurrection body ; but, above all, he puts the formidable
objection of the incompatibility between salvation by free
grace and salvation acquired by the merits of Jesus Christ.*
He questions Bullinger respecting the command which Jesus
Christ laid on several of his disciples not to proclaim him as
the Messiah, and to Bullinger he addresses in writing his
Confession of Faith, by way of self-defence against the de
nunciations of Martinengo and Philipp Saluz.^ But it is,
above aH, in his letters to J. Wolff, the successor to Bibli
ander in the Hebrew chair, that he propounds his doubts
respecting the intrinsic and supernatural value of the sacra
ments and respecting the Trinity.^" At length, after having
visited Ochino in his dangerous illness of 1560, and having
doubtless assisted him in the composition of his Labyrintfis
and his Tfiirty Dialogues, Lelio Sozini died at Ziirich at tRe
age of thirty-seven, protected by the venerable Bullinger
against the hatred of his accusers, and leaving the reputation
of one of the most piowerful minds and one of the noblest
hearts to which the Italian Reformation had given birth.
To sum up these scattered features of his Hfe, and to give
^ Calvini Opera, ut sup., vol. xiii. pp. 1191, 1212, 1231, 1323, 1341,
1361. ' Trechsel, utsup., vol. ii. app. vii.
'" Fausti et Lalii Socini item Ernesti Soneri Tractatus aliquot Theo-
lo^ici, nunquam antehac in lucem editi: Eleutheropolis (Amsterdam),
1654, p. 160.

1 84 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
a complete idea of Lelio Sozini as a man, before we address
ourselves to him as a thinker, we cannot do better than
present in this place the portrait of him which his nephew
has traced with a filial sort of piety.
" Far from being wanting in religious certitude, no man ever
entertained or expressed (when he judged it opportune) more
exact views on all the dogmata of the Christian religion. But
as he perceived that, after so great and so long a darkness,
scarcely anything, save the few essentials of salvation, was re
stored to pristine purity in the Churches that threw off" the
Roman antichrist, he would not open his mind to every one,
except in some controversies of small moment. This he did, for
fear of troubling the Churches, and lest the weak, for whom he
ever had the greatest consideration, should be offended, and
perhaps drawn back again from the worship of the true God to
idols ; and lest the divine verity, proclaimed by a layman, should,
to the great detriment of the Christian world, be rejected and
spurned, from the lack of authority in its publisher.
" He saw that, in some Churches, opinions and customs were
so strong, that even a murmur against them was received with
execration. Therefore he thought it better now and then to
propose doubts and questions to men illustrious in the Church,
that in this way by degrees an approach might be made to the
truth. " For instance, these men, in consequence of his arguments,
were led in the meantime to distrust the soundness of their
inveterate opinions, and so they forbore from impressing them
on the people as axioms of Christian religion. This he did, to
avoid all offence, under the plea of a desire to be taught (pro
bably a true plea in the outset), and always professed himself a
learner, never a teacher. But he was fully sensible that this plan
was not to the whole extent approved by his friends, yet would he
not comply with their suggestions.
" In removing this eminent man by an untimely death, God
had a purpose, which was not slow to appear; since, almost
directly after his death, some part of what he had not himself
the courage to teach openly, began to appear in print and to be
made generally known, which, had he lived, would never perhaps

CHAPTER IX. l8g
have happened. In fact, up to that time his friends were not
fully imbued with his ideas, by what he had written, since he
kept it to himself; and were not bold enough to make public,
against their master's will, any one of the things which they
had learned from him. In this way hath it pleased God to
make manifest to all what He had revealed to him alone ; to the
end that, the darkness of ignorance being thoroughly dispelled.
Christian people may begin at length with their whole mind to
render unto Him faith and due obedience, and that outsiders
may more readily be drawn to the true and saving knowledge of
Him through Jesus Christ."'^
If Leho Sozini only left two or three tractates,'^ some
annotations on the margins of his Bible, and about thirty
letters to friends, on the other hand he had found in his
nephew Fausto not only a worthy heir, but one gifted with
the firmness to carry out his thoughts and his projects. In
other respects, the characters of the uncle and of the nephew
present a curious contrast. If Lelio was to a certain extent
timid in practice, Fausto, we shall find, was proportionally
firm, and sometimes hard, in social intercourse ; Lelio was
an ardent and generous soul, Fausto is cold and reserved
even to dryness ; Lelio is bold only in his thought, but docile
to outside influences ; Fausto is a man of statesmanlike qua
lities, who, while repudiating the headship of a party, pos
sessed every fitness for the position.
Born at Siena, fifteen years after Lelio (5 Dec. 1539),
Fausto Paulo Sozzini received the same education as his
uncle, an education literary and legal. Losing his father in
his second year, he came under the more direct influence of
his mother and grandmother, Agnese Petrucci and Camilla
Salvetti, his aunt and his sister ; and this intercourse with
women of superior mind imparted to him a high elevation
of sentiment, and early inspired him with a true veneration
¦" Socini Opera, ut sup., vol. i. 782.
^''- Fausti et Lain Socini . . . . tractatus, 1654, utsup.

1 86 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
for moral beauty. On the other hand, he professed but a
mean opinion of the legal studies which were the hereditary
glory of the Sozzini ; and concerning Bartolo, Baldo and the
like, who were the classic authors in this science at this
epoch, he expresses himself in terms of contempt almost
identical with those of Acontius in his letter to Wolff."
Accordingly, following the example of Lelio, he started in
his twenty-second year for a tour of Europe, hoping to find
abroad that liberty of thought and belief which was wanting
in his own country. He had, there is no doubt, entered
into relations with his uncle during his last visit to Italy in
1559,'* but, for what reason we know not, he made Lyons
and Geneva his first two stopping-places. At Lyons the
Italian Protestants were very numerous, and had even ob
tained permission to hold public worship. At Geneva,
Fausto gave in his name as a member of the Italian Church,
and contracted a friendship with Manfredo Balbani, the son
of the Italian pastor. It was while at Lyons that he received
the unexpected news of Lelio's death. He at once'^ set out
for Zurich, where he was welcomed by Bernardino Ochino
and the elders of the Locarnese Church, and gathered up
his uncle's books and papers.
Having found amongst them a sort of paraphrase of the
Proem to St. John's Gospel, which appeared to him to offer
an entirely novel interpretation of the Logos, he published it

-'^ See his letter to Scipione Bargagli, in Cantii.
'* [It is not clear that Lelio reached Italy in 1559, though he intended
to go to Venice. His last known visit to Italy was in 1552-53, which
fits better with what Fausto says of his uncle's influence on him as "a
young man, almost a boy." Opp. ii. 118.]
1^ [So says Przypcowski ; but J. 'Wolff, writing on 23 Aug. 1562,
speaks of Fausto as returning from Italy, and says he brought letters
from Francesco Negri. This seems to show that, on hearing of his
uncle's death, he went home, before proceeding to Zurich. See Trechsel,
vol. ii. 201.]

CHAPTER IX. 187
at the request of some of his friends, but without affixing his
name (1562). "^
Did the premature death of Lelio cause some remorse to
the Grand Duke Cosimo, who, three years previously, had
refused him the withdrawal of the Inquisition's sequestration
of his patrimony, or must the prince's change of mind be
attributed to the influence of Count Celso Sozzini ? It is a
fact that in the following year we find Fausto employed as
the Grand Duke's secretary for foreign affairs, and enjoying
the favour of his daughter Isabella, Duchess of Bracciano. ^''^
Fausto remained in the prince's service until his death
(1563 — 1574), and during those eleven years made outward
profession of Catholicism. Let us not judge this attitude
too severely ; we may surmise that Fausto was not yet con
verted in his inmost conviction, and we may remember that
Valdds and many other believers, already thoroughly per
suaded of the truth of justification by faith, considered it
permissible to participate in the exterior rites of the esta
blished Church. Nevertheless, the witness of Fausto, though
eclipsed, was not entirely lost to the cause of the gospel.
At the instigation of his patroness, IsabeHa de' Medici, he
composed in ItaHan, and afterwards in Latin, an important
work on the Authority of Holy Scripture, which is a remark
able defence of the truth of the Bible. ^^
¦"^ Socini Opera : Explicatio sive Paraphrasis in Procemium Johannis.
[Fausto distinctly says that this Explicatio was his own, though suggested
by a few words of his uncle's manuscript. Opp. i. 497, ii. 640.]
¦". [This paragraph touches the most obscure points in the storj' of
Lelio and Fausto. We gather from unpublished documents that Lelio
came in for nothing under his father's will, and that any attempts of the
Inquisition to interfere with the disposition of the .Sozzini patrimony
were at that time unsuccessful. Fausto was certainly in the service of
Isabella, and spent twelve years (1563 — 1575) at ease in Italy, "partly
at court" (Opp. i. 490). That he was ever in the service ofthe Grand
Duke is not borne out by his (unpubHshed) letters to the Grand D\ike3
Francesco and Ferdinando.]
^^ De Auctoritate S. Scriptum, in F. Soc. Opp.

l88 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
However, the word of God, assiduously pondered and
scrutinised by Fausto, effected in his soul a hidden working,
which was sure, sooner or later, to issue in a rupture at once
with the Roman tradition and with aU human authority. The
publication of Girolamo Zanchi's book, De tribus Elohim^ a
learned defence of the doctrine of the Trinity (in the Preface
to which the anonymous tract of 1562 on the Proem of St.
John is attributed to Lelio Sozini, and treated as an "impious
interpretation," "a Samosatenian heresy"), appears to have
been the decisive occasion of this rupture. From that time
Fausto had but one thought — to avenge the memory of his
uncle, which had been undeservedly outraged, and boldly .
to scatter the darkness of prejudice and error which obscured
the truth in all quarters, including even the Protestant
Churches. On the death of the Grand Duke Cosimo
(1574),'^ Fausto refused all the honours and riches which
were offered him, and, bound only by the promise made
to his benefactress that he would preserve the anonymous
in his publications, bade farewell to Florence.
This time Fausto took up his residence at Basel, where
he remained about three years, doubtless induced to stay
by the liberty which men of letters there enjoyed, by the
presence of some members of his family, and by the attrac
tive society of several friends, — Manfredo Balbani, Francesco
Betti, the friend of Acontius, Giovanni Francesco Castig
Hone, and Girolamo Marliano. Here "it was that he had the
good fortune to obtain possession of the manuscripts left by
Sebastian Castellio, some of which he published shortly after
vt^ith an important Preface.
While there he also engaged in two controversies which
led to the publication of two of his works. The first of
these, in which he was engaged with Jacques Couet, then
a divinity student, and afterwards minister of the French
" [It was after the death of Isabella in 1576 that he wrote from Basel,
courteously excusing himself from entering the service of Francesco.]

CHAPTER IX. 189
Church at Basel, gave him the opportunity of developing
his ideas on the satisfaction of Christ in his celebrated work,
De yesu Christo Servatore, which for a long time circulated
as an anonymous manuscript, before being printed with his
name (1594).
He held the second of these controversies with Francesco
Pucci, a young Florentine refugee, who denied the utility of
any visible church, and maintained the necessity of a new
revelation, and the natural immortality of the soul. On this
last point Fausto held the opposite thesis, and published it
in his De Statu Primi Hominis ante LapsumP
Called (1578) by Dr. Giorgio Biandrata to Kolozsvar in
Transylvania, there to defend the usage of the invocation of
Jesus Christ in prayer, which was being attacked by Bishop
Ferencz David, Fausto Sozzini eventually took up his abode
at Krakow, and there married Elzbieta, daughter of Krzysz-
tof Morsztyn. He spent there nearly twenty years, engaged
in his works on the Bible, and in the propagation of his ideas
among the churches of Poland. But the publication of his
De Jesu Christo Sen<atore having given rise to a popular
disturbance, in which his house was pillaged and himself
much maltreated, he sought a last asylum in the house of
his friend Abraham Blonski at Lusla-wice. He died there at
the age of sixty-five (4 March, 1 604), in peace with God, and
in the conviction that he had worked for the advancement
of Christ's kingdom on earth.
The parallel which we have instituted between the lives
of the two founders of Socinianism has already brought into
relief the contrast of their characters. That of their doctrines
is less marked, and for an excellent reason, namely, that
their point of view is the same — to accept, as true, only that
which is in conformity with Scripture when interpreted by

^ For information about Pucci, who studied at Oxford (1572 — 1574),
see Gordon, Theol. Rev. Oct. 1879, pp. 549-551.

190 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
sound reason, and, as essential to salvation, only tl}at which
is instrumental in obtaining eternal life. But if they agree
in the principle, how widely do they differ in their methods
of propounding and disseminating it ! Lelio to a large extent
practises the system of accommodation recommended. by
his master, Ochino, and sows the seeds of his ideas in the
shape of questions, marks of interrogation, applying already
the Cartesian doubt. Fausto, on the contrary, strikes full
in the face of aH the orthodox dogmata, which he considers
as so much refuse of Roman superstition. The ideas of
the former appear uncertain and incoherent — portentosa
(monstrosities) as Calvin calls them — because he gives them
out only in fragments, and in the form of antinomies ; while
those of Fausto present themselves as a system thoroughly
digested and all of a piece. Let us make this difference clear
by a few examples.
In the first place, with respect to the dogma of §xpiation,
Lelio only brings out the contradiction between these two
propositions— ^rj-/, salvation is off'ered to us without price by
the grace of God ; second, it was necessary for Jesus Christ
to expiate our sins by his merits, in order to satisfy the justice
of God and gain for us eternal salvation. Calvin having
answered him that the merits of Jesus Christ are to be viewed
as coming under the category of God's good pleasure, and that
this unpurchased character of salvation can only be properly
opposed to our own merits, and to all acts of human righteous
ness, Lelio professed himself satisfied with this solution,
closely conformed to that of Duns Scotus.^^ It did not satisfy
the matter-of-fact and logical mind of Fausto. In his De
yesu Christo Servatore, he utterly demolishes the doctrine
of "vicarious satisfaction." In his view, Jesus Christ came
to reconcile, not God to men, but men to God. All that
Jesus said or did which was divine, he did in virtue of the
" Calvini Opera, vol. x. i6o, Consilia Dogmatica.

CHAPTER IX. 191
grace conferred upon him by his Father. His special func
tions were those of a prophet and a king, and not that of a
high-priest. If he died, it was to seal with his blood the
truth of his revelations, and not to appease the wrath of an
ever good and merciful God.
This leads us to the second point which engages our
attention, that of the divinity of Christ. Lelio allows to
Jesus the titles of Messiah or Christ ; Son of God, unique (but
not eternal),^^ and Word of God, who was incarnate in the
womb ofthe Virgin (in accordance with the Apostles' Creed).
But already for Lelio, Jesus is, above all, " our sweet cruci
fied one" and "our precursor ;" that is to say, the one who
has pointed to us, through suffering, the way which leads
to life eternal. ^^ Fausto Sozzini emphasises still more the
humanity of Christ ; in his eyes Jesus Christ is verus homo
(he does not sa.-^ purus homo). He accords divinity to him,
in the same sense in which he also admits his miraculous
and immaculate conception, and the incarnation of the Word
of God in him, namely, to the end that he might be enabled
to fulfil his prophetic and regal offices ; but he refuses to
him participation in essential and eternal deity. And, above
all, he insists on this, that Jesus was truly our brother, having
shared the same evils and the same death that we do, in
order that, by his passion, he might serve as example to us,
and that, by his resurrection, he might give evidence of the
life and immortality which await us. Let us note, in pass-
^^ [It does not appear that Lelio expressly affirmed or denied the
eternal Sonship. In his Confession of Faith (15 July, 1555), he calls
Christ "our eternal God, Judge, Deliverer, Lord and King."]
^' Trechsel, vol. ii. app. x. "Non dubbitate punto, che, se hora di
spine col nostro dolce crocifisso, un giorno e tosto di vera e triomphante
gloria saremo coronati. . . . In somma, viviamo di maniera . . . da noi
rendasi . . . honore . . . al nostro Padre e Dio, per il Signer Christo
Jesu, nostro precursore." Letter from Lelio to the Church at Locarno
{IS5S)-

192 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
ing, this singular opinion of Fausto, doubtiess borrowed from
Pomponazzi's book, that the soul is mortal in its nature, and
only acquires immortality by the power of the Holy Spirit,
effecting in us, through faith, a new creature."
Lastly, let us observe the attitude of the two Sozzini in
regard to the dogma of the Trinity. Lelio, iu his letter to
Wolff, raises two objections against the Trinity. The first is
directed against the separate personality of the Holy Spirit :
" In this saying of Jesus, ' God is a Spirit,' the term ' spirit'
is taken in the sense of spiritual essence. Now if God is
tripersonal, this attribute must belong to the three persons."
In that case, Lelio asks if the Holy Spirit ought to be other
wise conceived of than as spiritual essence. The second
objection is this : Lelio asks himself how the expression,
" Jesus is Son of God," ought to be understood. If God is
tripersonal, we should have to conclude thence that the man
Jesus is Son ofthe Trinity; for he is a creature, and overt
actions of the Trinity are not distributable among the persons.^''
It even appears that in his conversations with members of
the Italian Church at Geneva, LeHo went so far as to treat
the Trinity as a sort of tripartite chimera, and gloried in
being the new giant who should overturn this tower. ^^ And
yet, in defending himself to Bullinger, he declared that he
^* Fausti et Lcelii Socini .... tractatus, ut sup. (Summa Religionis
Christiance, a F. Socino conscripta). [Sozzini's exact doctrine is as
follows. A man is a union of three constituents : body, anima (the force
by which we live and feel), and animus (the force by which we think).
Death separates these constituents, and, in so doing, dissolves the man.
The body returns to earth ; the anima ceases to have independent exist
ence, and returns to the Fountain of life ; the animus possibly retains a
separate existence, but can in no case be called a man. Only in the
case of some will there be that glorified re-union of the constituents,
never to be again severed, which constitutes immortality.]
^' Hottingersche Sammlung, at Zurich, v. 332. See Appendix XIII.
"^ Trechsel, vol. ii. 180, n. (Letter from Martinengo to Bullinger).
[The reference is not to himself, but to Servetus.]

CHAPTER IX. 193
abhorred Sabellianism, Tritheism and Arianism, and en
trenches himself behind the authority of the Scriptures and
the Aposties' Creed.'"
How much more frank and unequivocal is the attitude of
Fausto Sozzini ! Pursuing the method of Acontius, he begins
by classifying the question of the nature of God among the
truths that are profitable, but non-essential to salvation. Then
he demonstrates that the Trinity is contrary at once to
Scripture and to reason. To Scripture, because nowhere is
the Holy Spirit expressly called God, and because the term
God, when applied to the Son, is taken in the sense of
holding his power of the Almighty or participating in the
Divine majesty, as in several passages in the Old Testament.
Reason, for her part, repels the doctrine : i. Because the
divine unity and the triplicity of persons involve a contra
diction ; 2. Because division of persons is incompatible with
the perfection of being ; 3. Because the eternal generation
of the Son is irreconcilable with perfect equality. And he
concludes that in the essence of God there is but one sole
person, the Father of our Saviour Jesus Christ. '^^
Such is the gradation which marked Antitrinitarian criti
cism in its passage from Lelio to Fausto Sozzini ; and when
we recall the previous stages of this theological process,
which begins with Erasmus and Michael Servetus, and pur
sues its course in the Anabaptists of the Low Countries and
the "pseudo-evangelicals" of London, we shall be able to
judge of the ascending scale and victorious march of the
Unitarian movement.
England was a field fully prepared for receiving the Soci
nian ideas. Ochino had broken the clods, Acontius had
ploughed the furrows, Corranus had watered the ground ;
nothing now was wanted but to sow the seed. Ood confided
^ Hottinger, Ecc. Hist. N. T. (1667) vol. ix. sec. xvi. 2, pp. 417 ff.
^8 Socini Opera, vol. i. 652. Cf. Racovian Catechism. See Appendix
XIV.

194 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
this task to agents of every sort, both conscious and mecha
nical. The first was Lelio Sozini. We do not dwell on the
importance of his visit to London in 1548. In fact, he
was then only twenty-three )'ears of age, and made but a stay
of a few months. Attended by all the prestige which be
longed to the name of the Sozzini, he was probably presented
by Ochino at the court of Edward VI. What a charm, at
any rate, must he not have exercised over his fellow-country
men at Austin Friars ! And if we bear in mind that, in the
following year, Hooper apprises Bullinger of the appearance
of the first who denied the divinity of Jesus Christ, it is
impossible to withhold from LeHo Sozini his share in the
evolution of English extra-Trinitarian theology.^" This influ
ence was principally exerted through the numerous English
exiles at Geneva and Ziirich, during the reign of Mary Tudor,
who maintained relations with Lelio. These were the picked
men of the English clergy and nobiHty, as we may judge
from those who signed the Letter addressed to the Council
of Zurich. 2° Among them we may mention Sir Richard
Morison and the Earl of Bedford, whom LeHo doubtless
met at the house of Ochino, whose patrons they had been;
and especially a certain John Burcher, " a great lover of the
Ziirichers," and a bold antagonist ofthe Jews and the Jesuits,
who appears in the Ziirich letters as an ultra-Puritan, and
who ended by taking orders in the Anglican Church and
obtaining a living near London.'^ Perhaps also we should
place among the first disciples of Socinianism in England,
Dr. Raphael Ritter, a Londoner by birth, who, about 1575,
published a Brevis Detnonstratio, quod Christus non sit ipse

"-^ Trechsel (Letter from Lelio Sozini to Bullinger, from Basel, 19 July,
1549, on his return from England), vol. ii. appendix.
'° Moerikofer, ut. sup. , appendix.
'^ Zurich Letters, 3 ser.. Letters 294 and 333.

CHAPTER IX. 195
Deus qui Pater, nee ei cequalis ; and Bartholomew Legate,
who was condemned to the stake as an Arian by James I. in
1612. But the most powerful missionary of Socinianism in En
gland was the press, which, under cover of the troubles
which preceded and followed the fall of Charles I., enjoyed
an extraordinary freedom.^^ And even before the English
press could print Antitrinitarian books with impunity, the
printing-presses of Zaslaw, ^^'ilno and Rakdw, in Poland, and
later those of Liibeck and Amsterdam, inundated Great
Britain with Socinian works, translated into Latin for the use
of English readers. In 1609 appeared the first Latin edition
of the Catechism of the Unitarian Churches of Poland and
Lithuania, better known under the name of the Raco%dan
Catecliism, and translated from the Polish by Jeromos Mos-
korzowski of Moskorzow, with a highly eulogistic dedication
to the King of England, James I.^^ This dedication proves
that the edition was especially intended for the English, but
it did not preserve the little duodecimo from the fury of tho
guardians of English orthodoxy; it was pubHcly burnt in
1614. Happily for the truth, governments cannot burn ideas.
They rise anew, in stronger life than ever, even from the
ashes of the books which had first offered them to the world's
view. The Unitarian ideas made their way, by channels
secret yet sure, among the enlightened classes of the EngHsh
nation.^* Under the reign of Charles I., they found a
shield in the Latitudinarian party, which, inspired by the
'^ [No avowedly Antitrinitarian books were printed in England with
impunity before 16S7.]
^'* Cateciiesis Ecclesiarum qua, in Regno Polottia et Alagiw Ducatu
Lithuanice. . . . ante annos quatuor Polonic^, nu-nc verb etiam Latine edita:
Racovite, 1609.
'¦' For the remainder of this, and for the following chapter, see Robt.
Wallace, ut. sup., vol. i. Historical Introduction.
O 2

196 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
principles of Acontius, aimed at the limitation of funda
mental doctrines to those which are strictly essential. One
of the three leaders of the Latitudinarian party, Lucius
Carey, Lord Falkland, having received some writings of
Fausto Sozzini from his chaplain. Dr. Hugh Cressy, of
Oxford, " was so extremely taken and satisfied with them,
that," notwithstanding the opposition of his mother, who
was a Catholic, "from that time was his conversion" to
Socinianism. Some years afterwards, the great champion of
the Trinity, Francis Cheynell, found an English translation
of a Socinian book in the chamber of John Webberley, B.D.,
Fellow and sub-Rector of Lincoln College. This discovery
was made in the course of a Pariiamentary visitation of the
University, the chief commissioner being Viscount Say and
Scale, to whom Cheynell dedicated his work entitied, " The
Rise, Growth and Danger of Socinianisme" (1643). John
^Vebbel•ley, who was imprisoned and expeHed the University
for resisting the action of the visitors, translated several
Socinian works, among which was a " Socinian Master-
peece." He had rendered it " into English, for the benefit
of this Nation, and prepared it for the presse." Webberley,
seeking refuge perhaps at Amsterdam, and William Hamil
ton, making his way to Franeker, continued to employ them
selves in disseminating their ideas. In 1651, the second
Latin edition of the Racovian Catecfiism was printed in
London, and the first EngHsh translation of it was printed
at Amsterdam in 1652. A year later, Richard Moone, at
the Seven Stars, in St. Paul's Churchyard, published English
translations of certain tracts, written by the Polish Socinians :
A Brief Enquiry toucfiing a better 'Way then is commonly
made use of, to refute Papists, &c., by Joachim Stegmann, the
elder ;^^ The Life of tfiat Incomparable Man, Faustus Socinus
^^ [Brevis Disqidsitio, an et quomodo vulgb dicti Evangelici, Pontijicios
.... solide atque evidenter refutare queant, 1633.]

CHAPTER IX. 197
Senensis, described by a Polonian Knight, i. e. Samuel Przyp
cowski ; and, lastly, A Discourse toucfiing the Peace &> Con
cord of the Church, &'c., by the same author. These trans
lations are attributed to John Bidle. From this time (1653)
Socinian pubHcations had a rapid run with the English public
up to the end of the century. In 1731 the Rev. Edward
Coombe ventured to publish an English translation of the
De Auctoritate S. Scriptwas oi Fausto Sozzini, with a dedica
tion to Queen CaroHne. It was re-issued in 1732.
Moreover, Unitarian ideas began to assume an organised
form in 1644, and were impersonated in some few knots of
religious separatists. In London, in 1644, a preacher at a
religious society in Bell Alley declared that " though Christ
was a prophet and did miracles, yet he was not God ;" and
near Coleman Street there was a society denying the divinity
of Christ, under the leadership of a certain Welshman. Four
years later, Rev. John Goodwiiywho had opened an Inde
pendent chapel for the setting forth of Arminian doctrines,
wrote these beautiful words in the Epistle prefixed to his
translation of the first four books of the Stratagemata oi
Acontius :
" In vain do they blow a trumpet to prepare the Magistrate to
battle against Errors and Heresies, whilest they leave the judg
ments and consciences of men armed with confidence of truth
in them. If men would call more for light, and less for fire from
heaven, their warfare against such enemies would be much sooner
accomplished. For he that denied the one, hath promised the
other (Prov. ii. 3, 4, 5 ; Jam. i. 5). And amongst all weapons,
there is none like unto light to fight against darkness. But
whilest men arm themselves against Satan with the material
sword, they do but insure his victory and triumph."^''
Finally, John Bidle, M.A., Oxon., and Thomas Lushing-
ton, B.D., Oxon., did their utmost by their writings to under-
^ Wallace, vol. i. 101.

198 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
mine the popular belief in the Trinity. They digested the
Acontian and Socinian ideas, adapting them to the practical
and philanthropic character of the Anglo-Saxons, and thus
became the first native organs of Unitarianism in England.

CHAPTER X.
Influence of the Anglo-Saxon genius on the development of, English
Unitarian Christianity : Bidle and Firmin. — Relations with the Lati
tudinarians, the Quakers, the New -Arians. — Milton, Locke and
Newton. We now return from the tour of Europe which we under
took in our search for the sources of English Unitarianism,
after having established the position that it had not its
original roots in British soil. We have traversed all the
countries which held relations with Great Britain in the
matter of religious ideas, the Low Countries and Germany,
Switzerland and Italy, Spain and Poland ; we have inter
rogated in turn Anabaptists and Quakers, Episcopalians and
Puritans, and we arrive at this conclusion. The first shoots
of Unitarian Christianity budded in Italy, where Michael
Servetus sowed, or whence perhaps he derived, the seed.
Uprooted by the tempest of the Inquisition, these plants
took fresh root in the hospitable valleys of Switzerland, and
driven off once more by the blast of intolerance which stirred
most of the churches, seeds were carried, some to the coasts
of Britain, others to the steppes of Poland and the moun
tains of Transylvania. It was in the spring of 1550 that the
first Unitarian party made its appearance in the Strangers'
Church in London ; and from that time, fostered by the
utterances of such men as Ochino, Acontius, Corranus and
the Sozzini, it did not cease to grow until it reached such
proportions that it could free itself from all foreign influence,
and assume its proper and original character, its idiosyncrasy.

200 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
SO to speak. At present, then, what we have to do is to
examine, first, the mode in which the Anglo-Saxon genius
has assimilated the Unitarian doctrine, that completely Latin
conception; and next to inquire how it has appHed it in
the practical work of the Church.
Let us mark, at the outset, the transformation which the
Acontian and Socinian ideas have undergone, in passing
through the medium ofthe acknowledged Fathers of EngHsh
Unitarianism, Bidle, Hamilton, Firmin, and the like.
" Wilh the exception of a slender intermittent stream of
Servetianism," says Mr. Gordon, " which in England at least
has never attained the proportions or the influence of a school
of theology. Liberal Christianity has always owed the largest
debt to the Socinian impulse  that exotic theology
which, with the necessary modifications, the learned Bidle,
and later on the gentie Lindsey, exerted themselves to plant
on EngHsh soil as a Unitarian Church.'" This enterprise was
begun with translations ; but these versions were not literal,
and bore already the traces of doctrinal modifications, the
work of the translators.
Thus it is that WilHam Hamilton, some time Fellow of
AH Souls', Oxford, the presumable translator of the Racovian
Catechism (1652), naively avows having made changes from
the Latin original, to suit the taste of the English reader.^
Some time before, Thomas Lushington (d. 1661), of Pem
broke CoUege, Oxford, chaplain to Charles I., had translated
the Commentaries of Johann Krell, the elder, and of Jonas
SchHchting on the Epistle to the Hebrews, and that of the
former on the Epistle to the Galatians (1647 — 1650), not.

1 Theol. Rev. Oct. 1S79, pp. 532, 533.
^ [No such avowal appears, though the changes are made ; but 'Web
berley, in his Epistle prefixed to the unknown " Socinian Master-peece,''
stated, according to Cheynell, " that Socinianisme was to be corrected
and chastised with respect to the nature of our climate. "]

CH.\PTER X. 201
however, v.-ithout additions and alterations.^ It was also
from the writings of the learned divine of Rakow (Krell)
that Bidle drew his Unitarian theories.
John Bidle, born at Wotton-under-Edge, in Gloucester
shire, 14 Jan. 1616 (d. 1662), M.A., Oxon., and master of
the Free-school in the parish of St. Mary de Crypt at Glou
cester, experienced his first doubts concerning the Trinity
while reading the Bible, without having, as yet, opened any
Socinian book. Denounced by some false brethren, and
removed from his office, he was cited before a Parliamentary
Committee sitting at Westminster, and openly denied the
Deity of the Holy Spirit.*
After languishing in suspense for sixteen months, ten of
which he spent in close custody, and being unable to obtain
either a hearing or a discharge, Bidle decided to make an
appeal to public opinion, and printed his Letter to Sir Henry
Vane, along with XII Arguments drawn out of the Scripture :
wherein ifie commonly received Opinion touching the Deity of
the Holy Spirit is clearly and fully Refuted (1647).
In his Letter to Vane, Bidle declares that he believes
" the Holy Spirit to be the chief of all ministering spirits,
peculiarly sent out, from heaven to minister on their behalf
that shall inherit salvation. ... As there is one principal
spirit among the evil angels, known in Scripture by the
name of Satan, .... even so is there one principal Spirit
among the good angels, called by the name of the .... Ploly
Spirit." Parliament ordered the suppression of Bidle's pam
phlet, had it burnt by the hangman, and, the following year
(2 May, 1648), passed an Ordinance "for the punishing of
Blasphemies and Heresies," declaring the denial of the
Trinity equivalent to the crime of felony, and making it
punishable by death. Others would have given way to such
menaces ; the dauntless prisoner at Westminster issued from
^ Wallace, vol. iii. art. 284. "* Ibid. vol. iii. art. 285.

202 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
his cell two fresh works : A Confession of Faith toucfiing tfie
Holy Trinity according to the Scripture, and The Testimonies
of Irenceus, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Novatianus, Theo
philus, Origen . ... as also of Amobius, Lactantius, Eusebius,
Hilary and Brigfitman, concerning tfiat One God, and tfie Persons
of tfie Holy Trinity, &c. (1648). We must not mistake this
display of patristic authorities ; Bidle, at the close, carefully
tells us that he has only invoked the testimony of the Fathers
in order to pursue his adversaries on their own ground. For,
says he, though they " lay aside this plea when they have to
do with Papists .... yet do they take it up again, in a manner
waving the Scripture, when they argue with me." Now in
Bidle's eyes there is no other rule in matters of faith but
Holy Scripture, and, in case of controversy respecting the
sense of Scripture, no other authorised interpreter but reason.
For a short period Bidle obtained his Hberty, only however
to be cast into Newgate by President Bradshaw. At length
set free, after (in all) six years' imprisonment, thanks to the
Act of Oblivion of 10 Feb. 1652, Bidle began to meet his
friends every Sunday, and expounded the Scriptures to them
in the sense of the Socinian Commentaries, translated in
part by Lushington, and the Racovian Catecfiism.
He himself was not satisfied with all the articles of this
Catechism; for he published, two years after the appearance
of its English translation, a Twofold Catecfiism . the One
simply called A Scriptwe- Catecfiism ; the Otfier, A brief Scrip-
ture-Catecfiism for Children. The work was drawn up in the
form of questions, with " answers taken word for word out
of the Scripture, without either consequences or comments."
This book, which also had the honour of being burnt, cost
its author a three years' banishment to the Scilly Isles. On
being allowed to return, he at once resumed his meetings.
For a short time he was persuaded to retire into the country;
but, on venturing back, the unfortunate Bidle was again
arrested at his lodgings in London, and sentenced to lie i* ,

CHAPTER X. 203
prison until he had paid a fine of one hundred pounds. In
a few weeks he died (22 Sept. 1662), from want of fresh air
and wholesome nourishment, a true martyr of the Unitarian
faith. Little did he imagine that he would have a leading con-
tinuator of his work in the person of that same Rev. John
Cooper^ who had been appointed in his stead to the Master
ship of the Crypt Free-school at Gloucester. Cooper was
one ofthe two thousand Presbyterian clergymen ejected by
the Act of Uniformity ; he became the first minister of a
Unitarian congregation at Cheltenham, which he served
faithfully for twenty years (1662 — 1682), being a model of
virtue and charity to his flock.
Bidle also left disciples at London, such as Rev. John
Knowles,'' whose moral courage cost him his liberty ; and
young Nathaniel Stuckey,'^ who had translated into Latin
Bidle's Twofold Catechism, publishing along with it a short
piece of his own on the death of Christ, and was giving
tokens of the greatest promise, when, at sixteen years of age,
he was carried off by the Great Plague of London (1665).
In that same year appeared the translation of Johann
Krell's principal work, De uno Deo patre, with the English
title, Tfu Two Books of John Crellius, Francus, touching
One God the Father, &c. In this treatise the author not
only affirmed the strict unipersonality of God the Father,
but elucidated also the uncompounded nature of the Son of
God, and that of the Holy Spirit. Under the pseudonym
of "Kosmoburg" we recognise the cosmopohtan city of
London, and in the "Sign ofthe Sunbeams" we detect the
publisher Richard Moone at the " Seven Stars," who for
twenty years had published nearly all the translations of
Socinian treatises.
^ Wallace, vol. iii. art. 350. ^ Ibid. vol. iii. art. 287.
" Ibid. vol. iii. art. 344.

204 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
The English Unitarians, at this time, were in frequent
communication with the Polish Brethren, and especially
with the KreU family. Christoph, the second son of Johann
Krell, pastor of a congregation of Polish exiles at Fried-
richsburg in Silesia, twice visited England (1666 and 1668);
and, having become a widower, confided the education of a
son and a daughter to Nathaniel Stuckey's mother, who had
offered to take charge of them, in memory of her beloved
son, cut off in the flower of his age. Christoph's son, Samuel
Krell,^ thus educated in London, and subsequently in the
Arminian Gymnasium at Amsterdam, became later on
minister at Koenigswald, near Frankfort-on-the-Oder, but
revisited England several times, and was in communication
with many illustrious men, including Tillotson, the celebrated
Archbishop of Canterbury, and the great Newton. Thus
did the disciples of Bidle, encouraged by that feeling of a
common cause which united them to the Unitarians of
Prussia and the Arminians of Holland, continue his work,
undeterred by the menaces of the most terrifying edicts,
notably the Conventicle Act.
But the most active and most successful advocate of the
Unitarian cause, after Bidle, was a layman, Thomas Firmin,'-'
whose name, and sympathies for the victims ofthe revocation
of the Edict of Nantes, betray a French origin. He was a
mercer, and had a large place of business in Lombard Street,
London. While stiH quite young, he had directed his good
offices to mitigate at least, if he could not cut short, the cap
tivity of Bidle. He had been one of the assiduous hearers of
the first Unitarian minister in London, as well as of Rev. John
Goodwin, the Arminian translator ofthe Stratagemata; and
during Bidle's exile, he had even begun to disseminate Unita
rianism on his own account. Nevertheless, after the death

"Wallace, vol. iii. art. 358.
' Ibid. vol. iii. art. 353. Cf. vol. i. 151.

CHAPTER X. 205
of Bidle, Firmin was an attendant at the services of the
Established Church, and maintained friendly relations with
several of the clergy of that Church, including Dr. Benjamin
Whichcote, Provost of King's College, Cambridge ; Dr. John
Worthington, Master of Jesus College, Cambridge; and, above
all. Dr. Tillotson, who afterwards became Archbishop of
Canterbury. Theophilus Lindsey has keenly reproached
him with this compromise between his Unitarian principles
and those of a Church which had officially condemned
them.'"-" He views it as a betrayal of principle, due to the
fear of the penalties decreed by the Act of Uniformity (1662)
and the Conventicle Act (1664). A less severe judgment
will be passed on this attitude of Firmin, if allowance is
made for two circumstances : first, that Firmin was a layman,
who had not been bound by any ecclesiastical obligation,
and who, like Acontius, professed little admiration for reli
gious sects and coteries ; and, secondly, that most of the
higher clergy in the Anglican Church were at that time
imbued with Arminian and Latitudinarian ideas — witness
Archbishop Tillotson, who in his letter to Bishop Burnet,
speaking of the Athanasian Creed, remarks. " I wish we
were well rid of it."^'- With bishops thus broad-minded,
our Unitarian might well feel at his ease, and that without
sacrificing an iota of his principles. He employed in the
service of this cause two means, which, having no tinge of
ecclesiasticism, were so much the more powerful in moving
public opinion, which in England was prejudiced already
against anything that savoured of " clerical cant." These
were, an intelligent and inclusive philanthropy, and an in
comparable talent for public affairs. Thomas Firmin was
the first to respond, in 1662, to the appeal of Unitarian
^'' Theoph. Lindsey, An Historical Vie-w of the State of the Unitarian
Doctrine and Worship, London, 1783, Svo, chap. v. 295.
'' Wallace, vol. i. 275,

206 .SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Protest.ant5 of Poland, driven from their countrj- by the
intriirues of the Jesuits, and abandoned by the cowardice of
the Lutherans and Calvinists. And when, in 1680-81, the
interference with the Edict of Xantes cast hundreds of French
refugees on the shores of Great Britain, it w.is Firmin ag.iin
who headed the subscription list, and who was charged, by
the unanimous confidence of the donors, with the delioue
office of treasurer. 1'-^
Firmin's charit}-. like that of the good Samaritan, was
extended to all, even to his adversaries in religion ; but he
was at times ill requited for his generositw as is shown by
the anri-Socinian pamphlet of Lamothe. This ingratitude
did not discoumge him, any more than the edicts against
Antitrinitarian books intimidated him, and he it was who
g.ive a considerable impulse to Unitarian publications.
He had already, in 1665, caused the English version of
the Di uno Deo Patre. by Johann Krell, the elder, to be
printed at his own cost, and he had perhaps a hand in the
translation. In 16S9 he had to do with the publication of
Tfie Xa ied Gospel, by Arthur B ury, D.D. This Latitudinaria n
clergyman propounded in the work just named an eirenical
theor\-, \er\- Hke that of Acontius and F. Sozzini, respecting
the small number of articles which are really fundamental
and universal, his aim being to serve the project, attributed
to WilHam IIL, of uniting all the English sects in one
Church. In 1691 was pubhshed, at Firmin's expense, a
volume which contained the first series of Unitarian Tracts,
and in this were reprinted the principal writings of John
Bidle. The second series, which appeared about 1693, was
composed of tracts all relating to the doctrine of the Trinity
and the questions which it r.iises. The third was published
at the end of 1695. while Firmin was still living ; and the
fourth some years after his death.
^- Wallace, vol. i. 140, 176, iii. 376.

CHAPTER X. 207
These three or four volumes, known as the old Unitarian
Tracts}'^ played an important part in the celebrated Trini
tarian controversy engaged in by Drs. Sherlock, South and
Wallis, at the close of the seventeenth century ; and it may
be said that, in the absence of a constituted Unitarian
Church, they were the means by which Unitarian ideas
made their way into the bosom of the Anglican Church.
In fact, as Mr. Albert Reville justly remarks, the real
influence of Unitarianism must not be measured by the size
of its churches or by the number of their members. Faithful
to the thought of their Italian precursors, Acontius' and
the Sozzini, the first EngHsh L^nitarians thought much less
of founding new churches than of completing within the
older churches the unfinished reformation of the Romish
dogmatic system.
We have already noted the friendly relations of Thomas
Firmin with many high dignitaries of the Anglican Church.
During several years (1668 — 1670) he was on terms not less
good with the reformers of Quakerism, WiUiam Penn and
Robert Barclay.'* In 1668, WilHam Penn published a book
entitled The Sandy Foundation Shaken. Relying on the tes
timony of the Scriptures and right reason, Penn refutes in
this work " those so generally believed and applauded Doc
trines of One God, subsisting in three distinct and separate
Persons ; the Impossibility of God's pardoning Sinners, with
out a plenary Satisfaction ; the Justification of impure Per
sons by an imputative Righteousness." The book entailed
a seven months' imprisonment on its author; but, on the
other hand, it was warmly welcomed by the Unitarians, who
found in it many of their cherished ideas, including Bidle's
two-fold principle, the Scripture as interpreted by reason.
Their delight was of no long duration. The moment the
leaders of Quakerism, William Penn and George Whitehead
" Wallace, vol. i. 219, 331, &c. " Ibid. vol. i. 160 — 169.

208 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
realised that they were being taken for disciples of Sozzini
and Bidle, they retracted. Penn, during his imprisonment,
published his pamphlet, Innocency with Iier Open Face (1669),
in which he confessed his faith in God, who is an eternal
Spirit ; in the only Son of God, who took upon him flesh ;
and in the Holy Spirit, that proceeds from the Father and
the Son. " He that has one has aU, for ' these three are
one,' who is the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,
God over aU, blessed for ever."
Robert Barclay, again, in his famous Apology for the True
Christian Divinity (1676), of which a sketch has been given
(Chap. I. pp. 35, 36), reaches the same result as Penn; that is,
a conception of the Trinity verging on that of Sabellius, and
the denial of the imputation of Adam's sin and of predesti
nation. Henceforth there was a rupture between the Quakers
and the Unitarians, the latter accusing the former, not with
out reason, of having contradicted themselves in the course
of a few years. We have but one point gained, namely, that
both parties rejected the Athanasian Creed, in which they
had Archbishop Tillotson as a confederate.
The relations of the English Unitarians with the theolo
gians who inclined to Arianism were more sympathetic, but
still did not amount to a fusion. Thus Christoph Sand,
the younger, in his Bibliotheca Antitrinitariorum (published
posthumously at Amsterdam, 1684), erected a veritable
monument to the glory of the unipersonal God ; but, taking
his stand on the authority of the Fathers anterior to the
Council of Nicaea, this author professed faith in an eternal
and pre-existent Christ.
Dr. Samuel Clarke, again, coa3jutor and friend of the
great Newton, confided to him his doubts as to the aposto-
licity of the Trinitarian doctrine, and published his Scripture
Doctrine of the Trinity in 1712. In it he exhibits a bibhcal
erudition and a freedom of inquiry which greatly scandalised
many of the orthodox (as may be seen in Voltaire's Letters

CHAPTER X. 209
on tfie English) ; but, to Newton's great regret, his conclu
sions were identical with those of Sand, that is to say, they
bordered on Arianism. But what proves the radiating force
of the Unitarian idea in England towards the end of the
seventeenth century, still more than the voluntary or invo
luntary concessions of the Quakers and the New-Arians, is
the real, if not avowed, adhesion given to it by three of the
greatest English geniuses of this epoch, Milton, Locke and
Newton. This testimony, however, is shorn of some of its glory by
the fact that these great minds did not make known their
religious opinions during their lives. Yet, if a posthumous
avowal takes from the courage and magnanimity of the wit
nesses, it leaves untouched the worth of the testimony. Nay,
these affirmations of the personal unity of God, which seem
to come from beyond the tomb, carry for this very reason
all the more weight and solemnity.
Every one knows Milton the poet ; some few know Milton
the politician ; scarcely any know Milton the theologian, i**
John Milton (1608 — 1674) was a profoundly religious soul.
Trained by a father who had been disinherited on account
of his Protestantism, and by a mother rich in good works,
he acquired for himself a faith resting on St. Paul's principle,
" Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." He is
supposed to have inspired OHver CromweU, whose Latin
secretary he was, with all the measures relating to the liberty
of conscience, of the press and of public worship, which were
carried into effect during the Protectorate.
For his own part, disgusted with the narrowness and the
disputes of most of the Churches, whether Established or
Nonconformist, Milton attended no house of prayer, and
rendered to God a solitary worship. " Every morning,"

^* Wallace, vol. iii. art. 345. Cf. Lichtenberger's Encyclopedic, art.
Stroehlin on Milton.

210 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
M. Taine teUs us, in the beautiful pages he has devoted to
him, " Milton had a chapter read to him from the Hebrew
Bible, and remained some time in grave silence, in order to
meditate on what he had heard." That was his prayer. Was
not that also a prayer — and one of the most beautiful that
ever issued from human Hps — the magnificent invocation
which is found at the close of his Reformation in England
(1641)? It begins with these words : " Thou, therefore, that sittest
in light and glory unapproachable, Parent of angels and men !
next, thee I implore, omnipotent King, Redeemer of that
lost remnant whose nature thou didst assume, ineffable and
everlasting Love ! and thou, the third subsistence of divine
infinitude, illumining Spirit, the joy and solace of created
things ! one Tripersonal Godhead ! look upon this thy poor
and almost spent and expiring church."
In this hymn, as in his two poems. Paradise Lost and
Paradise Regained, MUton still preserves the Trinitarian
phraseology, although already with a very pronounced Arian
tinge. But in his posthumous work, De Doctrina Christiana,
ex Saci'is duntaxat Libris petita, which for a century and a half
was buried among the State Papers,'** the great poet gives
his final word on this question in the foUowing terms : "The
Israelites under the law and the prophets always understood
that God is numerically One, that beside Him there is no
other, much less any equal  Proceeding to the New
Testament, we find its testimony no less clear, .... inas
much as it testifies that the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ
is that One God."'^ His conception of the Son is Arian,
and of the Holy Spirit the same as Bidle's.
'* See the history of the discovery of this manuscript in Wallace, vol.
iii. art. 345. It was discovered in 1823 by Mr. Lemon, Deputy-Keeper
of the Records, in an envelope addressed to Mr. Skinner, merchant, and
was published by order of George IV. in 1825.
" See Appendix XV.

CHAPTER X. 211
If Milton, that bold and uncompromising republican whom
no misfortune, no menace, was able to bend, recoiled from
the publication of his Antitrinitarian dogmatics, we need feel
no astonishment that men of a peaceful disposition, and who
occupied official positions, hesitated to avow opinions which
would have drawn them within the calamitous arena of con
troversy. Such was the case with Locke and Newton, who
were united in the bonds of a close friendship and a Chris
tian sympathy. Nevertheless,'^ in point of courage in the
expression of his opinions, Locke stands above Newton ;
for, after much wavering, he ventured to publish, under the
veil of the anonymous, a treatise entitled The Reasonableness
of Christianity as delivered in tfie Scripture? (1695).
In this book, Locke (1632 — 1704) sets himself to prove,
Bible in hand, that the fundamental truth preached by the
apostles was the Messiahship of Jesus Christ, and that every
man who admits that has a right to the name of Christian.
Beyond this, he says not a word of the Trinity, or of the
divinity of Jesus Christ. But in his Adversaria Tfieologica,
the manuscript of which was found among his papers by
Lord King, and published long after his death, Locke is
much more explicit. In it he arranges parallel columns of
passages for and against the Trinity, and makes the balance
evidently lean to the side of Unitarianism. Lastly, the
author of the Essay of Human Understanding clearly betrays
his Unitarian opinions in his letters to the Arminian Philipp
van Limborch, grand-nephew of Episcopius, to whom he avows
his doubts on the principal dogmata of orthodoxy, as well
as in his controversy with Dr. John Edwards, who, having
pierced the veil of the anonymous author, had treated him
as a Socinian. Locke repels this appellation, sheltering him
self behind the authority of the Apostles' Creed, saying it is

'^ Wallace, vol. iii. art. 356.
P 2

212 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
"well for the compilers of that Creed that they lived not in
Mr. Edwards's days ; for he would, no doubt, have found
them 'aU over Socinianized.'"
And now, how is the reserve of a Newton '» (1642 — 1724)
to be explained? The explanation is, that men diff'er in
assortment of quaHties even more than in mental rank, and
that character does not always keep pace with genius. It is
weU known that this great man was as timid in his actions
as he was bold in his scientific conceptions. In November,
1690, he addressed to Locke '^\i Historical Account of Two
Notable Corruptio7is of Scripture. In this he demonstrates,
by an almost mathematical process, that the passages i John
V. 7 and I Timothy iii. 16 had suffered interpolations in the
interest of the dogma of the Trinity. His manuscript was
to have been forwarded anonymously to M. Le Clere, of
Amsterdam, to be translated into French and published.
Scarcely, however, had the precious treatise reached Hol
land, than poor Newton was seized with terror at the thought
that the authorship would be discovered, and that he would
thus be drawn into a theological controversy. He imme
diately countermanded his instructions to Locke, and there
fore the work was not published until after his death. Post
humous, in like manner, were his Observations upon the Pro
phecies of Daniel and tfie Apocalypse of St. John, in which
the Unitarian tendency is very marked. Newton ought to
have recollected these two passages of Scripture : " Nothing
is hid that shall not be made manifest,'' and " Let your light
shine before men.'' In the very year of Newton's death,
Voltaire, who had just spent a year in England, wrote to M.
Theriot: "The Arian party is beginning to revive in England,
as well as in Holland and in Poland. The great Newton
honoured this opinion by his approbation. This philosopher
^^ Wallace, vol. iii. art. 357.

CHAPTER X. 213
thought that the Unitarians reasoned more geometrically
than we."20
Voltaire, who did not plume himself on being a theolo
gian, in his Letters confuses the Unitarians with the Arians,
the Socinians and the Quakers. He understands well enough
what these various sects have in common, namely, the denial
of the Athanasian Trinity and the radical reformation of the
Church in accordance with Scripture, but he does not seize
the shades of thought which distinguish them one from the
other. Accordingly it devolves upon us to recapitulate here
the resemblances and the differences between these dissent
ing sects, which played so important a part during the period
of the English Commonwealth, and in the formation of the
great American Republic.
Let us first of all put aside the Quakers, who in the seven
teenth century were, in some sort, the heirs of Anabaptism.
We have already remarked that William Penn's thought
oscillated between Socinianism and Trinitarian orthodoxy,
and that he ended.by falHng into SabelHanism.^' In Robert
Barclay, the type of doctrine is more orthodox : he declares
that the revelations of the Spirit can never be in contradic
tion to Scripture ; yet he admits that Christ manifested him
self under a two-fold aspect, the man Jesus, the Almighty
God. The points, then, which separate the English Unitarians
from the Quakers are the following. First, the source of
their faith is Holy Scripture, interpreted by sound reason,
and not by the spontaneous movements of a Spirit within.
very difficult to distinguish from the suggestions of our own
private spirit. In the second pface, agreeing with Acontius,
they discard the complication of the persons in the Divine
^'' Voltaire, Letter vii. on the English. Cf. Dictionnaire Philosophique,
art. Sociniens.
-^ See Penn's No Cross, No Crown, as quoted by Guichard, Histoire du
Socinianisme, p, 135.

214 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
essence, and maintain that Jesus was emphatically the Son,
and subordinate to the Father. Lastly, following the tra
dition of St. Paul, they retain the two sacraments instituted
by Jesus Christ, and respect constituted authorities ai deriv
ing their power from God.
As regards the New-Arians, what we have said respecting
the opinions of Clarke and the younger Sand proves that
two points clearly distinguished them from the Unitarians, —
the recognition of the authority of the ante-Nicene Fathers
in matters of faith, and the belief in the pre-existence of
Christ, which makes him a secondary and subordinate
divinity. Clarke is to Newton what Arius is to Paul of
Samosata. Lastly, the important thing in relation to our subject is
to apportion aright the share of the Socinian elements, and
that of the English or Anglo-Italian elements, in the forma
tion of British Unitarian Christianity. In addition to the
comparison between the Latin edition of the Racovian Cate
chism on the one hand, and the EngHsh edition and Bidle's
Twofold Catechism on the other, we possess, for this purpose,
an almost contemporary document, the testimony of Sir
Peter Pett in the preface to his work on Tfie Happy Future
State of England (London, 1688).
His account of the beliefs which bound together the ad
herents of John Bidle is as follows :
" That the fathers under the old covenant had only temporal
promises ; that saving faith consisted in universal obedience,
performed according to the commands of God and Christ ; that
Christ rose again only by the power of the Father, and not his
own ; that justifying faith is not the pure gift of God, but may
be acquired by men's natural abilities ; that faith cannot believe
anything contrary to, or above reason ; that there is no original
sin ; that Christ hath not the same body now in glory, in which
he suffered and rose again ; that the saints shall not have the
same body in heaven which they had on earth ; that Christ was
not a Lord or King before his resurrection, or Priest before his

CHAPTER X. 215
ascension; that the saints shall not, before the day of judgment,
enjoy the bliss of heaven ; that God doth not certainly know
future contingencies ; that there is not any authority of Fathers
or General Councils in determining matters of faith ; that Christ,
before his death, had not any dominion over the angels ; and
that Christ, by dying, made not satisfaction for us."^^
From these pieces of evidence we conclude that five
elementary principles were transmitted from Socinianism to
the English Unitarians. The first two are, that there is no
other rule of faith but the Scripture, nor any other inter
preter but reason; and that the aim of the Christian religion
is to conduct us to eternal life (but as the Lord Jesus will
not have in his glory the same body as in his suffering, no
more will the saints live again in heaven with the same
flesh as here below). The other three elements are these :
Saving faith consists in obedience to the commandments of
God, and in imitation of Jesus Christ ; whence it follows
that faith depends, in part, on the free efforts of the human
wiU, and that in all the Churches salvation may be secured.
There is but one sole person in the Divine essence, namely,
the God of Israel, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ ; and
this God has no certain knowledge of future contingencies
(thus predestination is rejected). Lastly, Jesus Christ, the
only, but not the eternal. Son of God, had not to satisfy by
his death the justice of God ; was not made Lord and King
before his resurrection, nor High Priest before his ascension.
But Bidle and the fathers of Anglo-Saxon Unitarianism
excluded two Socinian ideas, — the invocation of Jesus Christ
with the title of God, which they (like Ferencz David) con
sidered as an inconsistency; and the natural mortality of
man, and his condemnation to eternal death in consequence

22 Wallace, vol. iii. pp. 186, 1S7.

2X6 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
of Adam's sin.^^ On the other hand, they added two new
ideas, — the conception of the Holy Spirit as the Prince of
the angels of good and tmth ; and the essential immortahty
of the soul, a doctrine which gives a possibiHty of salvation
for all. It is this latter principle which has enabled the
Unitarian Christianity of our century to make so much
progress among the Quakers, LTniversalists and Baptists of
America.

^' [The declarations of Bidle, the practice of Firmin, and the language
of the Unitarian Tracts (Wallace, i. 254), are all distinctly in favour of
the invocation of Christ. On the other point there was some variety
of opinion ; Bidle was very strong on the ultimate destruction of the
wicked.]

CONCLUSION.
We hope we have established our thesis that the dogma
ofthe Divine unipersonality is a conception formed by certain
Spanish and Italian Protestants, and introduced by them
into the Strangers' Church in London, towards the middle
of the sixteenth century. As regards the contrary opinion,
we had refuted it, to begin with, by showing that this doc
trine had not had its sources either in England or in any
other Teutonic country. We have, in the last place, endea
voured to explain how the fusion was effected between
Socinianism, the last fruit ofthe tree of ItaHan Protestantism,
and the rational and universalist elements of Anglo-Saxon
Christianity. This fusion, begun in the polemical writings
of Bidle and the old Unitarian Tracts, matured by the
theological writings of Milton, Locke and Newton in the
seventeenth century, and in the eighteenth by those of
Lardner, Lindsey and Priestley, reaches its more complete
expression in the Unitarian Christianity of Channing and of
Theodore Parker.
Thus, from Ochino to Channing, as from Servetus to
Parker, there is a filiation of doctrines of which we can
follow the steps, without any break of continuity. The
eminent Boston pastor has crowned the edifice whose first
stones were laid, two centuries and a half before, by a few
proscribed Italians, exiles in London for the cause of the
gospel. This, certainly, is a remarkable phenomenon of reli
gious acclimatisation ; an additional instance in proof of the
powerlessness of brute force, the handmaid of intolerance,
to put down an idea, true or false. You cannot stifle an

2X8 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
idea by force of burnings or of excommunications ; an idea
can be destroyed only by another idea ; or, to employ the
fine phrase of Edgar Quinet, " In matter of religious opinion,
that alone is kiUed which is replaced." Free discussion
must be allowed to draw the Hne between error and truth.
But, conversely, it does not always foUow that because
an idea has been persecuted and coerced, therefore it is
true. Its resistance to the shocks of persecution proves but
one thing, the moral dignity of the heretic, who will not
yield to menace or even torture, and who knows how to
die, like John Hus and Servetus, a martyr to his idea.
In order that the justness of a religious idea may be
¦ established, it is still necessary to prove its conformity with
human reason and with the Holy Scripture, that is to say,
with the highest revelation of the divine Reason. It now
remains for us to show that the Unitarian idea fulfils this
requirement. I. A previous question which presents itself for considera
tion is, whether the work begun by the ItaHan Protestants
and continued by the English Unitarians was a legitimate
one. In other words, had these theologians the right to
apply the incisive edge of criticism to the dogma of the
Trinity as formulated in the Symbolum Quicumque? The
answer depends upon the point of view at which -we take
our stand.
From the Catholic point of view, the answer is not doubt
ful. Bossuet has not been slow to give it ; he declares in
his Variations that the Unitarians are blasphemers of the
Trinity, in revolt against the Roman Church and against
God, justly hunted down by the tribunal of the Holy Office,
and who found a refuge in Switzerland and Poland in the
bosom of the Churches misnamed Reformed, of the Geneva
pattern.' And Pere Anastase Guichard does not hesitate
' Bossuet, Variations des Eglises pretendues Riformees, bk. xv. p. 1 23.

CONCLUSION. 219
to say that the Socinians have merely renewed the heresies
of Artemon, Theodotus of Byzantium, Paul of Samosata,
and other monarchians of the second and third centuries.
The moment we admit, outside the Bible and reason, a
principle of authority in matter of dogma and interpretation,
these condemnations are logical.
But what appears strange is to hear Protestants disputing
the right of other Protestants to touch the formula of the
Trinity, a formula promulgated in Gaul during the first
quarter of the ninth century, in the full swing of Catholicism.
Is it not singular to hear a Calvinistic theologian, such as
Voet, say, when speaking of the Unitarian tendencies of
Acontius, " The snake in the grass is soon to be recognised,
when we perceive that this man has not reckoned among
fundamental articles the consubstantiality ofthe three divine
persons ; and has not condemned the heresies of Arius,
Photinus, Paul of Samosata," &c. ?^ For in the name of
what principle did the Reformers separate themselves from
the Roman Church ? It was in the name of the Word of
God, revealed in the Old and New Testaments, and freely
examined in the Hght of conscience and reason. And it is
precisely on this principle that the Unitarians of aU countries
and all times have claimed the right to reject the " orthodox''
formula of the Trinity ; for it is clear that there is nothing
Biblical or Apostolic either in the terms or in the spirit of
the Athanasian Creed. But it may be urged, if the terms
Trinity, homoousios, eternal generation, are not in Scripture,
at any rate the ideas corresponding to them are found there
clearly expressed. Not at all : we have searched for them
in vain ; and since the revision of the text and translation
of the New Testament, that dogma has lost its strongest
Biblical evidence.^ The dogma of the Trinity is only an
^ Gisbert Voet, Selecta Disputationes Theologica, 164S, vol. i. 501.
' Alex. Gordon, Christian Doctrine in the Light of Ne-w Testament
Revision: London, 1882.

220 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
attempt on the part of theologians, from the third to the
ninth century, to explain the relations of God to the worid.
This dogma is not in the Bible ; such is the first argument
which gives validity to Antitrinitarian criticism. Still further,
before the Council of Nicsa, and even till Augustine, we do
not find in the writings of the Fathers of the Church the
dogmata of the divinity of Jesus Christ and the Trinity
formulated in an explicit manner. At Rome, in the second
century, Theodotus and Artemon openly professed Unita
rianism ; and the great doctor of Alexandria, Origen, while
admitting the pre-existence of Jesus, conceived of the union
of the two natures in Christ in a manner analogous to that
admitted by the Quakers, which is evidently not Trinitarian.
By the confession of the first author in whom we meet with
the word Trinitas, Tertullian, the advocates of the divine
Monarchia expressed the sentiments of the majority of
Christians in his time. In the third century, Unitarianism
found an interpreter, at once learned and popular, in Paul
of Samosata, the celebrated bishop of Antioch.* Why then
should the modern LTnitarians be refused a right, exercised
by many Fathers during the first three centuries, the golden
age of the Church ? Such is the second argument.
And now for the third, which is, that the Reformers
themselves were the first to use, in regard to the Trinity,
that self-same right of free inquiry which they had claimed
in reference to Catholic dogma in general. Our Introduc
tion has shown what embarrassment Melanchthon expe
rienced on the topic of this dogma, which appears quite
foreign to the great question of sin and redemption, and
to what tragedies the Wittenberg Reformer foresaw that it
would give rise in the new Church. Erasmus, and Calvin
following his steps, are bolder in their exegesis. They upset,

* Reville, History of tlie Dogma ofthe Deity of Jesus Christ (English
translation): London, 187S, p. 92.

CONCLUSION. 221
one by one, the interpretations which the scholastic doctors
gave to the passages quoted in favour of the Trinity; in
such wise that this doctrine no longer holds its place with
them except by the thread of tradition. Farel cuts this
slender tie, and the Trinity passes away, in his Summary of
truths essential to salvation. After all, however, the boldest
in his criticism of the Trinitarian formula is Luther, who
suppressed in his liturgy the invocation to the Trinity, and
confessed, in his blunt frankness, that the name Trinity
never occurs in the Scripture, but was conceived and invented
by men ; that every article of faith must be founded on
Scripture sayings ; and that it would be much better to say
God than the Trinity.^

^ Luther's Kirchen- Postille (Predigt am Sonntag nach Pfingsten, soge-
nannt S. der heihgen Dreifaltigkeit). " Man diesen Namen Dreifaltigkeit
nirgend findet in der Schrift, sondem die Menschen haben ihn erdacht
und erfunden. Darum lautet es zumal kalt, und viel besser spraehe man
Gott denn die Dreifaltigkeit. Diess Wort bebeutet aber dass Gott drei
faltig ist in den Personen. Das ist nun himmlisch Ding, das die Welt
nicht verstehen kann. Darum habe ich eurer Liebe vor oft gesagt, dass
man den und einen jeglichen Artikel des Glaubens griinden miisse,
nicht auf die Vernunft oder Gleichniss ; sondein fasse und grunde sie
auf die Spriiche in der Schrift; denn Gott weiss wohl wie es ist; und
wie er von ihm selbst reden soil. Die hohen Schulen haben mancher-
lei Distinctiones, Traume und Erdichtung erfunden ; damit sie haben
woUen anzeigen die heihge Dreifaltigkeit, und sind dariiber zu Narren
worden." (Ed. Walch, vol. xi. 1549; ed. Erlangen, vol. xii. 378; cf.
vol. vi. 230, et ix.. I.) ["This name Trinity is never found in the Scrip
ture, but men have devised and invented it. Therefore it sounds some
what cold ; and it is much better to say God than Trinity. This word
denotes, however, that God is three-fold in person. Now that is a
heavenly matter, which the world cannot understand. Therefore have
I told you often aforetime, beloved, that the articles of the faith one and
all must not be grounded on reason and probability, but must be fixed
and grounded on the sayings in the Scripture; for God knows well how
it is, and how to speak of Himself The Schools have invented manifold
distinctions, dreams and fictions, wherewith they have set themselves to
show forth the Trinity, and thereby are become fools. "]

222 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
After Luther, we will cite only Schleiermacher, as a sample
of many others. He relegates the examination of this
dogma to a postscript in his Dogmatics, and declares inad
missible the traditional formula of the Trinity, which in his
eyes has only the value of an insoluble problem.^
II. Criticism of the dogma of the Trinity is therefore legi
timate. This appears to us superabundantly demonstrated,
both by the logic of the Protestant principle, and by the
example of the Reformers themselves. A second question
remains for our examination : Is the solution of the problem
of the relations between God and the human mind, proposed
by the Italian Unitarians, including the Socinians, a satisfac
tory one ? Here we do not hesitate to answer in the nega
tive. In fact, the outcome of "aU the teachings of the Bible
is, that God is no mere abstract, transcendent Being, seated
in heaven above the visible world, but that He is per
petually revealing himself in Creation, the work of His wis
dom, and that He has revealed himself, in time, by Moses
and the prophets, by Jesus Christ and the apostles. Such
is the magnificent thought which the theologians of the first
three centuries have expressed in the doctrine of the Logos
or Word of God.'' The Son is the Logos incarnate in Jesus
Christ ; the Holy Spirit is the Logos immanent in the Church.
So that Wisdom, Word, Holy Spirit, are but synonyms for
one and the same idea — to wit, God manifesting himself to
the world under this three-fold form, Creation, Jesus Christ,
and the Christian Church.
Thus far aU is clear ; and, let us carefully note, the formula
of baptism goes no further. It is limited to the expression
of the revelation of God, in the universe under the name of
^ Schleiermacher, Glaubenslehre, vol. ii. 527 — 531. Cf. Channing,
Christianity a Rational Religion, "I have done with the first objection,"
&c. ' Scholten, De Leer der hervormde Kerke: Leyden, 1862, vol. ii. 208.
Cf. Schleiermacher, Glaubenslehre, Conclusion.

CONCLUSION. 223
Father, in Jesus under the name of Son, and in the Church
under the name of Holy Spirit, reserving to the Father all
the same His absolute pre-eminence.
But the Fathers of Nicsea and the theologians of a later
day have set themselves to pass these limits imposed by the
very wisdom of the divine Master ; they have pretended to
know more details of his person and of his relations with his
Father than he has himself declared. They have attributed
to the Logos an individuality or hypostasis distinct from that
of God, and an existence co-eternal with His ; a doctrine
altogether contrary to the first conception of the divine Word,
and resulting from its identification of it with Jesus Christ.
After this, led into error by the use of two different epithets,
they have made an arbitrary distinction between the Logos and
the Paracletos, to which, under the name of Holy Spirit, they
have attributed a distinct personality.
Lastiy, putting the finishing-touch to these distinctions
and logomachies, they have placed these three terms in juxta
position, pretending that they are three hypostases, equal in
duration and in power, of one and the same God.
Ochino and Fausto Sozzini in the sixteenth century, and
Schleiermacher and Baur^ in our own time, have had no
difficulty in showing, i, that this Trinity in the One Being
implies a contradiction in terms, and a change of condition
inadmissible in the Being pre-eminently immutable ; 2, that
the terms generation (of the Son) and procession (of the
Holy Spirit) imply an idea of dependence incompatible with
absolute equality among the three hypostases.
On the other hand, the Italian Unitarians, notably the
Socinians, aiming at a reaction against the Trinity in the
name of cool reason, and without consulting the heart and
conscience, fell into the opposite extreme. They confounded
the terms hypostasis a.r\A.person, and denied to the Holy Spirit

F. C. Baur, Die Christliche Lehre der Dreieinigkeil, vol. iii.

224 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
all individuality, that is to say, any separate mode of exist
ence. They employed the term Holy Spirit simply as the
specific term serving to designate the special graces which
God bestows on men ; and, under cover of combatting the
dualism of the natures in Christ, they went so far as to deny
the existence of any divine essence in him.
With Fausto Sozzini, the conclusion of the matter was,
as we have seen, that Christ is a veritable man ; and not a
mere man, in this sense, that he has a right to divine honours,
by reason of his miraculous birth, and of the prophetic mis
sion with which he has been endowed. Thus, for Socinian
ism, revelation is reduced to a sort of mechanical operation,
redemption to a juridical process, all living communication
between God and the human soul is suppressed. The Soci
nians conceived the heavenly Father as a legislator seated
far above humanity, or, according to Pascal's expression, as
"a God far off" {Dieu de loin), who leaves us frigid and
dumb, and does not invite us to prayer.
These criticisms fully apply to the rationalistic system of
Acontius and the Sozzini, and are equally apphcable to the
religion of causality, represented by Bidle, Locke and Priest
ley. Nevertheless, if we recollect the favourite idea of Ochino,
Dei sermo interior, and his conception of God as Love, we
shall note that his doctrine partly escapes these censures,
and that there was in it a mystical element, of which, later
on, advantage might be taken for the true solution of the
relations of God with humanity.
In fact, that which in Ochino was the result of a skilful
balance between the reason and the heart, was effected among
the Anglo-Saxon Unitarians by a happy combination of
ItaHan rationalism with the mystical sense inherent in all
the Teutonic races.
Channing is, in our eyes, the finished type of this fusion.
He corrects the dryness of the Socinian doctrine by the ten
derness of a heart which beats in unison with the whole of

CONCLUSION. 225
sentient nature. He completes the idea of absolute causality,
the sole aspect under which Priestley conceived of God, by
the ideas of conscience and of moral freedom. Doubtless
for him, as for Sozzini, God is the unipersonal Being, who
could not share His attributes with any other being in the
universe, not even with His Son ; but He is also the Father,
full of love and mercy, who communicates His Holy Spirit,
the Spirit of power and light, in all time and to all men.
Jesus is emphatically the Son of God, in this sense, that he
was one with the Father in affection and wiU ; and the Son
of Man, because he partook of the same circumstances and
the same trials that we experience, and because he was united
to mankind by the bonds of a deep community and sympathy.
With regard to the relations between celestial spirits and
men, Channing, without attempting to sound the unfathom
able, inclines to the belief that " all minds are of one family ;"
that the angelic nature and human nature are of one and the
same essence ; in fine, that the inhabitants of the invisible
world are in constant communication with our own.^ By
this doctrine he bridges the gulf that Socinianism had laid
open between heaven and earth. Channing acknowledges
the principle of divine immanence.
III. When we consider that Unitarian Christianity was
represented in the middle of the sixteenth century by a
handful of Spaniards and Italians, almost all martyrs to their
faith, whom the Roman Inquisition had proscribed and the
Calvinist and Zwinglian Churches repulsed, whereas to-day
it counts many hundreds of thousands of adherents in all
the Protestant communities, and forms flourishing Churches
in Transylvania, Great Britain and the United States, — when
we observe the enthusiasm with which the centennial of the

' For the development of Unitarian Christianity from Bidle and Locke
to Channing and Parker, see J. Martineau, Three Stages of Unitarian
Theology: London, 1S69. Cf. R. Spears, Historical Sketcli, ut. sup.
Q

226 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
birth of A\'illiam Ellery Channing was celebrated a few years
ago,'° and the success attained by the translations of his
works with the French Protestant public, and even in more
extensive Catholic circles,— it will be impossible for us to
treat this doctrine with the disdain affected by certain Cal
vinist and Lutheran theologians. This is a proper case for
the application of the precept of the wise Gamaliel: "If
this counsel or this work be of men, it will be overthrown ;
but if it is of God, ye wiU not be able to overthrow them."
After three centuries of furious conflict between the adver
saries and the partisans of the Trinity, the divine truth
immanent in history has pronounced its verdict : the Atha
nasian Creed is condemned, and will not recover from the
universal discredit into which it has fallen. However, we
must not make the mistake of thinking that the dogma of
the Divine unipersonality is the fundamental idea of Unita
rian Christianity ; it is simply its distinguishing characteristic.
For, with Acontius and Fausto Sozzini, it did not even forra
one of the articles of faith which they judged essential to
salvation ; their criterion in matters of faith was what con
duced to etemal life.
But there was a feeHng common to all these Unitarians,
which was, as it were, the ruling passion of their soul — this
was the sentiment of catholicity. By this we are to under
stand the consciousness they possessed of the universality
of the gospel of salvation, and of the spiritual bond which
should unite all Christians within one Church, broader than
any ofthe separate Churches. This is an eminently evan
gelical thought ; and the Lord Jesus has himself expressed
it, as a wish, in his prayer of sacrifice, " that they may aU be
one ; even as thou. Father, art in me, and I in thee ;" and

^° See the volumes of reports of the Centenary Commemoration of
the Birth of W. E. Channing (7 April, 17S0), pubhshed in England and
America (1S80).

CONCLUSION. 227
as a prophecy, in this saying, " they shall become one flock,
one shepherd." Now it is to be remarked that this sen
timent appears much more strong and deep among the
Protestants of Latin race than among the Reformers of pure
Germanic race. These latter take part more readUy in the
divisions and subdivisions of the Church, and do not offer
sufficient resistance to the exaggeration of the principle of
individualism ; the former, on the contrary, as if they retained
something of that idea of cosmopolitan centralisation which
made the greatness of the Roman people, feel a deep need
of-the approach and reunion of the various Churches, on the
one foundation than which none other can be laid. Thence
arise the eirenical overtures put forth by Unitarians of every
age. As Mr. Gordon well says, speaking of Servetus and
other Unitarian leaders, " They left Rome not to join Luther.
They brushed aside the Trinitarian dogma in their haste to
get at Christ  Their idea was to rally and re-inspirit
the Christian mind by recalling the primary allegiance ofthe
Christian heart. Let Christ be known in his true self, and
neither the pure majesty of Christian truth, nor the sure bond
of Catholic unity, could fail.""
Bernardino Ochino is not less straitened than Servetus in
aU the separate Churches, and he aspires after the union of
all Christians through the love of God and a living faith in
Christ. " These forty years," he writes in 1 56 1, " have many
Churches reformed themselves, and aU think themselves most
perfect, especially as regards doctrine ; and yet they herein
differ so much, that each of them condemns as heretic.1l
aU the other Churches which do not accept its doctrines."
" There is only one way of uniting all in Christ, and that is
to show that man may be loved, justified and saved by God,

" Tlieolog. Review, April, 1878, art. Miguel Serveto. Cf. Tolhn, Das
Characterbild M. Servets. Q 2

228 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
whether he beheve in the Real Presence or no."'^ A maxim
which, in his thought, was apphed to all doctrines which are
not expressly mentioned in the Bible.
This severance which Ochino recommended between the
points that are essential and common to all the Churches
and the accessories which divide them, Acontius, his disciple
and friend, took pains to effect in his fine book, the Strata
gemata. He, too, deplores aU the party names, all the hos
tUe Confessions of Faith, which the Protestant sects have
adopted ; he sees the advantage which their CathoHc oppo
nents cleverly derive from this state of things ; and he would
fain re-unite them all in a single Confession of Faith, on the
basis of Holy Scripture. Listen to this eirenical appeal :
" If there is one God, one Christ, one Baptism, one Faith,
what is the object (says the adversary) of all these various
denominational confessions?" "If the Churches among which
there is agreement about those heads of doctrine, the knowledge
of which is essential to salvation, could hold these also as one
common Confession of Faith, in order that, as in fact they
belong to one body as it were, they might also appear so, 1
should not disapprove. But since this may not be, I had rather
there were no Confession than so many. . . . Assuredly such an
accord of the Churches would compose many verbal disputes of
men, and would remove many and great obstacles which won
derfully retard the course ofthe Gospel."'^
As regards Fausto Sozzini, the broadness of the conception
which he had formed of the Church is well known. He
energeticaUy disclaimed having entertained the desire of
founding a new sect, and refused to join any of the separate
Churches which existed in Poland in his time, remarking,

'^ Disputa di M. Bernardino Ochino da Siena intorno alia present
del Corpo di Giesu Christo -lul Sacramento della Cena, quoted in Ben
rath's Ochino, pp. 281 and 27S.
^^ Stratagejnata, bk. vii. pp. 331, 333, 334 (ed. Grasser).

CONCLUSION. 229
' I do not entirely belong to any sect." He thought, with
Ochino and Acontius, that whoever believes and acts in
accordance with his personal faith in the Christ of the
Gospels, may be saved, to whatever Church he belongs.
Faithful to this catholic feeHng of the Sozzini, the Polish
Brethren, even after their exodus into Transylvania, preserved
to their Church the name of Coctus Christianarum Catho
licorum, " quos ITnitarios vocant," and set forth their faith
under the title of a Confessio Fidei Exulum Christi, qui ab
efus sanctissime nomine Christiani tantum appellari amant. '*
Such is the grand and beautiful idea of unity in diversity
with which the Italian Unitarians, during their exile in
London, inoculated the Anglo-Saxon genius. It rightly indi
cates, in our opinion, the important part which is reserved for
Lf^nitarian Christianity in the religious crisis of our time.
The Unitarians are those who, in virtue of their very
name and of their principles, may prevent an impending
divorce between science and the gospel, between reason
and faith. It is for men of their way of thinking, who are
to be found in all the Churches, to bring the various
Christian denominations nearer to each other, on the basis
of the gospel, interpreted by conscience and reason.
Channing had a vision of this magnificent ideal when he
wrote his beautiful discourse on the Church :
" There is a grander Church than all particular ones, however
extensive — the Church Catholic, or Universal, spread over all
lands, and one with the Church in heaven. All Christ's followers
fonn one body, one fold. . . . Into this Church, all who partake
the spirit of Christ are admitted. . . . No man can be excom
municated from it but by himself, by the death of goodness in
his own breast."
To this voice from across the ocean respond the impres
sive tones of Alexandre Vinet, who also is a prophet of
" Theolog. Revie-iU, Oct. 1S79, pp. 568, 569.

230 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARI.VNISM.
unity in freedom, when he says, " The Church of free inquiry
shoiUd never be anything but a society of consciences.
Either it must abjure its own principle, or else it must
consent to liberty. Its head is either in Rome or else in
Heaven. Protestantism for me is but my starting-point ;
my religion is something beyond this. . . . I might, as a
Protestant, hold Catholic opinions, and who shall say that I
do not?""*
"To unity through freedom" — this, in our judgment, is
the very motto of Unitarian Christianity ; and this idea
contains the whole future of the Church.

Esprit d'Alex. Vinci, ed. .Astic, vol. i. 304, 389.

APPENDIX I.
(P- 33.)
Extract from Confession of John Tyball [Theobald], of Bumstede-atl-
Turrim [Steeple Bumpstead], made and subscribed by the said John
before the Reverend Father in Christ, Cuthbert [Tonstall], Lord
Bishop of London, in the Chapel below the Palace at London, 28 Aug.
A.D. 1528. (Given in Strype, Eccles. Memorials, ed. 1822, i., part 2,
app. 17)
" Furthermore, he saythe, that, at Mychaelmasse last past was
twelve monethe, this respondent and Thomas Hilles came to
London to Frear Barons, then being at the Freers Augustines
in London, to buy a New Testament in Englishe, as he saythe.
And they found the sayd Freer Barons in his chamber ; wheras
there was a merchant man, reading in a boke, and ii. or iii. more
present. And when they came in, the Frear demawnded them,
from whence they cam. And they said, from Bumstede ; and
so forth in communication they desyred the sayd Freer Barons,
that thy myght be aquaynted with hym ; because they had herd
that he was a good man ; and bycause they wold have his
cownsel in the New Testament, which they desyred to have of
hym. " And he saithe, that the sayd Frear Barons did perseve very
well, that Thomas Hilles and this respondent were infected with
opinions, bycause they wold have the New Testament. And
then farther, they shewyed the sayd Frear, that one Sir Richard
Fox Curate of Bumstede, by ther means, was wel entred in ther
lernyng ; and sayd, that they thowghte to gett hym hole in shorte
space. Wherfore they desyryd the sayd Frear Barons to make
a letter to hym, that he wold continew in that he had begon-

232 .SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Which Frear did promyse so to wryte to hym a letter at after-
noone, and to gate them a New Testament.
" And then after that communication, the sayd Thomas Hilles
and this respondent shewyd the Frear Barons of certayne old
bookes that they had : as of iiii. Evangelistes, and certayne
Epistles of Peter and Poule in Englishe. Which bookes the
sayd Frear dyd litle regard, and made a twyte of it, and sayd,
A poynt for them, for they be not to be regarded toward the
new printed Testament in Englishe. For it is of more cleyner
Englishe. And then the sayd Frear Barons delyverid to them
the sayd New Testament in Englyshe : for which they payd iiij.
'nd. and desyred them, that they wold kepe yt close. For he
wolde be loth that it shold be knowen, as he now remembreth.
And after the delyverance ofthe sayd New Testament to them,
the sayd Frear Barons did lyken the New Testament in Latyn
to a cymbal tynkkling, and brasse sowndyng. But what farther
exposytion he made uppon it, he cannot tell.
"And then at afternone they fett the sayd letter ofthe sayd
Frear ; which he wrote to Sir Richard ; and red that openly
before them : but he doth not now remember what was in the
same. And so departed from hym ; and did never since speke
with hym, or write to hym, as he saithe."

APPENDIX II.
(P. 41.)
Extract from the Preface of Erasmus to the Works of St. Hilary;
addressed to Giovanni Carondileto, Archbishop of Palermo. (Divi
Hilarii Pictauorum Episcopi Lucubrationes per Desid. Erasmum
Roterodamum . . . emendatas, &c. Basel: Froben, 1523, p. aa6.)
" In his evolvendis, illud obiter subiit animum meum, for
tasse non defuturos qui mirentur, quum tot libris, tanto studio
tantoque molimine, tot argumentis, tot sententiis, tot anathe
matis agatur, ut credamus Filium esse verum Deum, ejusdem
essentise, sive, ut ahquoties loquitur Hilarius, ejusdem generis,
aut naturae cum Patre, quod Graeci vocant 'Oiiovawv, potentia.

APPENDIX IL 233
sapientia, bonitate, seternitate, immortalitate, caeterisque rebus
omnibus parem : de Spiritu Sancto interim vix ulla fiat mentio :
cum tota controversia de cognomine veri Dei, de cognomine
homusii, de jequalitate, non minus pertineat ad Spiritum quam
ad Filium.
" Imo nusquam scribit adorandum Spiritum Sanctum, nus
quam tribuit Dei vocabulum, nisi quod uno aut altero loco in
Synodis refert improbatos eos, qui Patrem, FIHum et Spiritum
Sanctum auderent dicere tres Deos : sive quia putarit tum
magis patrocinandum Filio, cujus humana natura faciebat, ut
difficilius persuaderetur Deum esse, qui idem esset homo ....
sive haec veterum religio fuit, ut licet Deum pie venerarentur,
nihil tamen de eo pronunciare auderent, quod non esset aperte
traditum in sacris voluminibus. In quibus ut ahquoties Filio
tribuitur Dei cognomen, ita Spiritui Sancto nusquam aperte :
etiam si post orthodoxorum pia curiositas idoneis argumentis
comperit e sacris Uteris, in Spiritum Sanctum competere quicquid
Filio tribuebatur, excepta personarum proprietate.
"Sed, ob impervestigabilem rerum divinarum obscuritatem, in
nominibus tribuendis erat religio : de re divina nefas esse duce-
bant aliis verbis loqui, quam sacrs Liters loquerentur. Spiritum
Sanctum legerant, Spiritum Dei legerant, Spiritum Christi lege
rant. Didicerant ex Evangelio, Spiritum Sanctum non seiungi
a Patre et Filio. Docentur enim apostoli baptizare in nomine
Patris et Fihi, et Spiritus Sancti. Servant trium personarum
consortium solennes illee preculse, ex antiquissimo Ecclesiae ritu
nobis relictae, breves iuxta ac docta, in quibus Pater rogatur per
Filium, in unitate Spiritus Sancti. Pater frequentissime Deus
vocatur, Filius ahquoties, Spiritus Sanctus nunquam.
" Atque h£Bc dixerim, non ut in dubium vocem, quod nobis e
divinis Uteris Patrum orthodoxorum tradidit autoritas ; sed ut
ostendam quanta fuerit antiquis reUgio pronunciandi de rebus
divinis, quum sanctius etiam eas colerent quam nos, qui hue
audacisB prorupimus, ut non vereamur Filio praescribere, quibus
modis debuerit honorare matrem suam. Audemus Spiritum
Sanctum appellare Deum verum, quod veteres ausi non sunt:
sed iidem non veremur ilium subinde nostris sceleribus ex animi
nostri templo deturbare, perinde quasi crederemus Spiritum
Sanctum nihil aliud esse, quam inane nomen. Quemadmodum

234 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
plerique veterum, qui summa pietate colebant Filium, tamen
homusion dicere verebantur, quod ea vox nusquam in sacris
Uteris haberetur. Adeo prior fuit Ecclesia; profectus in puritate
vitae, quam in exacta cognitione divinitatis ; nee unquam plus
accepit dispendii quam quum in eruditione philosophica, demum
et in opibus hujus mundi, quam maxime promovisse videbatur."

Translation.
" In the course of this investigation it has come into my
mind by the wa)', that perhaps there will not be wanting some
to wonder, while in so many books, with so much zeal and
pains, by so many arguments, so many opinions, so many ana
themas, we are urged to believe the Son to be True God, of the
same essence (or, as Hilary sometimes speaks, of the same
genus or nature) with the Father, which the Greeks call homo
ousios, equal [to Him] in power, wisdom, goodness, eternity,
immortality, and all things else — meantime scarce any mention
is made ofthe Holy Spirit, though the whole controversy con
cerning the appellation True God, the appellation homoousios,
and the equality, relates not less to the Spirit than to the Son.
" In fact [Hilary] nowhere writes that the Holy Spirit is to be
adored, and nowhere applies [to the Spirit] the word God (unless
that in one or two places in the Dc Synodis he states that those
were censured who dared to call the Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit, three Gods) ; whether because he thought it more neces
sary at that time to protect the Son, whose human nature made
it more difficult to persuade men that he is God, who at the
same time was man .... or whether it was a scruple with the
ancients that, albeit they piously venerated God, they yet dared
not pronounce anything concerning Him, that had not been openly
delivered in the sacred volumes. Wherein, while sometimes to
the Son the appellation God is applied, stiU [it is] nowhere openly
[given] to the Holy Spirit ; although afterwards the pious inqui-
sitiveness of the orthodox ascertained, by fitting arguments from
the sacred writings, that whatever was attributed to the Son
belongs to the Holy Spirit, the individuality of the persons being
excepted. " But, from the unsearchable obscurity of divine things, there

APPENDIX IL 235
was a scruple in applying [certain] terms ; they judged it a pro
fanity to speak on a divine matter in other words than the sacred
writings spoke. They had read ' Holy Spirit,' they had read ' Spirit
of God,' they had read ' Spirit of Christ.' They had learned from
die Gospel that the Holy Spirit is not disjoined from the Father
and the Son. For the Apostles are taught to baptise in the name
of the Father and the Son and the Hoh' Spirit. The association
ofthe three persons is maintained in those solemn prayers, brief
and learned, which are left to us from the most august rite of
the Church ; wherein the Father is petitioned ' through the Son,
in unit)' of the Holy Spirit.' The Father is with the utmost
frequency called God, the Son sometimes, the Holy Spirit never.
"And these things I would sa)', not to call in question what
the authority of the orthodox Fathers has deli\ered to us in the
divine writings, but to show how great was the scruple of the
ancients about pronouncing on divine things, inasmuch as they
reverenced them yet more religiously than we do, who have run
out to such a length of audacity that we are not afraid to dictate
to the Son in what waj-s he ought to honour his own mother.
We dare to call the Holy Spirit True God, which the ancients
did not dare [to do] ; but at the same time we are not afraid of
continually by our wickednesses thrusting him out of the temple
of our mind, just as if we thought the Holy Spirit was nothing
else than an empty name. In like manner, many of the ancients,
who reverenced the Son with the highest degree of piety, were
yet afraid to call him homoousios [consubstantial], because that
expression was nowhere employed in the sacred writings. Thus
the Church's proficiency in purity of life was earlier than [her
advance] in exact knowledge of divinity ; nor was she ever more
at a discount [in character] than when she seemed to have made
the greatest strides both in philosophic erudition and in this
world's wealth to boot."

236 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
APPENDIX 111.
(Pp.61, 121.)
Letters Patent of Edward "VI., constituting the Strangers' Church in
London, 1550. (Taken from Utenhove's Simplex et FideUs Narratio
de . . . . Belgarum atiorumque Peregrinorum in Anglia Ecclesia, Basel,
1 560, collated with Kuyper's Joannes h Lasco, vol. ii. See also Burnet,
ii. 2, 158, for a still better text ; and CoUier, ix. 276, for a French dupH-
cate.) "Eduardus Sextus, Dei gratia Anglise, Franciae, Hibernije
rex, fidei defensor, et, in terra, Ecclesias Anghcanae et Hibernicas
supremum, sub Christo, caput, omnibus ad quos prassentes literae
pervenerint, salutem.
" Cum magnae quaedam et graves considerationes nos ad prae-
sens specialiter impulerunt, tum etiam cogitantes illud, quanto
studio et charitate christianos principes in sacrosanctum Dei
evangelium et religionem apostolicam ab ipso Christo inchoatam,
institutam et traditam, animatos et propensos esse conveniat,
sine qua baud dubie politia et civile regnum neque consistere
diu, neque nomen suum tueri potest, nisi principes, caeterique
praepotentes viri, quos Deus ad regnorum gubernacula sedere
voluit, id imprimis operam dent, ut per totum reipubhcae corpus
casta synceraque religio diffundatur, et ecclesia in vere christianis
et apostolicis opinionibus et ritibus instituta atque adulta, per
sanctos ac carni et mundo mortuos ministros conservetur.
" Pro eo quod christiani principis officium statuimus, inter alias
suas gravissimas de regno suo bene splendideque administrando
cogitationes etiam religion!, et religionis causa calamitate fractis
et afflictis exulibus consulere, Sciatis,
" Quod, non solum praemissa contemplantes, et ecclesiam a
Papatus tyrannide per nos vindicatam in pristina libertate con
servare cupientes ; verum etiam e.xulum ac peregrinorum con
ditionem miserantes, qui jam bonis temporibus in regno nostro
Angliae commorati sunt voluntario exilio, religionis et ecclesise
causa mulctati ; quia hospites et exteros homines propter Christi
evangelium ex patria sua profligates et eiectos, et in regnum
nostrum profugos, praesidiis ad vitam degendam necessariis in
regno nostro egere, non dignum esse, neque christiano homine
neque principis magnificentia duximus, cuius liberalitas nullo

APPENDIX in. 237
modo in tali rerum statu restricta clausave esse debet ; ac
quoniam multi Germanae nationis homines, ac alii peregrini
(qui confiuxerunt, et in dies singulos confluunt in regnum
nostrum Anghae, ex Germania et ahis remotioribus partibus
in quibus Papatus dominatur, evangelii libertas labefactari et
premi coepta est) non habent certain sedem et locum in regno
nostro, ubi conventus suos celebrare valeant, ubi inter suae gentis
et moderni idiomatis homines religionis negocia et res ecclesias-
ticas pro patriae ritu et more inteUigenter obire et tractare pos
sint ; idcirco de gratia nostra special!, ac ex certa scientia et mero
motu nostris, "necnon de advisamento Consilii nostri, volumus,
concedimus et ordinamus :
" Quod de caetero sit et erit unum templum, sive sacra aedes
in civitate nostra Londinensi quod vel quae vocabitur ' Templum
Domini lesu,' ubi congregatio et conventus Germanorum et
aHorum peregrinorum fieri et celebrari possit, ea intentione et
proposito ut a Ministris Ecclesiae Germanorum ahorumque Pere
grinorum sacrosanct! evangelii incorrupta interpretatio, sacra
mentorum juxta verbum Dei et apostolicam observationem
administratio fiat : ac templum illud, sive sacram aedem illam
de uno Superintendente et quatuor verbi Ministris erigimus,
creamus, ordinamus et fundamus per praesentes ;
" Et quod idem Superintendens et Ministri in re et nomine sint
et erunt unum corpus corporatum et politicum de se, per nomen
' Superintendentis et Ministrorum Ecclesiae Germanorum et ali
orum Peregrinorum ex fundatione Regis Eduardi sexti :' in civi
tate Londinensi per praesentes incorporamus, ac corpus cor
poratum et politicum, per idem nomen realiter et ad plenum
creamus, erigimus, ordinamus, facimus et constituimus per pras
sentes ; et quod successionem habeant.
" Et ulterius de gratia nostra speciali, ac ex certa scientia et
mero motu nostris, necnon de advisamento Consilii nostri, dedi-
mus et concessimus, ac per praesentes damns et concedimus
pr«fato Superintendenti et Ministris Ecclesiae Germanorum et
aliorum Peregrinorum in civitate Londinensi, totum illud tem
plum sive ecclesiam, nuper Fratrum Augustinensium in civitate
nostra Londinensi, ac totam terram, fundum et solum ecclesia;
praedictae, exceptis toto choro dictae ecclesiae, terris, fundo et solo
eiusdem, habendum et gaudendum ; dictum templum sive eccle-

238 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
siam, ac castera praemissa, exceptis prasexceptis, praefatis Super
intendenti et Ministris et successoribus suis, tenendum de nobis,
haeredibus et successoribus nostris, in puram et liberam elee
mosynam. " Damus ulterius de advisamento praedicto, ac ex certa scientia
et mero motu nostris praedictis per praesentes concedimus prae-
fatis Superintendenti et Ministris, et successoribus suis, plenam
facultatem, potestatem et autoritatem ampliandi et maiorem
faciendi numerum ministrorum, et nominandi et appunctuandi
de tempore in tempus tales et huius modi subministros ad ser-
viendum in templo praedicto, quales praefatis Superintendenti et
Ministris necessarium visum fuerit; et cj^uidem haec omnia iuxta
beneplacitum regium.
"Volumus praeterea, quod loannes h Lasco, natione Polonus,
homo propter integritatem et innocentiam vitae ac morum, et
singularem eruditionem valde Celebris, sit primus et modernus
Superintendens dictas Ecclesiae : et quod Gualterus Deloenus,
Martinus Flandrus, Franciscus Riverius, Richardus Gallus, sint
quatuor primi et moderni Ministri.
" Damus prasterea et concedimus praefatis Superintendenti et
Ministris, et successoribus suis, facultatem, autoritatem et licen
tiam, post mortem vel vacationem alicuius ministri praedictorum,
de tempore in tempus eligendi, nominandi et surrogandi alium,
personam habilem et idoneum, in locum suum ; ita tamen quod
persona sic nominatus et electus praesentetur et sistatur corami
nobis, haeredibus vel successoribus nostris, et per nos, haeredes
vel successores nostros, instituatur in ministerium praedictum.
" Damus etiam et concedimus prasfatis Superintendenti, Minis
tris, et successoribus suis, facultatem, autoritatem et licentiam,
post mortem seu vacationem Superintendentis de tempore in
tempus eligendi, nominandi et surrogandi alium, personam
doctum et gravem in locum suum ; ita tamen quod persona sic
nominatus et electus praesentetur et sistatur coram nobis, hasre-
dibus vel successoribus nostris, et per nos, haeredes vel succes
sores nostros, instituatur in officium Superintendentis praedictum.
" Mandamus, et firmiter iniungendum praecipimus, tum Maiori,
Vicecomitibus et Aldermanis civitatis nostras Londinensis, tum
Episcopo Londinensi et successoribus suis, cum omnibus aliis,
Archiepiscopis, Episcopis, justiciariis, officiariis et ministris nos-

APPENDIX in. 239
tris quibuscumque, quod permittant prasfatis Superintendenti et
Ministris, et successoribus suis libere et quiete frui, gaudere, uti
et exercere ritus et ceremonias suas proprias, et disciplinam
ecclesiasticam propriam et peuliarem, non obstante quod non
conveniant cum ritibus et ceremoniis in regno nostro usitatis,
absque impeditione, perturbatione aut inquietatione eorum, vel
eorum ahcuius ; aliquo statute, actu, proclamatione, injunctione,
restrictione, seu usu in contrarium inde antehac habitis, factis,
editis seu promulgatis in contrarium non obstantibus, eo quod
expressa mentio de vero \alore annuo, aUt de certitudine pras-
missorum, sive eorum alicuius, aut de aliis donis sive conces-
sionibus per nos praefatis Superintendenti, Ministris et succes
soribus suis, ante haec tempora factis, in praesentibus minime
facta existit ; aut aliquo statuto, actu, ordinatione, provisione,
sive restrictione inde in contrarium factis, editis, ordinatis seu
provisis, aut aliqua alia re, causa vel materia quocumque in
aliquo non obstante.
" In cuius rei testimonium has literas nostras fieri fecimus
patentes. " Teste me ipso, apud Leighes, vicesimo quarto die Julii, anno
regni nostri quarto.
" Per breve de privato sigillo, et de datis prasdicta autoritate
Parliamenti.
"P. Southwell. W. Harrys."
Translation.
" Edward the Sixth, by the grace of God king of England,
France and Ireland, defender of the faith, and on earth supreme
head, under Christ, ofthe Church of England and Ireland, to all
to whom these letters present may come, sendeth greeting.
"Whereas certain great and weighty considerations have at
this present especially moved us, moreover also thinking with
what zeal and love it behoveth Christian princes to be animated
and disposed towards the most holy Gospel of God, and the
apostolic religion begun, instituted and delivered by Christ him
self, without which, doubtless, the state and civil rule can neither
long hold together nor preserve its prestige, unless princes, and
the other powerful magnates whom God hath pleased to set at
the helms of kingdoms, make it their first care that through the

240 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
whole body of the commonwealth pure and undefiled religion be
diffused, and that the Church, instituted and matured in truly
Christian and apostolic opinions and rites, be preserved by holy
ministers, dead to the flesh and the world :
" Forasmuch as we conclude that it is the duty of a Christian
prince, among his other most weighty designs for the good and
illustrious administration of his kingdom, also to provide for
religion, and for exiles broken by calamity and afflicted in the
cause of religion. Know ye,
"That, not only having in view the matters aforesaid, and
desiring to preserve in its original freedom the Church which has
by us been liberated from the tyranny of the Papacy ; but also
commiserating the condition of exiles and strangers, who have
sojourned this good while in our kingdom of England in volun
tary exile, punished in the cause of religion and the Church ;
for, that visitors and foreigners, ruined and ejected from their
own country on account of the Gospel of Christ, and coming as
fugitives to our kingdom, are here in want of essential securities
of life, we have judged unworthy either of a Christian man, or
of the magnificence of a prince, whose liberality ought in such
a state of things to be in no way restricted or close ; and since
many men of German race, and other strangers (who have
flocked, and do every day flock, into our kingdom of England
out of Germany and other more distant parts in which the
Papacy hath sway, the freedom of the Gospel is begun to be
subverted and oppressed) have no fixed seat and locality in
our kingdom, where they are authorised to solemnise their own
assemblies, where among men of their own nation and ordinary
idiom they can intelligently execute and transact the affairs of
religion and ecclesiastical concerns in accordance with the ritual
and usage of their own country ; therefore, of our special grace,
and from our own assured knowledge, and of our own mere
motion, at the same time by the advice of our Council, we do
will, grant and ordain :
"That henceforward there may and shall be a temple or
sacred edifice in our city of London, which shall be called the
'Temple ofthe Lord Jesus,' where the congregation and assem
bly of Germans and other strangers may be held and solemnised,
with this intention and purpose, that by the Ministers of the

APPENDIX III. 241
Church of Germans and other Strangers there may be rendered
an incorrupt interpretation of the most holy Gospel, and an
administration of the sacraments according to the word of God,
arid the apostolic observance : and this temple or sacred edifice,
of one Superintendent and four Ministers of the word, we do
erect, create, ordain and found by these presents ;
"And that the said Superintendent and Ministers may and
shall be in fact and name a body corporate and politic of them
selves, by the name of 'The Superintendent and Ministers ofthe
Church of Germans and other Strangers on the foundation of
King Edward the Sixth :' by these presents we do incorporate
them in the city of London, and we do by these presents really
and fully create, erect, ordain, make and constitute them a body
corporate and politic by the said name ; and that they may have
succession. "And furthermore of our special grace and from our own
assured knowledge and of our own mere motion, at the same
time with the advice of our Council, we have given and granted,
and by these presents we do give and grant to the aforesaid
Superintendent and Ministers of the Church of Germans and
other Strangers in the city of London, all that temple or church
lately of the Austin Friars in the city of London, and all the
land, ground and soil of the aforesaid church, except all the
choir ofthe said church, the lands, ground and soil ofthe same,
to have and to enjoy : the said temple or church and the other
premises, except the before excepted, to be holden by the afore
said Superintendent and Ministers and their successors, of us,
our heirs and successors, in pure frank-almoin.
"We do furthermore give, by advice as aforesaid, and from
our certain knowledge and of our mere motion, as aforesaid, we
do by these presents grant to the aforesaid Superintendent and
Ministers, and to their successors, full faculty, power and autho
rity of enlarging and making greater the number of Ministers,
and of nominating and appointing from time to time such and
such sub-ministers for serving in the aforesaid temple, as to
the aforesaid Superintendent and Ministers shall have seemed
necessary ; and, moreover, all this with concurrence ofthe king's
good pleasure.
" We do will besides that Jan Laski, a native of Poland, a man

242 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
of high repute for integrity and innocence of life and morals,
and for singular erudition, be the first and customary Superin
tendent of the said Church ; and that Wouter Deloen, Marten
[Microen] of Flanders, Frangois La Rivifere and Richard Fran
gois, be the four first and ordinary Ministers.
" We do besides give and grant to the aforesaid Superinten
dent and Ministers, and to their successors, faculty, authority
and licence, after the death or demission of any minister of the
aforesaid, for choosing, nominating and surrogating into his
place from time to time another, an able and suitable person ;
so, nevertheless, that the person thus nominated and chosen be
presented and appear before us, our heirs or successors, and by
us, our heirs or successors, be instituted into the aforesaid
ministry. " We do also give and grant to the aforesaid Superintendent,
Ministers, and their successors, faculty, authority and Ucence,
after the death or demission of a Superintendent, for choosing,
nominating and surrogating into his place from time to time
another, a learned and grave person ; so, nevertheless, that the
person thus nominated and chosen be presented and appear
before us, our heirs or successors, and by us, our heirs or succes
sors, be instituted into the aforesaid office of Superintendent.
"We do command, and order that it be strongly enjoined both
on the Mayor, Sheriff's and Aldermen of our city of London, and
on the Bishop of London and his successors, with all others.
Archbishops, Bishops, justices, officers and ministers of ours
whatsoever, that they permit the aforesaid Superintendent and
Ministers and their successors freely and quietly to indulge,
enjoy, use and exercise their own proper rites and ceremonies,
and their proper and peculiar ecclesiastical discipline, notwith
standing that these may not agree with the rites and ceremonies
practised in our kingdom, without hindrance, disturbance or dis
quieting of them or of any of them ; any statute, act, proclama
tion, injunction, restriction or usage to the contrary thereof
aforetime held, made, published or promulgated to the contrary
notwithstanding, on the ground that in these presents there
nowhere arises any express mention made respecting the true
annual value or the warranty of the premises or of any of them,
or respecting other gifts or grants made by us aforetime to the

APPENDIX IV. 243
aforesaid Superintendent, Ministers and their successors ; or
any statute, act, ordinance, provision or restriction to the con
trary thereof made, published, ordained or provided, or any
other thing, cause or matter in any respect whatsoever notwith
standing. "In testimony of which thing we have caused these letters
patent to be made.
" Witness myself, at Leighes, the twenty-fourth day of July in
the fourth year of our reign.
" By brief of the privy seal, and of grants on the aforesaid
authority of Parliament.
"P. Southwell. W. Harrys."
[Observe that persona is treated as a masculine noun.]

APPENDIX IV.
(P. 82.)
Extract from a Letter of the Geneva Ministers, forwarded by Theodore
Beza to the Ministers of East Friesland, 2 Sept. 1566. (Epistolarum,
Theologicarum Theodori Bezce Vezelii, liber unus, Genev. 1573, Letter
iv. pp. 42, 43.)
Having enumerated the heads of accusation against a certain
Adrianus, pastor of the French Church at Emden, the letter
proceeds :
" Quartum accusationis caput est, quod Adrianus, clam Emden-
sibus ministris, .... curauerit Valdesii considerationes, multis
erroribus, atque etiam blasphemiis adversus sacrum Dei verbum
scatentes, non tantum in Flandricam linguam conuertendas, sed
etiam edendas, et iis locis distribuendas 
" Scimus, ex idoneorum hominum testimonio, quantum nascenti
Neapolitanas ecclesias liber ille detrimenti attulerit ; scimus etiam
quod fuerit de illo judicium D. Joannis Caluini ; scimus & illud,
Ochinum, infelicis memoris virum, ex illis lacunis suas illas pro-
fanas speculationes hausisse, et ita tandem sensim a verbo Dei
abductum, in vltimum illud exitium sese pracipitasse, in quo
miser interiit : ac proinde librum IUum a spiritu Anabaptistico
multis locis non multum dissidentem, id est a verbo Dei ad
inanes quasdam speculationes, quas falso Spiritum appellant,
R 2

244 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
homines abducentem, vel nunquam editum, vel statim sepultum
fuisse magnopere cuperemus." Translation.
" The fourth head of accusation is that Adrianus, unbeknown
to the ministers of Emden, .... caused the Considerations of
Valdes, swarming with many errors and even blasphemies against
God's sacred word, not merely to be translated into the Flemish
tongue, but to be published too, and distributed in that locaHty. . .
" We know, on the testimony of competent men, how much
injury that book did to the nascent church at Naples ; we know
too what was the judgment of Master John Calvin respecting
it; we know also this, that out of these pits Ochino, of unhappy
memory, drew those profane speculations of his, and so at length
led off' little by little from the word of God, he precipitated him
self into that last destruction, wherein he miserably perished:
and accordingly we should greatly wish that this book, differing
not much from the Anabaptist spirit in many places, that is to
say, leading men off from the word of God to certain empty
speculations, which they falsely call the Spirit, had either never
been published, or were at once consigned to the tomb."

APPENDIX V.
(P. 98.)
Extract from Twenty-six Questions on the Trinity proposed by four
Grisons ministers to the Zurich divines, 24 May, 1561. (Trechsel, ii.
app. v., from MS. No. 122 in the Bern Library.)
" 4. An ad aeternam salutem consequendam prasstet sanctissi-
mum Triadis arcanum silentio adorare, quam de ea, aliter quam
sacras liters docent, et secundum varias hominum sententias,
temere loqui?
" 5. An perspicacior acutiorve sanctissimae Triadis inteUigentia
pro consequenda vita aaterna nobis necessaria sit quam ea, quae
in divinis Uteris a Spiritu S. nobis tradita sit?
"6. An ecclesiarum Dei ministri et doctores cogere simpUces

APPENDIX VI. 245
et imperitos possint, constituta etiam illis privationis coenas domi-
nicas pcena, ut, de sanctissima Triade disserentes, aliis vocibus
et nominibus, ab istis minime intellectis utantur, quam bis quibus
in s. Uteris Spiritus Sanctus utitur?
"20. An quis, tanquam pertinax et convictus haereticus ob
simplicem errorem in articulo Trinitatis, cujus arcanum sacratis-
siraum vix ab Angelis comprehendi potest, debeat excommuni
cari quomodocumque in caeteris omnibus, is doctrina atque vita
sit inculpabili, imo laudatissimis moribus, et summa erga pau
peres charitate sit praeditus ?"
[Translated above, pp. 97, 98.]

APPENDIX VI.
(P. 105.)
Confession of Faith imposed on the Italian Church at Geneva, 1 8 May,
1558. [Extracted by the State Archivist, M. Ad. C. Grivel, from the
Archives of Geneva (Prods Criminels, No. 746). It is printed, with
the Latin text, by H. Fazy, Proces de V. Gentilis, 1878.]
"Ancor che la confession de la fede, contenuta nel symbolo
de gli Apostoli doverebbe bastare per la simplicitci del popolo
Christiano, nondimeno percioche alcuni, essendosi per la loro
curiositk disviati de la pura e vera fede, hanno turbato I'unione
e concordia di questa Chiesa, e seminato de le opinione false et
erronee : Per ovviare k tutte le astutie di Satano et esser muniti
e provisi contra quelli che ci volesseno sedurre, e mostrare che
noi crediamo d'un cuore, e parliamo d'una bocca, e similimente
che noi rifutiamo e detestiamo tutte le heresie contrarie k la pura
fede, la quale infino k qui habbiam tenuta, e vogliamo seguire in
sino i la fine, habbiam risoluto di fare la dichiaratione, che qui
appresso segue, quanto k la unica e semplice essentia di Dio, e
la distintione de le tre persone.
" Noi dichiariamo dunque, che il padre Iddio, ha in tal modo
generato fin da ogni eternitk la sua parola e [0?] sapientia, che fe il
5U0 unico figliuolo, e che lo Spirito Santo h proceduto d'amendue;
che non vi h se non una sola et semplice essentia del padre,

246 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
del figliuolo, et de lo Spirito Santo : e che questo, che il padre h
distinto dal figluolo, lo Spirito Santo da I'une e da I'altro, h per
rispetto de le persone.
" Per il che noi danniamo e detestiamo I'errore di quelli che
dicono che il padre, semplicemente quanto alia sua essentik, et
in quanto h solo vero Iddio (come esse dicono) ha generato il
suo figliuolo : come se la divina maestk, imperio, essentia, et
insomma la vera divinitk, non appartenesse se non al padre solo,
e che Jesu Christo, e lo Spirito Santo fusseno Iddii procedenti
da lui, e che in questo modo I'unitk de I'essentia divina fusse
divisa o separata.
" In tanto, confessando noi che non ci h se non un solo Iddio,
riconosciamo che tutto quello che s'attribuisce a la divinitk, alia
sua gloria et essentia, conviene tanto al figliuolo, quanto alio
Spirito Santo, quando si parla semplicemente di Dio, senza far
comparatione da una persona a I'altra. Ma facendosi la compa-
ratione de le persone de I'una k I'altra, ci conviene osservare
quello che h proprio k ciascuna, per fame tale distintione, che il
figliuolo non sia il padre, ne lo Spirito Santo sia il figliuolo.
" Quanto alia persona del nostro signer Jesu Christo, oltre che
fin da ogni eternitk h stato generato da Iddio suo padre et h
stato persona distinta da lui, noi teniamo che nella sua natura
humana, de la quale egli si fe vestito per nostra salute, egli fe
ancora vero e naturale figliuolo di Dio, per havere in tal modo
unite le due nature che non fe se non un solo mediatore, Iddio
manifesto in carne, riservando sempre le propriety di ciascuna
de le due nature.
" Hor, faciendo questa dichiaratione, noi protestiamo, e sopra
la fede che noi debbiamo k Dio promettiamo e ci obligliamo de
seguir questa dottrina, e di perseverar in essa, senza contra-
venirvi ne direttamente, ne obliquamente, di certa scientia, o
con alcuna malitia, per nutrire alcune dissentione, o differentia,
che fusse per disviarci da tale accordo. E generalmente per
chiuder la porta k tutte le discordie per I'avvenire, noi di'chiariamo
di voler vivere e morire nell'obbedientia de la dottrina di questa
Chiesa, e quanto per noi si potra risistere k tutte le sette che si
potesseno levare all'incontro, e cosi I'approviamo, accettiamo, e
confermiamo sotto pena di esser tenuti pergiuri e mancatori di
fede.

APPENDIX VI. 247
" Io Silvio Telio approve la confessione supra scritta et detesto
tutto quello il fusse in contraria a essa.
" Io fran" Porcellino da pioue di sacco accetto et approve la
sopra scritta confessione come in essa ci contiene.
" Io Filippo Rustici da Lucia sottoscriuo et accetto la confes
sione che di sopra si contiene.
" Io Valentino Gentile Cosentino accetto ut supra.
" Io Ypolito Pelerino da Carignano acceto como di sopra.
" Io Nicolao Gallo accetto ut supra."
Translation.
" Although the confession of faith contained in the Apostles'
creed should be sufficient for the simplicity of Christian people,
nevertheless since some, led by their curiosity from the path of
the pure and true faith, have disturbed the union and concord
of this Church, and disseminated false and erroneous opinions :
To meet all the wiles of Satan, and be protected and provided
against any who would seduce, and to show that we believe with
one heart and speak with one mouth, and likewise that we repel
and detest all heresies against the pure faith which we have
held hitherto, and wish to follow even to the end. We have
resolved to make the declaration hereinafter following, in regard
to the single and simple essence of God, and the distinction of
the three persons.
"We declare then that God, the Father, hath in such wise
generated from all eternity his Word and [Lat. has " or" {sive)']
Wisdom, which is his only Son, and that the Holy Spirit hath
proceeded [in such wise] from both, that there is but one sole
and simple essence of Father, Son and Holy Spirit ; and that it
is in respect of the persons that the Father is distinct from the
Son, and the Holy Spirit from the one and the other.
"¦Wherefore we damn and detest the error of any who say that
the Father, simply in virtue of His own essence, and in as much
as He is the only true God (as they say He is), hath generated
His Son ; as if the divine majesty, dominion, essence, and in
short the true divinity, belonged to the Father alone, and Jesus
Christ and the Holy Spirit were Gods proceeding from Him,
and in this wise the unity of the divine essence were divided or
separated.

248 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
" Howbeit while we confess that there is but one sole God, we
acknowledge that whatsoever is attributed to the divinity, to His
glory and essence, belongs equally to the Son as to the Holy
Spirit, when we are speaking simply of God, without comparing
one person with another. But when we compare the persons
among themselves, we must observe what is proper to each,
making such distinctions that the Son be not the Father nor the
Holy Spirit the Son.
"As for the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, besides that he
hath from all eternity been generated by God, his Father, and
been a person distinct from Him, we hold that in his human
nature, which he hath put on for our salvation, he is likewise true
and natural Son of God, through having in such wise united the
two natures that he is one sole Mediator, God manifest in flesh,
with reservation of the properties of each of the two natures.
" Now in making this declaration, we protest, and we promise
and bind ourselves by the faith which we owe to God, that we
will follow this doctrine and persevere in it, without either
directly or indirectly contravening it, knowingly or with any evil
intent, so as to nourish any dissension or difference which might
lead us from the path of this accord. And in general, to shut
the door on all discord for the future, we declare that we wish to
live and die in obedience to the doctrine of this Church, and, so
far as in us lies, to resist all sects that could rise in opposition.
And this we approve, accept and confirm, under penalty of being
held perjurers and faithless.
" I, Silvio Telio, approve the above-written confession and
detest everything opposed to it.
" I, Francesco Porcellino, of Piove di Sacco, accept and ap
prove the above-written confession according as is contained in it.
" I, Filippo Rustici, of Lucia, subscribe and accept the confes
sion which is contained above.
" I, Valentino Gentile, of Cosenza, accept as above.
" I, Ypohto Pelerino, of Carignano, accept as above.
" I, Nicolao Gallo, accept as above."

APPENDIX vn. 249
APPENDIX VII.
(P. 124.)
Organisation of the Ministry and the Conferences in the Strangers'
Church, London, I5S°- (Forma ac Ratio Ecclesiastici Ministerii in
Peregrinorum Ecclesia, Frankf. May, 1551 ; reprinted in Kuyper's
Joannes it Lasco, 1866, ii. pp. 45 ff.)
" De Forma ac Ratio7ie Ecclesiastici Ministerii.
"Nos id quidem in nostris ecclesiis pro nostra virili conati
sumus, sumpto exemplo a Gene\"ensi et Argentinensi Peregrino
rum Ecclesia 
" Hisce nimirum donis suis exornat Dominus in sua ecclesia
verbi divini ministerium, ad ejus aedificationem, ministrosque
ipsos postorum ac doctorum nomine dignatur. Quanquam autem
apud istos quoque curam ac custodiam gubernandae ecclesias
praecipuam esse voluit, duo tamen adhuc custodum praeterea
genera illis in sua ecclesia adjunxit, peculiaremque eis ipsorum
functionem consignavit. Atque alii quidem in Scripturis vocantur
presbyteri, sive seniores, item episcopi, praepositi et guberna-
tiones : alii vero potestates, prascellentes ministri, et altores
ecclesiae Christi, quos nos magistratum vocamus.
"Porro ad hunc presbyterorum ordinem ipsi quoque pastores
ac doctores omnes pertinent, sed curam sibi gubernandas conser-
vandaeque ecclesiae non sumunt soli, nisi in reliquorum presby
terorum coetu, quem ut sibi adjunctum habeant omni studio ac
soUicitudine adniti debent. (Pp. 48, 49.)
" De Modo ac Ratione PropheticB in Germanoru^n Ecclesia diebus
Jovis.
" Ratio prophetic in Germanorum Ecclesia h^c est visa fere
maxime utilis toti ecclesi;c, ut in ilia excuterentur et approba-
rentur omnia per mutuam locorum e Scripturis collationem, quas
in totius ejus hebdomadis concionibus videri poterant vel non
recte, vel non ad plenum omnino fuisse explicata, aut qualem-
cumque tandem in animis dubitationem forte adhuc reliquissent.
Cum enim nusquam aliunde plus imminere posse periculi constet
in omnibus ecclesiis, quam ex doctrinae dissidiis, nihU sane aeque
etiam utile esse potest in omnibus ecclesiis quam ut unanimus

250 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
doctrinas consensus in illis ex verbo Dei retineatur. Ad quem
equidem retinendum atque etiam alendum vix quidquam haberi
excogitarique potest aut melius, aut commodius, aut etiam effi-
cacius hac tali publica doctrinae ministrorum examinatione atque
approbatione. " Die Jovis igitur, sub finem concionis, quas hora propemodum
nona ante meridiem habetur, ecclesiastes ipse hortatur seniores
ecclesiae et omnes eos qui ad proponendas objectiones designati
sunt, ad proferendum in medium aliquid, cum omni modestia et
gravitate, ad ecclesias aedificationem, non autem ad vanam osten-
tationem. Ac tum ministri rationem reddunt doctrinas suae, in
ejus hebdomadis concionibus traditae, si quid adversus illam
objiciatur. (Pp. loi, 102.)"
Translation.
" On the Form and Plan ofthe Ministry of the Church.
" We have indeed attempted this in our churches to the best
of our ability, following the example of the Strangers' Church at
Geneva and at Strassburg 
" With these gifts of his in sooth the Lord adorns the ministry
of the divine word in his church, to its edification, and the
ministers themselves he honours with the name of pastors and
doctors. Although, however, he wiUed that the principal care and
charge of governing the church be committed to them also, never
theless he has adjoined to them in his church two other kinds of
custodians besides, and has assigned to these a peculiar function
of their own. And of these the one class are called in the
Scriptures presbyters or elders, also bishops, foremen or govern
ments ; but the others are called powers, principal ministers,
nourishers of the church of Christ, whom we call the magistracy.
Further, to this order of presbyters the pastors and doctors
themselves also belong, but they do not take to themselves alone
the care of governing and preserving the church, save in the
assembly of the other presbyters, and they ought with all ear
nestness and anxiety to strive to have this [assistance] adjoined
to themselves.
" On the Method and Plan ofthe Prophesying in the Germans'
Church on Thursdays.
" This plan of the prophesying in the Germans' Church has

APPENDIX VIH. 251
appeared of weU-nigh the highest utility to the whole church, so
that in it, by a mutual comparison of passages of the Scriptures,
all those points should be thoroughly discussed and approved,
which in the preachings of that whole week might seem to have
been explained, either incorrectly, or not altogether fully, or
which had haply still left any sort of lingering doubt in the
hearers' minds. For since it is certain that in all churches there
can from no quarter arise greater danger than from discords of
doctrine, so nothing truly can be of equal utility in all churches,
as that a unanimous agreement of doctrine be retained in them
by appeal to the word of God. For retaining and even increasing
which, scarcely anything can be had or thought of, either better,
or more convenient, or even more efficacious than this sort of
public examination and approbation of the doctrine of the
ministers. " On Thursday, then, at the end of preaching, which is held
about nine in the forenoon, the preacher himself exhorts the
elders ofthe church, and all those who are assigned for proposing
objections, to bring forward something, with all modesty and
gravity, for the edification of the church, but not for empty
ostentation. And then the ministers render an account of their
doctrine delivered in the preachings of that week, if anything be
objected against it."

APPENDIX VIIL
(P. 128.)
Letter from Microen to Bullinger, respecting the first Unitarians of
London, 1551. (State Archives of Zurich, Litterce Anglica, fol. 103;
extracted by the kindness ofthe archivist, Dr. Johann Strickler.)
" S. P. Quamquam variis distringar negociis, in hac praesertim
ecclesiae nostrae infantia instituenda, non possum tamen oblatam
hanc ad te scribendi opportunitatem prffitermittere, ne me tui
oblitum putes, qui animo meo alte infixus haeres, cum propter
chnstianissimas tuas quas audivi ex te conciones, tum propter
Decades tuas nuper editas, quibus nos adulescentiores ad exco-
lendam ecclesiam Christi iuvamur non vulgariter. Subsidiis
nobis opus est in tanta negociorum difficultate. Undique peti-

2S2 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
mur qui lubenter sinceram Dei doctrinam ecclesiis traderemus.
Nobis non tantum cum Papistis lucta est, quos iam fere ubique
errorum suorum pudet, sed multo maxime cum sectariis et Epi-
curasis ac pseudo-evangelicis. Praster veteres errores de paedo-
baptismo, de incarnatione Christi, auctoritate magistratus, iura-
mento, bonorum proprietate ac communitate, similesque, novi in
dies oboriuntur cum quibus luctandum nobis.
" Sunt autem in primis divinitatis Christi hostes Ariani, qui
iam multo gravius ecclesias nostras quatere incipiunt quam
unquam fecerunt, conceptionem Christi e virgine negantes.
Prascipua illorum argumenta in tria fere capita redigi possunt
Unum est de Dei unitate per totam veterem ac novam Scrip
turam explicata, Trinitatisque rem cum vocabulo novam esse,
utpote nullis Scripturis proditam. Alterum, Scriptura (inquiunt),
qui unum per omnia agnoscit Deum, fatetur ac profitetur iUum
unum Deum esse solum Patrem (Joan. 17), qui etiam Paulo
vocatur unus deus (i Cor. 8). Postremo, loca qua divinitatem
Christi astruere videntur sic illudunt, ut dicant ea omnia Christo
non ex se competere, sed aliunde accepta, nempe a patre habere
(Joan. 5, Math. 28). Sed (inquiunt) Deus non accipit a Deo.
Eoque tantum nomine hominum quemvis exceUit, quod plura
dona acceperit a Deo patre.
" His respondimus quod Dominus dedit, et, gratia sit Domino,
adest nobis D. a Lasco, unicus post Deum ecclesiae nostras
clypeus. Volui tamen ista humanitati tuas exponere, ut, si vacet,
quid propriissime ad haec tria capita hostium Christi responderi
possit, scribere ad me digneris ; nam ex tua Decade in qua
alioqui solidissime stabilis divinitatem Christi, nihil aut parum
elicere potui, quod his commode opponatur. Vos patres, prae-
ceptores et duces nostri in reformandis ecclesiis, non gravabimini
nos monere ac docere, quo Dei ecclesiam recte instituamus, ac
contra omnes hareses muniamus.
"Agimusque. Hue spectant omnia, ac imprimis instituta est
in ecclesia nostra Germanica Scripture collatio, in qua discu-
tiuntur conciones superioris hebdomadas, ad puritatem doctrinae
retinendam, qus res nonnihil compescit hasreticos, et iuniores
confirmat in doctrina Christiana. Habemus praeterea in nostro
Germanico templo alias duas lectiones latinas, unam a Domino
a Lasco, alteram a Domino Gualtero Delvino, post quas singulae

APPENDIX VIIL 253
Scripturarum coUationes de proximis lectionibus habentur, non
sine maxima ecclesiarum commoditate. Tres itaque singulis
hebdomadibus Scripturarum coUationes habemus, cum principio
de duabus tantum inter nos constitutum fuisset.
" Unum adhuc imprimis in ecclesia nostra requiritur, usus
videlicet baptismi et coenae dominies. Libertas nobis regio pri-
rilegio concessa est, sed per malevolos quosdam stat quominus
tanto beneficio fruamur. Laborat quidem pro officio suo dili
genter Dominus a Lasco adversus episcopos, ut libertate facta
frui liceat; sed movet tamen, nihil autem promovet. Metuo ne
nobis ad Parlamentum usque sit e.xpectandum, quod quando
filturum sit, nescio. Grassatus est Londini, mense Julio, sudor
anglicus, quo correptus D. a Lasco periculosissime laboravit,
adeo ut de eius vita actum esse putaremus. Sed convaluit,
misertus enim est nostri Dominus ; nam, eo sublato, metuendum,
ne sint peregrinorum quoque ecclesiae. Dominus est ecclesiae
suas propugnator unicus.
" Quo in statu sint res Domini Hopri, episcopi Glocestriensis,
ex ipsius litteris rectius intelliges. Quantum ego sane intelligere
possum, fideliter suum talentum exponit. Rogo te, ut pro tua
auctoritate ilium commonefacias mansuetudinis ac benignitatis.
U-xorem ejus D. Annam monebis, ne se curis huius seculi in-
volvat; caveat sibi a spinis quibus suffocatur verbum Dei; rem
periculo plenam esse, sub Christo, venari opes atque honores.
Habent enim admonitiones tuae plurimum ponderis apud utrum
que. Discessit non ita pridem e terris episcopus Lincolniensis,
evangelicas doctrinae fautor. Abripuit sudor anglicus dominos
praeclarissimos adolescentes, ducem Suffolciae et fratrem ipsius
Carolum. Regnum hac aestate, gratias Deo, pacatum habuimus ;
nam tumultus quorumdam rusticorum, principio aestatis exortus,
auctoritate magistratus ac diligentia celerrime oppressus fuit.
" Bene vale, mi Domine, meamque libertatem boni consulas.
Nostro nomine non graveris precor, salutare observandos prae-
ceptores nostros, D. Bibliandrum, Pellicanum, Gesnerum et Fri-
sium. Dominus vestram ecclesiam ab omni malo liberet. Amen.
1 55 1, Augusti 14.
" D. a Lasco ruri est apud Episcopum Cantuariensem ; ad te
alioqui, quantum antea ex eius verbis coUigere potui, scripturus.
Tuus, quantus est,
"Martinus Micronius.

254 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Translation.
[Revised from Dr. Hastings Robinson's version, in ZUrich Letters, 3 ser.
PP- 574— 577-1
" Very much greeting. Though I am distracted by various
affairs, especially in establishing this infancy of our church, yet
I cannot pass by this off'ered opportunity of writing to you, lest
you think me forgetful of you, who are deeply fixed in my
thoughts, both on account of your most Christian discourses
which I have heard from your own mouth, and on account of
your lately published Decades, whereby we younger men are
assisted in no ordinary degree to improve the church of Christ.
We have need of helps in this great difficulty of our affairs. On
every side are we attacked, who would willingly deliver to the
churches the unmixed doctrine of God. Our wrestling is not
only with the Papists, who are almost everywhere ashamed of
their errors, but by far the most with sectaries and Epicureans
and pseudo-evangelicals.' Besides the ancient errors respecting
pasdo-baptism, respecting the incarnation of Christ, the authority
of the magistrate, oath-taking, the property and community of
goods, and the like, new ones are rising up every day with which
we have to wrestle.
" There are, however, in the front rank as enemies of Christ's
divinity, Arians,^ who now begin to shake our churches much
more severely than they ever did, as they deny the conception
of Christ by a virgin. Their principal arguments may be reduced
to three heads. One is respecting the unity of God as unfolded
throughout the entire Old and New Scripture ; and that the
' [By " pseudo-evangelicals '' Microen does not mean Unitarians (as
is supposed pp. 128, 129, 17S, 193, above), but the high episcopal party,
to which he subsequently refers as "those enemies of Christ, the
hypocritical and heretical bishops" (7 Nov. 1551), and as "the pseudo-
bishops" (18 Feb. 1553). Ridley of London, and Goodrich of Ely, are
esj)eci"'lly named by him. Ziir. Lett., 3 ser. 266, 267, 268.]
'¦^[As-early as 20 May, 1550, Microen, writing to Bullinger, mentions
"Arians ... in great numbers," as making it "of the first importance
that fhe word of God should be preached here in German, lo guard
s : the heresies which are introduced by our countrymen. " Zur.
2^0.]

APPENDIX VIIL 255
Trinity, both the term and the thing, is new, inasmuch as it is
disclosed in no passages of Scripture. The second is, Scripture
(say they) which acknowledges one God pervading all things,
owns and professes that this one God is the Father alone (John
xvii. 3), who is also by Paul called the one God (i Cor. viii. 6).
Lastly, the passages which seem to estabhsh Christ's divinity
they so trifle with as to say that all these things do not belong
to Christ of himself, but as received from another, namely, that
he has them from the Father (John v. 19, 30; Matt, xxviii. 18).
But (say they) God does not receive from God. And by this sole
title does [Christ] excel any one of mankind, in that he has
received more gifts from God the Father.
" To these things we have replied what the Lord hath given
[us to say], and, thanks be to the Lord, Master k Lasco is with
us, the sole shield of our church, next to God. I have desired,
however, to lay these things before your politeness, that, if
you have leisure, you may deign to write me word what may
most fitly be replied to these three heads of argument of the
enemies of Christ ; for from your Decade, wherein you most
solidly establish Christ's divinity on other grounds, I have been
able to elicit nothing, or very little, that may be satisfactorily
brought against these positions. You, who are our fathers, pre
ceptors and leaders in reforming the churches, will not grudge
us your advice and instruction how we may rightly establish the
church of God, and fortify it against all heresies.
" And we are busy. All things are directed to this end, and,
in the first place, there has been established in our German
church a comparison of Scripture in which are discussed the
sermons ofthe preceding week, to preserve the purity of doctrine,
a measure which to some extent represses heretics, and confirms
the younger men in the Christian doctrine. We have, besides,
in our German place of worship two other Latin lectures, one by
Master k Lasco, the other by Master Wouter Deloen, after which
there are held separate comparisons of Scriptures on the subject
of the next lectures, not without the greatest satisfaction of the
churches. Thus we have three comparisons of Scriptures evpr-
week, whereas at first we had made arrangements among our
selves for only two.
"One thing of the first importance is stiU wanting 'u'/-,
church, namely, the use of Baptism and the Lc-d "'^' "™

256 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Liberty was granted to us by the royal patent, but through
certain ill-disposed individuals the fact is that we are prevented
from enjoying this great benefit. Master k Lasco does, indeed,
according to his office, make diligent efforts, in opposition to the
Bishops, that we may be allowed to enjoy the liberty given us ;
but still he pushes on and yet makes no way. I fear we may
have to wait tiU Parliament meets, and when that may probably
be, I know not. The sweating sickness raged in London during
the month of July, and Master k Lasco was seized with it, and
most perilously distressed, so that we thought his time was come.
But he recovered, for the Lord had mercy lipon us ; for, had he
been taken away, it is to be feared that the Strangers' Churches
would have been taken too. The Lord is the only champion of
his own church.
" In what state are the affairs of Master Hooper, Bishop of
Gloucester, you will more correctly understand from his own
letter. So far as I can well understand, he displays his talent
faithfully. I beg you that according to your authority you
impress upon him mildness and affability. His wife. Mistress
Anne, you will advise that she do not involve herself in the cares
of this world ; that she beware of thorns, whereby the word of
God is stifled ; that it is a matter full of peril, under Christ, to
hunt after riches and honours. For )'our admonitions have the
greatest weight with them both. Not so long ago departed this
life the Bishop of Lincoln [Henry Rands], a favourer of evan
gelical doctrine. The sweating sickness carried off the most
noble young lords, the Duke of Suffolk and his brother Charles.
We have had the kingdom, thank God, tranquillised this summer ;
for a rising of some rustics, which broke out at the beginning of
the summer, was very quickly put down by the authority and
diligence of the magistrates.
"Farewell, my Master, and take my freedom in good part.
Refuse not, I pray, to greet in my name my worshipful preceptors
Masters Bibliander, Pellican, Gesner and Friese. The Lord
deUver your church from every ill. Amen. 1551, August 14.
" Master k Lasco is in the country at the Bishop of Canter
bury's ; otherwise, so far as I could gather from what he pre
viously said, he was going to write to you.
" Yours, to the best of his power,
"Marten Microen.'

APPENDIX IX. 257
APPENDIX IX.
(P. 136.)
Formula of Retractation presented to Adriaans van Hamstede by the
Bishop ofLondon, 31 July, 1562. (Strype's Grindal, app. ii., edition
of 1 82 1, p. 469.)
"Ego Hadrianus Hamstedius, propter assertiones quasdam
meas et dogmata verbo Dei repugnantia, dum hie in ecclesia
Londino-Germanica ministrum agerem, decreto Episcopi Lon
dinensis, ministerio depositus atque excommunicatus, nunc post
sesquiannum vel circiter, rebus melius perpensis, et ad verbi
Dei regulam examinatis, aliter sentio : et culpam meam ex animo
agnosco, doleoque me tantas offensiones et scandala peperisse.
" Hi sunt autem articuli, seu assertiones, in quibus me errasse
fateor: " I. Primo, quod scripto quodam meo, contra verbum Dei
asseruerim, atque his verbis usus fuerim, scil. ' Quod Christus
ex mulieris semine natus sit, ac nostras carnis particeps factus,
id non fiindamentum esse, sed ipsius fiindamenti circumstantiam
quandam, etiam pueri primis Uteris imbuti agnoscent. Itaque
qui Christum ex mulieris semine natum esse negat, is non funda-
mentum negat, sed unam ex fundamenti circumstantiis negat.'
" 2. Quod Anabaptistas, Christum verum mulieris semen esse
negantes, si modo nos non proscindant et condemnent, pro
fratribus meis, membrisque corporis Christi debilioribus, agno-
verim : et, per consequens, salutem vita astemae IUis ascripserim.
"3. Quod negantes hujusmodi Christi ex Virgine incarna
tionem asseruerim in Christo Domino, unico fundamento, fun-
datos esse ; eorum hujusmodi errorem, lignum, stipulam, et
foenum fundamento superasdificata appellans ; quo non obstante,
ipsi servandi veniant, tanquam per ignem; de quibus testatus
sum me bene sperare, quemadmodum de omnibus aliis meis
charis fratribus in Christo ftindatis : cum tamen Spiritus Sanctus
per Joannem apostolum manifeste affirmet negantes Christum
in came venisse (de ipsa came loquens quas assumpta erat ex
semine Abrahas et ex semine Davidis) esse seductores et anti-
christos, et Deum non habere.
"4. Etiam in hoc graviter me peccasse fateor, quod constanter
asseruerim negantes Christum esse verum mulieris semen, non
S

258 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
proinde necessario et consequenter negare eum esse nostrum
Emanuelem, Mediatorem, Pontificem, Fratrem : neque propterea
negare ipsum verum hominem esse, carnisve resurrectionem.
Nam istam consequentiam negantes, 'Christum esse verum
mulieris semen,' eadem opera negare Christum esse nostrum
Mediatorem, plane necessarium esse agnosco. Et non minus
quam IUam, qua usus est divus Paulus ad Corinthios decimo
quinto : ' Si resurrectio mortuorum non est, nee Christus quidem
resurrexit. Quod si Christus non resurrexit, inanis est videUcet
prasdicatio nostra ; inanis autem est et fides vestra.'
" 5. Quod ahquoties in meis concionibus, praster officium pii
ministri, usus fuerim argumentis, persuasionibus, similitudinibus
et dicteriis, ad istas assertiones populo persuadendas : videUcet,
similitudine, ' non referre cujus sit coloris vestis regia ;' et liti-
gantes de carne Christi militibus de tunica Christi alea luden-
tibus comparando : casterisque hujusmodi. Quae omnia eo ten-
dunt, ut hunc fundamentalem fidei nostrae articulum extenuarent,
et negantibus salutis spem non praecluderent. Agnosco enim
plurimum interesse utrum Christus nostram carnem, an aliquam
aliam coelestem, seu astheream assumpserit; cum non nisi in
nostra carne judicio Dei satisfieri, et pro peccatis hostia Deo
accepta offerri potuisset.
"6. Agnosco etiam in eo culpam meam, quod in concionibus
meis affirmaverim unicuique in Ecclesia reformata liberum esse
infantem suum sine baptismo ad aliquot annos reservare ; neque
ullius fratris conscientiam, in hac re, ad aliquod certum tempus
astringi posse.
"7. Postremo, quod horum praescriptorum errorum monitores,
utriusque ecclesiae ministros contempserim : atque ipsum adeo
reverendum Episcopum Londinensen, utriusque Peregrinorum
ecclesiae superintendentem. Imo potius, contemptis omnibus
admonitionibus, ad jus provocarim ; quo tamen convictus, legi-
jtimis et fide dignis testimoniis, culpam agnoscere renuerim.
Quodque praedictos ecclesiarum ministros, et alios monitores
accusarim, tam dictis quam scriptis, Londini et in partibus ultra-
marinis; quasi non ordine, juste et debite ejectus et excommu
nicatus fuerim. Agnosco enim me optimo jure hoc promeruisse ;
atque ordine a dicto Episcopo mecum fuisse actum.
" Cui dictus Hadrianus subscriber e recusal."

APPENDIX IX. 259
Translation.
[Revised from Strype's Grindal, 1822, p. 67.]
" 1, Adriaans van Hamstede, who, on the ground of certain
assertions of mine, and dogmata contrary to the word of God,
while I acted here as minister in the German Church of London,
was deposed from the ministry and excommunicated by the
decree of the Bishop of London, now, after a year and a half, or
thereabouts, weighing things better, and examining them by the
rule of God's word, do think otherwise ; and from my heart do
acknowledge my fault, and am grieved that I have given rise to
so great offences and scandals.
" Now these aire the articles or assertions in which I confess
that I have erred :
" 1. In a certain writing of mine, I have asserted, contrary to
the word of God, and used these words, viz. ' That the proposi
tion, ' Christ was bom of the seed of the woman and made par
taker of our flesh,' is not the foundation [of our faith], but a
certain circumstance of the actual foundation, even boys who
have learned the first rudiments will acknowledge. Therefore
he that denieth Christ to be born of the seed of the woman,
doth not deny the foundation, but one of the circumstances of
the foundation.'
" 2. That the Anabaptists, denying Christ to be the true seed
of the woman, provided they do not revile and condemn us, I
have acknowledged as my brethren, and weaker members of the
body of Christ ; and by consequence, have assigned to them the
salvation of life etemal.
"3. That those who deny the incarnation of Christ by the
Virgin, I have declared to be founded in Christ the Lord, the
one foundation ; calling their error of this sort wood, stubble and
hay, builtupon the foundation ; notwithstandingwhich, they them
selves come to be saved, as through fire ; of whom I have testi--
fied that I hoped well, as of all my other dear brethren who are
founded in Christ. Whereas nevertheless the Holy Spirit by
John the Apostle affirms that those who deny that Christ has
come in the flesh (speaking of that very flesh which was assumed
ofthe seed of Abraham and ofthe seed of David) are seducers
and Antichrist, and have not God. S 2

260 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
" 4. Also in this I confess that I have gravely erred, that I
have constantly asserted that those who deny Christ to be the
true seed of the woman, do not forthwith necessarily and by
consequence deny him to be our Emanuel, Mediator, Priest,
Brother ; nor therefore deny him to be true man, or the resur
rection of the flesh. For I acknowledge that it is plainly
necessary that those who deny this consequence, ' that Christ is
the true seed of the woman,' do by the same act deny Christ to
be our Mediator. And not less [necessary] than that consequence
which St. Paul has drawn in i Cor. xv. : ' If there be no resur
rection of the dead, neither is Christ risen ; and if Christ be not
risen, our preaching is vain, and your faith is vain.'
" 5. That sometimes in my sermons, going outside the duty of
a pious minister, I have used arguments, persuasions, similitudes
and strokes of wit, to convince the people ofthe above assertions :
viz. by the similitude, ' that it is no matter what colour the royal
robe is of;' and by comparing those that contended concerning
the flesh of Christ to the soldiers that played with dice upon
Christ's garment, and other things of this nature. All which
things tend to this, that they would minimise this fundamental
article of our faith, and would not shut out the hope of salvation
from them that deny it. For I acknowledge that it is of the
greatest importance whether Christ took our flesh, or some other
celestial or ethereal flesh ; since except in our flesh he could not
satisfy the judgment of God, and be a sacrifice accepted of God
for our sins.
" 6. I acknowledge also my fault in this, that in my sermons
I have affirmed that it is free to every one in the Reformed
Church to keep back his child for some years without baptism,
and that the conscience of any brother cannot be tied, in this
matter, to any given time.
"7. Lastly, that I have contemned the ministers of both
Churches, who were my admonishers of these errors above
written ; and even the right reverend the Bishop of London
himself, the Superintendent of both Churches of the Strangers.
Yea rather, contemning all admonitions, I have appealed to the
law [of the Church] ; whereby nevertheless being convicted, on
lawful testimonies and worthy of credit, I have refused to acknow
ledge my fault. And the aforesaid ministers of the Churches,

APPENDIX X. 261
and others that admonished me, I have accused both by words
and by writings, in London and in the parts beyond the sea ; as
though I were not orderly, justly and lawfully ejected and excom
municated. For I acknowledge that I have most justly deserved
this, and that tbe Bishop of London hath dealt orderly with me.
" Whereunto tlie said Adriaans refuseth to subscribe!'
APPEJ^DIX X.
(P. ISO.)
Extract from Ochino's De Purgatorio.
[A Dialogue between Theodidactus, Carmelita, Franciscanus,
Benedictinus, Dominicanus, Augustinianus.]
"Theodid. . . Moriendo, igitur non plus quam debuerat fecit
[Christus], sed solum quod debebat . . . Quinimo ipse Scotus tuus
dixit, Christi merita, licet ut homo, non ut Deus meruerit, in
infinitum preciosa esse ; non quidem quia opera ilia meritoria
propria natura infiniti meriti et excellentiae fuerint, cum in se
finita et determinata essent, sicut et anima quae merebatur et a
qua proficiscebantur ; sed quia Pater mera gratia sua ea pro
operibus infiniti pretii acceptavit, licet in se, propriave natura,
infinite preciosa non essent  Ideo, si Deus ipso juris rigore
causam nostram definire, nee ulla in parte nobis gratificari ....
voluisset, et meritoria Christi opera librasset, ea in se propriave
natura, sublata omni divinae acceptationis gratia, adeo efficacia
non reperisseL (P. 36.)" Translation.,
" Theodid. . . Accordingly, by enduring death Christ did no
more than he had been bound to do, but simply what he was
bound  In fact your own Scotus has said that the merits of
Christ, though he had merit as man, net as God, are infinitely
precious ; not indeed that those meritorieus works were, of their
own proper nature, of infinite merit and excellence, since in them
selves they were finite and bounded, as also was the soul which
acquired the merit, and from which the works proceeded ; but
because the Father of his own mere grace accepted them as
works of infinite worth, although, in themselves, or of their own
proper nature, they were not infinitely precious  Therefore,

262 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
if God had willed to determine our cause by the sheer rigour of
legal right, and not to indulge us in any point . . . and had weighed
the meritorious works of Christ, he would not have found them
sufficiently efficacious, in themselves or of their proper nature,
when all favour of divine acceptation was withdrawn."
Extract from Ochino's Thirty Dialogues, vol. ii., dial, xviii., De Summa
Trinitate.
[The interlocutors are Spiritus and Ochinus.]
"Spiritus. Die mihi, credisne hominem ilium lesum, qui
Christus est, Mariae Deique filius, esse Dei filium unigenitum,
ideoque et primogenitum ? OCHINUS. Credo. Sp. Qui fit autem
ut sit unigenitus, cum in sacris Uteris Dei filii nominentur non
solum oredentes omnes, verum etiam qui aliquo munere fungun-
tur ? OCH. Christus ideo est unigenitus quod inter eiectos solus
ipse est summus vates, rex regum, summus sacerdos, unicus
magister et caput. Item, quia solus conceptus est ex Spiritu
Sancto, soU dedit Deus spiritum sine mensura, in ee solo latent
omnes opes divinae sapientiae et scientia, solus est innocens,
plenus gratiae et veritatis, in quo est virtutum omnium omnibus
numeris absoluta perfectio, quique Deo unice charus est. (P. 14.)
" Sp. Quidnam igitur id est quo differunt [tres Personae Tri
nitatis] ? OCH. Dicunt nonnuUi divinas personas ideo re ips^
inter se dififerre, quia Pater non sit genitus ut Filius, neque item
productus aut spiratus, ut Spiritus Sanctus. Sp. Sunt ergo acci
dentia. OCH. Sunt quippe reales relationes .... ejusmodi sunt
ut alteri impertiri nequeant. Sp. Qui scis ? Si esset in prima
persona Paternitas, eademque idem esset quod essentia divina,
necesse est ut Pater essentiam suam fiUo impertiens, eidem etiam
Paternitatem impertiret ; quippe cum Paternitas et essentia
divina, cum sint idem, habeant idem esse. Praeterea si Pater
nitas est aeterna, sicut et Filiatio et Spiratio, et inter sese rei
natura differunt, erunt in Deo tres asternse res, nee inerit in ee
summa simplicitas. (Pp. 31 — 34.)
" Sp. In sacris Uteris memoriae proditum est, missum a Deo
fuisse ipsius Filium in mundum; idemque de Spiritu Sancto
traditum est, misso a Patre et Filio. Jam vero non dubium est,
quin qui mittitur inferior sit mitten te. Nen sunt ergo aequales
tres divinae personae ; non est ergo tua ista Trinitas. (P. 37.)

APPENDIX X. 263
"Sp. Si est Christus secundum subjectum divinum, quo pacto
verum erit illud ejus dictum : 'Pater major me est.'' .... Si
verba ilia .... dicta fuerunt a supposito divino, necesse est ut
a Patre quoque et a Spiritu Sancto dicta fuerint, quippe qui
eamdem habeant veluntatem et potentiam et virtutem easdemque
actiones. Esset ergo perinde ac si non solum Filius, verum
etiam. Pater et Spiritus Sanctus dixissent Patrem ipsis esse
majorem, et porro se ipso majorem, id quod fieri non potest ;
nee vere dici potest de humanitate Patri adunata, cum ipse non
assumpserit humanam carnem sicut fecit FiUus. (Pp. 40, 41.)"
Translation.
" Spirit. Tell me, do you believe the man Jesus, who is
the Christ, the son of Mary and of God, to be God's only-
begotten, and therefore also first-begotten, son ? Ochino. I
do. Sp. But how does it happen that he is the only-begotten,
when in the sacred writings not only all believers, but also those
who discharge a certain office, are called sons of God? OCH.
Christ is thereby the only-begotten, because he alone among the
elect is the highest prophet, the king of kings, the highest priest,
the sole master and head. Alse because he also was conceived
of the Holy Spirit, te him alone God gave the spirit without
measure, in him alone are hid all the treasures of divine wisdom
and knowledge, he alone is guiltless, full of grace and truth, in
whom there is the absolute perfection of all virtues, and who is
singularly dear to God. (P. 14.)
" Sp. What then is it wherein [the three persons ofthe Trinity]
diff'er? . . . . OCH. Some say that the divine persons have thereby
a real difference among themselves, because the Father is net
begotten as is the Son, nor again produced or breathed as is the
Holy Spirit  Sp. [The distinctions] then are accidents.
OcH. They are in fact real relations .... they are of that sort
that they cannot be imparted to another. Sp. How do you know?
If in the first person there were Fatherhood, and this same
quaUty were identical with the divine essence, it would neces
sarily be that the Father, imparting his essence to the Son,
would impart te him also the Fatherhood ; inasmuch as Father-
hoed and the divine essence, since they are the same, have the
same being. Besides, if the Fatherhood is eternal, as also the

264 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Filiation and the Spiration, and they differ from each other in
real nature, there will be in God three etemal realities, nor will
there be in Him the highest simpUcity. (Pp. 31— 34-)
"Sp. In the sacred writings it is recorded for a remembrance
that God's own Son was sent by Him into the world ; and the
same thing is delivered concerning the Holy Spirit, sent by the
Father and the Son. But there is no doubt that he whe is sent
is inferior to the sender. Accordingly the three divine persons
are net equal ; this is not then that Trinity of yours. (P. 37.)
"Sp. Ifhe is Christ in respect ofthe underlying divinity, in
what way will that saying of his be true, ' The Father is greater
than I'? . . . . If those words were spoken by the underlying
divinity, they must necessarily have been spoken by the Father
alse, and by the Holy Spirit, since they have the same will and
power and virtue, and the same actions. It would therefore be
as if not only the Son but alse the Father and the Holy Spirit
had said that the Father is greater than they, and furthermore
is greater than Himself, which cannot be ; nor can it be truly
spoken ofthe humanity united to the Father, since He took not
upon Him human flesh, as the Son did. (Pp. 40, 41.)"

APPENDIX XI.
(Pp. 165, 172.)
Letter of Pierre La Ramee to Acontius, 15 December, 1565. (Petri Rami
Professoris Regit .... collectanece Prefationes et Epistola, Sec. Paris,
1577, p. 203.) Jacobo Acontio Tridentino. S.
" Jacobi Acontii nomen e prasclaris ingenii monumentis jam-
pridem orbi notum atque illustre est ; sed tamen Jo. Lasicii poloni
e Britannia reditu, nobis etiam jucundum charumque factum
est. Etenim cum doctos in ea insula et mathemat[ic]is praesertim
deditos nosse cuperem, et ad te forte fortuna Lasicius delatus
esset, operK-pretium nobis fuit Lutetiam reversum, de humanitate
et gratia, de variis et reconditis artibus Acontii, narrantem
audire : inter quas laudes cum Archimedeam illam de machinis
et urbium munitionibus geometriam audivissem, non putavi tan
tam docti et ingenui animi salutandi occasionem mihi praetermit-
tendam esse.

APPENDIX XI. 265
" Interea bibliopolas nostri, Francoforto Lutetiam reversi, attu-
lerunt octo libros Stratagcmatum, quorum lectione non solum
recreatus sum vehementer, sed quibusdam apud nos melioris et
notas et literaturae theologis legendos proposui, qui modestiam
orationis et disputationis prudentiam mirifice comprobarunt.
"Libellum autem de Methodo multo jam antea legeram, non
abhorrentem quidem ab institutis nostris ; sed neque plane con-
venientem. Equidem mirifice desiderio teneor tua omnia per-
legendi ac cognoscendi, praesertim si geometricum aliquid et
mechanicum cemmentatus es ; iis enim studiis modo totus dedi-
tus sum. Ea de causa scribe etiam ad Joannem Dium ; literas
nostras eodem fascicule cenclusi, satis confisus te protinus ei
redditurum. Nee dubie utrumque vestrum, nee unquam dubi-
tabo quemquam vestri similem provocare gratia vel accipienda,
vel etiam referenda. Hoc enim liberalis animi commune inter
bonos et humanitati deditos esse arbitror. Vale. Lutetias, 14
Cal. Janu. 1565."
Translation.
To Giacomo Contio of Trienta, Greeting.
" Known to the world and illustrious this long time from the
briUiant monuments of his genius, is the name of Giacomo Con
tio ; but since the return from Britain ef John k Lasco, the
Pole, it has become in addition delightful and dear to me. For
since I desired to know the learned men in that island, and
especially those given to mathematics, and since k Lasco hap
pened fortunately to have been thrown in your way, it was worth
our while to listen to his account, on his retum te Paris, of the
culture and grace, the various and recondite scientific acquire
ments of Acontius ; and when among these praises I had listened
to that Archimedean system of surveying in reference to engines
of war and the fortifications of cities, I considered that such an
opportunity of greeting a learned and open mind was not te be
passed ever by me.
"Meanwhile our bookseUers, on their return from Frankfurt
to Paris, brought back the eight books of the Stratagemata, with
the reading of which I was not merely extremely refreshed
myself, but I placed them in the hands of some theologians here
of superior repute and literature, who approved to admiration
the modesty of the style and the prudence of the discussion.

266 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
" But long before this I had read the little book on Method,
which is not absolutely at variance with my own principles,
and yet not wholly in accord with them. I am in fact pos
sessed with a wonderful desire of perusing and becoming
acquainted with aU you have written, especially if you have
elaborated anything of a geometrical and mechanical nature,
for to these studies I am so to say entirely devoted. On that
account I am writing also to John Dee; I have enclosed my
letter in this same packet, being confident enough that you will
hand it over to him forthwith. With neither of you de I hesitate,
nor with your like shall I ever hesitate, to make a call upon you
by the acceptance, or, again, by the return ef a kindness. For
this proof ef a liberal spirit I think te be common property
among the virtuous and those devoted to culture. Farewell. —
Paris, 15 Dec. 1565." APPENDIX XII.
(Pp. 170, 176.)
The inadequacy of the Apostles' Creed to serve as a common Confession
of Faith among Protestants, according to Acontius. (Stratagemata
Satanm, first edition, Basel, 1565, 4to, bk. vii. pp. 226 — 2^0.)
"At extat quidem vetustissima IUa ac brevissima confessio
quae Symboli nomine Apostolis ascribitur, quam nemo non ad-
mittit Quid ita ? Causa est minime obscura. Non nisi summa
christianae pietatis complectitur capita, ac certissima quaeque, et
in divinis Uteris cuique obvia. Nullius ibi curiosae quacstionis
est judicium, sive decisio. Itaque nemini scrupulum, quamobrem
probet, relinquit. Hinc igitur, quid sit, quod vix quisquam
alterius mallt subscribere confessioni, quam novam excogitare,
palam est; quia nimirum, praeterquam quod nostris utimur verbis,
non iis quibus Spiritus Sanctus est usus, minutissima quaque
complecti volumus. Si constaret Apostolos ejus fuisse confes-
sionis auctores, quae eorum titulo est cencinnata, ut Christian-
erum esset symbolum, vix carere temeritate posset, qui ea con
tentus non esset. Verum cum nemini dubium sit, quin ratio
jutificationis nostras praecipuum sit evangelicae doctrinae caput ;
atque adeo ejus quasdam summa; et id uno 'remissionis pecca
torum' verbo attingatur; ut ad contrarias videatur sententias

APPENDIX XIL 267
posse accemmedari, quid mihi persuadeam vix habeo. Nen
enim aperte meriti errorem longe maximum excludit. Ac mirari
etiam quis non possit neque baptismi, neque ccenae dominicae
uUam fieri mentionem?
" Sed, ut se res habet, hase piis ingeniis proponimus consi
deranda ; si qua forte ratione concinnari aliquando fidei confessio
possit aliqua talis, quse omnibus piis ecclesiis satisfaciat. Tametsi
enim reliquae essent controversiae, cum tamen persuasi homines
essent, inter quos illse intercederent, communia esse nihilominus
sacrorum jura, esse nihilominus inter se fratres, spes aliqua esset,
fore ut et ipsae quoque centroversias multo majore tractarentur
sequanimitate ; quin etiam, ut, sublatis simultatibus, inter eos
tandem conveniret, atque ita adversariis omnis prsecideretur
calumniandi occasio. Quod ut aliquando contingat, summis
precibus est k Deo contendendum."
Translation.
" It is true there is extant that very ancient and brief confes
sion, which, under the name of The Creed, is ascribed to the
Apostles, and this confession ever)' one admits. Why so ? The
reason is by no means obscure. It embraces nothing but the
chief heads of Christian piety, and those which are most certain
and ob-vious to every one. In it there is no judgment or decision
on any curious question. Therefore it leaves no one any subtlety
as a reason why he approves it. Accordingly it is obvious from
this how it is that hardly any one would subscribe another's
confession in preference to thinking out a new one ; because,
forsooth, besides that we employ [in preference] our own words,
not those which the Holy Spirit has employed, we wish to
embrace [in our creed] every little minute particular. If it were
certain that the Apostles were the authors, with a view to its
being the creed of Christians, of that confession which has been
composed with their label, he would hardly be free from rashness
who should not be content with it. Yet, since no one doubts
that the ground of our justification is the principal head of evan
gelical doctrine, and thus a sort of summary of it ; and since this
is touched [in the Apostles' Creed] only in the one expression
'remission of sins,' so that it may seem capable ef being accom
modated te contrary opinions, I hardly know what to think.

268 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Fer it does not openly exclude the very greatest error on the
subject of merit. And who cannot be surprised, teo, that not
any mention is made either of Baptism er of the Lord's Supper ?
" But, as the matter stands, we propose these things for con
sideration by pious minds ; if haply by any method some confes
sion of faith may sometime be composed, such as may satisfy all
pious churches. For though there should still be controversies
remaining, yet when men, between whom these controversies
should come, should be persuaded that nevertheless they have
laws in common on sacred things, that nevertheless they are
brothers among themselves, there might be some hope that even
the very controversies too might be handled with much greater
calmness ; nay even that, strifes being dismissed, there might at
length be agreement among them, and so all occasion of calumny
from their adversaries might be cut off!. That this may some
time come about, we must with our utmost prayers endeavour to
obtain from God."
Protest of Acontius against the Church's use of the secular arm. (Stra
tagemata Satance, bk. iii., first ed., pp. 95, 96.)
" Sunt quibus quiescente gladio protinus de religione omni
actum fore videatur. Magna vero fiat Domino injuria, si eum
dormire suspicemur, neque sui populi uUam eum curam tangere ;
vel sine gladio Evangelium eum suum conservare non posse,
quasi Verbi nulla esset vis, verum Christianis omnis in ferro
posita spes esse videatur. .... Bono simus animo, non dormit
Dominus, sed vigilat. Si in illo nostra posita sit spes omnis, si
Verbo pugnaverimus, sed ejus afiflati spiritu (qui assiduis impe-
trandus est precibus), nas quod ab haereticis. timeamus nihil
fuerit 
"At vero si semel illud obtinuerint pastores, ut quisquis mutire
quid ausus fuerit, protinus sit accersendus carnifex, qui solo
gladio omnes solvat nodes, quod deinceps magnum sit divinarum
literarum studium? Certe non magnopere sibi opus esse intelli-
gant. Poterunt enim quidquid somniaverint misero pepelle
obtrudere ; et suum nihilominus tueri dignitatis locum. Vse
nobis, vas nostris posteris, si hoc, quo une et pugnare nobis licet,
et vincere semper possumus, abjecerimus telum. Actum sit."
[Translated above, pp. 176, 177.]

APPENDIX XIIL 269
APPENDIX XIII.
(P. 192.)
Letters of Lelio Sozini to Johann Wolff, 1554 — 1555. (From the
Hottingersche Sammlung, vols. v. p. 332, and vii. p. 198, by the kind
ness of Prof. Fritzsche, of Zurich.)
I. "Si nomen Spiritus commune est tribus Personis in hac
propositione Deus est Spnritus, quoniam significat essentiam
spiritualem ; ego scire velim an significet aliud, quando tertiam
designat Personam? Quid tandem monstret a Patre et Filio
discretum ? Quaso dicas subiectum ne sit an prasdicatum ?
Num Deo tunc nomen Spiritus concedatur, ut Patris et Filii
nomen tribuitur? Sed quam relationem habeat simul indicate.
An Spiritus ille reperiatur in Dei essentia ab eo distinctus qui
est Deus Pater atque Filius ? Postremo vide an Filius de ipso
Deo, sicut Pater, omnino praedicetur : nam Jesus Christus, illius
Dei Filius, qui trinus et unus creditur esse, non tamen Filius
Trinitatis dicitur, quamvis creatura sit et opera Trinitatis ab
extra censeantur indivisa."
2. "Nihil gratius mihi peterat contingere, verum ipse ad te
veniam et gratias agam. Interea bene et feliciter vale, mi Jeanne
Vulphi, quem ego pluris facie et magis diligo atque cole quam
re ipsa declaraverim ; sed occasio dabitur ut me vera loqui et
scribere intelligat.
" LasUus, sive de amicitia vera et Christiana quae in asternum
durat."
Translation.
I. " If, in the proposition God is Spirit, the term Spirit is
common te the three Persons, since it signifies spiritual essence,
1 would wish to know whether it signifies something else when
it designates the third Person ? What in short does it point to,
distinct from the Father and the Sen ? Prithee tell me, Is it
subject er predicate? Surely the name of Spirit is not then
granted to God [in the same way] as the name of Father and
of Son is applied ? But indicate at the same time what relation
it bears. Can that Spirit be found in the essence of God, dis
tinct from him who is God the Father and the Son ? Lastly,
see whether the word Son is predicated out and out of God

270 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
himself, like Father ; for Jesus Christ, the Son of that God who
is believed te be threefold and one, is nevertheless not called
Son of the Trinity, although he be a creature, and the extra
works of the Trinity are reckoned indistributable [among the
persons]." 2. " Nothing more pleasant could happen te me, but I wiU
myself come to you and thank you. Meantime, fare well and
happily, my John Wolff, whom I make more of, and lo\e and
reverence more than I could really express ; but occasion will
be given that he may understand that I speak and write what is
true. " Laelius, or Friendship, true and Christian, which for ever
endures."

APPENDIX XIV.
(P. 193.)
Extract from the Racovian Catechism, 1609, bk. ii. chap. ii. quest. 71,
73, 74, 75, 78, So. (Catechesis Ecclesiarum quce in regno Polonice et
magno ducatu Lithuaniee . . . affirmant: neminem alium propter Patrem
domini nostri Jesu Christi esse ilium unui?i Deum Israelis ; hominevi
autem ilium Jesum Nazarenum, qui ex virgine natus est, nee alium
prceter aut ante ipsum, Dei filium unigenitum, et agnoscunt et confi
tentur. Racoviae, 1609.)
" D. Exposuisti quae cognitu ad salutem de essentia Dei sunt
prorsus necessaria : expone, quas ad eam rem vehementer utilia
censeas ?
"R. Id quidem est ut cognoscamus, in essentia Dei unam
tantum personam esse.
" D. Quasnam est haec una persona divina ?
" R. Est ille Deus unus, Domini nostri Jesu Christi Pater.
" D. Qui istud planum facis ?
" R. Testimoniis Scripturas evidentissimis, quse sunt : Hac
est vita asterna (ait Jesus) ut cognoscant te (Pater) IUum solum
verum Deum, Je. xvii. 3. Et ad Corinthios Apostolus scribit :
Nobis unus Deus (est) ille Pater, ex que omnia, i Cer. viii. 6.
Et ad Ephesios : Unus est Deus et pater omnium, qui est super
omnia et per omnia et in omnibus, Eph. iv. 6.

APPENDIX XIV. 271
" D. Verum Christiani non solum Patrem, vemm etiam Filium
et Spiritum Sanctum personas esse in una deitate vulgo statuunt.
" R. Non me clam est ; sed graviter in eo errant, argumenta
ejus rei afferentes e Scripturis male intellectis.
" D. Quid autem de Filio respondebis ?
"R. Ea vox, Deus, duobus potissimum modis in Scripturis
usurpatur : Prior est, cum designat IUum qui in coelis et in terra
omnibus ita dominatur et praeest, ut neminem superiorem agnos
cat : ita omnium auctor est et principium, ut a nemine dependeat.
Posterior modus est, cum eum denotat qui potestatem aliquam
sublimem ab uno illo Deo habet, aut deitatis unius illius Dei
aliqua ratione particeps est. Etenim in Scripturis, propterea,
Deus. ille unus Deus Deorum vocatur, Ps. 1. 1. Atque ea quidem
posteriere ratione Filius Dei vocatur Deus in quibusdam Scrip
turse locis.

" D. De Spiritu autem Sancto quid respondes ?
" R. Spiritus Sanctus nusquam in Scripturis vocatur expresse
Deus. Quia vero, quibusdam locis, ea attribuit ipsi Scriptura,
quae Dei sunt, non eo facit, ac si ipse vel Deus sit, vel persona
divinitatis ; sed longe aliam ob causam, quemadmodum suo loco
audies." Translation.
" Disciple. You have set forth the points which are absolutely
necessary to a saving knowledge ofthe essence of God; now set
forth those which you deem eminently conducive to that pur
pose? " Responsor. It certainly is so, to know that in the essence
of God there is but one person.
" D. Which is this one divine person?
" R. It is the one God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
" D. Hew de you make that plain?
"R. By the clearest testimonies of Scripture; which are : This
is life etemal (said Jesus) to know thee (Father) the only true
God, Jo. xvii. 3. And the Apostle writes to the Corinthians :
To us (there is) one God the Father, from whom (are) all things,
I Cor. viii. 6. And to the Ephesians : There is one God and

272 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
Father ef all, who is above all, and through all, and in all,
Eph. iv. 6.
" D. But Christians commonly maintain that not the Father
alone, but also the Son and the Holy Spirit are persons in the
one Godhead.
" R. That is no secret te me ; but therein they gravely err,
producing arguments on this matter from Scriptures ill under
stood. " D. But what answer will you make respecting the Sen ?
"R. This word God is employed in two ways mostly -in the
Scripture. The former is when it designates Him whe so rules
and presides over all things in heaven and earth, that He owns
ne superior, and is so the author and fountain-head of all things
as te depend en none. The latter way is when it denotes him
who has seme sublime power from that one God, or is in some
way partaker of the Godhead of that one God. Fer in the
Scriptures, on this account, that one God is called God of Gods,
Ps. 1. I. And on this latter ground the Son of God is called God
in seme places ef Scripture.

" D. But what answer do you make respecting the Holy
Spirit? " R. The Holy Spirit is nowhere expressly called God in the
Scriptures. But because, in some places, the Scripture attributes
to him those things which belong to God, it does not de so on
the ground as if he were either God, or a person of the divinity,
but fer a very diff'erent cause, as you shall hear in its proper
place.''
APPENDIX XV.
(P. 2IO.)
John Milton on the Unity of God. (De Doctr. Chr. i. 2, pp. 17, 18.)
Having cited several texts of the Old Testament in favour of
the Divine Unity, Milton thus proceeds :
" Quid planius, quid distinctius, quid ad vulgi sensum quoti-
dianumque loquendi usum accommodatius dici potuit, ut intelli-
geret Dei populus esse unum numero Deum, unum spiritum, et

APPENDIX XIV. 273
ut quidvis aUud numerando unum esse intelligebat ? ^quum
enim erat, et rationi summe consentaneum, sic tradi primum
illud adeoque maximum mandatum, in quo Deus ab universe
populo, etiam infime, reUgiese coll volebat, ut ne quid in ee
ambiguum, ne quid obscurum suos cultores in errorem impel-
leret, aut dubitatione aliqua suspenses teneret : atque ita prorsus
inteUexit semper populus ille, sub lege atque prophetis, Deum
nempe unum numero esse, alium praeterea neminem, nedum
parem. Enimvero nondum nati erant scholastici qui acumi-
nibus suis, vel potius meris repugnantiis cenfisi, unitatem Dei,
quam asserere pras se ferebant, in dubium vocarunt. Quod
autem in omnipotentia Dei merite excipi omnes agnoscant, non
ea posse Deum quse contradictionem, quod aiunt, implicant, ut
supra monuimus, ita hie meminerimus non posse de une Deo
dici quae unitati ejus repugnant, unumque et non unum faciunt.
"Nunc ad Novi Foederis testimonia veniamus non minus
clara, dum priora repetunt, et hoc insuper clariora, quod Patrem
Domini nostri Jesu Christi unum ilium Deum esse testantur.
Marc, xii., interrogatus Christus quodnam esset primum omnium
mandatum, respondit (v. 29) ex Deut. vi. 4, supra citato, adeoque
non aliter intellecte atque inteUigi solebat, Audi Israel, Dominus
Deus noster, Dominus unus est, cui responso scriba ille assensus
(v. 32) Bene, inquit, prcEceptor, in veritate dixisti: nam unus est
Deus, nee alius est prceter eum  "
Translation.
"What could be said mere plainly, more distinctly, in a man
ner mere adapted te ordinary capacity and the daily usage of
speech, so that the people of God might understand that God is
one numerically, one spirit, and precisely as they understood any
other thing to be one numerically ? For it was just, and in the
highest degree agreeable to reason, that the first and therefore
the greatest commandment, wherein God's will was that He be
reUgiously worshipped by the whole people, even the lowest of
them, should be so delivered that nothing ambiguous therein^
nothing obscure, should drive His worshippers into error, Or
hold them suspended in any doubt: and in that manner this
people ever thoroughly understood it, under the law and the
prophets, namely that God is one numerically, and there is none
T

274 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.
other besides, still less any equal. Fer truly the Schoolmen were
not yet born, who, relying en their subtleties or rather sheer
incompatibilities, cast a doubt upon the unity of God which they
professed to assert. But as we have given warning above, that
all own as a just exception to the omnipotence of God that God
cannot do those things which involve what is called a contradic
tion, so here let us remember that of the one God things cannot
be said which are incompatible with His unity, and make Him
one and not one.
"Let us now come to the testimonies ofthe New Covenant,
which are not less clear while they recapitulate the foregoing,
and are in this respect still clearer, that they testify that the
Father of eur Lord Jesus Christ is the one God. In Mark xii.,
Christ, being asked which was the first commandment of all,
answered (verse 29) from Deut. vi. 4, above cited, and thus [by
him] not otherwise understood than as it was wont te be under
stood, ' Hear, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One,' to
which answer the scribe assenting said (verse 32), ' Teacher,
thou hast spoken in truth : for one is God, and there is none but
He.'  "

INDEX.

Names of authorities quoted are in italics.

Abel, John, 115 /;.
Accademia dei Sizienti, iSo.
Acceptationism, 97, 130, 261 — 262.
Acontius, see Contio.
Adam, 130, 216.
Adda, fhe, 87, 88, 92.
Adriaans, Cornelis, xii «., 39, 1 29.
Adriaanszoon van Hamstede, Cor-
nehs,65, 134, 135—136, 159, 161,
164, 171, 172, 257 — ^261.
Adrianus, 243 — 244.
Agapas, 96.
A Kempis, see Hemerken.
A Lasco, see Laski.
Albigenses, I.
Alciati, Gianpaolo, 100, 103 — 105.
Alessandria, 110.
Alexandre, Pierre, 118, 119.
-Alexandria, 220.
Aliodi, see Claude.
Alps, 86; Cottian, 72; Rhaetian, 87.
Alsace, 49, 54, 70, 99, 118.
Altieri, IJaldassare, ix, 68 — 6g, 77,
181.
Alumbrados, 2.
American Republic, 213.
Amsterdam, 44, 45, 46, 49, 172,
195, 204, 208, 212.
Anabaptism — Dutch, 21 ; 35, 40,
44, 56, 82; Servetus, 102; 127,
128, 213, 243, 244.
Anabaptists, -vi, xii, 5, 7, 9, 15, 18,
29, 36, 38, 43. 45. 49. 5°. 51. 52>
56, 60, 61 n., 64, 67, 135, 164,
174, 193. 199. 257, 259.
Ancona, 134.
Andrea, Dr., 134.
Angels, 225.

Anglican Church, v, 21, 23, 32, 33 ;
characteristics, 34 ; 35, 37, 62,
63, 64 — 65, 119, 205, 207.
Anglo-Italian element, 214.
Anna, of Oldenburg, 47.
Anselm, 144, 150.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, 208,214, 220.
Antichrist, Roman, 91, 126.
Antinomianism, 51.
Antioch, 220.
Antitrinitarianism, 50," 55 ; Italy,
Si; Grisons, 98; Geneva, loi ;
130, 135, 182, 220.
Antitrinitarians, 5, 7, 9, 18, 29, 56,
57. 64-
Antitrinitarian tendency of the Re
formation, 5, 9, 10, 17, 52; Italy,
78 ; Grisons, 94.
Antwerp, 33, 58, 133, 155, 156,
157-
Apocalypse, 169.
A Porta, Egidio, 105.
Apostles, the, 222.
Apostles' Creed, see Symbolum Ro
manum.
Apostolate, the, 28.
Apostolic Church, 100, 249 — 251.
Appiano, Filippo, 107, 109 n.
Apulia, 72.
Aquila, 68.
Archimedes, 162.
Arianism, ix, 41, 131, 152, 193, 209,
210, 212.
Arians, 18, 19, 38, 51, 128, 129,
195. 213. 252, 254.
Aristocracy, English, 30 — 31.
Aristotle, 79, 162, 176.
Arius, 214, 219.

T 2

276 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Arminianism, xii, 205.
Arminians, xiv, 65, 165, 172, 197,
204, 211.
Arminius, see Hermans.
Arnoldists, 2.
Artemon, 219, 220.
Articles of Reformation (1536), 31.
Arundel, Thomas, 58.
Ashton, John, 27.
Assheton, John, 38.
Athanasian Creed, see Symbolum
Quicumque.
Athanasianism, 55, 83, 213.
Athanasius, 24.
Atheists, Unitarians called, iS.
Atonement, see Redemption.
Augsburg, 49, 107, 109, no, 113,
116, 146.
Augsburg Confession, 12, 157.
Augustinus, Aurelius, xi, 4, 24, 116,
220.
Augustinians, 33, 92, 231 — 232.
Austin Friars, viii, 32, 33, 61, 121
—122, 131— 132, 178, 194, 231,
237, 241.
Avignon, 119.
Babington, Warden ofthe Fleet, 64.
Babington, Churchill, 2n., -jm.
Bacon, Francis, 37, 155, 165, 166.
Bacon, Sir Nicholas, 155.
Baden, in Aargau, 106.
Bailiwicks, Italian, 87 — 89.
Baillet, Adrien, 168 n.
Balbani, Manfredo, 186, 188.
Balbani, Niccolo, 83, 142 n.
Balbani, the, 100, no.
Baldo, de Ubaldis, 162, 1S6.
Baldi, Joachim, 90.
Baptism, 28, 170.
Baptism, private, 183.
Baptismal formula, 222, 232, 235.
Baptists, American, 216.
Barclay, Robert, the Apologist, 36«.,
207, 208, 213.
Barclay, Robert, 44, 49.
Bargagli, Scipione, 186 K.
Barlow, 'William, 158 — 159.
Baron, a Spanish refugee, 133.
Barons, Friar, 33, 231 — 232.

Barrett, William, 65 1.:
Bartolo, di Sassoferrato, 162, 186.
Baschi, Matteo, 139.
Basel, V, 3, 52, 53, 72, Z^n., 91, 99,
IOI, 107, 109, no — 112, 114, 115,
145, 146, 147, 149, 163, 164, 172,
iSo, 1S3, 188.
Basel, Registers of French Church,
won.. Ill «.
Battenburgians, 46.
Baur, Ferdinand Christian, 10, 24,
36, 85 n., 102 «., 223.
Bayle, Pierre, llS»., 165 ».
Beccaria, Giovanni, 93, 106, 107,
140.
Bedford, Earl of, 118, 151, 153, 194.
Bell Alley, 197.
Bellerive, see Corro.
Bembo, Pietro, 137.
Benedetto, of Locai-no, 75. 93. '40-
Benedetto, of Mantua, 74, 141 k.
Benedictus, of Nursia, 140.
Benedictines, 141 n.
Be-nefizio de Gesu Cristo, '2.;']Qi, 141,
149, 153-
Benincasa, Caterina, 76, 138.
Benrath, Karl, 50K. , 74«., 75 '*•>
I03«., 107 «., io8«.. III?!.,
116 «., 117 «.i 130 ?2., 137 ».,
138 ?Z., 139 «., 140 K., 144 ».,
145 »., 147 n., 148 «., 155 ».,
163 «., 228 «.
Bergamo, no.
Bern, 105.
Bernina Pass, 91.
Bernus, Auguste, lion., llin.
Besozzo, Antonio Maria, 93, 109,
no.
Besozzo, Clara, 107.
Besze, 'Theodore, 79, 81, no, 157,
243-
Betti, Francesco, 104, 107, 161 n,,
162 — 164, 169, 171, 17s «., 188.
Betti, the, no.
Bells, fohn Thomas, 73 ».
Betulejus, see Birck.
Beukelszoon, Jan, 44.
Beza, see Besze.
Biandrata, Giorgio, 7, 103 — 104,
189.

INDEX.

277

Bible, authority, 21; contents, 20;
vernacular translations, xv.
Bible, English, xii — xvi.
Bible, Italian, 75, 78.
Bible, Spanish, xv, 117.
Biblemen, 27, 31, 33.
Bibliander, see Buchmann.
Bidle, John, xiv, xv, 20, 21, 37, 197,
200, 201 — 204, 207, 208, 210, 214
— 215, 216 «., 217, 224, 225 «.
Binningen, Johann von, 47.
Birck, Sixt, 146.
Bisschop, Simon, 165 «., 172, 211.
Biveroni, Giacomo, 90, 92.
Bivio, 94 n.
Bizarri, Pietro, 70, no, 114, 117,
118, 161 «.
Blasphemy, 201.
Blonski, Abraham, 1 89.
Boccaccio, Giovanni, 68.
Bocher, Joan, 38.
Boehmer, Edward, 73«.,83«., II7«.
Bologna, 71, 74, 79, So, 84, 180,
1S2.
Bolsec, Jerome Hennas, no.
Bomberg, Daniel, So.
Bonaventura, see Fidenza.
Bondo, 94?^
Bonifacio VIIL, 147.
Bonnet, Jules, 77, loi n.
Borgarucci, Giulio, 134.
Borgo d'Oltramontani, 72.
Bormio, SS.
Borrhaus, Martin, 6, 44, 56.
Bossuet, Jacques Benigne, 21S.
Boston, 217.
Bourchier, Thomas, 29.
Braccietti, the, 77.
Bradshaw, John, 202.
Brandon, Charles, 253, 256.
Brandt, Gerard, 39, 43«., 133 «.
Brescia, 69, 101.
Bruccioli, Antonio, 75-
Bruccioli, the, 77, 78.
Bruges, xii«. ; Convention of, 30;
39. 129-
Briigge, Johann von, 47.
Brully, Pierre, 118.
Brunetti, the, 70.
Brusio, 94 n.

Brussels, 117, 118.
Bucer, see Kuhhorn.
Buchlein, Paul, 33, 52, 58 n., 70,
113, 118, 119.
Buchmann, Theodor, 52, 163, 183,
253. 256.
Buckholdt, Conference, 46.
Budny, Szymon, 19.
Bugenhagen, Johann, 3.
Bulhnger, Heinrich, 36, 5o»., 52,
54, 55. 59. 63. 64, 65, 69, 93, 95,
99«., 106, 113 K., Ii4«.. 117,
IlS»., 121 K., 122 72., 1237;.,
I24K., 125, 128, 129, 143, 15377.,
15972., 183, 192, 194, 251,25477.
Buonconvento, 179.
Burcher, John, 194.
Burgos, 117.
Buriamacchi, the, 100.
Buriamacchi, ' Vincentio, IOI.
Burleigh, Baron, 61, 120, 126, 127,
133. 153. 156.
Burn, John Southernden, 122, n.
Burnet, Gilbert, 236.
Burrows, Montagu, 30.
Bury, Arthur, 206.
Butler, John, 53. '
Calabria, 72, 84.
Calais, 119.
Calvary, xi.
Calvin, Jehan, 4 ; Institutio, 5 ; 6 ;
Trinity, 15—17; 37, 41. 52. 53—
54, 56. 59. 60 77., 63, 65, 77, 78,
82, 84, 86, 96, 99, 100 ; Serveto,
102 — 103; no, 112, 113, 11977.,
125, 129—130, 137; 138, 143 n.,
144, 145, 147 «-. 148. 149 »-. 157.
163, 183, 190, 220; Valde-s, 243,
244.
Calvinism, v, 175.
Cal-vinists, 142, 206, 225, 226.
Cambridge University, 33, 113, 1 17,
"9, 133-
Camerarius, see Kammermeister.
Camillo (called Renato), 84, 86, 92,
95—97, 103, 104, 182.
Campanus, John, 6.
Canterbury, 116, llS, 1 19, 127,
134. 153-

278 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Cantii, Cesare, idn., 18077., 18677.
Capito, see Kopfel.
Capo d'Istria, 91, 14277.
Capuchins, 94, 139, 140.
Caracciolo, Galeazzo, 74, 100, loi.
Caraffa, Giampietro, 68, 143.
Cardoini, the, 71.
Carignano, 72.
Carlisle, 118.
Carnesecchi, Pietro, 74, 75.
Caroli, Pierre, 16.
Caroline, Queen, 197.
Carondileto, Giovanni, 232.
Casaccia, 9477.
Caserta, Francesco, 74.
Caspan, 95.
Cassiodoro, Ju&n, de Reyna, IOI,
133-
Castasegna, 9477.
Castellio, see Chateillon.
Castelvetro, Lodovico, 92, 100.
Castiglione, Giovanni Battista, 134,
161, 165, 172.
Castiglione, Giovanni Francesco,
III 77,, 188.
Castiglione, Varnerio, 93, 106.
Cataneis, Albertus de, 72.
Catherine, St., see Benincasa.
Catherine II., 72.
Catholicity, 226 — 230.
Cavour, 72.
Cecil, William, see Burleigh.
Cecilia, St., 126.
Celibacy, clerical, 58.
Cellarius, see Borrhaus.
Celsi, Mino, 76, no, 112, 176.
Celtis, Conrad, 180.
Champel, 102.
Channing, William Ellery, xiv, xvi,
20, 21, 26, 217, 222 77,, 224 — 226,
229.
Charles I., 195, 200.
Charles V., 71, 73, 74, 84, 137, 141,
146.
Chastellain, Pierre, 134.
Chateillon, Sebastien, 1 10, 1 1 1 , 1 1 2,
11377., 145, 146, 151 7«., 15S— 159,
176, 188.
Chatham, Earl of, 35 77.
Chaucer, Geoffrey, 67.

Cheke, John, 61, 62, in, 113, 120,
147. 153-
Cheltenham, 203.
Cheynell, Francis, 171, 173, 17477.,
196, 20077.
Chiaja, the, 74-
Chiavenna, v, 88, 90, 91, 92 — 93, 96,
97, 98, III 77., 114, 143, 149, 182.
Chieri, 72.
ChiUingworth, William, xii, 37, 174.
Christ, two natures, 4, 55, So;
images of, 5; hypostasis, 10; 23;
truly man, 38; man-God, 51; 56,
57. 85, 94; fallible, 96; 98, 104,
128,130—131, 135, 139, 151, 177,
178, 191, 192, 211, 222, 225, 261
— 264.
Christian, preference of Socinians
for this name, 228 — 229.
Christiern III., 131.
Christology, xi, 138.
Chur, 88, 90, 94, 95, 97, 98.
Church, Christian, 222.
Cibo, Caterina, 143.
Cicero, Marcus Tullius, 80.
Circulation of the blood, 84.
Citolini, the, 114.
Clarke, Samuel, 208, 214.
Claude, of Savoy, 15.
Clemente VIL, 53, 73.
Colchester, 48, 134.
Coleman Street, 197.
Colet, John, 41.
Colli, the, no.
Collier, Jeremy, -2,\n., 6177,, 6277.,
66 77., 13277., 236.
Colonna fainily, 68.
Colonna, Vittoria, 73, 137, 143,
162 n.
Comander, see Dorfmann.
Comenius, see Kommensky.
Commonwealth, English, 213.
Communism — Apostohc, 5 ; 38,
252, 254.
Como, bishopric of, 87, 88.
Compagni, Bartolommeo, 159.
Comprehension, 17377.
Compromise, 35.
Conception, supernatural, the, ix,
50, 224, 252, 254.

INDEX.

279

Confession, auricular, xiii, 58.
Confessions of Faith, 169 — 170, 228.
Constantine, Donation of, xiv, 79.
Constanz, 3, 7, 146.
Consubstantiality, 6, 233, 234.
Contarini, Gasparo, 68, 143.
Contio, Giacomo, 65, 71, Si, 107,
134. 135—136. 155. 159—177.
178,182, 1S6, 188,193, 196, 197 —
198, 199, 200, 205, 206, 207,213,
224, 226, 228, 229, 264 — 26S.
Conventicle Act, 204, 205.
Conversion, 50.
Cooke, Anne, 153, 155.
Cooke, Sir Anthony, 153, 155 n.
Cooke, Lady, 155 77.
Coombe, Edward, 197.
Cooper, John, 203.
Coquerels, the, xiv.
Cordeliers, 140.
Corranus, see Corro.
Corro, Antonio de, 65, 133, 155 —
160, 172, 17S, 193, 199.
Cosenza, 84.
Cosmopolitanism, 227.
Costa, Andrea, n I ?z.
Couet, Jacques, 1 88.
Cousin, Jean, 134, 136, 157.
Coverdale, Miles, 58, 59, 62.
Cox, Richard, 62.
Cranmer, Thomas, 4, 31, 32, 33,
52, 54, 58, 60 — 62, 70, 112 — 113,
115— 121, 127, 147, 148, 253,
256.
Creation, n, 222, 269 — 270.
Creeds, the, xiii, 31.
Crell, see Krell.
Cremona, 91.
Crenius, see Crusius.
Cressy, Hugh Paulin, 196.
Cromwell, Oliver, 209.
Cromwell, Thomas, 31, 54.
Crusius, Thomas Theodorus, i6gn.,
i-jon.
Cuenja, 73.
Culdees, 24.
Curione, Celio Secondo,' 69, 76, 81,
95,96, 111—112, 113, 116, 119,
145. 147. 164-
Curioni, the, no.

Cyprianus, Thascius, 11677.
Dammartin, Madlle, 116.
D'Annoni, the, 1 10.
Dante Alighieri, 76.
Dardier, Charles, 8477.
D'Avalos, Costanza, 74.
D'Avalos family, 162.
David, Ferencz, 19, 82 77., 189, 215.
Davos, 88, 89, 92.
Day, John, 153.
De Brez, Guy, 133.
Dee, John, 265, 266.
Deism, 19, 222.
De la Palma, Marco, 133.
Delft, vi, 45, 48, 49.
Delia Riva family, 99.
Deloen, Pieter, 134.
Deloen, Wouter, 122, 124, 238, 242,
252, 255.
Denk, Johann, 44, 56.
Denmark, 131.
De Ponchell, Antoine, 134.
De Questa, a Spanish refugee, 133.
De Salis, Ercole, 92.
De Salis, the, 92.
Descartes, Rene, 165, 166, 167 — 168,
172, 17S, 190.
De Trye, Guillaume Henri Cathe-
rin, 102.
Diaz, Juan, IOI.
Diodati, the, 1 10.
Dominicans, 87, 91.
Domo d'Ossola, 88.
Dordrecht, 39.
Dorfmann, Johann, 90, 92.
Droin, Mense, 133 «., 14277.
Dryander, see Enzina.
Duno, Taddeo, 93, 107, 15077.
Duns, John, 139, 150, 190.
Durie, John, 173.
Dutch Church, London; see Ger
mans' Church, Strangers' Church.
Dutch Church, Registers, 12277.
Dutch refugees in England, 122,
131-
Ebionites, 95.
Eclecticism, 80.
Edward HI., 30.

28o SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM,

Edward VI., 32, 36, 49, 55, 59, 6077.,
61, 62, 63, 70, 113, 114, 115, 117,
119, 120, 123, 127,131,147, 153,
194, 236 — 243.
Edwards, John, 211 — 212.
Egidio, di Viterbo, 71, So.
Eglises plantees, 79.
Eldon, Lord, 134.
Eliot, Nicolas, 53, 5477.
Elizabeth, Queen, 35, 36, 49, 63,
loS, 131, 148, 153—154, 161, 164,
175-
Elsinore (Helsingbr), 131 77.
Emanuele Filiberto, 72.
Emden, v, 46, 48, 49, 81, 113, 120,
123, 131, 243, 244.
Engadine, the, 90, 91, 94, 99, in n.
English Reformation, aristocratic,
30—31-
Enzina, Francisco de, 117, 119,
122 77., 153.
Epicureans, 252, 254.
Epiphanius, 116 77., 118.
Episcopacy, 35, 62, 131.
Episcopalians, 199.
Episcopius, see Bisschop.
Erasmus, Desiderius, vi, xi, 2 77,, 39,
40, 41—43. 52, 55. 56. 67, 82, 83,
no. III, 113,120, 129, 158, 193,
220, 232 — 235.
Ercole II., 76.
Erickson, Alfred, 55 77.
Eschatology, x.
Eternal Sonship, 191, 193, 219.
Evangelicals, 131.
Extratrinitarian position, 178, 194.
Fabriz, Andreas, 90.
Fagius, see Buchlein.
Faith and Reason, xiv, 80.
Falkland, Viscount, 196.
Family of Lovfe, ix, 48, 49.
Farel, Guillaume, xi, 15, 5077., 54,
221.
Farges, 103.
Fatherhood of God, xiii, 222, 223,
225, 262, 263, 269, 270, 271, 273,
274.
Fatio family, n 1 77.
Fazy, Henri, 105 77., 245.

FeUce, of Prato, So.
Ferrara, 68, 72, 76—77, 117.
Fettan, 94.
Fick, Jules Guillaume, 1 5 n.
Fidenza, Giovanni (or Pietro), 139.
Fieri, Lodovico, 92, 97, 98,
Filiberto VL, 72.
Fiorenzio, 120, 12577.
Fileno, Lisia, see Ricci.
Firmin, Thomas, 200, 204 — 207,
21677.
Fitzwilliam, Lady, 15577.
Fitzwilliam, Sir 'William, 15572.
Flacio Illyrico, see Francowitz.
Flaminio, Marcantonio, 68, 74, 77,
141 77.
Flanders, see Low Countries.
Fleet Prison, 64.
Flekwijk, Herman van, xii7«., 39,
128.
Flemish Church in London, 124—
125, 134.
Flemish refugees in England, 1 22 — ¦
123, 131.
Florence, 91 77., 149, 175, 188.
Florio, Michel-Angelo, 97, 114,
125—127, 129—130, 134, 158.
Fontana, Baldassare, 105.
Foreigners' Church, see Strangers'.
Forty-two Articles, 60.
Fox, George, 35.
Fox, Richard, 231 — 232.
Foxe, John, 28, 54, 62, 63, 114.
France, xv, i, 88, 118.
Francesco, of Calabria, 84, 94.
Francesco, of Padua, 104.
Franciscans, 87, 93, 106, 139, 140,
150.
Franco-Helvetic Protestantism, 4,
14.
Fran9ois, Richard, 65, 122, 238,
242.
Francowitz, Mattia Flach, 77, 156.
Frankfurt-a-M., 62, 265.
Fratres Poloni, 10, 16, 204.
French Church, Basel, 188 ; Emden,
243; London, 123 — 124,130,171.
French refugees in England, llS,
122, 206.
Friedrich lit of Saxony, 71.

INDEX.

281

Friedrichsburg, 204.
Friese, Johann, 163, 253, 256.
Friesland, 47, 49, 81, 120, 243.
Froben, Johann, 1 10.
Fugger family, 113.
Galiffe, Jacques Augustin, 99 72.,
IOI 72., 13472.
Gallo, Nicolao, 104, 247, 248.
Gamaliel, 226.
Gansfort, Johan Wessel, 142.
Garnier, Jean, 119.
Gaskell, William, 20.
Gaul, 219.
Geelen, Jan van, 38, 44 — 45, 49.
Geiler, Johann, 142.
Geishauser, Oswald, 52, 55, no, 145.
Geldenhauer, Gerard, 131 ?2.
Generation, of the Son, 6, 222, 223.
Geneva, 5, 7, 52, 56, 63, 84, 99—
105, 107, 109, no, 114, 124, 142,
143—145. 148, 150. 183, 186,
194, 218, 243, 245, 249, 250.
Geneva, Council Registers, 100 n.
Genoa, 126, 143.
Gentile, Alberico, 134.
Gentile, Giovanni Valentino, 16,
81, 84, 104 — 105, 247, 248.
Gentile, Matteo, 134.
Gentile, Scipione, 134.
Gentili, the, 71.
George IV., 21072.
Germanic Reformers, 227.
Germans' Church, London, 61, 249
—250, 252—253, 255—256, 259.
Germany, xv, 49, 88, 91, 174, 199.
Gessner, Georg, 253, 256.
Gex, 103, 105.
Girolamo, di Melfi, loi.
Giuho, di Milano, 91, 100.
Glarus, 90.
Glastonbury, 127.
Gloucester, 201, 203.
Gniezno, 120.
Gonzaga, Giulia, 74.
Goodrich, Thomas, 254 n.
Goodwin, John, 173, 197, 204.
Gordon, Alexander, -yi , 10277., 12477.,
135 »¦. 139. 153 »-. 154 K-. I79«-.
182, 18972., 200,21972., 227,22972.

Grasser, Johannjakob, 16572., 17072.,
171 77., 172.
Grataroli, the, no.
Gravesend, 131 ?2.
Grenoble, 105.
Grey, Jane, 127.
Grey Leagues, 88 — 90.
Gribaldo, Matteo, 78, 81, 86, 103 —
105, 182.
Grindal, Edmund, 62, 114, 132,
134. 135. 157. 159. 164. 171, 257,
259-
Grison dialects, 90.
Grisons, the, 85, 88 — 99, 11177.,
244.
Grivel, Ad. C, 245.
Grosart, Alexander Balloch, 15577.
Grynaeus, see Gryner.
Gryner, Simon, 52, 53, 55.
Guardia, 72.
Guichard, Louis Anastase, 21 77., 38,
152, 21377., 218.
Guidaccerio, Agattia, So.
Guizot, Francois Pierre Guillaume,
31—32.
Haag, Elaine and Emile, 118 77.
Haariem, 44, 46.
Hagenau, 56, 84.
Hague, the, 44, 5077., 136.
Hales, John, xii, 174.
Hallam, Henry, 16572., 176.
Hamilton, William, 196, 200.
Hamstede, van, see Adriaanszoon.
Hardenberg, Albrecht, 120.
Hard-wick, Charles, 34 n., 60 n.
Harrys, W., 239, 243.
Hartlib, Samuel, 173.
Hatzer, Ludwig, 7, 44, 56.
Hausschein, Johann, 52, 53, 55 72.,
106, no.
Heidelberg, 118.
Helvetic Confession, first, 55.
Helvidius, 95.
Hemerken, 'Thomas, 142.
Henri II. of France, 72.
Henry VIIL, 30, 32, 53, 54, 58,
68, 115, 147.
Henry, an Englishman, 46.
Heracles, vii.

282 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Herbert, Baron, of Cherbury, 29, 37.
Herbst, Johann, 1 10.
Hereford, Nicholas, 26.
Heresy, 201.
Hermans, Jakob, 172.
Herminjard, Aime Louis, 15, 16.
Herzog, Joliaym Jakob, 63 n., 83 72,
Hesdin, 133.
Hierarchy, 50.
High Churchism, 30 — 31, 59, 62 —
63, 254-
Hilarius, of Poitiers, 232.
Hilles, 'Thomas, 231, 232.
Hispano-Italian Protestantism, 4.
Hofmann, Melchior, 44, 51.
Hofmannites, 46, 47.
Holland, vi, xii, xv, 37, 168, 204,
212.
Holy Spirit, 6, 13, 19, 35, 51, 57,
82, 84, 95 — 96, 100, 131, 144, 192,
193,201, 210,213, 216, 222, 223,
224, 225, 233—235, 262—264,
271, 272.
Homoousia, 6.
Homoousios, 13, 219, 233, 234.
Hooper, Anne, 253, 256.
Hooper, John, 36, 5072., 58 — 59,
63—64, 120, 127, 194, 253, 256.
Hosmann, Andreas, 32.
Hottinger, Johann Heinrich, 193 77.
Hottingersche Sammlung, 192 77.
Hulner, 168, 172.
Humanitarianism, ix, 38, 1 28, 191.
Humphrey, Laurence, 62, 63, 64,
Hus, Jan, 27, 138, 218.
Hypostasis, 10, 223.
Ignatius, of Antioch, 104, 118.
Ilanz, 88, 89.
Images, 5.
Inutatione Christi, De, 11.
Immortality, 96, 19277., 216.
Incarnation, ix, n, 38, 50, 12S, 135,
252, 254, 257, 259.
Indifferentism, 174.
Individualism, 227.
Indulgences, xiii.
Inn, the, 9477.
Inner voice, 51, 160, 213, 224, 243,
244.

Inquisition, Flanders, 117; France,
102 ; Italy, 70, 86, 88, 90, 91; 99,
113, 137, 143, 182, 199, 218, 225;
Spain, 73.
Interim, the, 49, 60, 70, 113, 116,
119, 120.
Invocation of Christ, 18 — 19, 215,
21677.; Calvin rejects, 17,
Invocation of Saints, '142.
Irenaeus, 118.
Isis, vii.
Istria, 78, 126.
Italian Church, Basel, no — 112;
Geneva, 99 — 105, 186, 192, 245;
London, 70, 71, 125 — 127, 129—
131. 133—134. 156. 161, 164;
Zurich, 105 — 109, 163 — 164.
Italian Protestants, 3, 217 — 218.
Italian Reformation, 71 — 78-
Italian refugees, England, 70 — 71,
112 — 114; Grisons, 90 — 99.
Italian Unitarians, ix, 225, 229.
Italy, vi, I, 5, 67, Si, 88, 102, 140,
143, 147, 186, 199.
James L, 195.
Jamet, Lyon, 77.
Jerlito, Girolamo, 134, 136, 156 —
157-
Jerome, of Prag, 27.
Jerusalem, 5.
Jesuits, 194, 206.
Jewel,John, 62, 153, 159, 161, 164.
Jews, monotheistic influence, 80 —
81; 194.
Joachim, of Flora, 2, 47.
Johann Friedrich, Elector of Saxony,
69.
John, King of England, 24.
John, St. (I Jo. V. 7), 14. .
Joris, David, 44, 45—47. 48, 49.
no.
Jud, Leo, 52.
Jud^, see Jud.
Julier-Alp, 90.
Julius II. , 71.
Jundt, Auguste, 14277.
Justification, Socinian view, 19 ;
170.
Kammermeister, Joachim, 12, 18.

INDEX.

283

Kepler, Johann, vi.
King, Baron, 211.
Knowen men, 28, 31.
Knowles, John, 203;
Knox, John, 37, 63.
Kolozsvar, 189.
Konigswaid, 204.
Kommensky, Jan Amos, 172.
Koornhert, Dirk, 176.
Kopfel, Wolfgang Fabricius, 52,
54, 56-57-
Kosmoburg, 203.
Krakow, log, 189.
Krell, Christoph, 204.
Krell, Johann, xiv, 200, 201, 203,
204, 206.
Krell, Samuel, 204.
Kuhhorn, Martin, 3, 33, 52, 54,
5877., 60, 113, 119, 121 72., 146.
Kuyper, Abraham, 12377., 12472.,
125 77., 236, 249.
Laboulaye, Emile, 21, 23.
Lacisio, Paolo, 76, 114.
Lactantius, L. C. Firmianus, 146.
Lago di Como, 87, 92.
Lago Maggiore, 87.
Lambeth, 112, 115, 119.
Lamothe, Charles G., 206.
Landolfi, Rodolfo, 92.
Languet, Hubert, 77.
La Ramee, Pierre de, 165, 172,
176, 264—265.
Lardner, Nathaniel, 217.
La Riviere, Fran9ois Martoret, 122,
238, 242.
La Roche, Michel de, 39.
Laski, Jan, 46, 49, 60, 65, 113,
119 — 126, 129 — 131, 135, 153,
156, 23S, 241, 252—253, 255—
256, 264, 265.
Lateran Council (1512), 71.
Latimer, Hugh, 33, 54, 58, 120.
Latin Protestants, 227.
Latin races, vi, xv, i .
Latitudinarians, xii, xiv, 174, 195 —
196, 205, 206.
Latomus, see Masson.
Lavin, 94.
Law, study of, 80.

Lechler, Gottliard Victor, 23 77.,
2677., 27 72., 31 77., 37 n.
Lecky, Wm. Ed-iv. Hartpole, 79 n.
Le Clere, Jean, 212.
Leeuwaarden, 46.
Legate, Bartholomew, 195.
Legate, Robert, 120.
Leicester, Earl of, 134, 156.
Leiden, 44, 46, 133.
Leith, 1 73 72.
Leighes, 239, 243.
Lemon, Robert, 21077.
Leone, Pietro, 97, 98.
Leonistas, 2, 88.
Leti, Gregorio, yon., 13172., 13577.
Liberalism, 174.
Lichtenberger, FridSric, 2 72., 5572.,
146 72., 209 II.
Lifforti, the, gg.
Lille, 118.
Limborch, Philipp van, 211.
Lindsey, 'Theophilus, 20, 200, 205,
217.
Lismanini, Francesco, 7, 140, 150.
Litany, of the Virgin, 14; Luther's,
14; Anglican, xiii, 34.
Lithuania, 19, 195.
Liturgy, Ed. VI., 58.
Locarno, 88, gi, g3, 106 — 107, log,
I4g, 163, 186, igi 77.
Locke, John, xii, 20, 26, 209, 211 —
212, 217, 224, 22572.
Logos, 17, 25, 102, 222 — 223.
Lollards, 26, ,31, 33, 67.
London, v, 7, 91 77., 97, 107, log,
147, I4g, 162, 164, 16572., 182,
194, 217, 231.
Long, Paul, 2 77.
Lord's Supper, xiii, 4, 64, 115, 116,
146, 156, 170.
Lorimer, Peter, 23.
Loudun, 155.
Louis XIL, 71, 76.
Low Countries, 49, 70, nS, 120,
133. 179. 199-
Liibeck, 195.
Lubieniecky, Stanislaw, 182.
Lucca, 76, 100, IOI, no, 118.
Lugano, 88.
Lupetino, Baldo, 77, 140.

284 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Lushington, Thomas, 197, 200, 202.
Luslawice, 189.
Luther, Martin, xi, 3, 4, g ; Trinity,
12 — 14; 32, 33, 41, 55 n., 6g, 72,
73. 77 n., 78, S2, 105, 138, 139,
221, 227.
Lutheranism, v, 4, 92, 143, 175.
Lutherans, 13172., 156, 157, 206,
226.
Lutteroth, Henri, 1^6 n.
Lyons, 2, 8472, 88, 102, 105, 1S6.
Magistracy, an order of church
officers, 24g, 250.
Magistrates, authority, 38.
Magna Charta, 25.
Maidstone, 134.
Mainardo, Agostino, 92 — 93, g6, 97,
114.
Mainz, 49, I So.
Malherbi, see Mallermi.
Mallermi, Nicolo di, 75 72.
Manrico, Alfonso, 42.
Alanriquez, Isabella, 74, 108.
Mantu.i, 85, 146.
Marburg, confession of, 55 77.
Marguerite, de Valois, 76 — 77.
Marignano, 88.
Mariolatry, xiii.
Marliano, Girolamo, 94, 188.
Marot, Clement, 77.
Marriages, mixed, 183.
Martin, Jacques, 12772.
Martineau, James, 2C|, 225 72.
Martineau family, 134.
Martinengo, Celso Massimiliano,
76, 100, IOI, 104, 114, 183, 19277.
Martini, Rudolph, 48, 67.
Mary, mother of David Joris, 46.
Mary, Queen, 37, 62, 114, 126, 131,
134, 148. 194
Mary, Queen of Hungary, 1 18.
Mary, Virgin, 50, 95, 129, 130, 171,
181, 233, 235.
Mass, the, xiii, 126.
Massario, Girolamo, 114, 164.
Masserano, Filiberto di, 93.
Masson, Jacques, 13.
Matthijszoon, Jan, of Haarlem,
44.

Matthijszoon, Jan, of Middelburg,
46.
Maturo, Bartolommeo, 91.
M'Crie, Thomas, 68 n., 6g 72., 71 77.,
72 77., 76 72., 81 72., Sg 72., 92 77.
104 72., 125 77., 133 72., 134 72.,
13777., 161, 16477.
Medici, Cosimo de', 75, 187, 188.
Medici, Ferdinando de', 18772.
Medici, Francesco de', 1S7 77., 18S.
Medici, Isabella de', 187, 188.
Melanchthon, Philipp, 3, 9 ; Loci
Communes, 10, il; 12, iS, 32, 52,
5577., 60 77., 72, 82, S3, 84, 113,
117, 120, 148, 220.
Melander, Dionysius, 57.
Menno, see Simons.
Mennonites, 46, 47.
Mera, the, 92.
Mersenne, Marin, 16S.
Messiah, the Hebrew, vii.
Messiahship, 64, 108, 128, 183, 211.
Meyer, Ferdinand, 6872., 6972., 91 77.,
g377., 10577., 10672., 10772., 10977.,
11477.
Micheli, the, 1 10.
Microen, Marten, 5077., 51 77., 5477.,
5972., 121 72., 122, 123, 12477., 128
— 129, 17S, 23S, 242, 251 — 256.
Middelburg, 46.
Milan, 75; Duchy of, 87, 105; 126,
162.
Military service, 35, 50.
Millenarianism, 51, 67, 102.
Milton, John, 20, 16977., 174, 2og
— 211, 217, 272 — 274.
Ministry, orders of the, 249, 250.
Mirandola, see Pico.
Modena, 75, 142.
Moerikofer, Johann Caspar, 76 77.
11077., 19477.
Mollio, Giovanni, 74, 75.
Monachism, 29.
Monarchia, 220.
Monotheism, Jewish, So.
Montalcino, 74.
Montpellier, 84 7«.
Moone, Richard, 196, 203.
Morata, Olympia Fulvia, 77.
Morato, Fulvio Pellegrino, 77.

INDEX.

285

Moravia, log, 149.
Morison, Sir Richard, 14S, 153, 194.
Morone, Giovanni, 68, 143.
Morsztjm, Krzysztof, 189.
Mortality, human, 19277., 215.
Mosel, 'Wolfgang, 4977., 116, 119,
122 77., 146, 147 72.
Moses, 126, 222.
Moskorzowski, Jeromos, 195.
Miihlhausen, 109.
Miinster, 44.
Miinsterians, 46.
Muralto, Giovanni, 93.
Muralto, Martino, 93, 106, 107, 149.
Musculus, see Mosel.
Muston, Alexis, 72 72.
Muzio, Girolamo, 142 ».
Myconius, see Geishauser.
Mysticism, 51, 100, 143, 224.
Mystics, 36.
Mythology, comparative, vii.
Naked Gospel, xv, 206.
Nantes, Edict of, 204, 206.
Nardi, Jacopo, 75.
Naples, 72, 73—75, 83, IOI, 141,
142, 143, 243, 244.
Negri, Francesco, 92, 96, 186 72.
Neo-Arians, 129, 252, 254.
New-Arians, 209, 214.
Newton, Isaac, 20, 204, 208 — 209,
211, 212, 214, 217.
Nicaea, 208, 220, 223.
NicKan doctrine, 63 77.
Niclaes, Hendrik, 48 — 49.
Nippold, Friedrich, 30, 46 ?2., 47 n.,
49 »•
Nonconformists, 32.
Nonconformity, 30.
Norwich, 12472., 134—135, 156.
Noviomagus, see Geldenhauer.
Niirnberg, 109.
Oaths, 35, 38, 50, 59, 252, 254.
Oberland, the, 142 72.
Ochino, see Tomassini.
Odoni, the, 114, 164.
CEcolampadius, see Hausschein.
Oporinus, see Herbst.
Oratory of Divine Love, 68.

Orelli, Bartolommeo, 107,
Origen, iiS, 165, 220.
Original sin, xiii, 96, 208.
Osiander, see Hosmann.
Osiris, vii.
Osservanza, convent ofthe, 139.
Oxford, 53, 165 72., 172.
Oxford University, 33, 70, 72, So,
113, 118, 133, 140, 157.
Padua, 72, 78, 79, 80, 81, 85, 103,
III 77., 182.
Paedobaptism, 38, 50, 129, 135, 252,
254.
Paget, William, 6g.
Paglia, Antonio della, 68, 76, 78,
99. 137-
Paleario, Aonio, see Paglia.
Palermo, 75.
Palla-vicini, Gianandrea, g6, 104.
Pallavicini, the, 95, in 77., 182.
Palmer, Herbert, 15572.
Pantheism, 56, 67.
Pantheists, 1 8.
Paolo IIL, 68, 141.
Papists, 252, 254.
Paraclete, 223.
Paris, 84, 264, 265.
Parker, Matthew, 62, 156.
Parker, Theodore, xiv, 20, 21, 217,
22577.
Parris, Georg van, ix, 7, 49, 65, 129,
135. 136-
Partridge, Nicolas, 53, 5472.
Pascal, Blaise, 224.
Pastor, Adam, see Martini.
Paul, St., 4, II, 26, 73, 143, 20-
232, 252, 255, 258, 260.
Paul, of Samosata, 12, 214, 219,
220.
Paul's Cross, 29.
Pavia, 72.
Pecock, Reginald, 26, 27—29, 31,
152.
Pelagianism, 43.
Pelerino, Ypolito, 104, 247, 24S.
Pellican, Conrad, 52, 93, 106, 107,
145, 163, 253, 256.
Penance, xiii.
Penn, WUliam, 207, 213.

286 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Percena, 179.
Perez, Juan, de Pineda, loi.
Perna, Pietro, no, 164, 172.
Perucell, see La Riviere.
Perugia, no, 114, 118.
Pescaro, Marchese di, 161 72., 162.
Pestalozzi, the, 92.
Peter, St., 232.
Peter Martyr, see Vermigli.
Peter's pence, 24.
Petrarca, Francesco, 68.
Petrucci, Agnese, 185.
Pett, Peter, 214.
Philip IL, 35, 133.
Philipp, Landgraf of Hesse, 46,
69.
Philips, Dirk, 46.
Philips, Obbe, 45, 46.
Photinus, 219.
Piacenza, 1 1 1 77.
Pico, della Mirandola, Gianfran-
cesco, 71, 80.
Pico, della Mirandola, Giovanni, 2,
80.
Piedmont, 72, 100, no.
Pirckheimer, Wilibald, 42.
Pisa, Council, 3, 71.
Planitz, Johann, 71.
Plato — "Trinity, 26; 79, 162.
Platonism, of Wiclif, 24.
Poitiers, 1 12 77.
Poland, V, xii, 7, 19, 48, 105, 150,
174, 179, 195, igg, 206, 212, 218,
22g.
Pole, Reginald, 68.
Polish Socinians, 229.
Pomponazzi, Pietro, 79, 165,' 192.
Ponet, John, 62, 114, 153, 155.
Poor Men of Lyons, 2, 88.
Pope, the, (Antichrist,) gi, 126.
Porcellino, Francesco, 104, 247,
24S.
Porta, Petro Dominico Rosi da,%'&n.,
94«-. 95 »•
Poschiavo, 91, 92, 9477.
Poullain, 'Valerand, 118, 119 77.,
127.
Pragela, 72.
Prayer-book, Common, 33, 34 ;
in French, 127 n.

Predestination, 65, 108-, 112, 130,
136, 139. 145. 148. 179. 208.
Pre-existence of Christ, ix, 214.
Presbyterianism, 93.
Presbyterians, 37, 66.
Price, Richard, xiv.
Priestley, Joseph, xiv, 20, 217, 224,
225.
Priuli, Luigi, 68.
Procession of the Holy Spirit, 223,
245. 247-
Prophesyings, 124, 24g, 251, 252,
253. 25s, 256.
Prophets, the, 222.
Protestantism, i ; three types, 3 ;
170, 2ig.
Protestant Synod, 60.
Prussia, 204.
Przypcowski, Samuel, 18672., ig7.
Pseudo-evangelicals, 1 28, 129, 178,
ig3, 252, 254
Pucci, Francesco, 175 77., i8g.
Puritanism, 35, 36, 5g, 63, 66, 131.
Puritans, 37, 62, 64, igg.
Purvey, John, 27.
Pusey, Edward Bouverie, 21.
Quakers, 35, 36, 199, 208, 209, 213,
216, 220.
Quinet, Edgar, 218.
Quintana, Juan, 84.
Racovian Catechistn, 193 72., 195,
200, 202, 214, 270 — 272.
Radziwill, Mikolaj, 6, 16, loS, 151.
Ragnone, Lattanzio, 74, 76, lOl, 104.
Rakow, 195, 201.
Ramus, see La Ramee.
Rands, Henry, 253, 256.
Rationalism, xv, 51.
Rauchlin, Johann, 106.
Real Presence, 228.
Reason, 25, 51, 84.
Reason and Faith, xiv, 79 — 80.
Redemption, x, xi, xiv, 80, 95, 96,
97, 10977., 130, 144, 150, 179,
181, 183, 190— igi, 207, 215,
224, 261 — 262.
ReformatioLegumEcclesiasiicarum, 33-

INDEX.

287

Reformation, l ; radical, 6, 50 ; in
complete, 57 ; English, 30 — 3 1 ;
Italian, 71—78.
Refugees, Protestant, 32.
Renan, Ernest, 1 77.
Renascence, 40, 72.
Renee, of Ferrara, 72, 75, 76 — 77,
99. H3-
Resurrection, 179, 1S3, 258, 260.
Reuss, Rudolf, 1 14 72., nS ?2., ng 72.
Revelation, x, xi, xiv, 20, 23, 25,
224.
Reville, Albert, 5, 207, 220 n.
Rhaetic Confession, 94.
Rhenish Academy, iSo.
Rhenish Provinces, 49.
Rhine, the, 90, 131.
Ricci, Paolo, 75.
Ridley, Nicholas, 33, 121, 132,
25472.
RiUer, Raphael, 194.
Robinson, Hastings, 254.
Rogers, John, 58, 59.
Romani language, 90, 92.
Rome, 78, So, no, 227.
Romulus, vii.
Ronco, Lodovico, 93, 107.
Rosalino family, 109 72.
Rosary, xiii.
Rosso, Giovanni, 75 77.
Rosso, Gregorio, 74.
Rotterdam, vi, 46.
Ruchat, Abraham, 55 n.
Rustici, Filippo, 104, 247, 24S.
Sabellianism, 17, 83, 102, 193, 213.
Sabellius, 171, 208.
Sacraments, xiii, 60, 95 — g6, 124,
179, 214, 253, 255—256.
Saintonge, 155.
Saluz, Philipp, go, g4, g5, 183.
Saluzzo, 104.
Salvation, without knowing Christ,
130.
Salvetti, Camilla, 180, 185.
Samosatenianism, 1 88.
Sampson, Thomas, 62, 64, 114, 153,
154, 164.
Sa-nd, Christoph -von den, 82, 147,
181 n., 182, 208, 209, 214.

Sandwich, 134.
Sandys, Edwin, 157.
San Frediano, convent of, 76, loi,
iiS.
Saragossa, 8472.
Sarravia, Adriano de, 133.
Satan, 147, 201, 245, 247.
Savonarola, Girolamo, 2, 71, 75,
137. 138. 143-
Savoy, 99.
Saxony, vi.
Saxo-Scandinavian Protestantism,
3. 4-
Say and Seale, Viscount, 196.
Sayous, Edouard, 37 72.
Schelhorn, Johann Georg, 99 77.,
14672.
Schleiermacher, Friedrich Daniel
Ernst, 222, 223.
Schlestadt, iSo.
SchHchting, Jonas, 200.
Schm-idt, Charles, 44.
Sclibll, Carl Wilhelm, 36, 63 72. , 65 77.
Scholten, Jan Hendrik, 4 72.. 17 77.,
222 77.
Schwalb, Maurice, 13.
Schweitzer, Alexander, 15072.
Scilly Isles, 202.
Scotism, 139, 150, 1 78.
Scripture, xv, 35, 50, 5g, 64, 82,
135. 21S.
Seez, the, go.
Sepp, Christiaan, 136, 15777., 15877.
Servetans, 15.
Serveto y Reves, Miguel, ix, 2, 4,
6, 7, 10, 12, 16; introduced the
word Trinitarian, 1777.; 56,81,
84 — 86, g5, g7, 102 — 103, 108,
109, 13372., 138, 148, 171, 19277,,
193, igg, 217, 218, 227.
Servetus, see Serveto y Reves.
Setzer, Johann, 84.
Seville, 133, 155.
Sforza, Massimiliano, 88.
Sherlock, William, 207.
Sicily, 84, 141 72.
Siena, 76, no, 138—139, 142, 179,
180.
Sigismundus Augustus, of Poland,

288 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Silesia, 204.
Simler, Josiah, I5g, 163.
Simons, Menno, 36, 47, 51.
Six Articles, 32, 58.
Sisto v., 35.
Skinner, Daniel, 21077.
Slavkov, 109.
Smithfield, ix, 49, 129.
Socini, A., IIO, 180.
Socinianism, ix, xii, 4, 18 — 19, 21,
38, 85, 96, 130, 150, 174, 178—
ig8, 200, 211 — 212, 213, 214,
215, 217, 2ig, 222, 223 — 224,
225, 270 — 272.
Soglio, g4 72., 97, 114, 130.
Somerset, Lord Protector, 120,
15277.
Soncinati, the, 80.
Soubise, Michelle de, 77.
South, Robert, 207.
Southampton, 134.
Southern races, i ; refugees, x.
Southwell, P., 239, 243.
Sozini, Lelio Francesco Maria, ix,
56, 69, 70, 86, 92, 96, 103, 106,
107, 112, 114, 149, 163—164, 174
— 175, 178 — 198, 269 — 270.
Sozzi, the, 179.
Sozzini, Alessandro, 179.
Sozzini, Bartolomeo, 179.
Sozzini, Camillo, 92, 97, 180.
Sozzini, Celso Ascanio Pietro Maria,
180, 187.
Sozzini, Cornelio, 180.
Sozzini, Elzbieta, 189.
Sozzini, Fausto Paulo, 10, 17, 18,
19. 8577,, 150, 163—164, 175,
178 — igS, 206, 208, 223, 224,
225, 226, 228 — 22g.
Sozzini, Mariano, il vecchio, I7g.
Sozzini, Mariano, il giovane, I7g —
180, 18277.
Sozzini, Porzia, 180.
Sozzini, the, 4, 76, 81, g7, 136,
igg, 207, 224.
Spain, vi, i, 2. 162, 199.
Spanish Church, London, 127, 132
—133. 156.
Spanish Protestants, 3. 217.
Spanish Reformers, 2.

Spanish refugees, Italy, IOI — 102.
Spanish Unitarians, ix, 225.
Spears, Robert, 2677., 225 72.
Spiritus Belga, see Martini.
Stafford, Lady, 156.
Stampa, 94 77.
Stancaro, Francesco, 7, 16, Si, g5,
96, 146.
State Papers, Calendar of , Ed. VI.,']0.
Steeple Bumpstead, 33, 231.
Stegmann, Joachim, 196.
St. Paul's, 133, 157.
Strangers' Church, Geneva, 249 —
250.
Strangers' Church, London, viii, 49,
50, 60, 61 — 62, 63, 65 — 66, 67,
115 — 136, 157, 164, 172, 178,
igg, 217, 236—243, 24g— 251.
Strangers' Church, Strassburg, 249
— 250.
Strassburg, 47, 53, 54, 56, 57, 58,
62, 72, 84 72., gi 77., gg, loi, no,
113 — 114, 116, 118 — 119, 146,
164, 180, 249, 250.
Strickler, Johann, 251.
Strbhlin, Ernest, 20977.
Struve, Burckhardt Gotthelf, 17477,
Strype, John, 33, 38, 5072., 6077.,
116 77., 117 72., 118 77., 120 72.,
125 77., 126 72., 127 77., 129 72.,
132 77., 133 77., 13477., 13672.,
15677., 171, 172, 231,257,259.
Stuckey, Nathaniel, 203, 204.
Stuppani, the, i n 77.
Sturm, Johann, 52, 1 18.
Subordinationism, 94, 130, 148,
150, 214.
Suffolk, Duke of, 253, 256.
Sulzer, Simon, no.
Siis, 94.
Swiss Reformers, xi, 22, 52 — 53,
55. 58, 63, 112, 181.
Swiss, the, 88.
Switzerland, 70, S3, gg, 102, 103,
131, 137, 140, 14S, 168, 174,
199, 218.
Symbolum Quicumque, 8 ; origin,
9; authority, 16; 17, 24, 31, 33,
39, 63—64, 67, 108, 205, 208,
218, 219, 226.

INDEX.

289

Symbolum Romanum, 31, 3472., 7g,
106, igi, 193, 211, 245, 247,
266—268.
Taine, Hippolyte Adolphe, I n.,
14872., 210.
Tait, Archibald Campbell, 12772.
Tauler, Johann, 14277.
TegUo, 92.
Teho, Silvestro, 104, 164, 247, 248.
Temple Church, 133, 157.
Terenziano, Giulio, 70, 76, 91 n.,
114, 116, ng, 125.
Tertulhanus, Quint. Sept. Flor., 24,
220.
Teutonic nations, vi, i, 217.
Theobald, John, 23. "
Theodicy, 138.
Theodotus, 219, 220.
Theofilo, Massimo, 75.
Theologia Germanica, eqan.
Theriot, 212.
Thirty-nine Articles, 33, 34, 65.
Thorpe, William, 27.
Thurgau, 56.
Ticino, the, 87, SS.
Tillotson, John, 204, 205, 208.
Tirano, 92, 95.
Tiziano, of 'Val Tellina, 94 — 95,
96.
Toledo, Pedro de, 141.
Toleration, 51, 97.
Tollin, Henri, 84 77., 13372., 22772.
Tomassini, Bernardino, ix, xi, 2, 4,
33, 48 K., 49«-. 60, 70, 74, 75,
78, 81, 82,91, 94, 97, 100  IOI,
103, io6, 107—109, III, 113—
117, 119, 121 K., 125, 126, 130,
136, 137—160, 161, 163, 171, 173,
178, 179, 180, 182, IS3, 186, 190,
193, 194, igg, 217, 223, 224, 227
— 22S, 229, 243 — 244, 261 —
264. I
Toniola, Giovanni, 1 1 1 72.
Toniola, Giovanni (the son), 112 77.
Tonstall, Cuthbert, 231.
Torriani, the, 70.
Toulmin, Joshua, 39 «.
Toulouse, 84 72.
Tradition, xiv, 25 ; Papal, 50.

Traheron, Bartholomew, 53.
Transylvania, 229.
Transylvanian Unitarians, 19, 17372.,
179, 189, igg, 225.
Traona, g6.
Trechsel, Friedrich, 6 72., 7, 48 n.,
S6n., 5772., 7g77., 81 72., 8672.,
9472., 95 72., 9672., g7 77,, gS72.,
10372., 10472., 10972., 182, 18377.,
18672., 191 72., 19472., 244.
Tremellio, Emanuele, 70, 76, 80,
117, 118, ng.
Treviso, 77 77., 78.
Trienta, 78, 162, 264, 265.
Trijpmaaker, Jan, 44.
Trinitas, first use of word, 220.
Trinitarian, name, rejected by Cal
vin, 17 n.; worship, viii.
Trinity, 6, 7, 24, 34, 37, 51, 57, 67,
80, g7— gS, 112,128—131, 135,
171, 178, 181, ig6, 218, 219, 220,
223,226, 227,244—245, 252, 254,
255; Bidle, 201; Calvin, 16 — 17,
22 ; Castellio, 145 ; Clarke, 208 ;
Corranus, 158; Erasmus, 41 — 43,
220 — 221, 232 — 235; Farel, 15,
221; Gribaldo, 1 03; first Helvetic
Confession, 55 ; Italian Church,
Geneva, 245 — 248 ; Joris, 47 ;
Laski, 123 ; Locke, 211 ; Luther,
12 — 14, 221; Melanchthon, 10 —
12; Milton, 272 — 274; Niclaes,
48; Ochino, 144, 152,262 — 264;
Penn, 207 — 208; Racovian Cate
chism, 271 — 272; Schleierma
cher, 222; Scripture, xiii — xiv;
Serveto, 84 — 85; L. Sozini, 269
— 270; F. Sozzini, 192 — 193 ;
Tiziano, 94; Valdes, 83.
Tritheism, 103, ig3.
Tiibingen, gi, 103.
Tudela, 84 72.
Turin, 33, 72.
Turner, William, 120.
Tuscany, 100, 126.
Turriano, Girolamo, g7.
Tyndal, William, 58.
Ulmis, Johannes ab, 55 72.
Uniformity Act, 203, 205.

U

290 SOURCES OF ENGLISH UNITARIANISM.

Unipersonality of God, viii, xiii,
go, ig3, 208, 209, 215, 217, 225,
226, 270 — 274.
Unitarian Christianity, v, xii; essen
tial principles, 23; 44, 112, 171,
179, 214, 217, 225, 226, 230.
Unitarianism, English, vi; several
sources, vii; 19 — 20; possible
sources, 21 ; 57, 63, 65, 138,
195, igS, 199 — 216.
Unitarian name, 229.
Unitarians, 6; English, ig — 20; 35,
50, 51 ; in Strangers' Church,
127 — 129; 229.
Unitarian Tracts, the, 206 — 207,
21677., 217.
United States, 225.
Universalists, 216.
UsoZ i Rio, Luis, 2 n.
Utenhove, Jan, 6172., 65, 119 77.,
131 72., 236.
Vadian, Joachim, 1572., 9977., 106
77., 143 n.
Val Bregaglia, 85, 87, go, 91, 92,
gg, 114.
Val di Lugano, 87.
Val di Poschiavo, 85, gi, 94, 95.
Val Maggia, 87.
Val TeUina, S3, 85, 87, 88, gi, 92,
95., 99. 109, "4. 127, 130.
Valdes, Alfonso de, 73.
Valdes, Juan de, ix, xi, 2, 73 — 75,
81 — 84, 91, loS, 117 77., 139,
141— 142, 145, 149. 243, 244.
Valentinianism, 5172., 13577., 257,
259.
Valera, Cipriano de, 133.
Valla, Lorenzo, 71, 79.
Vane, Sir Henry, 201.
Varillas, Antoi-ne, 15277.
Vauville, see Fran5ois.
Velsius, Justus, 5072., 136.
Venice, heresy at, 12 ; 69, 72, 75 72.,
77 — 78, Si, 84, 85, 91, 100, 126,
137, 142, 150, 181, 182, i86?2.
Vergerio, Giambattista, 77.
Vergerio, Pierpaolo, 77, 91, 96,
114, 147.
Vermigh, Pietro Martire, 60, 70,

74. 75. 76, 78, 81, 91 72., IOI,
106, 107, 113, 115— 119, 125, 130,
132. 143. 144. 146, 147. 148,
15377., 154, 159, 163.
Vermigli, Stefano, 75-
Versasca family, log n.
Vestments, 5g.
Vicenza, 7772., 78, Si, 85, no; Con
ferences, 86, 147, 181 — 1S2.
Vicosoprano, 91, 9472.
Vienna, 180.
Vienne, 102.
Vinet, Alexandre, 229.
Viret, Pierre, 14372.
Vitells, Christopher, 48 — 49.
Voet, Gisbert, 219.
Voltaire, Franfois Marie Arouei de,
208, 212, 213.
Voltatura, 72.
Waaden, Jan, 44.
Waddington, Charles, 162, 16572.
Waldenses, i, 2, 24, 72, 88.
Wallace, Robert, 20, 38 77., 39 72.,
48 72., 57 77,, 173 77., 195 72., 197 72.,
201 77., 203 77., 204 72., 205 77,,
206 72., 207 72., 209 n., 211 72.,
21277., 215 77., 21672.
Wallis, j'ohn, 207.
Walloon Church, Antwerp, 1 56;
Canterbury, 127 ; Glastonbury,
127; London, 125, 134; Low
Countries, 133; Norwich, 12472.,
134-135-
Walloon refugees in England, 118,
122.
Warszaw, 120.
Webberley, John, 196, 200 77.
Werdmiiller, Jakob, go.
Westminster Assembly, 173— 174'
Westphal, Joachim, loS.
Whichcote, Benjamin, 205.
Whitehead, George, 207.
"Whittington College, 28.
Wiclif, John, xiv, 23, 24 — 26, 30,
31. 33. 67. 152.
Wiffen, BeniaminBarron, 2»., 73«.
Will, doctrine of the, 32.
William IIL, 206.
Wilno, 195.

INDEX.

291

Wimpheling, Jakob, 180.
Wiszowaty, Andrzej, 181.
Wittenberg Univei-sity, 72, 220.
Wolff, Johann, 162, 166, 167 72.,
168 77., 183, 186, 192, 269 — 270.
Wolsey, Thomas, 52.
Worship, simplicity of, 5g.
Worthington, John, 205.
Wotton-under-Edge, 201.
Wyngins, Govert, 134.
Yarmouth, 120.
Zanchi, Girolamo, 58, 93, 114, 132,
164, 188.
Zannoni, the, no.
Zaslaw, 195.
Zeus, -vii.
Zimmem, Helen, 7572,, 13872.

Ziirich, 43, 52, 53, 54, 56, 58, 62,
9°. 91. 97. 98. gg, 105— log, no,
114, 117, 143, 146, I4g, 150, 151,
154, 158, 163, 164, 181, 1S2, 183,
186, 194, 244.
Zurich Letters, 4972., 5072., 5322,,
5472., '5577., 5977., 60 72,, 6^n.,
6472., 11472., 11672., 11772., 11872.,
11977., 121 77., 12372., 12472., 12872.,
131 77., 153 72., 15477., 157 72., 15972.,
16477., 19472., 254.
Zwick, Johann, 15.
Zwingli, Hulderich, 4; Sabellian,
17; 43, 52. 53.54, 55.63.72,78.
93. 105.
Zwingli, Hulderich (son of the Re
former), loS.
Zwinglians, 225.
ZwingUo-CalvinianProtestantism,4.

Errata.
P. 65, hne ig,for Utenhoven T-sot/ Utenhove.
P. SS n.,for Rosio de Porta read Rosi da Porta.
P. 122, Une iS, for du Rivier read La Riviere.
P. 122 n.,for Kerkraad's read Kerkraad's.

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