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Scriptures and ancient writers call him the prophet . ** It has been suggested that the circumstance of Servetus ' s having been born in Spain may have given currency to the above rumour , since that country , besides containing many persons of the Jewish persuasion , lies directly opposite to the coast of Africa , where Mahomet an ism is the prevailing religion : but it seems far more probable that the charge originated in a perversion of passages occurring in Servetus's own writings , in which he alludes familiarly to the Talmud and the Koran , speaks of the doctrine of the Trinity as afford ing- matter for
derision to the followers of Mahomet , and says that the Jews ridicule the folly of the Christians for their belief in this dogma , and are prevented by such blasphemies from acknowledging Jesus as the Messiah promised in I heir Law . Servetus left Basil in the year 1530 or 1531 ; for he found that the doctrines which he taught were not more acceptable to the Protestants of that city than they had been to the Catholics in the South of France . From Basil he proceeded to Strasburg , where he sought an interview with Bacer and Capito , who were then residing in that city , Capito , if we may judge from the silence of the writers who allude to this interview , saw little or
nothing to censure in the opinions of Servetus ; but Bucer appears , from a passage in one of Calvin ' s letters , to have been completely horror-struck when he heard them , and to have publicly declared that the man who could hold such opinions deserved to be disembowelled and torn in pieces . Servetus ' s stay at Strasburg was short . As his usual occupations were entirely of a literary nature , and he had no knowledge of the German language , he was unable to procure a livelihood in that city , and therefore soon quitted it , and returned to Lyons . Up to this period , as we learn from himself , he had
been somewhat guarded in the dissemination of his opinions ; for he repeatedly declared , in his supplicatory letters to the Senate of Geneva , that his religious discussions in Germany were entirely confined to CEcolampadius * Bucer , and Capito . If , however , we are to give credit to Zeltner , Spanheim , and Beza , he was actively employed in diffusing his sentiments ia France as early as the year 1523 . But at that time he was a boy of fourteen years of age , and it is scarcely credible that he should have commenced the office of Reformer at so early a period of life as this . Bulliuger fixes the time of his
first appearance as an avowed opponent of the doctrine of the Trinity five years later : but he also seems to have fallen into an error , for Servetus's work De Trinitatis Erroribus was not published till 1531 , and before this time all that he had advanced upon the subject was in the way either of correspondence or of private conversation with literary men . Before Servetus left Basil he consigned the above-mentioned work to the hands of Conrad Russ , the printer , with a view to its publication ; but Russ , not being able to
elude the vigilance of the Swiss clergy , sent the manuscript to Hagenau in Alsace where it was printed under the immediate superintendence of its author , who had removed to Strasburg for that purpose . It found a ready and quick sale , and was perused and approved b y immense numbers , particularly in Germany . The majority of Christians , however , as might have been anticipated , joined in its condemnation . The leaders among the Reformed party in Switzerland were extremely apprehensive that its appearance might prejudice the cause of Luther and his associates in the eyes of the Christian
wor \ d 9 which induced GEcolampadius to request that Bucer would write to the great Reformer , and say that the work had been surreptitiousl y published . It was suppressed at Ratisbon , A . D . 1532 ; and CEcolampaaius , at the instigation of the magistrates of Basil , publicly denounced it as an impious work in a discourse delivered in the presence of the senate- Servetus now
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328 Biographtcai Notices of Eminent Continental Unitarians ,
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1831, page 328, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2597/page/40/
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