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    with his conscience , and to conceal his real sentiments , we must attribute it to the temper of the times in which he lived , and to the dread of falling a victim to that persecuting spirit which consigned Servetus to the flames .

    But we come now to notice , in the last place , the part which Curio took in the publication of Ochino's Dialogues ; and which , we may safely venture to affirm , could not have been the act of a conscientious Trinitarian . A manuscript copy of these Dialogues , in the Italian language , was submitted , by Peter Perna , the printer , to the inspection of Basil Amersbach ,

    Rector of the University of Basil ; who , being unacquainted with Italian , referred it to the judgment of Curio . When Curio had perused it , he returned it to the printer , and gave it as his opinion , that it contained nothing which need operate as a bar to its publication . The printer upon this ventured to commit to the press , not the Italian copy , which Curio had examined , but a Latin version of it , by Castalio ; and thus made it accessible to the learned throughout Europe . But notwithstanding Curio ' s favourable judgment of the contents of these Dialogues , they were found , on examination , to contain much that was objectionable , on the subject of

    the Trinity ; which brought upon their author a summary sentence of banishment from the city and territory of Zurich , where he was residing at the time of their publication . Here , then , arises an interesting question for the casuists . The printer could say that he did his duty in submitting the manuscript to the inspection of Basil Amersbach , the Censor , and that if the work was fit for publication , it mattered little whether it was printed

    in Latin or Italian ; the Censor might plead ignorance of the language in which the manuscript was written , and refer to the high character of Curio , in justification of the part which he took in the transaction : while Curio would hold himself exonerated , upon the plea that he was answerable only for the contents of the original manuscript , which might have undergone a

    thousand changes in the process of translation . We find , accordingly , that the whole burden of the blame ultimately fell upon Castalio , the translator , who thus attempts to exculpate himself and the printer who employed him : 46 With regard to the charge of my having translated the Dialogues of Bernard Ochino , that , I think , cannot in fairness be imputed to me as a fraud . For I rendered them into Latin- as I had before rendered other works of the same writer , not as a judge , but simply as a translator by profession , with a view to obtain something for the support of my family : and the printer

    informed me that he had submitted the book to the censorship , and that it had been regularly approved , according to the laws of the city of Basil . " Who does not see , then , that , if responsibility attaches to any one , it must be to the person who pronounced these Dialogues fit for publication ? Curio could not fail to know that they contained a great deal of matter at variance with the creed of the Reformed Church , particularly on the subject of the Trinity ; and , knowing this , how shall we free him from the suspicion of secretly favouring the sentiments of their author ? The whole affair , it

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    644 Biographical Notices of Eminent Continental Unitarian * .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1831, page 644, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2601/page/68/