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interspersed with observations verging towards Socinianism ; as well as with doubts concerning some points deemed fundamental by the majority of Christians . From this time , it is probable , Ochino ' s sentiments gra ~ dually inclined more and more towards Unitarianism ; till at last he entirely discarded all his remaining prepossessions in favour of the doctrine of the Trinity .
In the year 1563 , two volumes of Dialogues appeared in Latin under his name , which created a considerable sensation among the members of the Helvetic churches . In the twenty-first of these Dialogues , the author brought forward several arguments in favour of Polygamy , for which he was banished from the state of Zurich , and turned adrift , in the midst of winter , with the whole of his family , at the advanced age of seventy-six . " The severe doctors of the Helvetic Church , " says a writer in the Monthly Review { Vol . LXIIL p . 322 ) , " never made charity a fundamental article of their creed : and without sympathizing in his misfortunes , they proceeded to damn his principles . They were not accustomed to
seek for candid apologies in the infirmities of age , or the chagrin which ariseth from ill treatment ; but finding him in an error , they applied the common argument of bitter zeal to correct it . The method they took with . poor Ochino was short , but irresistible ; ibr they banished him at once from their Church and State , as the best method to preserve the peace and purity of both , " But after all , it is by no means certain that Ochino meant to defend Polygamy , or to do any thing more than give a fair state- * naent of the arguments for and against it . This , in fact , may be said to be the character of all his Dialogues ^ which are written in a spirit of the greatest impartiality ; and in which , as Ruarus observes , " he disputes in the academic manner , so that it is sometimes impossible to ascertain whether he takes the part of the interrogator or the respondent / ' This led
fieza , in his usual snarling manner , to say , that " Gen til is was less cunning than Ochino , who seems , like the academics , to doubt of every thing and to believe nothing . " But the truth is , that it was not so much on account of Qchino ' s Dialogue on Polygamy , as of those on the Trinity
that he fell upder the displeasure of the magistrates and ministers of Zurich . In the eyes of these Protestant inquisitors , no greater crime could be committed . than to mnravel the sophistry by which the Trinity had so Jong maintained its ground in the Christian world ; and Ochino , who indirectly attacked this doctrine , was deemed guilty of an offence , for which no after concessipns could atone . - The Dialogues , thirty in number , were oxiginally written in Italian ; and afterwards translated into Latin , by Castalio , from the author ' s manuscript This latter fact is called in . question by Ruarus , in a letter to Ab . Calovius ; hut Castalio ( himself vouches for its truth , in his exculpatory epistle to the chief magistrate and Senate of Basil . Calovius , however , was mistaken in supposing that these ^ Dialogues were pub lished by Ladius Socinus , under
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Biographical Notices of Eminent Continental Unitarians , 74 ?
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1831, page 747, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2603/page/23/
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