Schaff - History of the Christian Church Vol. 8 - Media Sabda Org

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acquainted with the writings of Luther, Zwingli, and Melanchthon through
an Augustinian monk, and labored zealously for the spread of Protestant
doctrines in Pavia, Padua, Venice, Ferrara, and Lucca. He barely escaped
death at the stake, and fled to Switzerland with letters of recommendation
by the Duchess Renata, the friend of Calvin. He received an appointment as
professor of eloquence in Lausanne (1543–1547) and afterwards in Basel.
He was the father-in-law of Zanchius. He attracted students from abroad,
declined several calls, kept up a lively correspondence with his countrymen
and with the Reformers, and wrote a number of theological and literary
works. He sided with the latitudinarians, and thereby lost the confidence of
Calvin and Bullinger; but he maintained his ground in Basel, and became
the ancestor of several famous theological families of that city (Buxtorf,
Zwinger, Werenfels, Frey).
Curio sympathized with Zwingli’s favorable judgment of the noble heathen,
and thought that they were as acceptable to God as the pious Israelites.
Vergerio, formerly a friend of Curio, charged him with the Pelagian heresy
and with teaching that men may be saved without the knowledge of Christ,
though not without Christ. f951
Curio advanced also the hopeful view that the kingdom of heaven is much
larger than the kingdom of Satan, and that the saved will far outnumber the
lost. f952
Such opinions were disapproved by Peter Martyr, Zanchi, Bullinger,
Brenz, John a Lasco, and all orthodox Protestants of that age, as
paradoxical and tending to Universalism. But modern Calvinists go further
than Curio, at least in regard to the large majority of the saved. f953
§ 131. THE ITALIAN ANTITRINITARIANS IN GENEVA.
GRIBALDO, BIANDRATA, ALCIATI, GENTILE.
See Lit. in § 127, and SANDIUS: Bibliotheca antitrinitaria. TRECHSEL (I.
277–390) is still the best authority on the early Antitrinitarians in
Switzerland, and gives large extracts from the sources. FOCK (I. 134) has
only a few words on them.—Comp. in addition, HEBERLE: G. Blandrata,
in the “Tübinger Zeitschrift für Theologie,” for 1840, No. IV. DORNER:
Hist. of Christology, German ed., II. 656 sqq.
The antitrinitarian leaven entered the Italian congregation at Geneva during
and after the trial of Servetus, but was suppressed by the combined action