Thus ended the Reform in Spain, as it had ended in Italy, uprooted by the intolerant dogmatism which assumed that there was an ascertained answer to every possible theological question, confused right-thinking with accuracy of knowledge, and discerned heresy in every reaction and every independent effort of the human mind. Many of those who had been driven out of Spain continued to work elsewhere. Such were Juan Perez already referred to, Cassiodoro de Reina, and Cipriano Valera, each of whom translated the whole Bible into Spanish, and many more. But without following these further, mention must be made of one great Spanish thinker of the earlier part of the century, who spent most of his life abroad. Miguel Serveto y Rêves was born at Tudela in Navarre about 1511, his family being of Villanueva in Aragon; and he studied at Toulouse. As secretary to Juan de Quintana, the Emperor's confessor, he was with him at Bologna in 1529 and at the Diet of Augsburg in 1530 (where he met Melanchthon, of whose Loci, communes he became a diligent student), but soon afterwards left his service and went to Basel. In 1531 he published his De Trinitatis Erroribus, and in 1552 two Dialogues on the Trinity: and the suspicion which he incurred by his views led him to flee to France. Here for the first time he met Calvin, who was his antithesis in every way, being as clear, logical, and narrow in his views as Serveto was the reverse. After acting as proofreader to Trechsel at Lyons, and producing a remarkable edition of Ptolemy, he went to study medicine at Paris. In this field he greatly distinguished himself, for he appears to have been the first discoverer of the circulation of the blood. After a period of wandering, during which he submitted to rebaptism by the Anabaptists of Charlieu, he came to Vienne, where his old pupil Pierre Palmier was now Archbishop, and remained there till 1553. In 1546-7 he engaged in a violent theological controversy with Calvin; and when at length he published his ChristianwnA Restitutlo the letters were added to the book as a kind of appendix. Not unnaturally offended, Calvin meanly accused his adversary, through an intermediary, to the Inquisition, and in April, 1553, both Serveto and the printer of the book were imprisoned. Serveto made his escape, probably by complicity of his gaolers, and was burned in effigy (June 17). He now resolved to make his way into northern Italy; but by a strange mischance he went by way of Geneva. His arrival was reported to Calvin, who resolved that his enemy should not escape; the blasphemer must die. On October 27, 1553, Serveto was burnt at the stake.
It is difficult to estimate his theological position; for his one follower, Alfonso Ligurio of Tarragona, is now little more than a name. Miguel Serveto stands quite alone, and towers far above other sceptical thinkers of his age. In some ways essentially modern, he is in others essentially medieval. He could not throw in his lot with any party because he held that all existing religions alike were partly right and partly wrong. It is impossible to judge of him by constructing a theological system
