WOBO: Search for words and phrases in the texts here...

Enter either the ID of an entry, or one or more words to find. The first match in each paragraph is shown; click on the line of text to see the full paragraph.

Currently only Chalmers’ Biographical Dictionary is indexed, terms are not stemmed, and diacritical marks are retained.

surnamed Mofa, was a learned civilian of Padua, who, after being a law

, surnamed Mofa, was a learned civilian of Padua, who, after being a law professor at Padua, Pisa, and Pavia, as far as 1557, left Italy, in order to make a public profession of the Protestant religion; but who, like some other Italian converts, imbibed the heresy of the Antitrinitarians. After having been professor of civil law at Tubingen for some time, he quitted the employment, in order to escape the punishment he would have incurred, had he been convicted of his errors. He was seized at Bern, where he feigned to renounce his opinions, in order to escape very severe treatment; but, as he relapsed again, and openly favoured the heretics, who had been driven from Geneva, he would, as Beza intimates, certainly have been put to death, if he had not died of the plague in September 1567, or as others say in 1564. In a journey to Geneva, during the trial of Servetus, he desired to have a conference with Calvin, which Calvin at first refused, but afterwards granted; and then Gribaldus, though he came according to the appointed time and place, refused to confer, because Calvin would not give him his hand, till they should be agreed on the articles of the Trinity. He was afterwards cited to appear before the magistrates, in order to give an account of his faith; but, his answers not being satisfactory, he was commanded to leave the city. He wrote several works, which are esteemed by the public; as “Commentarii in legem de rerum mistura, & de jure fisci,” printed in Italy. “Commentarii in pandectas juris,” at Lyons. “Commentarii in aliquot praecipuos Digesti,” &c. Francfort, 1577, fol. “Historia Francisci Spira?, cui anno 1548, familiaris aderat, secundum quae ipse viclit & audivit,” Basil, 1550. Sleidan declares, that Gribaldus was a spectator of the sad condition of the apostate Spira, and that he wrote and published an account of his case and sufferings. “De methoclo ac ratione studendi in jure civili libri tres,” Lyons, 1544 and 1556. He is said to have written this last book in a week.