Porta_, 1542, _in-folio_. This edition was vigorously suppressed on
account of the notes of Servetus.

After sojourning some time in Italy, he returned to France in 1534, and
settled at Lyons, where he published a new and highly esteemed edition of
the Geography of Ptolemy, inscribing himself as Michael Villanovanus, from
the name of his birthplace. His former works had been published under the
name of Reves, formed by the transposition of the letters of his family
name. In Paris he studied medicine, and began to set forth novel opinions
which led him into conflict with other members of the faculty. In one of
his treatises he is said to have suggested the theory of the circulation
of the blood. In 1540 he went to Vienne and published anonymously his
well-known work _De Restitutione Christianismi_. This book, when its
authorship became known, brought upon him the charge of heresy, and he was
cast into prison. Powerful friends enabled him to escape, and his enemies
were obliged to content themselves with burning his effigy and several
copies of his books in the market-place at Vienne. Servetus determined to
fly to Naples, but was obliged to pass through Geneva, where at the
instigation of the great Reformer Calvin he was seized and cast into
prison. It is unnecessary to follow the course of Servetus' ill-fated
history, the bitter hostility of Calvin, the delays, the trials and
colloquies. At length he was condemned, and the religious world shuddered
at the thought of seeing the pile lighted by a champion of the Reformation
and religious freedom. Loud and awful shrieks were heard in the prison
when the tidings of his sentence were conveyed to Servetus. Soon the fatal
staff was broken over his head as a sign of his condemnation, and on the
Champel Hill, outside the gates of Geneva, the last tragic scene took
place. With his brow adorned with a crown of straw sprinkled with
brimstone, his Fatal Books at his side, chained to a low seat, and
surrounded by piles of blazing faggots, the newness and moisture of which