But Servetus, unhappily for himself, did not improve the opportunity presented him of righting himself in any way with the Court by the manner in which he set about dealing with Calvin’s strictures on his replies to the incriminated passages of his book. He does not now, as he had done before, however curtly and imperfectly, reply to the Reformer’s refutations, and show wherein he is misinterpreted or misunderstood; neither does he present his views in another and more questionable light than they are set by his accuser, which he could readily have done in numerous instances at least; and, where this was impossible, he might have appealed to the reason and common sense of his Judges for latitude in interpreting matters that really lie beyond the scope of the human understanding. He, however, did nothing of all this, but proceeded as though he thought it neither necessary nor worth his while to defend himself or his opinions any further--he did not even take paper of his own for his reply, but contented himself with jottings on the margins and between the lines of Calvin’s elaborate refutation! the remarks he makes, moreover, being rarely in the way of answer or explanation. They are mostly curt expressions of dissent, or simply abusive epithets applied to the Reformer, who is called Simon Magus, liar, calumniator, persecutor, homicide, and more besides. Instead of persisting in his legitimate plea that he was but another in the ranks of the Reformers, interpreting the Scriptures by the understanding he had by nature and his education, or declaring, as he had done before, that he would be found ready to abjure those of his opinions that were shown him to be opposed to their teaching, and adverse to the peace of the world, he threw down the gauntlet on the whole question, not to Calvin only, but to the religious world at large. But this, the point of view from which the religious question was regarded in the middle of the sixteenth century, considered, was simply to ensure his condemnation. Men less bigoted, and, above all, less under the influence of the most intolerant of bigots, might possibly have been led to take pity on the writer, and to see him for what he was in truth--a sincerely pious zealot of irreproachable life, if much mistaken, as they believed, in his theological conclusions; and so, and save in the use of intemperate language, excusable on every ground of Christian charity. But this, perhaps, was more than could possibly be expected in the fifteen-hundred-and-fifty-third year of the Christian æra. In returning the document so unhappily annotated, Servetus appears to have felt that an apology was due to the Court for the style of response he had adopted. He therefore accompanied it with the following letter, in which he seeks to excuse himself for the course he has taken: