Previous to acting, however, they thought it would be well to have the opinion of their chief Pastor, Œcolampadius, on what had best be done, and so requested him to advise with them on the subject. He replied by a long letter in which he recapitulates the chief topics discussed by Servetus in his treatise. ‘He, Œcolampadius, will do what he can to place the good man’s views before them,--if indeed he may venture to speak of the writer as a good man; for it seems that he strives at times as much to darken the light as to enlighten the darkness, mixing up incongruities rashly and not seldom stopping short of contradicting himself. He opposes the orthodox doctors continually, and uses certain words in an arbitrary and unusual sense. He denies the coeternity of the Father and the Son, a doctrine hitherto held sacred by all the Christian churches; and only recognises the sonship from the moment of the engenderment, or rather of the birth of Christ. He even derides the idea of God having a son from eternity, and asks whence the heavenly father had his wife, or whether he were of both sexes in himself? He will only recognise the eternity of the Son as an _Idea_ in the divine mind: the Son was to be, but was not yet, until he appeared in the flesh. He will by no means concede that the Word of St. John was the Christ; yet he speaks of three persons in the one God; but it is with glozing and an arbitrary meaning attached to the word person, and with reasonings which, if they sometimes make for his views, are at other times opposed to them, he neither thinking nor speaking as do the apostles, and wresting the words of the fathers--of Tertullian and Irenæus especially--from the interpretation commonly put upon them. ‘Along with all this and much more that is objectionable, there are still some things in the book that are good; nevertheless as a whole it could not but offend me. God grant that the writer acknowledge the rashness which has led him to speak so unadvisedly as he has done of matters which transcend our human intelligence, and that he may live to amend what he has said. As to the book, it would be well perhaps that it were either totally suppressed, or were read by those only who are not likely to be hurt by objectionable writings. The errors he has fallen into acknowledged, _he will retract_ in his writings--_retractârit scriptis_. Perhaps he was not himself aware of their extent, or they were not seen by him as of such importance as they are in fact. But I leave all to your prudence and discretion, humbly commending myself and my work to your favour.’[33]