Note 25 — Chapter X · FREETHOUGHT IN THE RENAISSANCE

During this period too the philosophy of Averroës, as set forth in his “Great Commentary” on Aristotle, was taught in North Italy with an outspokenness not before known. Gaetano of Siena began to lecture on the Commentary at Padua in 1436; it was in part printed there in 1472; and from 1471 to 1499 Nicoletto Vernias seems to have taught, in the Paduan chair of philosophy, the Averroïst doctrine of the world-soul, thus virtually denying the Christian doctrine of immortality. Violent opposition was raised when his pupil Niphus (Nifo) printed similar doctrine in a treatise De Intellectu et Dæmonibus (1492); but the professors when necessary disclaimed the more dangerous tenets of Averroïsm.25 Nifo it was who put into print the maxim of his tribe: Loquendum est ut plures, sententiendum ut pauci—“think with the few; speak with the majority.”26