LELIO FRANCESCO MARIA SOZINI (1525-1562), theo-logical inquirer, was born at Siena on 29th January 1525. His family descended from Sozzo, a banker at Percena, whose second son, Mino Sozzi, settled as a notary at Siena in 1304. Mino Sozzi's grandson, Sozzino (d. 1403), was the ancestor of a line of patrician jurists, of whom Mariano Sozzini, senior (1397-1467), was the first and the most famous. Lelio was the sixth son of Mariano Sozzini, junior (1482-1556), by his wife Camilla Salvetti. The family name is variously spelled (usually " Soccini" by modern writers); Lelio invariably uses the form " Sozini," Latin-izing it "Sozinus" ; his nephew FAUSTO (see below) writes " Sozzini" and " Socinus." Sozini was educated as a jurist under his father's eye at Bologna. According to Melan-chthon, it was his desire to reach the fontes juris which led him to Biblical studies and hence to the rejection of "the idolatry of Rome." Later on he acquired some knowledge of Hebrew and Arabic (he gave to Bibliander a manuscript of the Koran) as well as Greek, but he was never a labori-ous student. His father supplied him with means, and on coming of age he went to Venice, the headquarters of the evangelical movement in Italy. A tradition first published by Sand in 1678, and amplified by subsequent writers, makes Sozini the leading spirit in certain alleged theological conferences at Vicenza, about 1546, which are said to have forecast the main positions of the Unitarian heresy; but the whole account, including the story of the flight of Sozini, must be rejected as mythical. At this period the standpoint of Sozini was that of evangelical Protestantism ; his mental temper presents a singular union of enthusiastic piety with a love for the subtleties of theological speculation. It was at Chiavenna in 1547 that he came under the influence of a gentle mystic, Camillo of Sicily, surnamed "Renato," wdiose teaching anticipated at many points that of the early Quakers. Pursuing his religious travels, Sozini visited Switzerland, France, England, and Holland, returning to Switzerland at the close of 1548. He had commendatory letters to the Swiss churches from Nicolas Meyer, envoy from Wittenberg to Italy; but his family name was a sufficient passport, and wherever he went his personal charm won friends. We find him in 1549-50 at Geneva and Basel (with Sebastian Miinster), but chiefly at Zurich, where he lodges with Pellican. He spends eleven months (July 1550 to June 1551) at Wittenberg, at first under Melanchthon's roof, then with Johann Forster for the im-provement of his Hebrew. From Wittenberg Sozini returned to Zurich (end of 1551) after visiting Prague, Vienna, and Cracow. Political events attracted him back to Italy in June 1552. Two visits to Siena (where free-dom of speech was for the moment possible, owing to the shaking off of the Spanish yoke) brought him into fruitful contact with his young nejihew Fausto. He was at Padua (not at Geneva, as is often said) at the date of Servetus's execution (27th October 1553). Thence he made his way to Basel (January 1554), Geneva (April), and Zurich (May), where he took up his abode.
Calvin, as well as Melanchthon, received Sozini with open arms. Melanchthon (though a phrase in one of his letters has been strangely misinterpreted) never regarded him with theological suspicion. To Calvin's keen glance Sozini's over-speculative tendency and the genuineness of his religious nature were equally apparent. A passage often quoted from one of Calvin's letters to Sozini (1st January 1552) has been construed as a breaking off of amicable intercourse; but, while more than once uneasy apprehensions arose in Calvin's mind, there was no breach of correspondence or of friendship. Of all the Beformers Bullinger was Sozini's closest intimate, his warmest and wisest friend. Sozini's theological difficulties turned upon the resurrection of the body, predestination, the ground of salvation (these were the points on which he corresponded with Calvin), the doctrinal basis of the original gospel (queries addressed to Bullinger), the nature of repentance

(to Rudolph Gualther), the sacraments (to Johann Wolff). Not till the fate of Servetus had directed his mind to the question of the Trinity did he throw out any doubts upon this subject. At Geneva, in April 1554, he had uttered incautious remarks on the common doctrine, emphasized in a subsequent letter to Martinengo, the Italian pastor. Bullinger, warned by several correspondents (including Calvin), questioned Sozini as to his faith, and received from him an explicitly orthodox confession, afterwards reduced to writing (15th July 1555), with a frank reservation of the right of further inquiry. A month before this Sozini had been sent with Martino Muralto to Basel to secure Ochino as pastor of the Italian church at Zurich. There can be little doubt that the minds of Sozini and Ochino (a thinker of the same order as Camillo, but with finer dialectic skill) acted powerfully on each other in the radical discussion of theological problems. Sozini lost his father in 1556, an event which involved him in pecuniary anxieties. To what property he was entitled does not appear; he got nothing under his father's will. Fortified with the most influential introductions (including one from Calvin), he visited in 1558 the courts of Vienna and Cracow to obtain support for his appeal to the reigning duke of Florence. His object was to realize his own estate and secure that of his family. It is a sufficiently curious circumstance that Melanchthon's letter introducing Sozini to Maximilian II. invokes the historic parallel of the emperor Constans rendering a hospitable reception to Athanasius, when he fled from Egypt to Treves. Well received out of Italy, Sozini (who does not appear to have got beyond Venice) found he could do nothing at home. The Inquisition had its eye on his family : his brother Cornelio was imprisoned at Rome ; his brothers Celso and Camillo and his nephew Fausto were " reputati Luterani" at Siena, and Camillo had taken refuge in flight. In August 1559 Sozini returned to Zurich, and we hear little more of him. His brief career ended on 14th May 1562, at his lodging in the house of Hans Wyss, silk-weaver.
The news of his death reached his nephew at Lyons through Antonio Maria Besozzo. Fausto repaired to Zurich and got his uncle's papers, comprising very little connected writing, but a good many notes. Fausto has so often been regarded as a plagiarist from Lelio that it may be well here to state that his debt to Lelio, somewhat over-estimated by himself, was twofold. (1) He derived from him in con-versation (1552-53) the germ of his theory of salvation; (2) Lelio's paraphrase (1561) of a.pxq in John i. 1 as "the beginning of the gospel" gave Fausto a hint of Biblical exegesis by help of which he constructed a new Christology. Apart from these suggestions, Fausto owed nothing to Lelio except a curiously far-fetched interpretation of John viii. 58, and the stimulating remembrance of his pure character and brilliant gifts. The two men were of totally different genius. Lelio, impulsive and inquisitive, was in quest of the spiritual ground of religious truth; the drier mind of Fausto sought in external authority a basis for the ethical teaching of Christianity.
Sozini's extant writings are (1) De Sacramentis Dissertatio, four parts, 1560, and (2) De Jiesurrectione, a fragment. Both were first printed in F. et L. Socini, item E. Soneri Tractatus, Amsterdam, 1654,16mo. To these may he added his Confession, 1555 (printed in Hottinger, Hist. Eccles. N. T., vol. ix., sec. 16, part 5, 1667), and about twenty-four letters, some still unprinted ; but the most im-portant will be found in Illgen and Trechsel, and (the earliest) in the edition of Calvin's works by Baum, Cunitz, and Eeuss. Sand adds a PJtapsodia in Esaiam Prophetam, of which nothing is known. Beza suspected that Sozini had a hand in the De Hsereticis, an sint persequendi, 1553, and to him has also been assigned the Contra Libellum Calmni, 1554 ; but these ascriptions were not made till his nephew had identified his name with active heresy, and are not supported by internal evidence. To Lelio also Beza assigned (in 1567) aji anonymous Expliccdio (1562) of the proem of St John's Gospel, which was the work of Fausto. This error, adopted by Zanchi, has been the chief source of the misconception which repre-sents Lelio as a heresiarch. In Franc. Guinio's Defensio Cath. Doct. de S. Trin., 1590-91, is an anonymous emimeratio of motives for adhering to the doctrine of the Trinity, by some ascribed to Lelio, by others, with somewhat more probability, to Fausto.
For the life of L. Sozini the best guide is Trechsel, Die Prot. Antitrin. vor F. Socin, vol. it, 1844 ; but there are valuable materials in Illgen, Vita L. Socini, 1S14, and especially Symbolw ad Vitam et Doctrinam L. Soc., &c, 1826. Wallace (Antitrin. Biog., 1850, ii. 63) gives the ordinary Unitarian view, relying on Bock, Da Porta, and Lubienecki; see also Bonet-Maury's Early Sources of English Unit. Christ, 1884, chap. 9. Use has been made above of unprinted sources.