Alciati John Paul   a Milanese of noble family, and a soldier, was one of that society of Italians, who, among other plans for reforming the Church, sought to bring about a reformation in some of those doctrines, which are received by the majority of Protestants, and at the head of which stands that of the Trinity.

The reputation of many persons bearing the name of Alciati has been celebrated by historical writers; and among the number, Andrew, who published a Book of " Emblems," which he dedicated to Conrad Peutinger, Secretary to the Senate of Augsburg, and discoverer of a celebrated Itinerary, on which are laid down the roads pursued by the Roman armies, in the reign of Theodosius the Great. Whether Andrew was the brother, or the cousin of John Paul Alciati, is uncertain. There were also a Melchior Alciati, and a Cardinal Francis Alciati. The Milanese branch of the family boasted of many eminent Jurists ; but John Paul was educated for a Physician, which may account, in some measure, for his great intimacy with George Blandrata, who was brought up to the same profession. He afterwards accepted a military appointment, according to the custom of his age; and is for this reason called by Beza a Milanese soldier.

On leaving Italy, he appears to have bent his course to Geneva, in which city he lived for some time with Blandrata, and joined the Church frequented by the Italian refugees. When Gentilis effected his escape from Geneva, and went to the village of Fargias, Alciati was staying there, as the guest of Gribaldi ; and when the fugitive was arrested in his flight, and thrown into prison at Gex, he was set at liberty, by the friendly intercession of Alciati with the Chief Magistrate of that town.

In the year 1553, Blandrata, accompanied by Alciati, visited the Grisons, for the purpose of strengthening and encouraging those of his countrymen, who had embraced Antitrinitarian sentiments, and had sought a refuge among that people.

In 1562, we find Alciati in Poland, with Blandrata, actively employed in undermining the established faith. Ruarus, writing to Abraham Calovius, from Dantzic, says, "I remember to have been told by Andrew Voidovius, that Alciati, a pious man, as he said, and of the same way of thinking as Socin, when he lived for some time at Cracow, and was in imminent danger of his life, from some petulant scholastics, because he was suspected of being what was then called an Arian, escaped by saying, in a sort of joke, that he was not an Arian, but a Marian. On being asked what that was, he replied, that he believed Jesus Christ to be the Son of the Living God and Mary; and when they heard the venerated name of Mary, they let him go uninjured, for they were as grossly ignorant, as they were malignant. From that time, I think, he transferred his residence to Dantzic." It appears, however, that he went with Gentilis into Moravia, and remained there some time, before he took up his abode at Dantzic.

De Porta likewise intimates, that Alciati and Blandrata paid a second visit to their brethren among the Grisons, and that, on the 11th of January, 1579, they were ordered by the assembly of the three estates, to quit the Rhaetian territory; and were told, that, if they were found there after that notice, it would be at the hazard of their lives.

Some writers have asserted, that Alciati went from Moravia to Constantinople ; and it is not improbable, that, in going from Poland into Moravia, or from Moravia into Prussia, he touched upon the borders of the Ottoman Empire. Bayer supposes, that, like Leonardo Bucali, he took refuge in Turkey from the persecution of his orthodox brethren; but for this supposition, though the thing is by no means improbable in itself, there are no proper historical grounds.

So late as 1586, forty years after the dispersion of the society at Vicence, and at a time when he was probably a very old man, Alciati wrote to the Synod of Lublin, for permission to print Faustus Socinus's Reply to the Hortatory Letter of Andrew Volanus, " On the Nature and Expiation of Christ;" and offered to be at part of the expense. Bock says, that the Alciati who made this offer was without doubt a son of John Paul (Hist. Ant. T. II. p. 470) ; but in the Synodical Acts, the individual alluded to is called "alciatus Italus," (p. 830,) a designation which evidently points to John Paul himself. Whether the offer was accepted does not appear: but some interest attaches to the fact of its having been made, from the circumstance of the above Reply being the first production of Socinus's pen, after he came into Poland. The author revised and corrected it in 1588, two years after Alciati's request to the Synod of Lublin ; and offered it, in the same year, to the public eye, with a Dedication to John Kiszka.

That Alciati was a married man we learn from Ruarus ; and that his worldly circumstances were such as to enable him to live in comfort, if not in comparative affluence, seems highly probable. He is not known to have left any family ; and the probability is that he died childless. Ruarus says, that his death took place at Dantzic. This statement is made in the letter to Calovius, referred to above. A rumour got abroad, that Alciati had renounced the religion of the Bible, and embraced that of the Koran ; and Calovius had given too ready credence to this idle story. It is the object of Ruarus to set him right upon this point, which he does in the following words. "Whatever may have been the opinions of Gentilis, you might have known, that Alciati spent some years of his life in this city, as a Christian, with singular piety ; and when on the point of death, commended his soul to Christ his Saviour. Catharine Weimer, my wife's grandmother, who knew him well as a neighbour, and was present at his death, and who herself died only three years ago, often mentioned this to her husband, David Werner Büttel, who is still riving. My mother-in-law also told me, no longer ago than yesterday, that she had over and over again seen Alciati's widow in this city, and that she survived her husband some years." (Ep. 47.) Ruarus says nothing, in this letter, about the time of Alciati's death; and yet Bock appeals to it, as his authority for asserting, that Alciati died in the year 1565. (Hist. Socinianismi Prussici, § iii. p. 5.) But we learn from De Porta, a writer who is remarkable for the accuracy of his facts and dates, that Alciati was living in the year 1579. (Hist. Ref. Eccles. Raeticarum, T. I. Lib. ii. C. xxiii. p. 632.)

With regard to the particular religious sentiments of Alciati, it is clear that they differed from those of Gentilis. He was neither a Tritheist, nor an Arian, properly so called, but rather a Humanitarian: for he believed that Christ had no existence before his birth of the Virgin Mary. In his letters to Gregory Pauli, he says, that he regards the doctrine of the Mahometans as more consonant with reason, than that of the orthodox, concerning three persons in the essence of God ; and we learn from Budzinius and Dudithius, that he wrote much on this subject. But neither Sandius nor Bock mentions any printed work, which claims him as its author. 

The rumour respecting Alciati's defection from the Christian to the Mahometan faith, appears to have originated with Beza, who, in a letter, dated Geneva, Aug. 1567, abounding in the most palpable falsehoods, and full of that bitter and unchristian spirit which pervades nearly the whole of his writings, says, that Alciati deserted the Christian cause, and became a Mahometan. But this may only mean, in the current language of the day, that his sentiments were completely Unitarian. The same reproach was thrown out against other Unitarians of that period, from a notion, that to oppose the doctrine of the Trinity, and deny the preexistence of Christ, was in effect to turn Mahometan ; the fundamental tenet of the Mahometan religion being the simple unity of the Divine Nature. Pope Clement, in his speech to Charles V., says, that there are some, who have revived the error of Paul of Samosata, which he describes as nothing different from pure Mahometanism; and Cheynell, in his " Rise, Growth, and Danger of Socinianisme," (Ch. iv. p. 46,) observes, that " any Liturgy which will please one that is a thorow Socinian, will please Turkes, and Jewes also, if it be but warily composed, and they will keep themselves in such generall expressions as some doe too much affect." The same idea has sometimes been expressed by orthodox writers in our own times; and the comparison between the disciples of Socinus, and the followers of the Arabian Prophet, is pursued at some length by Dr. White, in the "Notes and Authorities," subjoined to his celebrated "Bampton Lectures." If, however, Beza's assertion, respecting Alciati's change of faith, has any more definite meaning, and if we are to regard it as anything more than a loose and unguarded expression, intended to convey his extreme abhorrence of Socinianism, we can have no hesitation in pronouncing it a calumny.

The following are the only writings attributed to Alciati by Sandius and Bock.

1. Two Letters to Gregory Pauli, dated Austerlitz, 1564 and 1565. In these Letters Alciati endeavours to persuade his correspondent, that Christ had no existence before he was born of Mary.

(Vidend. Sandii B. A. pp. 27, 28. Bock, Hist. Ant. T. I. pp. 7, 8; T. II. pp. 465—470, et passim. Hist. Socin. Prus. 1. c. Lubieniecii Hist. Ref. Polon. L. ii. C. v. pp. 107.109. Ruari Epist. Cent. i. N. 47. De Porta, Hist. Reform. Ecclesiar. Raeticar. 1. c. Bayle, Diet. Hist, et Crit. Art. J. P. Alciat. Moreri, Diet. Hist. Art. 3. P. Alciat.)