Bovillus (Bonelles or Bonillé), Carolus

BOVILLUS (Bonelles or Bonillé), Carolus. - Theologian, philosopher, and man of letters, b. at Saucourt (Picardy) around 1470-75, d. canon and professor of theology at Noyon in 1553. He studied under the most celebrated masters of his time, such as Trithemius and Lefèvre, and enjoyed the highest reputation among the most distinguished figures, such as Card. Ximénes and Alanus Varenius. A follower of the philosophy of Card. Cusanus and of Neoplatonic tendency, in accordance with the spirit of the Renaissance, he is not immune to a certain rationalism, particularly baneful in his explanation of the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity, which he claims to demonstrate starting from natural premises. In general, without any trace of pantheism, as regards the knowledge of God, which he grounds in itself, he has recourse to a negative theology rather than a positive one.

Of his philosophical and theological works we recall: Theologicarum quaestionum ll. 10 (Paris 1510); De nihilo (Paris-Amiens 1510 and Groningen 1661); De sapiente (Paris-Amiens 1510-11; edited by Klibansky, Leipzig 1927); Dominica oratio (Paris 1511); Vita Lulli and Epistolae 43, (1511-14); Quaestiones in utrumque Testamentum (ibid. 1513); Theologicarum quaestionum ll. 7 (ibid. 1513); Supputatio septem aetatum mundi (Saucourt 1520); De voto, de libero arbitrio, de differentia orationis (1529, 1589); Dialogi duo de S.ma Trinitate, De divinis praedicamentis, De raptu Pauli (Paris 1531); De prophetica visione (1531); Dialogi de animi immortalitate, De resurrectione, De mundi excidio (ibid. 1551).

Vito Zollini