PAOLO ANTONIO FOSCARINI. — Carmelite theologian of the noble Venetian family of the F., born in Montalto Uffugo (Calabria) ca. 1565, died there on 10 June 1616. A celebrated preacher, mathematician, and professor of theology and philosophy at Naples and Messina, he also held the office of prior at Tropea (1607) and provincial of Calabria (1608–12).
Principal works: *Meditations, preces et exercitia quotidiana super orationem dominicam* (Cosenza 1611); *Insultationum omnis generis doctrinarum syntaxis* (1613); *Trattato della divinazione naturale cosmologica* (Naples 1615); famous is his *Lettera sopra l’opinione de’ Pittagorici e del Copernico della mobilità della terra e stabilità del Sole e del nuovo Pittagorico sistema del mondo* (1615), in which he endeavours to demonstrate how the doctrine of the immobility of the sun at the centre of the world and the mobility of the earth is consonant with truth and not contrary to Holy Scripture, and prudently declares that he does not wish to defend this system in an absolute manner but as a hypothesis, and to submit himself to the judgment of the Church. This letter was, by decree of 5 March 1616,
UGO FOSCOLO. — Portrait with autograph signature. Drawing by R. Bonaiuti, engraved by L. Paradisi (ca. 1825) — Rome, specimen in the Library of the Institute of Archaeology and Art History.
condemned by the Holy Congregation of the Index, together with the works of Galileo, yet despite this it was subsequently republished repeatedly in Latin (Treviso 1635, Leiden 1636, Lyons 1641, London 1663 together with the works of Galileo).
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