Paul of Venice (Paolo Nicoletti)

PAUL OF VENICE (PAOLO NICOLETTI). - Philosopher and theologian of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, b. at Udine ca. 1368, d. at Venice (according to other testimonies, at Padua) in 1429 (1428). He probably taught at Siena and Bologna (in which cities he carried out duties of the Order) and at the University of Padua (1408-15). In 1413 he was charged by the Republic of Venice with an embassy to the King of Poland; from the same he later received the prohibition to take part in the Council of Constance (1414-18), where his presence might have compromised the government of the Most Serene Republic. He traveled (1420-28) through various cities of Italy, and finally obtained permission to resume, for a short time, teaching at Padua.

Following John of Jandun he accepted and openly professed Averroist doctrines (unity of the intellect, double truth, etc.), of which Padua was then the principal center. Later he came under the influence of the Parisian masters and especially of Albert of Saxony (v.), whose doctrines had begun to spread at Padua. With Siger of Brabant (v.) and Thomas of Wilton he held that the single intellect is individualized in individuals by entering into the rational soul, the substantial form of the body. He wrote: Logica parva seu Summulae (Venice 1499; subsequent eds.); Logica magna (ibid. 1481; subsequent eds.): the Logica of P. V., accepted in the 15th-16th centuries as a scholastic textbook, is Ockhamist in inspiration; Summa totius philosophiae naturalis (Milan and Venice 1476): a commentary, informed by Averroism, on the works of Aristotle; Super universalia Porphyrii et artem veterem Aristotelis expositio (Venice 1494); De compositione mundi, etc. (Paris 1498); Commentarius... in libros Posteriorum Aristotelis (Venice 1477; subsequent eds.); Expositio super 8 libros Physicorum Aristotelis (ibid. 1476); Sophismata, etc. (ibid. 1480); Universalia praedicamenta sexque principia (ibid. 1494); De quadratura circuli; Summa de poenitentia; De conceptione B. Mariae Virginis; besides Sermones, etc.

Ugo Viglino