On the Christian Religion

To Antonio Contareno, Patriarch of Venice,

Lucas Olchinensis sends greetings.

Most reverend Lord, I send to you as a gift the De christiana religione of Marsilio—a man, without contradiction, the most learned in both Latin and Greek of all those whom our age has produced—which the greed of Venetian printers had struck off full of errors, but which I have restored to its pristine brilliance. It is most fitting for you, as much on account of your supreme religion and holiness of life as for your learning and theological erudition. Truly, how much utility this compendious little work brings—elegant, learned, and most useful in my judgment—can be known even from this: that the most profound Marsilius, running through, as it were, fragrant meadows, has chosen, excerpted, declared, and rendered familiar to us everything primary, entirely arcane and recondite, from the theology of Moses, Plato, and indeed of Christ. Therefore, these corrections, such as they are, we dedicate to your name, just as we do many others. We shall prepare to send to your lordship other things, thereupon, no less learned than they are profitable, prompted from the workshop of the excellent Marsilius, upon which the temerity of the Venetian printers has preyed. Farewell.