GALILEO. 127 



GALILEO. 



By EDWARD S. HOLDEN, ScD., LL.D., 



U. S. MILITARY ACADEMY. 



IV. 



WHEN the master of the palace examined the published book he 

 discovered that Galileo had not obeyed the orders and injunc- 

 tions given to him by the Holy Office on February 26, 1616, sixteen 

 years previously. Therefore the imprimatur for Eome was wrongly 

 attached. Galileo did not inform the Inquisitor at Florence of the 

 aforesaid injunctions and orders. Therefore the imprimatur for 

 Florence was obtained by e ruse.' Such was substantially the theory 

 held by Galileo's judges at Eome. It was, in strictness, true. The 

 command of the Holy Office (February 26, 1616) not to hold, teach 

 or defend the Copernican opinion had been violated in the Dialogues 

 (as indeed it had been violated less flagrantly in II Saggiatore and in 

 the letter on the tides). The orders of Eiccardi were obeyed in form 

 but not in substance. If the text of the Dialogues had been submitted 

 at Eome, the Eoman imprimatur would never have been given. 



Finally, the general prohibition of March 5, 1616, not to teach the 

 Copernican opinion had been disobeyed in the Dialogues, as in the two 

 preceding publications. That no proceedings had been taken regard- 

 ing the two last-named books did not in their eyes excuse the issuance 

 of the former. 



If Galileo had merely desired to promulgate the Copernican truths 

 it would have been perfectly easy and safe for him to have printed his 

 book in Germany, with or without his name. * But he wished for an 

 Italian triumph even more than for the spreading of a doctrine that 

 he knew to be true. 



The Dialogues were received on all hands with the greatest interest. 

 Galileo's friends were delighted as they before had been with II Sag- 

 giatore. They expected a similar reception for his new book, and 

 Galileo beyond a doubt shared their expectations. Castelli — who was 

 in favor with the Pope, and in Eome — wrote that he should read noth- 

 ing else but the Dialogues and his Breviary. The enemies of Galileo 

 were for the moment paralyzed with anxiety and rage. The argu- 

 ments of the Dialogues were more dangerous than those of II Sag- 

 giatore even. Its attack on Aristotelianism and orthodoxy was even 

 more insidious and vigorous. The upper classes of Italy have always 



