GALILEO. 257 



The heliocentric doctrine has for a century been making its way into the 

 minds of thoughtful men on the general ground of its simplicity and symmetry. 

 ( ; ;i lileo appears to have thought that now, when these original recommendations 

 of the system had been rcenforced by his own discoveries and reasonings, it 

 ought to be universally acknowledged as a truth and a reality. And when 

 arguments against the fixity of the sun and the motion of the earth were 

 adduced from scripture, he could not be satisfied without maintaining his 

 favorite opinion to be conformable to scripture as well as to philosophy; and 

 he was very eager in his attempts to obtain from authority a declaration to 

 this effect. The ecclesiastical authorities were naturally averse to express 

 themselves in favor of a novel opinion, startling to the common mind, and 

 contrary to the most obvious meaning of the words of the Bible; and when they 

 were compelled to pronounce, they decided against Galileo and his doctrines. 

 He was accused before the Inquisition in 1615; . . . the result was a 

 declaration of the Inquisition that the doctrine of the earth's motion [was] 

 contrary to the sacred scripture. Galileo was prohibited from defending and 

 teaching this doctrine in any manner, and promised obedience to this injunction 

 [as will be shown later]. 



But in 1632 he published his Dialogues and in these he defended the 

 heliocentric system by all the strongest arguments which its admirers used. 

 Not only so, but he introduced into this dialogue a character under the name 

 of Simplicius [supposed by contemporaries to have been intended to represent 

 the Pope then reigning, which idea was fully accepted by the Pope himself, 

 especially as the Pope's own words were attributed to Simplicius,] in whose 

 mouth was put the defense of all the ancient dogmas and who was represented 

 as defeated at all points of the discussion; and he prefixed to the dialogue a 

 notice To the Discreet Reader, in which, in a view of transparent irony he 

 assigned his reasons for the publication. . . . The result of this was that 

 Galileo was condemned for his infraction of the injunction laid upon him in 

 1010; his dialogue was prohibited; he himself was commanded to abjure on his 

 knees the doctrine he had taught; and this abjuration he performed. 



. . . The general acceptance of the Copernican system was no longer 

 a matter of doubt. Several persons in the highest positions including the Pope 

 himself [not the Pope] looked upon the doctrine with favorable eyes; and had 

 shown their interest in Galileo and his discoveries. They had tried to prevent 

 his involving himself in trouble by [through] discussing the question on scrip- 

 tural grounds. It is probable that his knowledge of those favorable dispositions 

 towards himself and his opinions led him to suppose that the slightest color of 

 professed submission to the church in his belief, would enable his arguments 

 in favor of the system to pass unvisited; the notice [To the Discreet Reader] 

 in which the irony is quite transparent and the sarcasm glaringly obvious, was 

 deemed too flimsy a veil for the purpose of decency, and, indeed, must have 

 aggravated the offence. 



The foregoing extracts from the writings of authoritative historians 

 of science place the chief events of Galileo's long life in what seems 

 to be the true light. There is little doubt as to the events themselves — 

 except in a single particular, which will be considered in what follows. 

 Much controversy has raged over their interpretation. They must 

 be considered in two regards : First, in respect of Galileo's private and 

 personal experience; second, in respect of the lesson which that expe- 

 rience has taught to the world in general. The remark of Bertrand 



