COPERNICUS. 123 



(VI.) the annual motion of the sun and (VII.) the motions of the 

 planets are, primarily, not due to their proper motions. 



In 1533 Copernicus was sixty years old and applied for a coadjutor. 

 His duties were, at this time, made light for him. In 1532 an 

 observation of Venus is recorded. Other observations were made in 

 1537. In 1533 he observed the comet of that year. It may be sur- 

 mised (his memoir on the comet is not extant) that the retrograde 

 motion of this heavenly body confirmed in his mind his criticisms of 

 the system of Ptolemy. 



The theory of Copernicus began to be known in Eome, and it was 

 well received. In 1533 Widmanstad, secretary to Pope Clement VII., 

 gave a formal explanation of the heliocentric theory of Copernicus to 

 the pope and to an audience containing several cardinals and bishops. 

 There is no doubt that the theory was received with interest. There 

 is no sign of opposition, and Widmanstad subsequently obtained high 

 honors in the church. The attitude of the Lutherans was, as we have 

 seen, very different. The cardinal-bishop of Capua wrote in 1536 to 

 Copernicus begging him for an explanation of his system. 



In 1537 Dantiscus became bishop of Ermeland. All the canons of 

 Frauenburg, Copernicus included, supported his nomination. Coper- 

 nicus was known, however, to be a warm friend of Giese, who should 

 have succeeded, as coadjutor, to his uncle's bishopric, but who was 

 elected to that of Culm by a compromise. Difficulties soon arose be- 

 tween Copernicus and his new bishop, and the breach was widened in 

 various ways. The bishop, himself a man of loose morals, ordered 

 Copernicus to send away his housekeeper, on the assumption of illicit 

 relations between the two, and kept the accusation alive by various 

 official letters. Bishop Dantiscus oppressed Copernicus in various ways 

 and remained his enemy in spite of certain advances on the part of the 

 latter. If Copernicus ever feared the persecution of the church on 

 account of his scientific teaching — of which there is little evidence — it 

 was because his bishop stood ready to use every and any weapon against 

 him. 



Copernicus gained an ardent disciple in George Joachim of Ehaetia, 

 known to us as Eheticus. He was born in 1514 and made his studies 

 at Nuremberg under Schoner to such effect that he was appointed to 

 be professor of mathematics at the University of Wittenberg in 1537, at 

 the age of twenty-three. In May, 1539, he visited the great astronomer 

 of Frauenburg chiefly to study his doctrines of trigonometry, and his 

 trigonometric tables. Copernicus was then sixty-six years of age and his 

 enthusiastic and loyal guest was twenty-five. He was received cordially 

 and at once set himself to study the manuscripts of Copernicus. His 

 visit extended itself from a few weeks to more than two years, and he 



