3 86 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



was not continued : only the beginning of the work was then known, 

 and of this Delambre, the astronomer, gave an account to the Italian 

 Venturi. 



In December, 1814, according to the Duke de Blacas, the private 

 library of Louis XVIII. received the entire MS. in the same condition 

 in which it had been found by the imperial government in Italy, and 

 thence carried to France. During the early years of the Restoration, 

 active negotiations were carried on by the court of Rome with the 

 French Government, to secure the return of these important docu- 

 ments. The Government, though it did not positively refuse to comply, 

 nevertheless delayed and procrastinated. It was not until 1846, after 

 thirty-two years of negotiation, that the MS. was sent back to Rome, 

 at the instance, no doubt, of Rossi, who himself presented it to Pius 

 IX., in behalf of Louis Philippe. By the pope it was restored in 

 December, 1848, to the secret archives of the Vatican, and there it still 

 remains. 



All that was known of this MS. before the publication of Berti's 

 work rested upon a selection of documents published at Rome in 

 1850, with many precautions, by Monsignore Marino Marini, sometime 

 Prefect of the Secret Archives of the Holy See, and upon a larger 

 work, in some respects inexact, and in others imperfect, published in 

 Paris in 1867, by Henri de l'Epinois. Both of these writers take 

 special points of view : they appear to be more intent upon justifying 

 the judges that condemned Galileo than upon laying bare the whole 

 truth with the boldness and freedom of an historian. Hence we can 

 appreciate the motives which led them to publish only a portion of 

 the MS. though the whole of it was in their hands. Did the court of 

 Rome really suppose that these two publications contained all the 

 documents pertaining to the double trial of Galileo, or did it think that 

 the time had come for no longer hiding anything from the public ? 

 However that may be, at all events Domenico Berti, in February, 

 1870, was permitted to examine the MS., and even to copy it at his 

 leisure in the room of Father Theiner, who had been officially author- 

 ized to intrust it to him. The present publication, therefore, was not 

 procured by fraud, and, if the Holy See should have any occasion to 

 regret it, at least it could neither dispute its authenticity, nor complain 

 that the work was done without its consent. 



I. 



The interesting history of the travels and of the final destiny of 

 the Vatican MS. is merely the preface of a far more important history, 

 whose events we will endeavor to record impartially, with the sole 

 purpose of unveiling and bringing to light the truth. Galileo, cele- 

 brated from his early years for the value of his discoveries and the 

 brilliancy of his lectures at the University of Padua, loaded with 

 honors at Venice and at Florence, and admired throughout all Italy, 



