1826.] Galileo, and the Copernican System. 61S 



■ condemnation of the Copernican system, which is referred to in the second 

 decree, which was made sixteen years afterwards. On the first occasion no pro- 

 ceedings were instituted against Galileo, and no punishment was inflicted upon 

 him. Two of his propositions were prohibited, namely, that in which the sun 

 was stated to be the centre of the system and to have no local motion, \^hich 

 was condennied as being heretical, because contrary to the Scriptures; and the 

 one in which it was asserted that the earth was not the centre of the universe, 

 and that it had a diurnal motion, as erroneous in regard to the faith. Afterwards 

 Cardinal Bellarmine exhorted Galileo in a friendly manner, and the commissary 

 of the Roman Inquisition strictly forbade him to maintain such propositions, 

 nay, even to discuss them — threatening him with imprisonment if he should dare 

 to contravene the prohibition : and at the same time he orilered that the work 

 of Copernicus, and some other books in which that system was adopted, should 

 be cleared from its errors and corrected, those passages being expunged in which 

 it was said that the sacred Scriptures were not contrary to that hypothesis. 

 {Fabroni, T. ii. [). .303.) It cannot here be concealed that, at this time, Galileo 

 began to act with insincerity. In two letters which he wrote on this occasion 

 to Curzio Piccheno, secretai}' to the Grand Duke, he makes no mention of the 

 prohibition he had received, but speaks only of the books which it had been or- 

 dered to amend. Alluding to the above-mentioned Dominican friar, who, in the 

 church of Santa Maria Novella at Florence and afterwards at Rome, had de- 

 nounced from the pulpit the opinion of Galileo as " contro alia fede e eretica," 

 he says, " per quello che I'esito ha dimostrato, ii suo parere non ha ritrovalo cor- 

 rispondenza in S. Chiesa, la quale altro non ha ricevuto, se non che taleopinione 

 non concordi con le Scritture sacre : onde solo restano proibiti quel libri, i quali 

 ex professo hanno voluto sostenere, ch'ella non discordi dalla Scrittura, &c. 

 {Fabroni, T. i., p. 48, 51.) Nor in his works docs he notice the prohibition at 

 all, except when he w as accused of having transgressed it, and then he wished 

 to excuse himself by saying, that he was only interdicted from defending and 

 supporting the Copernican system, and not from treating of it simply, as he 

 pretended only to have done in his celebrated dialogue. It appears then certain 

 that he was determined not to obey the command whichhe had received from 

 the Roman tribunal, and that he flattered himself that, if he were silent on the 

 subject, no other person would bear it in mind. After his return to Rome, he 

 occupied himself in composing his dialogue on the system of the world, which 

 was divided into four parts or days ; and which was finished in 1630. He well 

 knew that the printing of it would be dangerous after the decree of the Roman 

 Inquisition, in which the Copernican system was condemred as contrary to the 

 authority of the Scriptures ; wherefore he repaired to Rome, and presented the 

 dialogue to the master of the sacred palace, who, perhaps to the astonishment 

 of Galileo himself, having examined it, found nothing worthy of blame or of cen- 

 sure, and allowed it to be printed. Galileo returned to Florence to correct his 

 work, and afterwards to send it to Rome for publication j but on account of the 

 plague, which then began to rage in Italy, this did not take place. Therefore he 

 obtained leave from the master of the sacred palace, that after a new revision 

 of the work by a counsellor of the Inquisition in Florence, it might be printed in 

 this latter city, and thus it made its appearance in Florence in 1632. This is 

 the substance of the fact, and from it, it appears that Galileo was not reprehen- 

 sible. But frequently that which on a simple representation seems to be inno- 

 cent, when its circumstances are examined bears a very different complexion, 

 and this is particularly the case with respect to GalOeo. 



His preface to the dialogue is what cannot be entirely justified. He thus 

 begins, in the manner best calculated to impose upon the revisers of his work, 

 " Some j'ears since a beneficial edict was promulgated at Rome, which, to 

 obviate the dangerous dissensions of the present age, opportunely imposed 

 silence on the Pythagorean opinion of the motion of the earth. There were not 

 wanting those who rashly asserted that that decree did not arise from a skilful 

 examination, but from unenlightened prejudice; and complaints were heard that 

 counsellors, altogether ignorant of astronomical observations, ought not to clip 



