GALILEO AND HIS JUDGES. 17 



the tone and tendency of Rome (that is to say, Rome 

 as the centre of ecclesiastical tradition and authority) 

 is not still, as it was then, in favour of the same 

 rule of conduct that, namely, which keeps a scientific 

 man to his own province, and leaves to the authori- 

 ties of the Church the duty of reconciling physical 

 theories and speculations with the teaching of Holy 

 Scripture. On this last-named point I need not say 

 I speak with the utmost diffidence ; but on the his- 

 torical question, as to whether that was the feeling 

 which animated Popes and Cardinals in Galileo's day, 

 I think there can be very little doubt. 



Now, as the controversy became embittered, a 

 certain Father Cassini, a Dominican, preaching in 

 the Church of Santa Maria Novella at Florence, 

 attacked the Copernican doctrine as taught by 

 Galileo ; this aroused the wrath of the philosopher, 

 and he wrote (on the 21st December, 1612) a letter 

 to a Benedictine monk, Father Castelli, protesting 

 against the interpretation of Scripture which Father 

 Cassini had used ; and while so protesting, over- 

 stepping, it appears, the limits of prudence. The 

 result was that this unguarded letter was denounced 

 by Father Lorini to the Cardinal Prefect of the 

 Congregation of the Index. 



The consequence of this was that in the early 

 part of the year 1615 there commenced a process 

 which in the following year had an important 

 issue. It is said that in the month of March, 1615, 

 Cardinal del Monte and Cardinal Bellarmine had 



