io8 GALILEO AND HIS JUDGES. 



becoming, would have been to submit privately to the 

 Eoman authorities all the scientific arguments which 

 the Catholic astronomer supposing such to be the 

 case- had discovered as throwing fresh light on the 

 question. No one has a right to infer from the 

 instance of Galileo, whose arguments were not all 

 of them sound or convincing, that such an astronomer 

 as I have imagined would have been treated with 

 contempt or neglect, especially if he made it evident 

 that he was wholly submissive to the decrees of the 

 Index, or other Eoman Congregations. 



Some writers, and notably the late Dr. Ward, have 

 maintained that besides outward submission, a certain 

 " interior assent " was due to the decision of the 

 Congregation of the Index such assent, however, 

 being different in kind from that given to an article 

 of Faith. 



I submit, however, that although the fact of a 

 book being placed on the forbidden list requires from 

 all good Catholics a respectful assent to the principle 

 that the Church has a right to enact these rules of 

 discipline, it does not require an interior act of 

 intellectual approval. It is said that Bellarmine's 

 great controversial work was for a short time placed 

 on the Index on account of some unpalatable opinion 

 expressed in it. Did he think it necessary to make 

 an interior act of assent to the decree ? 



It is true that in the case of the works of 

 Copernicus and others, the grounds for prohibiting 

 them were stated ; but I would ask, are we obliged to 



