THE STRUGGLE FOR MORE LIGHT 



As a matter of fact, though Galilei was tried 

 for heresy on account of the above work, he was 

 treated without harshness, and even his obstinate 

 " E pur si muove" (And yet it moves), uttered 

 immediately after the revocation of his theories, 

 did not result in any increased penalty for him. 

 Luther might also have escaped with no more se- 

 vere penalties than Galilei, had it been merely a 

 question of a religious controversy. 



But the class-struggle seized upon both re- 

 ligion and science, just as it had done before, and 

 as it will continue to do so long as class an- 

 tagonisms exist. To the extent that the merchant 

 class grew in wealth and power, it did not only 

 protect the new world-conception, but also began 

 to question the right of the church to collect 

 taxes and to mismanage church-property. And 

 the ideas of religious reformers became at once 

 the rallying center of bands of revolting peasants 

 and impoverished nobles, who threatened the 

 holdings of the church in land and movable 

 wealth. This outraged and hurt the hierarchy 

 more than all attacks on established articles of 

 faith and philosophy. 



For this reason, it became a matter of self- 

 defence for the Roman church to call reactionary 

 science, religious fanaticism, and the entire appa- 



49 



