8 GALILEO GALILEI. 



seemed regal splendor to the poor astronomer. Xow 

 he studied the heavens with hope and delight. 



But sorrows soon came. His children died, his 

 wife became insane, and died also. The salary 

 could not be paid, on account of the religious wars 

 \vhich convulsed Germany. He wrote almanacs, 

 took private pupils, and in all ways tried to sup- 

 port his second wife and children, while he studied 

 the heavens year by year, discovering his three 

 great laws. The mathematical calculations for the 

 first law, that the planets move in elliptical orbits 

 round the sun, which is placed at one of the foci, 

 filled seven hundred pages. His "Harmonies of 

 the World " contained his third great law : " The 

 squares of the periodic times of the planets are 

 proportioned to the cubes of their mean distances 

 from the sun." 



Such was his joy when he discovered this law, 

 after seventeen years of labor, that he said, "I 

 have written my book. It will be read ; whether 

 in the present age or by posterity matters little. 

 It can wait for its readers. Has not God waited 

 six thousand years for one to contemplate his 

 works ? " In a last fruitless attempt to recover 

 twenty-nine thousand florins, owed him by the 

 government, worn out with want and disappoint- 

 ment, he fell ill and died at Katisbon, leaving 

 thirty-three works, twenty-two volumes in manu- 

 script, and his family in the direst poverty. Such 

 was the man who admired Galileo in his youth, 

 and who stands with him in the admiration of the 



