NEL T Cee 
595 
THURSDAY, MARCH 31, 1904. 
SCIENCE IN THE DAYS. OF THE 
INQUISITION. 
Giordano Bruno. By J. Lewis McIntyre, M.A., D.Sc. 
Pp. xvi+365. (London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 
1903.) Price 1os. net. 
Galileo: His Life and Work. By J. J. Fahie, M.1.E.E. 
Pp. xvi+451; with 27 illustrations. (London: John 
Murray, 1903.) Price 16s. net. 
12 is a remarkably opportune coincidence that these 
two volumes, dealing as they do with the lives of 
two pioneers of science of the Italy of three hundred 
years ago, should have appeared almost simultaneously. 
Each book would be interesting in itself, but when 
taken together the lives of Bruno and Galileo afford us 
a striking insight into the state of scientific knowledge 
at the commencement of the seventeenth century, the 
great advances made by the philosopher and the 
physicist, each working on independent lines, the oppo- 
sition which their labours aroused and the manner in 
which that opposition was affected by the character of 
the new ideas which they propounded 
Whether we read the life of Bruno or of Galileo we 
find the same story told regarding the obstacles against 
which the two workers had to contend. These were 
(1) the widespread and deeply-rooted belief in Aristotle, 
(2) the prevailing opposition to the Copernican doc- 
trine, and (3) the hostility of the Church of Rome to- 
wards any philosophy or doctrine which could be in- 
terpreted as coming into conflict with the teaching of 
the Bible, even though the exponent himself was at 
heart a zealous churchman. 
The philosopher was necessarily brought into conflict | 
with these influences at every step of his progress; not | 
so the mathematician and physicist, who, so long as | 
| points. 
he came before the world as an inventor only, was 
standing on safe ground on which he could gain for 
himself an immense reputation. Accordingly, we find 
that while Bruno met with an early martyrdom, and 
his works sank into an oblivion from which they were 
not rescued until recently, Galileo’s fame never suffered 
extinction, and the petty persecutions to which he was 
subjected are believed by the present writer of his life to 
have stopped short of actual personal torture. 
Giordano Bruno was born at Nola, near Naples, in 
1548, and at the age of fifteen entered the Dominican 
monastery at Naples. His advanced views soon 
brought him into trouble. In 1576 he left Naples, and, 
after sojourning three years in various parts of Italy, | 
he arrived finally in Geneva, where he appears to have 
found the Calvinistic spirit of the times but little less | 
narrow-minded and little more tolerant than 
Catholicism which he had left behind in Italy. At 
Paris he met with an enthusiastic reception, gaining 
the support and admiration of King Henry III. 
Here he brought out his works ‘De Umbris,” 
““Ars Memorie,’’ ‘‘ Cantus Circeeus,’”? “De Com- 
the | 
pendiosa Architectura,” and his comedy, “ {1 Can- | 
delaio’’; moreover, he was appointed to a university | 
| angle, though it could be multiplied indefinitely, could 
readership. 
NO. 1796, VOL 69] 
Not contented, however, he migrated to England and 
tried to establish a footing in Oxford, where he found 
little encouragement from a University in which im- 
plicit belief in the teachings of Aristotle was enforced 
by fines and penalties. His career was cut short by his 
success in “ flooring ’’ his opponent in a controversy. 
We note among many other interesting points that 
““what Bruno condemned in Oxford was the undue 
attention it gave to language and words, to the ability 
to speak in Ciceronian Latin, and in eloquent phrase, 
neglecting the realities of which the words were signs.”’ 
In London the French Ambassador, Mauvissiére, gave 
him a home, and he became acquainted with Sidney, 
Greville and other distinguished men. ‘‘ No fewer 
than seven works from Bruno’s facile pen were pub- 
lished in England.’’ His experiences of English life in 
the Elizabethan times are interesting reading, but the 
English attitude of indifference to his teachings appears 
to have been highly irritating to a man of his dis- 
position. At Wittenberg (1586-1588) he lectured to a 
sympathetic and appreciative university, and published 
a number of important books; as his biographer re- 
marks, it was the last or nearly last spell of happiness 
that life had in store for him. At Helmstadt he was 
less fortunate, being excommunicated by the pastor 
‘Boethus. In 1590 he left for Frankfort, where he super- 
intended the printing of his two great works ‘“‘ De 
Minimo ”’ and ‘‘ De Immenso.’’ 
Bruno’s desire to be received back into his church 
probably formed one of his motives for accepting an 
invitation from one Mocenigo, of Venice, which proved 
to be his death-trap. A few months later he was 
denounced to the Inquisition, his case came before a 
| tribunal, and he was sent to Rome, where, after a 
period of incarceration of about seven years. he was 
burnt as a heretic. 
Of Bruno’s philosophy we can only touch on a few 
He believed in an infinite deity and an in- 
finity of worlds, his argument in favour of the latter 
doctrine being based on the perfection of the universe. 
There is room in the universe for an infinity of worlds, 
Bruno would contend, and a universe containing them 
must be more perfect than one without them, there- 
fore we cannot believe in Divine perfection without 
admitting their existence. Of the ‘‘ coincidence of 
contraries,’’ now better understood to mathematicians 
as the “change of sign in passing through in- 
finity, Bruno gives some illustrations which now- 
adays appear curious. For example, the coincidence 
of infinitely quick and infinitely slow motions is 
deduced from the fact that a body moving infinitely 
quickly in an orbit is at every instant at every point of 
the orbit and, “‘ therefore, it stands still” (p. 179). His 
notion of matter as atomic (p. 241) led Bruno in ‘‘ De 
Minimis ”’ to formulate a geometry, offered as a simpli- 
fication of Euclid, of which it is difficult to judge by 
existing standards. In regard to rectifying the circle 
through the ultimate coincidence of arc and chord, he 
agreed fairly well with modern theory, but he did not 
admit that a figure of one shape could ever be equal to 
a figure of another shape except approximately. An 
Z 
