Historical Relations 137 



witness the truth and immutability of his opinions, the bigotry of 

 his enemies would have been disarmed, and Science would have 

 enjoyed a memorable triumph." It is a comfortable and bracing 

 assurance, but there is an alternative hypothesis. It may also be 

 that instead of his judges being thus awed they would have sent him 

 to the stake as they did Giordano Bruno. The blood of the 

 martyrs is perhaps the seed of the Church, but scientific truth is not 

 thus established, and it is quite certain that more men have suffered 

 for opinions that are demonstrably false than for opinions that are 

 demonstrably true. It may be convenient to have here the actual 

 sentence of the Inquisition. It runs as follows : 



" Having seen and maturely considered the merits of your case 

 with your confessions and excuses, and everything else which 

 ought to be seen and considered, we pronounce, judge and declare 

 that you have rendered yourself vehemently suspected by this Holy 

 Office of heresy, in that {a) you have believed and held the doctrine 

 (which is false and contrary to the Holy and Divine Scriptures) 

 that the sun is the centre of the world and that it does not move 

 from east to west, and that the earth does move and is not the centre 

 of the world ; and (Jb) that an opinion can be held and defended as 

 probable after it has been decreed contrary to the Holy Scriptures, 

 and, consequently, that you have incurred all the censures and 

 penalties enjoined in the sacred canons and other general and par-' 

 ticular codes against delinquents of this description. From this it 

 is Our pleasure that you be absolved provided that, with a sincere 

 heart and unfeigned faith, in Our presence you abjure, curse and 

 detest the said errors and heresies, and every other error and heresy 

 contrary to the Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome, and in 

 the form that shall be prescribed to you. But that your grievous 

 and pernicious error may not go altogether unpunished, and that 

 you may be more cautious in future, and as a warning to others to 

 abstain from delinquencies of this sort. We decree that the book, 

 ' Dialogue of Galileo Galilei,' be prohibited by public edict, and 

 We condemn you to the prison of this Holy Office for a period 

 determinable at Our pleasure, and by way of salutary penance We 

 order you during the next three years to recite, once a week, the 

 seven penitential psalms, reserving to Ourselves the power of 

 moderating, commuting, or taking off the whole or part of the said 

 punishment or penance." 



In response to this sentence Galileo had to kneel and make a 

 declaration of which the following is the terminal passage : 



" I abjure, curse and detest the said errors and heresies, and 



