# Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia/Chapter 19

CHAPTER IX.
THE SENTENCE AND RECANTATION.
On Wednesday, 22nd June, 1633, in the forenoon, Galileo was conducted to the large hall used for melancholy proceedings of this kind, in the Dominican Convent of St. Maria sopra la Minerva, where, in the presence of his judges and a large assemblage of cardinals and prelates of the Holy Congregation, the following sentence was read to him:—
by the grace of God, cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, Inquisitors General, by the Holy Apostolic see specially deputed, against heretical depravity throughout the whole Christian Republic.
​Whereas you, Galileo, son of the late Vincenzo Galilei, Florentine, aged seventy years, were in the year 1615 denounced to this Holy Office for holding as true the false doctrine taught by many, that the sun is the centre of the world and immovable, and that the earth moves, and also with a diurnal motion; for having disciples to whom you taught the same doctrine; for holding correspondence with certain mathematicians of Germany concerning the same; for having printed certain letters, entitled "On the Solar Spots," wherein you developed the same doctrine as true; and for replying to the objections from the Holy Scriptures, which from time to time were urged against it, by glossing the said Scriptures according to your own meaning: and whereas there was thereupon produced the copy of a document in the form of a letter, purporting to be written by you to one formerly your disciple, and in this divers propositions are set forth, following the hypothesis of Copernicus, which are contrary to the true sense and authority of Holy Scripture:
This Holy Tribunal being therefore desirous of proceeding against the disorder and mischief thence resulting, which went on increasing to the prejudice of the Holy Faith, by command of his Holiness and of the most eminent Lords Cardinals of this supreme and universal Inquisition, the two propositions of the stability of the sun and the motion of the earth were by the theological "Qualifiers" qualified as follows:
The proposition that the sun is the centre of the world and does not move from its place is absurd and false philosophically and formally heretical, because it is expressly contrary to the Holy Scripture.
The proposition that the earth is not the centre of the world and immovable, but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically, and theologically considered, at least erroneous in faith.
But whereas it was desired at that time to deal leniently with you, it was decreed at the Holy Congregation held before his Holiness on the 25th February, 1616, that his Eminence the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine should order you to abandon altogether the said false doctrine, and, in the event of your refusal, that an injunction should be imposed upon you by the Commissary of the Holy Office, to give up the said doctrine, and not to teach it to others, nor to defend it, nor even discuss it; and failing your acquiescence in this injunction, that you should be imprisoned. And in execution of this decree, on the following day, at the Palace, and in the presence of his Eminence, the said Lord Cardinal Bellarmine, after being gently admonished by the said Lord Cardinal, the command was intimated to you by the Father Commissary of the Holy Office for the time before a notary and witnesses, that you were altogether to abandon the said false opinion, and not in future to defend or teach it in any way whatsoever, neither verbally nor in writing; and upon your promising to obey you were dismissed.
​And in order that a doctrine so pernicious might be wholly rooted out and not insinuate itself further to the grave prejudice of Catholic truth, a decree was issued by the Holy Congregation of the Index, prohibiting the books which treat of this doctrine, and declaring the doctrine itself to be false and wholly contrary to sacred and divine Scripture.
And whereas a book appeared here recently, printed last year at Florence, the title of which shows that you were the author, this title being: "Dialogue of Galileo Galilei on the Two Principal Systems of the World, the Ptolemaic and the Copernican"; and whereas the Holy Congregation was afterwards informed that through the publication of the said book, the false opinion of the motion of the earth and the stability of the sun was daily gaining ground; the said book was taken into careful consideration, and in it there was discovered a patent violation of the aforesaid injunction that had been imposed upon you, for in this book you have defended the said opinion previously condemned and to your face declared to be so, although in the said book you strive by various devices to produce the impression that you leave it undecided, and in express terms as probable: which however is a most grievous error, as an opinion can in no wise be probable which has been declared and defined to be contrary to Divine Scripture:
Therefore by our order you were cited before this Holy Office, where, being examined upon your oath, you acknowledged the book to be written and published by you. You confessed that you began to write the said book about ten or twelve years ago, after the command had been imposed upon you as above; that you requested licence to print it, without however intimating to those who granted you this licence that you had been commanded not to hold, defend, or teach in any way whatever the doctrine in question.
You likewise confessed that the writing of the said book is in various places drawn up in such a form that the reader might fancy that the arguments brought forward on the false side are rather calculated by their cogency to compel conviction than to be easy of refutation; excusing yourself for having fallen into an error, as you alleged, so foreign to your intention, by the fact that you had written in dialogue, and by the natural complacency that every man feels in regard to his own subtleties, and in showing himself more clever than the generality of men, in devising, even on behalf of false propositions, ingenious and plausible arguments.
And a suitable term having been assigned to you to prepare your defence, you produced a certificate in the handwriting of his Eminence the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine, procured by you, as you asserted, in order to defend yourself against the calumnies of your enemies, who gave out that you had abjured and had been punished by the Holy Office; in which certificate it is declared that you had not abjured and had not been punished, but merely that the declaration made by his Holiness and published by the Holy Congregation of the Index, had been announced to you, wherein ​it is declared that the doctrine of the motion of the earth and the stability of the sun is contrary to the Holy Scriptures, and therefore cannot be defended or held. And as in this certificate there is no mention of the two articles of the injunction, namely, the order not "to teach" and "in any way," you represented that we ought to believe that in the course of fourteen or sixteen years you had lost all memory of them; and that this was why you said nothing of the injunction when you requested permission to print your book. And all this you urged not by way of excuse for your error, but that it might be set down to a vainglorious ambition rather than to malice. But this certificate produced by you in your defence has only aggravated your delinquency, since although it is there stated that the said opinion is contrary to Holy Scripture, you have nevertheless dared to discuss and defend it and to argue its probability; nor does the licence artfully and cunningly extorted by you avail you anything, since you did not notify the command imposed upon you.
And whereas it appeared to us that you had not stated the full truth with regard to your intention, we thought it necessary to subject you to a rigorous examination, at which (without prejudice, however, to the matters confessed by you, and set forth as above, with regard to your said intention) you answered like a good Catholic. Therefore, having seen and maturely considered the merits of this your cause, together with your confessions and excuses above mentioned, and all that ought justly to be seen and considered, we have arrived at the underwritten final sentence against you:—
Invoking, therefore, the most holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ and of His most glorious Mother, and ever Virgin Mary, by this our final sentence, which sitting in judgment, with the counsel and advice of the Reverend Masters of sacred theology and Doctors of both Laws, our assessors, we deliver in these writings, in the cause and causes presently before us between the magnificent Carlo Sinceri, Doctor of both Laws, Proctor Fiscal of this Holy Office, of the one part, and you Galileo Galilei, the defendant, here present, tried and confessed as above, of the other part,—we say, pronounce, sentence, declare, that you, the said Galileo, by reason of the matters adduced in process, and by you confessed as above, have rendered yourself in the judgment of this Holy Office vehemently suspected of heresy, namely, of having believed and held the doctrine—which is false and contrary to the sacred and divine Scriptures—that the sun is the centre of the world and does not move from east to west, and that the earth moves and is not the centre of the world; and that an opinion may be held and defended as probable after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to Holy Scripture; and that consequently you have incurred all the censures and penalties imposed and promulgated in the sacred canons and other constitutions, general and particular, against such delinquents. From which we are content that you be absolved, provided that first, with a sincere heart, and unfeigned faith, you abjure, curse, and detest the aforesaid errors and ​heresies, and every other error and heresy contrary to the Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church in the form to be prescribed by us.
And in order that this your grave and pernicious error and transgression may not remain altogether unpunished, and that you may be more cautious for the future, and an example to others, that they may abstain from similar delinquencies—we ordain that the book of the "Dialogues of Galileo Galilei" be prohibited by public edict.
We condemn you to the formal prison of this Holy Office during our pleasure, and by way of salutary penance, we enjoin that for three years to come you repeat once a week the seven penitential Psalms.
Reserving to ourselves full liberty to moderate, commute, or take off, in whole or in part, the aforesaid penalties and penance.
And so we say, pronounce, sentence, declare, ordain, condemn and reserve, in this and any other better way and form which we can and may lawfully employ.
So we the undersigned Cardinals pronounce.
F. Cardinalis de Asculo. G. Cardinalis Bentiuolus. Fr. Cardinalis de Cremona. Fr. Antonius Cardinalis S. Honuphrij. B. Cardinalis Gypsius. Fr. Cardinalis Verospius. M. Cardinalis Ginettus.
Before proceeding to narrate the consequences of this sentence to the culprit (namely, his recantation and punishment), this seems to be the place to subject this memorable document to a critical review, to show how far the sentence pronounced on Galileo had a legal basis, even on Romish principles. To this end it will be necessary to follow the construction of the sentences step by step, for only in this way can a correct opinion be formed of the accordance of this cunningly devised structure with the actual state of things.
The sentence begins with a condensed historical review of the transactions of 1615, obviously based on the denunciations of Lorini, and the evidence of Caccini of 20th March, 1615. Immediately afterwards follows the well-known opinion of the theological Qualifiers on the principles of Copernicus. ​This is plainly to justify the measures taken in consequence by the ecclesiastical authorities against his doctrine and its most distinguished advocate. For immediately after follows, first a recapitulation of the report registered in the Vatican MS. of the events of 25th and 26th February, 1616, and then the decree of the Congregation of the Index of 5th March, 1616, "by which those books were prohibited which treat of the aforesaid doctrine, and the same was declared to be false and entirely contrary to Holy and Divine Scripture." The sentence then comes to the occasion of the trial of Galileo, namely, his "Dialogues,"—and states: firstly, that by this book he had transgressed the special prohibition of 1616; secondly, that his statement therein, which is almost incredible, that he had left the Copernican view undecided and as only probable, is a "gross error," since a doctrine cannot in any way be probable (probalis) which has already been found and declared to be "contrary to Holy Scripture."
The first point, from the standpoint of the Inquisition, which treated the note of 26th February, 1616, as an authentic document, is certainly correct; the second, even according to the maxims of Rome, is not to the purpose. According to these maxims a proposition can only be made into a dogma by "infallible" authority, namely, by the Pope speaking ex cathedra, or by an Œcumenical Council; and on the other hand, it is only by the same method that an obligation can be laid upon the faithful to consider an opinion heretical. But a decree of the Congregation of the Index does not entail the ​obligation; for, although by virtue of the authority conferred on it, it can enforce obedience and inflict punishment, its decrees are not "infallible." They can, however, be made so, according to ecclesiastical views, either by the subsequent express confirmation of the Pope by a brief in his name, as supreme head of the Christian Catholic Church; or by the decree of the Congregation being originally provided with the clause: "Sanctissimus confirmavit et publicari mandavit." But the decree of 5th March, 1616, is neither confirmed by a subsequent brief, nor does it contain that special formula; and, therefore, in spite of this decree, which declared the opinion of Copernicus to be "false and contrary to Holy and Divine Scripture," it might still be considered as undecided, and even probable, because the decree might be fallible, and did not entail the obligation to adopt its sentence as an article of faith.
This must also have been the view of the ​ecclesiastical authorities of the censorship, who had given Galileo's book the imprimatur, and thereby, as H. Martin justly remarks, relieved the author of responsibility, not in anything relating to the assumed special prohibition, but concerning the accordance of the work with the published decree. Point 2, therefore, seems as unjustifiable as it is untenable. The sentence now gives a brief résumé of the confessions made by Galileo during the examination, which are employed to confirm his guilt. The twofold reproach is urged against him, as of special weight, that he began to write his "Dialogues" after the issue of the assumed prohibition, and that he said nothing about it in obtaining the imprimatur of the censors; thus the special prohibition was treated as an established fact—on the one hand, his disobedience to an injunction of the ecclesiastical authorities was proved, and on the other, the imprimatur was obtained on false pretences, and was null and void.
​After a rather weak recapitulation of the declaration so unedifying to posterity, made by Galileo at his second hearing, the sentence proceeds to the discussion of an authentic document which formed the chief defence of the accused: the certificate given him in 1616 by Cardinal Bellarmine. The authors of the sentence had at this point a delicate and difficult task to perform. The object was to uphold the inviolability of the "note" of 26th February, 1616—this main support of the whole indictment—and by no means to make this attestation appear at variance with the actual circumstances, or it would have become an important argument in favour of the accused. Nay, to avoid this rock, material for the accusation had to be found in the words of the certificate itself And thus we find this document, which, as Wohlwill pertinently remarks, by the words "but only" directly denies the assumed stringent prohibition of 1616, singularly enough, thanks to the sophistry of the Roman lawyers, forming a weighty argument in the sentence for the Inquisitors: "But this certificate," it says, "produced by you in your defence, has only aggravated your delinquency; since although it is there stated that the said opinion is contrary to Holy Scripture, you have nevertheless dared to discuss and defend it, and to argue its probability."
But as here they again had to refer to the protecting imprimatur of the ecclesiastical censors, they hasten to add: "nor does the licence, artfully and cunningly extorted by you, avail you anything, since you did not notify the command imposed upon you."
One cannot help drawing the conclusion, that if the attestation of Cardinal Bellarmine is accepted as true, "the command imposed" did not exist, and of course could not be communicated by Galileo to the censors.
In the clause of the sentence referring to the attestation, a passage is dexterously interwoven, which ascribes the decree of 5th March, 1616, to the Pope; while, as we know, ​it belongs officially to the Congregation alone. The words are these: "But merely that the declaration made by his Holiness (fatta da nostra Signore), and published by the Holy Congregation of the Index, had been announced to you."
Undoubtedly Pope Paul V. wished the decree made and privately instigated it, as Urban VIII. did the sentence against Galileo; and in this sense the former may be attributed to the one and the latter to the other, and the condemnation of the Copernican theory to both. But in this they acted as private persons, and as such they were not (nor would they now be), according to theological rules, "infallible." The conditions which would have made the decree of the Congregation, or the sentence against Galileo, of dogmatic importance, were, as we have seen, wholly wanting. Both Popes had been too cautious to endanger this highest privilege of the papacy by involving their infallible authority in the decision of a scientific controversy; they therefore refrained from conferring their sanction, as heads of the Roman Catholic Church, on the measures taken, at their instigation, by the Congregation "to suppress the doctrine of the revolution of the earth." Thanks to this sagacious foresight, Roman Catholic posterity can say to this day, that Paul V. and Urban VIII. were in error "as men" about the Copernican system, but not "as Popes." For us there remains the singular deduction, that the sentence on Galileo rests again and again, even on the principles of the ecclesiastical court itself, on an illegal foundation.
After a brief mention of the rigid examination of 21st June, the sentence comes to formulate the judgment more particularly. According to this Galileo is, (1) "in the judgment of this Holy Office, vehemently suspected of heresy, namely, of having believed and held the doctrine which is false and contrary to the Sacred and Divine Scriptures . . . and that an opinion may be held and defended as probable ​after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to Holy Scripture;" (2) and that consequently he has incurred all the censures and penalties imposed in the sacred canons against such delinquents. "From which we are content that you be absolved, provided that first you abjure, curse, and detest the aforesaid errors and heresies in the form to be supplied by us."
Point 1, according to Romish regulations about making an opinion an article of faith, in its relation to heresy appears to be illegal and incorrect. Galileo had not laid himself open to suspicion of heresy because he had inclined to a doctrine discovered to be contrary to Scripture by the fallible Congregation of the Index. Point 2 must also, therefore, be illegal, which says that Galileo had "consequently" incurred all the censures and penalties adjudged to such criminals by the canon law.
Galileo could never have been legally condemned on suspicion of heresy from his "Dialogues." In the first place, because neither he nor any other Catholic was bound by the decree of 5th March, 1616, to regard the confirmation of the old system or the rejection of the new as an article of faith; in the second place, because the imprimatur of the ecclesiastical authorities relieved him from all responsibility. But he could be condemned for disobedience to the assumed special prohibition of 26th February, 1616. In the sentence this forms the only legal basis of the indictment and condemnation. How far this prohibition is historically credible, we think we have sufficiently demonstrated in the course of our work.
And when we consider the penalties which follow from this sentence, based partly upon incorrect, and partly upon false accusations, we find that the Inquisition, by compelling Galileo to recant with a threat of other and severer penalties, far exceeded its powers. The Holy Tribunal was empowered to punish the "disobedience" of the philosopher with imprisonment and ecclesiastical penances, and to forbid him to ​discuss the opinion in writing or speaking, but it had no authority to extort from Galileo, or any one else, such a confession on an opinion which had not been defined by "infallible" authority.
This is openly admitted even by high theological authority: "In fact an excess of authority and an injustice did take place;" "but," the reverend gentleman hastens to add, "certainly not from malice, but from a mistake,"—a lenient opinion which we are unable to share.
Whether any scruples were expressed, or any dissentient voices heard in this ecclesiastical court about the manifold illegalities in the proceedings against the famous accused, we do not know, no notes having come down to us of the private discussions and transactions of the Holy Tribunal. But there is one fact which leads us to conclude that all the judges did not consent to this procedure, and that the sentence was not unanimous: at the head of the sentence ten Cardinals are enumerated as judges, but the document is signed by seven only, and besides this there is the express remark: "So we, the undersigned cardinals, pronounce"! Singularly enough, two hundred and thirty-one years passed by, during which much that is valuable was written about Galileo, and a great deal more that was fabulous, before this significant circumstance was noticed by any author. The merit of having first called attention to it belongs to Professor Moritz Cantor, in 1864. The three cardinals who did not sign were, Caspar Borgia, Laudivio Zacchia, and Francesco Barberini, the Pope's nephew, whom we have repeatedly found to be a warm patron and protector of Galileo.
Professor Berti offers as an explanation of the absence of the three signatures, that the Congregation in the name of which the sentence was passed consisted of ten members, but that at the last sitting seven only were present, so that seven only could sign, and adds, as it appears to us unwarrantably, ​"that it by no means follows that the three absentees were of a contrary opinion."
Pieralisi does not find the matter so simple, and devotes seven large pages to account for the absence of the three prelates from the Congregation. "Cardinal Borgia," he says, "was on very bad terms with Urban VIII., because he had addressed the Pope in a loud voice in a consistory, and the Pope had imperiously told him to be quiet and to go away." But it has been proved that even after this scene the cardinal appeared at the consistories up to 12th February, 1635, although there were complaints that he took walks in Rome instead of attending the sittings of the Propaganda and the Holy Office. But it is not likely that this cardinal, whose name stands at the head of the sentence, would have absented himself from the final sitting without some good reason. Pieralisi thinks that he was more friendly to Galileo than the other cardinals, an opinion for which there is no evidence and which proves nothing. Even Pieralisi confesses that he can find no reason for the absence of Cardinal Zacchia, but assigns the following motive for that of Cardinal Francesco Barberini: "He probably wished to uphold the right enjoyed by the cardinal nephews, and afterwards by the secretaries of state, of sometimes abstaining from voting in order to reserve to themselves greater freedom in the treatment of public, private, and political affairs." The insufficiency of this explanation is too obvious to need comment. Pieralisi himself comes to the conclusion that these dignitaries did not wish to append their signatures to the famous sentence, which is much the same thing as the conjecture that they did not agree to it.
In accordance with this sentence, certainly not passed ​unanimously by the members of the Holy Tribunal, which forms one of the foulest blots in the melancholy annals of the Inquisition, Galileo was compelled immediately after hearing it to make the following degrading recantation, humbly kneeling, before the whole assembly:—
Therefore, desiring to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and of all faithful Christians, this strong suspicion, reasonably conceived against me, with sincere heart and unfeigned faith I abjure, curse, and detest the aforesaid errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect whatsoever contrary to the said Holy Church; and I swear that in future I will never again say or assert, verbally or in writing, anything that might furnish occasion for a similar suspicion regarding me; but that should I know any heretic, or person suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor and ordinary of the place where I may be. Further, I swear and promise to fulfil and observe in their integrity all penances that have been, or that shall be, imposed upon me by this Holy Office. And, in the event of my contravening, (which God forbid!) any of these my promises, protestations, and oaths, I submit myself to all the pains and penalties imposed and promulgated in the sacred canons and other constitutions, general and particular, against such delinquents. So help me God, and these His holy Gospels, which I touch with my hands."
I, the said Galileo Galilei, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound ​myself as above; and in witness of the truth thereof I have with my own hand subscribed the present document of my abjuration, and recited it word for word at Rome, in the Convent of Minerva, this twenty-second day of June, 1633.
Certain Catholic writers express the hope, at the expense of truth, for the sake of Galileo's salvation and honour, that he really had, from conviction, renounced the opinion which he had been labouring for and advocating up to old age. Indeed, the super-Catholic author of an essay, called "The Holy See against Galileo Galilei and the Astronomical System of Copernicus," does not hesitate to say: "Probably the physical absurdities of his (Galileo's) doctrine had achieved a victory for the voice of reason and religion." Undoubtedly there were many physical difficulties in the way of a general acceptance of the new doctrines (especially the prevailing incorrect ideas about the specific gravity of the air), and they were only finally overcome by the discovery of the law of gravitation by the genius of Newton; but they were not so great as to prevent men, like Kepler, Descartes, Gassendi, Diodati, Philip Landsberg, Joachim Rhäticus, and others, and above all, the great Italian reformer of physics and astronomy, from, even at that time, recognising the truth of the new theory. It does not appear, either, that the author of that article had much faith in his own conjecture, for he proceeds to a demonstration, from opposite premises, which was for a time much in vogue with the Jesuitical defenders ​of the Inquisition against Galileo, and which must therefore be briefly mentioned.
This was nothing less than an attempt to show that even if Galileo held the Copernican system to be the only true one, he could, thanks to the wording of the formula of recantation, utter it without doing violence to his conscience; or, what is now known to be truth. Galileo swore that he never had believed and never would believe (1) "that the sun was the centre of the earth and immovable." That he could easily do, says our author, for, in relation to the fixed stars, the sun by no means forms the centre; and heavy bodies on the earth fall towards its centre and not towards the sun, which, also, in this sense, was not the centre! There was no difficulty for Galileo in recanting that the sun was immovable, for he had himself concluded from the motion of the spots that it revolved on its own axis. As to the earth, he abjured it as an error (2) that "the earth is not the centre;" quite right, for it is the centre for heavy bodies: and it was not said—"the centre of the universe;" (3) "that the earth moves;" vast efforts of sophistry were necessary to make this desperately precise proposition square with the arguments of this curious casuist. He therefore says, that as, according to the wording, it is not the diurnal motion of the earth that is in question, this proposition has quite a different meaning, in which, on the one hand, it must be said that the earth is immovable, and on the other, that it is only motion through the air from one place to another that is excluded. The earth may certainly, both in relation to its physical conformation and in contrast to what goes on upon it, be called immovable! At the time when these lines were written, in 1875, the author of this article in the "Historisch-politischen Blättern" was unknown to us. Afterwards, through the liberality of the Bavarian Government, among other works relating to Galileo ​in the Royal Library, the following were lent to us:—(1) "Di Copernico e di Galileo, scritto postumo del P. Maurizio-Benedetto Olivieri, Ex. generale dei domenicani e Commissario della S. Rom. ed Univ. Inquisizione ora per la prima volta messo in luce sull' autografo per cura d'un religioso dello stesso istituto. Bologna, 1872"; (2) "Il S. Officio, Copernico e Galileo a proposito di un opusculo postumo del P. Olivieri sullo stesso argomento apunti di Gilberto Govi. Torino, 1872." To our no small surprise we found, on reading the former, that it had by no means "seen the light" for the first time in 1872, but had appeared thirty-one years before in a literal German translation, as the article above mentioned in the "Historisch-politischen Blättern," with a few insignificant alterations, and a different title, the old one being given in a note. Neither the editor of the first Italian work of Olivieri, the Dominican monk, Fra. Tommaso Bonora, nor the author of the above rejoinder, Gilberto Govi, had, as appears from what they say, the least idea of this singular fact. In Germany, Professor Clemens of Bonn, was universally believed to be the author of this article, which excited great attention; so firmly was it held, that Professor Moritz Cantor, in a notice of the present work, gave no credence to our discovery, but stated in his critique, "The anonymous writer was not Olivieri, but Professor Clemens of Bonn." Upon this we sent Professor Cantor the essay from the "Historisch-politischen Blättern" and Bonora's work for examination, when he was constrained to be convinced by the sight of his own eyes.
The wretched attempt thus to clear the Inquisition, by ​Olivieri's method, of the reproach of having extorted an oath from Galileo entirely against his convictions, is unworthy of refutation. By impartial posterity the oath is and must be regarded as perjury, and is all the more repulsive because the promise was coupled with it that, "if he met with a heretic, or person suspected of heresy," he would denounce him to the authorities of the Church; that is, the master would denounce his disciples—for by a "heretic, or any one suspected of heresy," the adherents of the Copernican system must be chiefly understood—to the persecution of the Inquisition! The taking of this degrading oath may, under the circumstances, be excused, but it never can be justified.
After this painful act of world-wide interest had been completed, Galileo was conducted back to the buildings of the Holy Office. Now that he and the Copernican system had been condemned with becoming solemnity by the Holy Office, Urban VIII. magnanimously gave the word for mercy; that is, Galileo was not, as the sentence prescribed, detained in the prisons of the Inquisition, but a restricted amount of liberty was granted him. The Roman curia never entirely let go its hold upon him as long as he lived. On the day after the sentence was passed, the Pope exchanged imprisonment for temporary banishment, to the villa of the Grand Duke of Tuscany at Trinita de' Monti, near Rome, whither Niccolini conducted his unfortunate friend on the evening of 24th June, as we find from the despatch before quoted from him to Cioli of 26th of the month.
We learn from the same source that while Galileo took the prohibition of his book, of which he was aware beforehand, with tolerable composure, the unexpected proceedings of the Holy Office against him personally, affected him most deeply. Niccolini did his best to rouse him from his deep depression, but at first with little success. Galileo longed ​to leave Rome, where he had suffered so much, and therefore addressed the following petition to Urban VIII.:—
"Most Holy Father! Galileo Galilei most humbly begs your Holiness to exchange the place assigned t0 him for his prison near Rome, for some other in Florence, which may appear suitable to your Holiness, in consideration of his poor health, and also because the petitioner is expecting a sister with eight children from Germany, to whom no one can afford help and protection so well as himself. He will receive any disposition of your Holiness as a great favour."
But in the Vatican the opinion prevailed that to allow Galileo to return to Florence already would be a superfluity of indulgence. The Pope said to Niccolini: "We must proceed gently, and only rehabilitate Galileo by degrees." Still Urban was disposed to grant the ambassador's request, and to alter the penalty so far as to allow the exile to go to Siena, to the house of the Archbishop Ascanio Piccolomini, whom we know as a warm friend of Galileo's. Niccolini's urgent entreaties succeeded in obtaining a papal decree of 30th June, ordering Galileo to go by the shortest route to Siena, to go to the Archbishop's at once, to remain there, and strictly to obey his orders; and he was not to leave that city without permission from the Congregation. Galileo was informed of this decree on 2nd July by the Commissary-General of the Inquisition, Father Vincenzo Maccolani di Firenzuola, in person. On lOth July, Niccolini reported to Cioli: "Signor Galileo set out early on Wednesday, 6th July, in good health, for Siena, and writes to me from Viterbo, that he had performed four miles on foot, the weather being very cool.
* ↑ Galileo's letter to Castelli of 21st December, 1613.
* ↑ Appendix VI.
* ↑ It is very remarkable that Jagemann, in his book on Galileo, which appeared in 1784 (New Ed. 1787, pp. 86, 95), doubts the fact of such a special prohibition. Of course he is acquainted only with the sentence published by Riccioli, and surmises that he invented the passage in which the special prohibition is mentioned, "in order to justify the harsh proceedings of the Court of Rome under Urban VIII." So that ninety years ago, without anything to go by but the wording of the sentence, Jagemann suspected that this strict prohibition was never issued to Galileo, and says,—"Neither does this decree agree with the information given above on all points," i.e., in letters of Galileo and Guiccardini of 1616.
* ↑ Compare the excellent essay: "La Condemnation de Galilée. Lapsus des ecrivains qui l'opposent à la doctrine de l'infallibilité du Pape," von Abbé Bouix. Also Pieralisi, pp. 121–131; and Gilbert's "La Procés de Galilée," pp. 19–30. We may remark here, that according to these principles the doctrine of Copernicus was not made heretical by the sentence of the Inquisition, because the decree never received the Pope's official ratification. To confirm this statement we subjoin some remarks by theological authorities. Gassendi remarks in his great work, "De motu impresso a motore translato" (Epist. ii. t. iii. p. 519), published nine years after the condemnation of Galileo, on the absence of the papal ratification in the sentence of the Holy Tribunal, and that therefore the negation of the Copernican theory was not an article of faith. As a good priest he recognises the high authority of a decision of the Congregation, and subjects his personal opinions to it. Father Riccioli, in his comprehensive work, "Almagestum novum," published nine years after Gassendi's, reproduces Gassendi's statement word for word (t. i., pars. 2, p. 489), and entirely concurs in it, even in the book which was meant to refute the Copernican theory at all points (pp. 495, 496, and 500). Father Fabri, a French Jesuit, afterwards Grand Penitentiary at Rome, says in a dissertation published there in 1661 against the "Systema Saturnium," of Huyghens (p. 49), that as no valid evidence can be adduced for the truth of the new system, the authorities of the Church are quite right in interpreting the passages of Holy Scripture relating to the system of the universe literally; "but," he adds, "if ever any conclusive reasons are discovered (which I do not expect), I do not doubt that the Church will say that they are to be taken figuratively," a remark which no priest would have made about a doctrine pronounced heretical by infallible authority. Caramuel, a Spanish Benedictine, who also discussed the future of the Copernican theory, defines the position still more clearly than Fabri. In his "Theologia fundamentalis," published at Lyons in 1676 (t. i., pp. 104–110), after defending the decree and sentence of the Congregation, he discusses the attitude which the Church will take in case the system should prove indisputably true. In the first place he believes this will never happen, and if it does, it could never be said that the Church of Rome had been in error, as the doctrine of the double motion of the earth had never been condemned by an Œcumenical Council, nor by the Pope speaking ex cathedra, but only by the tribunal of cardinals. It is interesting to find that Descartes, Galileo's contemporary, put the same construction on the matter. He wrote on 10th January, 1634, to Father Mersenne: "As I do not see that this censure has been confirmed either by a Council or the Pope, but proceeds solely from the congregation of the cardinals, I do not give up hope that it will not happen to the Copernican theory as it did to that about the antipodes, which was formerly condemned in the same way." (Panthéon littéraire, Œuvres philosophiques de Descartes, p. 545)
* ↑ Page 141.
* ↑ Page 60.
* ↑ Abbé Bouix, p. 229.
* ↑ Zeitschrift für Math, und Physik. 9th series. Part 3, pp. 194, 195.
* ↑ "I Cardinale Inquisitori componenti la Congregazione, in cui nome la sentenza è fatta, erano in numero di dieci. Nell' ultima Congregazione se ne trovarono presenti solo sette; quindi sette solo sono sottoscritti. Da cio non può in nessuna maniera desumersi che i tre mancanti fossero di parere contrario." ("Processo originale," etc., p. 149, note 1.)
* ↑ " Urbano VIII. e Galileo Galilei," pp. 218–224.
* ↑ Appendix VI.
* ↑ Vol. vii. of the "Historisch-politischen Blätter für das Catholische Deutschland." Munich, 1841.
* ↑ Ibid. p. 578.
* ↑ The reproach which the apologists of the Inquisition are fond of bringing against Galileo, that he knew nothing about the specific gravity of the air, is incorrect, as appears from his letter to Baliani of 12th March, 1613 (published for the first time in 1864 by Signor Giuseppe Sacchi, director of the library at Brera, where the autograph letter is to be seen), in which Galileo describes a method he had invented for determining the specific gravity of the air.
* ↑ See the essay before mentioned, p. 583.
* ↑ Ibid. pp. 580, 581.
* ↑ Ibid. pp. 581, 582.
* ↑ It carefully refutes the assertion made by Father Olivieri, that the Holy Office had prohibited the Copernican doctrine from being demonstrated as true, and condemned its famous advocate, Galileo, because it could not then be satisfactorily proved scientifically, and Galileo had supported it with arguments scientifically incorrect. If we can believe the ex-general of the Dominicans, the Inquisition in 1616 and 1633 was only the careful guardian of science!
* ↑ Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, Beilage, No. 93, 2nd Aug., 1876.
* ↑ Gherardi's Documents, Doc. xv.
* ↑ Compare p. 228, note 3.
* ↑ Niccolini's despatch to Cioli, 3rd July, 1633. (Op. ix. p. 445.)
* ↑ Vat. MS. fol. 453 ro.
* ↑ Niccolini's despatch to Cioli of 3rd July.
* ↑ Vat. MS. fol. 453 ro. and 454 vo.
* ↑ Ibid. fol. 453 vo.
* ↑ Op. ix. p. 447.