But there is no height of fortune from which a man may not fall;and it is usually the proud, the ostentatious, and the contemptuous who do fall, since they create envy, and are apt to make social mistakes. Galileo continued to exasperate his enemies by his arrogance and sarcasms. "They refused to be dragged at his chariot-wheels." "The Aristotelian professors," says Brewster, "the temporizing Jesuits, the political churchmen, and that timid but respectable body who at all times dread innovation, whether it be in legislation or science, entered into an alliance against the philosophical tyrant who threatened them with the penalties of knowledge." The church dignitaries were especially hostile, since they thought the tendency of Galileo's investigations was to undermine the Bible. Flanked by the logic of the schools and the popular interpretation of Scripture, and backed by the civil power, they were eager for war. Galileo wrote a letter to his friend the Abbe Castelli, the object of which was "to prove that the Scriptures were not intended to teach science and philosophy," but to point out the way of salvation. He was indiscreet enough to write a longer letter of seventy pages, quoting the Fathers in support of his views, and attempting to show that Nature and Scripture could not speak a different language. It was this reasoning which irritated the dignitaries of the Church more than his discoveries, since it is plain that the literal language of Scripture upholds the doctrine that the sun revolves around the earth. He was wrong or foolish in trying to harmonize revelation and science. He should have advanced his truths of science and left them to take care of themselves. He should not have meddled with the dogmas of his enemies: not that he was wrong in doing so, but it was not politic or wise; and he was not called upon to harmonize Scripture with science.
So his enemies busily employed themselves in collecting evidence against him. They laid their complaints before the Inquisition of Rome, and on the occasion of paying a visit to that city, he was summoned before that tribunal which has been the shame and the reproach of the Catholic Church. It was a tribunal utterly incompetent to sit upon his case, since it was ignorant of science.
In 1615 it was decreed that Galileo should renounce his obnoxious doctrines, and pledge himself neither to defend nor publish them in future. And Galileo accordingly, in dread of prison, appeared before Cardinal Bellarmine and declared that he would renounce the doctrines he had defended. This cardinal was not an ignorant man.
He was the greatest theologian of the Catholic Church; but his bitterness and rancor in reference to the new doctrines were as marked as his scholastic learning. The Pope, supposing that Galileo would adhere to his promise, was gracious and kind.
But the philosopher could not resist the temptation of ridiculing the advocates of the old system. He called them "paper philosophers." In private he made a mockery of his persecutors.
One Saisi undertook to prove from Suidas that the Babylonians used to cook eggs by whirling them swiftly on a sling; to which he replied: "If Saisi insists on the authority of Suidas, that the Babylonians cooked eggs by whirling them on a sling, I will believe it. But I must add that we have eggs and slings, and strong men to whirl them, yet they will not become cooked; nay, if they were hot at first, they more quickly became cool; and as there is nothing wanting to us but to be Babylonians, it follows that being Babylonians is the true cause why the eggs became hard." Such was his prevailing mockery and ridicule. "Your Eminence," writes one of his friends to the Cardinal D'Este, "would be delighted if you could hear him hold forth in the midst of fifteen or twenty, all violently attacking him, sometimes in one house, and sometimes in another; but he is armed after such a fashion that he laughs them all to scorn."Galileo, after his admonition from the Inquisition, and his promise to hold his tongue, did keep comparatively quiet for a while, amusing himself with mechanics, and striving to find out a new way of discovering longitude at sea. But the want of better telescopes baffled his efforts; and even to-day it is said "that no telescope has yet been made which is capable of observing at sea the eclipses of Jupiter's satellites, by which on shore this method of finding longitude has many advantages."On the accession of a new Pope (1623), Urban VIII., who had been his friend as Cardinal Barberini, Galileo, after eight years of silence, thought that he might now venture to publish his great work on the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems, especially as the papal censor also had been his friend. But the publication of the book was delayed nearly two years, so great were the obstacles to be surmounted, and so prejudiced and hostile was the Church to the new views. At last it appeared in Florence in 1632, with a dedication to the Grand Duke,--not the Cosimo who had rewarded him, but his son Ferdinand, who was a mere youth. It was an unfortunate thing for Galileo to do. He had pledged his word not to advocate the Copernican theory, which was already sufficiently established in the opinions of philosophers. The form of the book was even offensive, in the shape of dialogues, where some of the chief speakers were his enemies. One of them he ridiculed under the name of Simplicio. This was supposed to mean the Pope himself,--so they made the Pope believe, and he was furious. Old Cardinal Bellarmine roared like a lion. The whole Church, as represented by its dignitaries, seemed to be against him. The Pope seized the old weapons of the Clements and the Gregories to hurl upon the daring innovator; but delayed to hurl them, since he dealt with a giant, covered not only by the shield of the Medici, but that of Minerva.