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Show Church fosters Science Galileo's Trial Ungovernable Disposition His Appeal to the Pope Heard Broke His Promise Decree of Condemnation Condemna-tion Not a Papal Document Kepler a i Staunch Protestant Condemned by the Academical Senate of Tubingen-Left Tubingen-Left Wurtemburg Found Safe Refuge With Jesuits of Gratz. ( l'"ree man's Journal.) (Continued from last week.) But Galileo would not be content either to hoM his opinion as a philosophical probability, or to uphold up-hold it on merely scientific grounds. He would hav it acknowledged as an unquestionable truth, ami would have it declared by the Inquisition as conformable con-formable to Scripture. For this purpose he set, out; for Rome a second time, and was again well and warmly received. With great ability and vehemence vehem-ence he defended on every occasion the Copernienn. system: but his keen satire and sarcasm excited and, inflamed many opponents. The Tuscan ambassador writing to his court, says of him, "He is so heated that he seems nor to know how to govern himself." At a -most inopportune moment, Galileo forced til1 Pope to send his affair before the Inquisition. In a few days n papal decree, founded on a decision oC the Inquisition, was issued obliging him to promise that he would iu longer teach, as a demonstrated fact, that the earth moved around the sun, as sucK opinion appeared contrary to Scripture. To this decree he humbly submitted, returned to te fair city on the banks of the Arn, in his pleasing vili called Segni. situated in. the lively suburbs of I5el-losguardo. I5el-losguardo. Seven years after, that, is in lt:J2, Galileo was d- 4. t-'.-.'d. refori,J ' lqn!-itior, foij hp.ving Virok-.-n hi Jv promise and au'it his' system- in a printed san.-as- t tic dialogue. J After a trial of ,ten months. Galileo was con-denmed con-denmed in June, W'-. During these ten months, j wtih the exception perhaps of three days (others sav one night, when for his own convenient''1 he slept near the court), he resided in the palace ot t he Tuscan Tus-can ambassador. Tie was ordered to abstain from teaching, as a demonstrated fact, that the earth wa in motion, as it appeared to be sgirinst the expres words of Scripture. The decree of the Inquisition against Galileo is not formally a papal document, and not signed byThe.Pope. lie was, moreover, sentenced sen-tenced to remain a prisoner at the good will of t'o court, and to recite the seven Penitential Psalms once a week for three years. T this sentence G.d-ileo G.d-ileo submissivevly biVed: and without ever uttering utter-ing "eppur si muove," (it moves., however) words constantly attributed to him. he leff the presence o his judges. It was at t-U", pleasing villa of Ascctri. about a mile from Flonmce. that Galileo was located, at a short distance from the Church of St. Matthew, where his two daughters were cloistered nuns. To this convent the father used often to go in order to enjoy the sweet conversation of his daughters, and to be comforted by the many proofs of tender affection affec-tion his children gave him. To us who live in times when the system of Cop- I ernicus is no more retarded as a theory but as a, demonstrated truth. it.J-et'ms very easy to reconcile it with Holy ScriptUii by saying that Scriptur never intended to teach any astronomical system, but that it spoke of the earth, sun, moon and star as they appear to the human eye (as all men. in- " -i eluding astronomers, st.ill commonly speak of sunrise sun-rise and sunset), accommodating itself to the popular popu-lar way of speaking bur it was not a very easy thins when the Sopernican system was only a theory supported sup-ported by mere probabilities. Xo wonder then the Protestants of that age feH ' into the same mistake. of denouncing as warmly a Catholics the rotary system of the earth as clashing clash-ing with Holy. Scripture. As a proof of this I here subjoin part of a cor- j respondence written in the year 1S.13. about Kepler, j : to the editor of the London Catholic Standard: J "Dear Sir: On perusing in a German new-spa- - per a few days ago. a very full report of an eloquent -discourse delivered at Leeds by the Cardinal Arch- : bishop of Westminster (Wiseman), on the eneouy- agement given to science by tho Catholic church i occurred to me, apropos to Galileo and the Komiu . Inquisition, that we Catlvlies would do well to bring more prominently forward than we are accus- i tomed to do, another eontcunparaneuos event of ,r similar kind one which entitles us to reply to every taunt easr'at us on account of Galileo, that evr- granting his ecclesiastical judges condemned him in the manner popularly supposed, they at least did m do so without first having the example set them bv a Protestant tribunal not tn,: their own, and under un-der circumstances just the - i.e.' ; I allude here to the coi;cemnatiou of the eele-brated eele-brated astronomer Kepler IrUhe theological faculty of Tubingen, in 1590, for Vanning the identical scientific truth, finch thirty-seven years later go j S Galileo into trouble. , ' I The great majority of English Protestants are, : without doubt, ignorant of this interesting cao- which I venture to think a very fair set-off to thei i favorite story about Galilei. It may very like! have escaped the attention of many Catholics also; and therefore with your permission. Ir. Editor, f will just give the heads of it a? briefly as possible. John Kepler, born near Stuftgard, in Wurtemburg. Wurtem-burg. in 1571, I need scarcely "remark, reflected n . less lustre on Protestant Germ.uiy in the seven- (Continucd on .V age 5.) . t I; 'fey '. ! t I ; . ; '.'..' .V" Church Fosters Science. (Continued from Page 1.) teenth century than Galileo on Catholic Italy. Kepler Kep-ler it was who, bv his great discovery of the elliptical ellipti-cal form of the planetary orbits, was led to establish estab-lish those laws in astronomy known by his name, which first settled the truth of the Copernican system sys-tem on an immovable basis, purifying it as he did from the erroneous hypothesis of the circular orbits, or-bits, its great author had still left adhering to it-For it-For doing this, Bailli, in his Historic de l'Astrono-mie l'Astrono-mie Moderne, calls Kepler "one of the greatest mon that ever appeared on the earth," and "the true founder of Modern Astronomy." When he wrote his celebrated work, whose lengthy title begins with the words, "Prodromu Dissertationum Cosmographicarum," etcc, in which he undertook by argument to demonstrate the truth of the Copernican system not less reprobated at, that time by the Protestants of Germany and England Eng-land than by the Catholics of Italy, he had to lav-it lav-it before the Academical Senate of Tubingen fo their approbation, without which, in the regular course of things, it could not be printed. The unanimous unan-imous decision of the- Divines comprising this senate sen-ate was that Kepler's book contained a deadly heresy, here-sy, because it contradicted the teaching of the Bible in that Passage where Joshua commands the sun to stand still. To this Kepler replied "tthat, as the Bible addressed itself to mankind, in general, it spoke of things in the life of the men as men in general are accustomed to speak of them ; that the Bible was in no respect a Manual of Optics or Astronomy, As-tronomy, but had much higher objects in view; tha it was a blamable abuse to seek in it for answer" to worldly things; that Joshua had wished to have the day prolonged and God had responded to hi wish ; how this had happened was not a subject for inquiry. Such an answer as this might at least have been expected to make an impression on a body of theologians, whose religious creed was the right of every man to explain the Bible for himself. So far from this, they repeated their condemnation with more -acerbity than before, and had not the Duke of Wurteinburg, who was personally attached to Kepler, interposed in his behalf, he would inevitably inevi-tably have been subjected to a persecution far more rigorous than anything Galileo underwent. As it was, the vexations with which his clerical opponents contrived to embitter his existence on account of - - 'V - i "v his opinions in spite of the Duke's protection, were such as occasioned him to write in despair to his friend Mastlin. "that he held it for the best to imitate im-itate the disciples of Pythagoras, and keep silence on the discoveries he had made, lest, like Apian, he should lose his situation, and be doomed to die of hunger." The upshot was that he quitted Wurten burg, and fled for refuge whither? to the Jesuit of Gratz and Ingoldstadt! who, staunch Protestant as he was to the last, honored his great talents, and received him with open arms because of the services serv-ices he had rendered to science. Eventually, on the death of Tycho Brahe. he received the appointment of Court Astronomer to the Emperor Rudolph II., at Prague. I am. very truly yours, R. RABY. Munich. Saturday in Holy Week, IS."):. |