“Thursday, 25th February, 1616. The Lord Cardinal Mellini notified to the Reverend Fathers the Assessors and the Commissary of the Holy Office, that the censure passed by the theologians upon the propositions of Galileo—to the effect particularly that the sun is the centre of the world, and immovable from its place, and that the earth moves, and also with a diurnal motion—had been reported; and His Holiness has directed the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine to summon before him the said Galileo, and admonish him to abandon the said opinion; and in case of his refusal to obey, that the Commissary is to intimate to him, before a notary and witnesses, a command to abstain altogether from teaching or defending this opinion and doctrine, and even from discussing it; and if he do not acquiesce therein, that he is to be imprisoned.”[138] This is followed in the Vatican MS. by a record intended to look like an official report on the course of the proceedings ordained above. Every unbiassed reader will expect to find in it either that Galileo refused to obey the admonitions of the cardinal, and that the Commissary-General of the Inquisition then issued the other strict injunction, or that Galileo immediately submitted, in which case the official of the Inquisition would not have had to interfere. Instead of this we find the following document, couched half in a narrative tone, half like the report of a notary:— “Friday, the 26th.—At the Palace, the usual residence of the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine, the said Galileo having been summoned and brought before the said Lord Cardinal, was, in presence of the Most Revd. Michael Angelo Segnezzio, of the order of preachers, Commissary-General of the Holy Office, by the said Cardinal warned of the error of the aforesaid opinion, and admonished to abandon it; and immediately thereafter, before me and before witnesses, the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine being still present, the said Galileo was by the said Commissary commanded and enjoined, in the name of His Holiness the Pope, and the whole Congregation of the Holy Office, to relinquish altogether the said opinion that the sun is the centre of the world and immovable, and that the earth moves; nor henceforth to hold, teach, or defend it in any way whatsoever, verbally or in writing; otherwise proceedings would be taken against him in the Holy Office; which injunction the said Galileo acquiesced in and promised to obey. Done at Rome, in the place aforesaid, in presence of Badino Nores, of Nicosia, in the kingdom of Cyprus, and Augustino Mongardo, from a place in the Abbacy of Rottz, in the diocese of Politianeti, inmates of the said Cardinal’s house, witnesses.”[139]