Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great ScientistsHubbard, Elbert
Science
Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists
Hubbard, Elbert
Scientists -- Biography
There are denials from Churchmen that Galileo was so much as imprisoned.
One writer has even tried to show that Galileo was a guest of the Pope
and dined daily at his table. The other side has told us that Galileo
was thrust into a dungeon, his eyes put out, and his old broken-down
form tortured on the wheel.
Recent careful researches reveal that neither side told the truth. We
have official record of the case written out at the time for the
Vatican archives. Galileo was imprisoned and the order of torture
issued, but it was never enforced. Perhaps it was not the intention to
enforce it: it may have been only a "war measure."
Galileo was alternately taken from dungeon to palace that he might
realize which course was best for him to pursue--oppose the Church or
uphold it.
Thus we see that there was some truth in the statement that "he dined
daily with the Pope."
That the man was subjected to much indignity, all the world now knows.
The official records are in the Vatican, and the attempt to conceal them
longer is out of the question. Wise Churchmen no longer deny the
blunders of the past, but they say with Cardinal Satolli, "The enemies
of the Church have ever been o'er-zealous Churchmen."
On bended knees, Galileo, a man of threescore and ten, broken in health,
with spirit crushed, repeated after a priest these words: "I, Galileo
Galilei, being in my seventieth year, a prisoner, on my knees before
your Eminences, the Cardinals of the Holy See, having before mine eyes
the Holy Bible, which I touch with my hands and kiss with my lips, do
abjure, curse and detest the error and heresy of the movement of the
earth."
He also was made to sign the recantation. On arising from his knees,
legend declares that he said, "Yet the earth does move!"
It is hardly probable that the words reached his lips, although they may
have been in his mind. But we must remember the man's heart was broken,
and he was in a mental condition where nothing really mattered. To
complete his dishonor, all of his writings were placed on the "Index,"
and he was made to swear that he would inform the Inquisition of any man
whom he should hear or discover supporting the heresy of the motion of
the earth. The old man was then released, a prisoner on parole, and
allowed to make his way home to Florence, which he did by easy stages,
helped along the way by friendly monks who discussed with him all
questions but those of astronomy.
Galileo's eldest daughter, a nun, whose home was near his, was so
affected by the humiliation of her father that she fell into a nervous
decline and died very soon after he reached home.
Between these two there had been a close bond of love and tender
sympathy, and her death seemed almost the crowning calamity.
But once back in his village home at Arcetri, Galileo again went to work
with his telescope, mapping the heavens.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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