Nearly a month later (June 16), by order of the Pope, Galileo was once again interrogated, this time under threat of torture.[275] Once again he declared the opinion of Ptolemy true and indubitable and said he did not hold and had not held this doctrine of Copernicus after he had been informed of the order to abandon it. "As for the rest," he added, "I am in your hands, do with me as you please." "I am here to obey."[276] Then by the order of the Pope, ensued Galileo's complete abjuration on his knees in the presence of the full Congregation, coupled with his promise to denounce other heretics (i.e., Copernicans).[277] In addition, because he was guilty of the heresy of having held and believed a doctrine declared and defined as contrary to the Scriptures, he was sentenced to "formal imprisonment" at the will of the Congregation, and to repeat the seven penitential Psalms every week for three years.[278] [Footnote 275: Ibid: 101.] [Footnote 276: Doc. in Favaro: 101.] [Footnote 277: Doc. in Favaro: 146.] [Footnote 278: Ibid: 145.] At Galileo's earnest request, his sentence was commuted almost at once, to imprisonment first in the archiepiscopal palace in Siena (from June 30-December 1), then in his own villa at Arcetri, outside Florence, though under strict orders not to receive visitors but to live in solitude.[279] In the spring his increasing illness occasioned another request for greater liberty in order to have the necessary visits from the doctor; but on March 23, 1634, this was denied him with a stern command from the Pope to refrain from further petitions lest the Sacred Congregation be compelled to recall him to their prisons in Rome.[280] [Footnote 279: Ibid: 103, 129.] [Footnote 280: Ibid: 134.] The rule forbidding visitors seems not to have been rigidly enforced all the time, for Milton visited him, "a prisoner of the Inquisition" in 1638;[281] yet Father Castelli had to write to Rome for permission to visit him to learn his newly invented method of finding longitude at sea.[282] When in Florence on a very brief stay to see his doctor, Galileo had to have the especial consent of the Inquisitor in order to attend mass at Easter. He won approval from the Holy Congregation, however, by refusing to receive some gifts and letters brought him by some German merchants from the Low Countries.[283] He was then totally blind, but he dragged out his existence until January 8, 1642 (the year of Newton's birth), when he died. As the Pope objected to a public funeral for a man sentenced by the Holy Office, he was buried without even an epitaph.[284] The first inscription was made 31 years later, and in 1737, his remains were removed to Santa Croce after the Congregation had first been asked if such action would be unobjectionable.[285] [Footnote 281: Milton: _Areopagitica_: 35.] [Footnote 282: Doc. in Favaro: 135.] [Footnote 283: Ibid: 137.] [Footnote 284: Fahie: 402.] [Footnote 285: Doc. in Favaro: 138; and Fahie: 402.]