We come now to that perplexing question, “Why did he recant? How could he, who was so evidently a freethinker and a rationalist, honestly affirm his belief in the Roman Catholic dogmas?” His confession seems to be straightforward and candid: had he wished to propitiate the Inquisitors, he needed only not to mention his philosophical doubts about the Incarnation and the Trinity; he needed only to admit that there were in his writings errors which he no longer approved, and to throw himself on the mercy of his tribunal. What, then, was the motive? Was it physical fear? Did life and liberty seem too tempting to him who loved both so intensely; preferable to death, no matter how great the sacrifice of honor? Did he simply perjure himself? Or was he suddenly overcome by a doubt that his opinions might be, after all, wrong, and that the Church might be right? He testified, and others testified, that before he had any thought of being brought to trial he had determined to make his peace with the Pope, and to obtain leave, if he could, to pass the remainder of his life in philosophical tranquillity. Did the early religious associations and prejudices, which he supposed had long ago ceased to influence him, unexpectedly spring up, to reassert a temporary tyranny over his reason? Many men not in jeopardy of their lives have had this experience of the tenacious vitality of the doctrines taught to them before they could reason. Did it seem to him a huge Aristophanic joke that a church which then had but little real faith and less true religion in it should call any one to account for any opinions, and that therefore the lips might well enough accept her dogmas without binding the heart to them? Many men, who believed themselves sincere, have subscribed in a “non-natural sense” to the Thirty-nine Articles of Anglicanism; did Bruno subscribe to the Catholic Articles under a similar mental reservation? Or, believing, as he did, that every religion contains fragments of the truth, could he not honestly say he believed in Catholicism, at the same time holding that her symbols had a deeper significance than her theologians perceived, and that the truth he apprehended was immeasurably wider?--just as a mathematician might subscribe to the multiplication table, knowing that it is not the final bound of mathematical truth, but only the first step towards higher and unlimited investigations.