also confessed that you began to write the said book ten or twelve years ago, after the order aforesaid had been given. Also, that you demanded license to publish it, but without signifying to those who granted you this permission, that you had been commanded not to hold, defend, or teach, the said doctrine in any manner. You also confessed that the style of the said book was, in many places, so composed, that the reader might think the arguments adduced on the false side to be so worded, as more effectually to entangle the understanding than to be easily solved, alleging, in excuse, that you have thus run into an error, foreign (as you say) to your intention, from writing in the form of a dialogue, and in consequence of the natural complacency which every one feels with regard to his own subtilties, and in showing himself more skilful than the generality of mankind in contriving, even in favour of false propositions, ingenious and apparently probable arguments.

"And, upon a convenient time being given you for making your defence, you produced a certificate in the hand-writing of His Eminence, the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine, procured, as you said, by yourself, that you might defend yourself against the calumnies of your enemies, who reported that you had abjured your opinions, and had been punished by the Holy Office; in which certificate it is declared, that you had not abjured nor had been punished, but merely that the declaration made by His Holiness, and promulgated by the Holy Congregation of the Index, had been announced to you, which declares that the opinion of the motion of the earth and stability of the sun, is contrary to the Holy Scriptures, and therefore cannot be held or defended. Wherefore, since no mention is there made of two articles of the order, to wit, the order 'not to teach,' and 'in any manner,' you argued that we ought to believe that, in the lapse of fourteen or sixteen years, they had escaped your memory, and that this was also the reason why you were silent as to the order, when you sought permission to publish your book, and that this is said by you, not to excuse your error, but that it may be attributed to vain-glorious ambition rather than to malice. But this very certificate, produced on your behalf, has greatly aggravated your offence, since it is therein declared that the said opinion is contrary to the Holy Scriptures, and yet you have dared to treat fit, and to argue that it is probable; nor is there any extenua

in the license artfully and cunningly extorted by you, since

you did not intimate the command imposed upon you. But whereas, it appeared to Us, that you had not disclosed the whole truth with regard to your intentions, We thought it necessary to proceed to the rigorous examination of you, in which (without any prejudice to what you had confessed, and which is above detailed against you, with regard to your said intention) you answered like a good Catholic.

"Therefore, having seen and maturely considered the merits of your cause, with your said confessions and excuses, and everything else which ought to be seen and considered, We have come to the underwritten final sentence against you:

"Invoking, therefore, the most holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of his Most Glorious Virgin Mother, Mary, by this Our final sentence, which, sitting in council and judgment for the tribunal of the Reverend Masters of Sacred Theology, and Doctors of both Laws, Our Assessors, We put forth in this writing touching the matters and controversies before Us, beween the Magnificent Charles Sincerus, Doctor of both Laws, Fiscal Proctor of this Holy Office, of the one part, and you, Galileo Galilei, an examined and confessed criminal from this present writing now in progress, as above, of the other part, We pronounce, judge, and declare, that you, the said Galileo, by reason of these things which have been detailed in the course of this writing, and which, as above, you have confessed, have rendered yourself vehemently suspected, by this Holy Office, of heresy; that is to say, that you believe and hold the false doctrine, and contrary to the Holy and Divine Scriptures, namely, that the sun is the centre of the world, and that it does not move from east to west, and that the earth does move, and is not the centre of the world; also, that an opinion can be held and sup. ported, as probable, after it has been declared and finally decreed contrary to the Holy Scripture, and, consequently, that you have incurred all the censures and penalties enjoined and promulgated in the sacred canons, and other general and particular constitutions against delinquents of this description. From which it is Our pleasure that you be absolved, provided that, with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith, in Our presence, you abjure, curse, and detest, the said errors and heresies, and every other error and heresy, contrary to the Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome, in the form now shown to you.

"But that your grievous and pernicious error and transgression

may not go altogether unpunished, and that you may be made more cautious in future, and may be a warning to others to abstain from delinquencies of this sort, We decree, that the book of the Dialogues of Galileo Galilei be prohibited by a public edict, and We condemn you to the formal prison of this Holy Office for a period determinable at Our pleasure; and, by way of salutary penance, We order you, during the next three years, to recite, once a week, the seven penitential psalms, reserving to Ourselves the power of moderating, commuting, or taking off the whole or part of the said punishment or penance.

"And so We say, pronounce, and by Our sentence declare, decree, and reserve, in this and in every other better form and manner, which lawfully We may and can use. So We, the subscribing Cardinals, pronounce." [Subscribed by seven Cardinals.]

In conformity with the foregoing sentence, Galileo was made to kneel before the Inquisition, and make the following Abjuration :

"I, Galileo Galilei, son of the late Vincenzo Galilei, of Florence, aged seventy years, being brought personally to judgment, and kneeling before you, Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lords Cardinals, General Inquisitors of the Universal Christian Republic against heretical depravity, having before my eyes the Holy Gospels, which I touch with my own hands, swear, that I have always believed, and, with the help of God, will in futur believe, every article which the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome holds, teaches, and preaches. But, because I had been enjoined, by this Holy Office, altogether to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the sun is the centre and immoveable, and forbidden to hold, defend, or teach, the said false doctrine, in any manner; and after it had been signified to ne that the said doctrine is repugnant to the Holy Scripture, I have written and printed a book, in which I treat of the same doctrine now condemned, and adduce reasons with great force in support of the same, without giving any solution, and therefore have been judged grievously suspected of heresy; that is to say, that I held and believed that the sun is the centre of the world and immoveable, and that the earth is not the centre and moveable; willing, therefore, to remove from the minds of You Eminences, and of every Catholic Christian, this vehement sus picion rightfully entertained towards me, with a sincere heart

and unfeigned faith, I abjure, curse, and detest, the said errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect contrary to the said Holy Church; and I swear, that I will never more in future say or assert anything, verbally or in writing, which may give rise to a similar suspicion of me; but if I shall know any heretic, or any one suspected of heresy, that I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor and Ordinary of the place in which I may be. I swear, moreover, and promise, that I will fulfil and observe fully, all the penances which have been or shall be laid on me by this Holy Office. But if it shall happen that I violate any of my said promises, oaths, and protestations (which God avert !) I subject myself to all the pains and punishments which have been decreed and promulgated by the sacred canons, and other general and particular constitutions, against delinquents of this description. So may God help me, and his Holy Gospels, which I touch with my own hands. I, the abovenamed Galileo Galilei, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound myself as above; and, in witness thereof, with my own hand have subscribed this present writing of my abjuration, which I have recited, word for word.

"At Rome, in the Convent of Minerva, twenty-second of June 1633, I, Galileo Galilei, have abjured as above, with my own hand."

Rising from his knees, after this humiliating lie, wrung from the aged philosopher by such horrible means, he turned to one who stood near, and exclaimed, “E pur se muove." For all this, it does move!

From the court Galileo was conducted to prison, to be immured for life in one of the dungeons of the Inquisition. His sentence was afterwards mitigated, and he was permitted to return to Florence; but the humiliation to which he had been subjected pressed even more heavily on his spirits than the cruel tortures which had been inflicted on him, beset as he already was with infirmities, and totally blind, au Le never more talked or wrote on the subject of astronomy.

There is enough in the character of Galileo to command a high admiration. There is much, also, in his sufferings in the cause of science, to excite the deepest sympathy, and even compassion. He is, moreover, universally represented to have been a man of great equanimity, and of a noble and generous disposition. No scientific character of the age, or perhaps of any age, forms a

structure of finer proportions, or wears in a higher degree the grace of symmetry. Still we cannot but regret his employing artifice in the promulgation of truth; and we are compelled to lament that his lofty spirit bowed in the final conflict. How far, therefore, he sinks below the dignity of the Christian martyr! "At the age of seventy," says Dr. Brewster, in his Life of Sir Isaac Newton, "on his bended knees, and with his right hand resting on the Holy Evangelists. did this patriarch of science avow his present and past belief in the dogmas of the Romish Church, abandon as false and heretical the doctrine of the earth's motion and of the sun's immobility, and pledge himself to denounce to the Inquisition any other person who was even suspected of heresy. He abjured, cursed, and detested, those eternal and immutable truths which the Almighty had permitted him to be the first to establish. Had Galileo but added the courage of the martyr to the wisdom of the sage; had he carried the glance of his indignant eye round the circle of his judges; had he lifted his hands to heaven, and called the living God to witness the truth and immutability of his opinions, the bigotry of his enemies would have been disarmed, and science would have enjoyed a memorable triumph."