“5. That he contemns authors who are of a contrary opinion, and those whom Holy Church chiefly employs.
“6. That he perniciously asserts and sets forth that, in the apprehension of geometrical matters, there is some equality between the Divine and human mind.
“7. That he had represented it to be an argument for the truth that Ptolemaics go over to the Copernicans, but not vice versa.
“8. That he had erroneously ascribed the tides in the ocean to the stability of the sun and the motion of the earth, which do not exist.”
The special commission, however, by no means draws the conclusion from all these errors and failings, that the “Dialogues” should be prohibited, but says: “All these things could be corrected, if it was thought that the book to which such favour should be shown were of any value.”
Immediately after this follows the seventh point, saying that “the author had transgressed the mandate of the Holy Office of 1616, ‘that he should relinquish the said opinion,’ etc.—down to, ‘and promised to obey.’”[292]
Herewith the memorial of the preliminary commission concludes. It draws no conclusions from the facts adduced, but leaves that to his Holiness the Pope. The last count confirms Galileo’s chief offence: he is guilty of having disobeyed a special mandate of the ecclesiastical authorities, has broken a solemn promise made before a notary and witnesses. Such a crime, according to inquisitorial usage, demanded severe punishment. The perfidy of 1616 had signally triumphed.