Galileo, who had received copies of these letters, thanked Peiresc most warmly in a letter of 21st February, 1635, for his noble though fruitless efforts, and added the following remarkable words:—
“As I have said, I do not hope for any amelioration, and this because I have not committed any crime. I might expect pardon and favour if I had done wrong, for wrong-doing affords rulers occasion for the exercise of clemency and pardon, while towards an innocent man under condemnation, it behoves them to maintain the utmost severity, in order to show that they have proceeded according to law. But believe me, revered sir, and it will console you to know it, this troubles me less than would be supposed, for two grounds of consolation continually come to my aid: one of these is, that in looking all through my works, no one can find the least shadow of anything which deviates from love and veneration for the Holy Church; the other is my own conscience, which can only be fully known to myself on earth and to God in heaven. He knows that in the cause for which I suffer, many might have acted and spoken with far more learning and knowledge, but no one, not even among the holy fathers, with more piety and greater zeal for the Holy Church, nor altogether with purer intentions. My sincerely religious, pious spirit would only be the more apparent if the calumnies, intrigues, stratagems, and deceptions, which were resorted to eighteen years ago to deceive and blind the authorities, were brought to the light of day.”[499]
If the issue of the assumed stringent prohibition of 1616 were admitted, this letter would be a piece of hypocrisy as glaring as it was purposeless; for in that case Galileo would not have been an innocent man under condemnation, who had committed no crime, and his conscience could not have consoled him in his painful situation. What he wrote to Peiresc about his religious spirit was also quite true, Galileo really was a truly religious man; his own revolutionary discoveries had not for a moment given rise to any doubts in his mind of supernatural mysteries as taught by the Roman Catholic Church. All his letters, even to his most intimate friends, proclaim it indisputably. He also perfectly well knew how to make his researches and their results agree with the dogmas of his religion, as is clear from his explanations to Castelli, Mgr. Dini, and the Grand Duchess Christine. The strangest contradictions were continually arising from this blending of a learned man striving to search out the truths of nature, and a member of the only true Church bound in the fetters of illusive credulity. Thus, at the end of 1633, he did not hesitate to act in opposition to his solemn oath, literally construed, by secretly sending a copy of his condemned and prohibited “Dialogues” to Diodati, at Paris, that they might be translated into Latin, and thus be more widely circulated. In 1635 the work really appeared in a Latin translation, from the press of the Elzevirs, in Holland, edited by a Strasburg professor, Mathias Bernegger, in order that no suspicion might rest upon Galileo of having had anything to do with it.[500] Such an act was very improper for a pious Catholic, and Galileo really was one. In the following year, however, he told his old friend, Fra Fulgenzio Micanzio, at Venice, with great delight, that Bernegger had brought out by the same publishers the Apology to the Grand Duchess Christine of 1615, in Italian with a Latin translation. The secret translator, concealed under the pseudonym of Ruberto Robertini Borasso, was also Diodati.[501] In a letter to Micanzio, as well as in another of 12th July, Galileo expressed an ardent wish that a large number of copies of it might be introduced into Italy, “to shame his enemies and calumniators.”[502] As we know, this letter to the Grand Duchess contained nothing but a theological apology for the Copernican system, so that what gratified Galileo so much in its publication, was that the world would now learn that he, who had been denounced as a heretic, had always been an orthodox Christian, into whose head it had never entered, as his enemies gave out, to attack the holy faith. Martin is quite justified in saying that “the reputation of a good Christian and true Catholic was as dear to Galileo as that of a good astronomer.”[503]
While Galileo was enjoying the twofold satisfaction of seeing his “Dialogues” attain a wider circulation (they had meanwhile been translated into English),[504] and yet of being acknowledged as a pious subject of the Roman Catholic Church, the Count de Noailles continued his efforts at Rome, before his approaching departure from Italy, to obtain pardon for Galileo. Castelli, who, in consequence of his too great devotion to Galileo and his system, had been banished for three years from Urban’s presence, had at length, by the end of 1635, been taken into favour again,[505] and reported faithfully to Galileo all the steps taken to procure his liberty. The utmost caution had been exercised in order to attain this end.[506] Count Noailles and Castelli had persuaded Cardinal Antonio Barberini, in repeated interviews, that nothing had been further from Galileo’s intention than to offend or make game of Urban VIII., upon which the cardinal, at the request of the French ambassador, promised to intercede with his papal brother for Galileo. On 11th July Noailles made the same assurances to the Pope at an audience, whereupon he exclaimed: “Lo crediamo, lo crediamo!” (We believe it), and again said that he was personally very well disposed to Galileo, and had always liked him; but when Noailles began to speak of his liberation, he said evasively that this affair was of the greatest moment to all Christendom. The French diplomatist, who knew Urban’s irritable temper, did not think it advisable to press him further, and consoled himself for the time, even after this cool reply, with the thought that the brother cardinal had promised to use his good offices for Galileo.
Castelli informed Galileo in a letter of 12th July[507] of all this, and advised him to write a letter of thanks to Cardinal Antonio for his kind intercession, which he at once did.[508] Noailles placed all his hopes on a farewell audience with the Pope, in which he meant to ask for Galileo’s pardon. On 8th August he drove for the last time to the Vatican. Urban was very gracious, and when Galileo’s affairs were introduced he even promised at last to bring the subject before the Holy Congregation.[509] Noailles told Cardinal Antonio of this most favourable result with joyful emotion, who said at once: “Good! good! and I will speak to all the cardinals of the Holy Congregation.”[510] They were apparently justified in entertaining the most sanguine hopes, but the future taught them that all this was nothing but fair speeches with which Urban had taken leave of the French ambassador. For there can be no doubt that if the Pope, with his absolute power, had been in earnest about Galileo’s liberation, the Congregation would not have been slow to comply with his wishes. Galileo, however, remained as before, a prisoner in his villa at Arcetri, which he had meanwhile bought, and the papal favour, of which a promise had been held out, was limited to allowing him, at the end of September, to accept an invitation from the Grand Duke to visit him at his Villa Mezzomonte, three miles from Florence,[511] and on 16th October to leave his place of exile for one day to greet the Count de Noailles, at Poggibonsi, in passing through it on his way to France.[512] This was the extent of the papal clemency for the present, and it was not till the old man was quite blind and hopelessly ill, with one foot in the grave, that any humane feeling was awakened for him at the Vatican.
CHAPTER II.
FAILING HEALTH AND LOSS OF SIGHT.
Galileo’s Labours at Arcetri.—Completion of the “Dialoghi delle Nuove Scienze.”—Sends it to the Elzevirs at Leyden.—Method of taking Longitudes at Sea.—Declined by Spain and offered to Holland.—Discovery of the Libration and Titubation of the Moon.—Visit from Milton.—Becomes Blind.—Letter to Diodati.—On a hint from Castelli petitions for his Liberty.—The Inquisitor to visit him and report to Rome.—Permitted to live at Florence under Restrictions.—The States-General appoint a Delegate to see him on the Longitude Question.—The Inquisitor sends word of it to Rome.—Galileo not to receive a Heretic.—Presents from the States-General refused from fear of Rome.—Letter to Diodati.—Galileo supposed to be near his End.—Request that Castelli might come to him.—Permitted under Restrictions.—The new “Dialoghi” appear at Leyden, 1638.—They founded Mechanical Physics.—Attract much Notice.—Improvement of Health.—In 1639 goes to Arcetri again, probably not voluntarily.
Galileo was unceasingly active in his seclusion at Arcetri. In the year 1636 he completed his famous “Dialoghi delle Nuove Scienze.”[513] He also exerted himself, like a loving father who wishes to see his children provided for before he dies, about the preservation and republication of his works which were quite out of print. But all these efforts were frustrated by envy, ecclesiastical intolerance, and the unfavourable times. His cherished scheme of bringing out an edition of his collected works could neither be carried out by the French mathematician, Carcavy, who had warmly taken up the subject,[514] nor by the Elzevirs through the mediation of Micanzio.[515] He had also to give up his project of dedicating his “Dialoghi delle Nuove Scienze” to the German Emperor, Ferdinand II., and of publishing them at Vienna, as he learnt from his friend and former pupil there, Giovanni Pieroni, that his implacable foes, the Jesuits, were all-powerful; that Ferdinand himself was entirely under their influence; and moreover that his bitterest foe, Father Scheiner, was just then at Vienna.[516] In the following year, however (1637), Pieroni succeeded by his prudent and untiring efforts, during the temporary absence of Scheiner, in obtaining a licence for Galileo’s latest work,[517] and afterwards one at Olmütz also; but meanwhile he had sent the MS. by Micanzio[518] to be printed by the Elzevirs at Leyden, and, under the circumstances described by Pieroni, he did not prefer to bring out his book at a place where his bitterest enemies were in power.