A CANDID ADMISSION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 207, 23 March 1877, Page 17

A CANDID ADMISSION.

The ' Appeal,' of Chicago, the organ of the Reformed Episcopalians, has the following in its December number : — If one attacks the Romish Church, Galileo is his gun of largest calibre. If one assails Christianity, Galileo is a whole battery. The popular impression is, probably, that Galileo was a pious, t^thful,. learned man of science, who was hung, drawn and quarte*d by the Christian religion. In the face of all the tears, eloquence and indignation which have been vented over this one solitary scientific "martyr," it is most cruel to tell the truth about him. He is such a magnificent weapon against the Jesuits that we Protestants are loth to give him up. But let us do justice even to the Devil. Galileo's condemnation was the work of the science of his day j his enemies were his fellow astronomers, who sought untiringly to overthrow him. All the protection and supporthe received was directly or indirectly from ecclesiastics. The Roman Inquisition repeatedly refused to prosecute him, though urged to do so, and when at length his scientific enemies -who all were advocates of the Ptolemaic System, forced the Inquisition to try him, the Holy Office contented itself with permitting him to maintain that Copernicanism. was " scientifically likely in the highest degree but not to teach it was absolutely proven." Under this decree the Inquisition virtually stood between him and his hostile scientific brethren for seventeen years.