Galileo's Dream

by Kim Stanley Robinson

  There were forces swirling around Rome, descending on this trial.

  The Villa Medici was much the same as it had been eighteen years before: a big blocky white building, surrounded by extensive formal gardens that were full of old Roman statues, slowly melting into smooth marble plinths. The ambassador Francesco Niccolini welcomed Galileo into the place with the greatest of solicitation, in marked contrast to the greetings Galileo had gotten on previous visits. Each time he came to Rome his standing was inexplicably different than it had been the times before. A dreamlike place; and this time a nightmare. But in this nightmare—incongruously, thankfully—there emerged this friendly and generous face.

  “I am here to help you in any way I can,” Niccolini said, and Galileo could see in his face that it would be true.

  “Where do such good people come from?” Galileo asked Cartophilus that afternoon, as the ancient servant unpacked his bags. Their rooms had east-facing windows this time, and a high ceiling; they were beautiful.

  “The Niccolini have always been a force in Florence,” Cartophilus said blandly into the big wardrobe where he was hanging Galileo’s shirts.

  Galileo blew air between his lips rudely. “This is no ordinary Niccolini.”

  Ordinary or not, he was a generous host and a fine advocate. He arranged meeting after meeting with the crucial cardinals, and joined many of the meetings to ask for the cardinals’ help. He worked around all the edges, and at the center he asked for yet another audience with Urban for himself, to arrange if possible for lenient and swift treatment of the old astronomer, stressing Galileo’s official capacity at the Tuscan Court, and his advanced age.

  However, as Niccolini described it in his letter to Cioli in Florence, the pope was unmoved by these appeals.

  He replied to me that Signor Galilei will be examined in due course, but there is an argument which no one has ever been able to answer: that is, God is omnipotent and can do anything; and since He is omnipotent, why do we want to bind Him? I said that I was not competent to discuss these subjects, but I had heard Signor Galilei himself say that first, he did not hold the opinion of the earth’s motion as true, and then that since God could make the world in innumerable ways, one could not deny, after all, that He might have made it this way. However, the Pope got upset at that, and told me that one must not impose necessity on the blessed God. Seeing that he was losing his temper, I did not want to continue discussing what I did not understand, and thus displease him to the detriment of Signor Galilei. So I said that, in short, Galileo was here to obey and to retract everything for which he could be blamed in regard to religion; then, in order not to arouse suspicion that I too might offend the Holy Office, I changed the subject.

  Before the papal audience was over, Niccolini requested that Galileo be allowed to stay at the Villa Medici even during his trial, but the pope denied the request, saying he would be given good rooms at the Holy Office, inside the Vatican.

  When I got home I did not tell Galileo about the plan to move him to the Holy Office during the trial as I was sure this would worry him a great deal and would make him restless until that time, especially since it is not known yet when they will want him.

  I do not like His Holiness’s attitude, which is not at all mollified.

  Galileo was then left to fret in the Villa Medici and its gardens for over two months. There was nothing to do but sit in the formal gardens and watch the shadows move on the sundials, and think, and endure. Day followed day, all the same.

  On April 9, 1633, his old student Cardinal Francesco Barberini appeared at the Villa Medici to break the long silence. He warned Niccolini that the trial would begin soon, and that Galileo would indeed be ordered to stay at the Holy Office during it.

  However, Niccolini wrote to Cioli, I could hide neither the ill health of this good old man, who for two whole nights had constantly moaned and screamed on account of his arthritic pains, nor his advanced age, nor the hardship he would suffer as a result.

  Niccolini therefore persisted with Urban.

  … this morning I spoke to His Holiness about it, who said he was sorry that Signor Galilei had gotten involved in this subject, which he considers to be very serious and of great consequence for religion.

  Nevertheless, Signor Galilei tries to defend his opinions very strongly; but I exhorted him, in the interest of a quick resolution, not to bother maintaining them, and to submit to what he sees they want him to hold or believe about any detail of the Earth’s motion. He was extremely distressed by this, and, as far as I am concerned, since yesterday he looks so depressed that I fear greatly for his life.

  This whole house is extremely fond of him and feels unspeakably sorry about it.

  Spies and rumormongers were spreading every kind of story explaining the situation, but it still was not clear to those in Galileo’s camp what was going on in the Vatican, or why. But understanding or not, the day came; and the trial began. On April 12, 1633, at ten in the morning, Galileo was escorted into the Vatican through the Arch of Bells to the palace of the Holy Office, a domed building on the south side of St. Peter’s Cathedral. Swiss Guards led the little contingent of inquisitors and the accused man down the halls to a small room, walled with white plaster and decorated only by a single large crucifix. A large desk occupied the center of the room; the inquisitors stood behind it, the accused before it, and a Dominican nun serving as recording scribe sat at a tall writing desk to the side. Servants stood in waiting in the hall outside, silent and unnoticed.

  The chief inquisitor was one of the cardinals, Vincenzo Maculano di Firenzuola, a thin Dominican about the same height as Galileo. His ascetic life had left the skin of his face so wrinkled, and his eyes so sunken, that he appeared almost older than the aged astronomer, though he was only forty-five. His nose was large, his mouth small.

  As the trial began his gaze was sharp, although his mouth had a relaxed and even a friendly set to it. “Time for a deposition,” he said gently.

  Summoned, there appeared personally in Rome at the palace of the Holy Office, in the usual quarters of the Reverend Father Commissary, in the presence of the Reverend Father Fra Vincenzo Maculano of Firenzuola, Commissary General, and of his assistant Reverend Father Carlo Sinceri, Prosecutor of the Holy Office, etc.

  Galileo, son of the late Vincenzio Galilei, Florentine, seventy years old, who, having taken a formal oath to tell the truth, was asked by the Fathers the following:

  He was asked: By what means and how long ago did he come to Rome.

  Answer: I arrived in Rome the first Sunday of Lent, and I came in a litter.

  Cardinal Maculano’s questions were asked, and recorded by the nun, in Latin, while Galileo’s answers were made and recorded in Italian. At the first sound of Galileo’s Tuscan vernacular, Maculano looked up from the desk, surprised; but after a moment’s hesitation he did not stop the answer, or request that Galileo make his replies in Latin. He only spoke his next question in Latin again:

  “Did you come of your own accord, or were you called, or were you ordered by someone to come to Rome, and if so, by whom?”

  Galileo answered as seriously as if this were the crux of the matter. “In Florence the Father Inquisitor ordered me to come to Rome to present myself to the Holy Office, this being an injunction by the officials of the Holy Office.”

  “Do you know, or can you guess, the reason why you were ordered to come to Rome?”

  Galileo said, “I imagine that the reason why I have been ordered to present myself to the Holy Office in Rome is to account for my recently printed book. I imagine this because of the injunction to the printer and to myself, a few days before I was ordered to come to Rome, not to issue any more of these books, and similarly because the printer was ordered by the Father Inquisitor to send the original manuscript of my book to the Holy Office in Rome.”

  Maculano nodded at this. “Please explain the character of the book on account of which you think you were ordered to come to Rome.”

>   “It is a book written in dialogue form, and it treats of the constitution of the world—that is, of the two chief systems. Also the arrangements of the heavens and the elements.”

  “If you were shown the said book, would you be prepared to identify it as yours?”

  “I hope so,” Galileo said. “I hope that if the book is shown to me, I would recognize it.”

  Maculano glanced up sharply at him. Was this sarcasm? A feeble attempt at a joke? The accused man’s flat tone and innocent expression did not allow an interpretation. He was intent, on point; this was clearly serious business to him, as well it should be. His gaze was transfixed on the face of Maculano. If there was a part inside him struggling against a sharp rejoinder or sarcastic put-down, it was still bottled in him, and escaping perhaps only in quick uncontrollable squirts, odd statements that were the only shards left of a lifelong habit of skewering opponents in debate.

  This opponent was too dangerous to be touched. Maculano let a few more moments go by. Was he appreciating Galileo’s irony, or warning him that this was no time to fool around? It was just as impossible for Galileo to tell what Maculano was thinking, as it had been for Maculano to determine what Galileo had meant. Impassively they stared at each other. Suddenly those of us watching had it brought home to us what this was going to be like; it was rhetoric as chess, but with an executioner standing behind the man playing the black pieces. He was one of the smartest scientists ever to live, but chess is not science; and this was not exactly chess.

  And who was the man playing white? Who was this tall emaciated Maculano from Firenzuola? A Dominican from Pavia, a functionary of the Holy Office, a mediocrity unnoticed by anyone until this moment. Once again a new player had stepped out of the shadows, confounding any sense that the cast of characters was fixed in number, or fully known to anybody involved. Or complete.

  Having been shown one of the books printed in Florence in 1632, whose title is Dialogue of Galileo Galilei Lincean etc., which examines the two systems of the world, and having looked at it and inspected it carefully, he said:

  “I know this book very well. It is one of those printed in Florence; and I acknowledge it as mine and written by me.”

  This was said with no inflection at all, but the inspection of the book had been rather drawn out, as if to match Maculano’s delay, perhaps thus to toss Maculano’s silent warning back into his face.

  Maculano, seeing this, again waited longer than seemed necessary. Finally he said, with a little press of deliberation or emphasis, as if warning Galileo yet again: “Do you likewise acknowledge each and every thing contained in the said book as yours?”

  Now Galileo replied quickly, almost impatiently. “I know this book shown to me, for it is one of those printed at Florence. I acknowledge all it contains as having been written by me.”

  “When and where did you compose this book, and how long did it take you?”

  “In regard to the place,” Galileo said, “I composed it in Florence, beginning ten or twelve years ago. It must have taken me seven or eight years, but not continuously.”

  “Were you in Rome any other times, especially in the year 1616, and for what occasion?”

  “I was in Rome in the year 1616,” Galileo confirmed, as if answering a real question; it had been a very famous visit. He listed all his subsequent trips to Rome as well, explaining that the most recent one was to get permission in person to publish the Dialogo. He went on to explain that the visit in 1616 was made of his own accord, because “having heard objections to Nicolaus Copernicus’s opinion on the earth’s motion, in order to be sure of holding only holy and Catholic opinions, I came to hear what was proper to hold in regard to this topic.”

  “Did you come of your own accord, or were you summoned, and what was the reason you were summoned?”

  “In 1616 I came of my own accord, without being summoned, for the reason I mentioned,” Galileo said firmly, as if correcting a student’s wrong answer in a class. Maculano nodded, and Galileo went on. “I discussed this matter with some cardinals who oversaw the Holy Office at that time, especially with Cardinals Bellarmino, Aracoeli, San Eusebio, Bonsi, and d’Ascoli.”

  “And what specifically did you discuss with the above-mentioned cardinals?”

  Galileo took a deep breath. “They wanted to be informed about Copernicus’s doctrine, his book being very difficult to understand for those who are not professional mathematicians and astronomers. In particular they wanted to understand the arrangement of the heavenly spheres according to Copernicus’s hypothesis—how he places the sun at the center of the planets’ orbits, how around the sun he places next the orbit of Mercury, around the latter that of Venus, then the moon around the earth, and outside this Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. And in regard to motion, he makes the sun stationary at the center and the earth turn on itself and around the sun, that is, on itself with the diurnal motion, and around the sun with the annual motion.”

  Maculano watched Galileo very closely, but the old man said all this as calmly as could be. “What then was decided about this matter?”

  “It was decided by the Holy Congregation that this opinion, taken absolutely, is repugnant to Holy Scripture and is to be admitted only ex suppositione,” Galileo using the Latin phrase here, as the term had a precise theological and legal meaning. Then he added, “In the way that Copernicus himself takes it.”

  This was the first of Galileo’s lies under oath. Copernicus had made it quite clear in several places in his books that he regarded his explanation of planetary movement to be both mathematically expedient and also literally true in the physical world. Galileo knew this. Very possibly Maculano knew it also.

  If so, Maculano brushed it aside. He said slowly, “And what did the Most Eminent Bellarmino tell you about this decision? Did he say anything else about the matter, and if so, what?”

  Galileo replied firmly, “Lord Cardinal Bellarmino told me that Copernicus’s opinion could be held ex suppositione, as Copernicus himself had held it. His Eminence knew that I held it ex suppositione, namely in the way that Copernicus held it.”

  Three times the lie, like Peter denying Christ. Now Maculano was frowning heavily. But Galileo forged on. He quoted from the letter Bellarmino had written to the Carmelite Father Foscarini, after the meetings of 1616 had ended; Galileo had brought a copy of this letter with him, and now he pulled it from his small stack of documents to read from it: “It seems to me that Your Paternity and Signor Galileo are proceeding prudently by limiting yourselves to speaking ex suppositione and not absolutely.”

  Maculano shrugged this off. “What was decided and then made known to you precisely, in the month of February 1616?”

  Galileo answered readily. “In the month of February 1616, Lord Cardinal Bellarmino told me that since Copernicus’s opinion, taken absolutely, was contrary to Holy Scripture, it could be neither held nor defended, but it could be taken and used ex suppositione. In conformity with this I keep a certificate by Lord Cardinal Bellarmino himself, dated May 26, 1616, in which he says that Copernicus’s opinion cannot be held or defended, being against Holy Scripture. I present a copy of this certificate, and here it is.”

  With that he showed Maculano a sheet of paper with twelve lines of writing on it. “I have the original of this certificate with me in Rome,” he added, “and it is written all in the hand of the above-mentioned Lord Cardinal Bellarmino.”

  Maculano took the copy and entered it as evidence in the case, marking it Exhibit B. His face was impassive; one could not tell if this letter’s existence was news to him or not. Certainly a signed certificate from Bellarmino allowing Galileo to discuss Copernicanism ex suppositione would seem to constitute unassailable evidence that if Galileo had written something hypothetical about Copernicus, the Church had allowed him to write it; which would mean that the accusation that had brought him here was incorrect. Which would make the Holy Office guilty of a mistake—or even of a malicious unfounded attack.

  But M
aculano did not look disturbed. He asked Galileo how he had been warned by Bellarmino, and if there had been anyone else there to witness it. Galileo described the conversation in Bellarmino’s chambers, including Segizzi and the other Dominicans who had been there.

  Maculano said, “If I read to you a transcript of what you were ordered, would you remember it?”

  “I do not recall that I was told anything else,” Galileo said, with just a trace of uneasiness at this persistence. “Nor can I know whether I shall remember what was then told me, even if it is read to me.”

  Maculano then handed him a paper of his own, which he said was the actual text of the injunction given to him by Bellarmino. “You see,” he said while Galileo was quickly reading it, “that this injunction, which was given to you in the presence of witnesses, states that you cannot in any way whatever hold, defend, or teach the said opinion. Do you remember how and by whom you were so ordered?”

  Galileo’s ruddy complexion had gone pale. He had never seen this document before, and had not known of its existence. Supposedly a record of the warning given in the meeting, it prohibited him from even teaching Copernicus, either orally or in writing. The ban on teaching or discussing was not in Bellarmino’s certificate to Galileo.

  This new injunction was not actually signed by Bellarmino, however, nor by anyone else. Galileo noted this, and saw also that it had been written on the back side of another document. This, together with the lack of any signature, made him suspicious. Segizzi must have added it to the file without Bellarmino’s knowledge. Or possibly it was even a forgery, written later, on the back of a document with a date from that time, and added to the file to give weight to any later case against him. It could have been written the previous week.