of Venerable Antiquity and proved many of their greattest and weightiest Opinions to be vain and false The Doctrine of the Antipodes by many of the Antients of approved Wisdome and Learning was held a Paradox no less absurd than this Our Opinion of the Earths Motion may seem to be as likewise that of the Habitablenesse of the Torrid Zone Of these Opinions the first was accounted unpossible by many but the latter was absolutely denyed by the unanimous consent of all But later Authors to the great felicity and perpetual Glory of their Age have not so much by Authority as by accurate diligence and indefatigable study to finde out the truth proved them both to be undoubtedly true Thus I affirm that the Antients were deceived and that in too lightly challenging Credid and Authority for their Inventions they discovered too much folly Here for brevities sake I pass by many Dreams lately detected both of Aristotle and other of the antient Philosophers who in all likelihood if they had dived into the Observations of Modern Writers and understood their Reasons would by changing their judgements have given them the precedency and would have subscribed to their manifest Truth Hereby we see that we are not to have so high a respect for the Aâ—tiens that whatever they assert should be taken upon trust and that Faith should be given to their sayings as if they were Oracles and Truths sent down from Heaven But yet which indeed is chiefly to be regarded in these matters if any thing be found out that is repugnant to Divine Authority or to the Sacred Leaves that were dictated by the Holy Ghost and by His Inspiration expounded by the Holy Doctors of the Church in this case not onely Humane reason but even Sense it self is to submitt which though by all manner of weighty Conditions and circumstances it should hold forth any thing contrary to Divine Authority which indeed is so plain that there is no way left to evade the right understanding of it yet is it to be rejected and we must conclude our selves deceived by it and believe that that is not true which Sense and Reason represents unto us For however we judge of things we have both in this and all other cases a more certain knowledge which proceeds from Divine Faith as S. Peter hath most excellently exprest it Who though with his Senses he saw and perceived the Glory of our Lord in his Transfiguration and heard his words manifesting his great Power yet nevertheless all these things compared with the Light of Faith he adds We have also a more sure word of Prophecy c. Wherefore since this Opinion of Pythagoras and Copernicus hath entred upon the Stage of the World in so strange a Dress and at the first appearance besides the rest doth seem to oppose sundry Authorities of Sacred Scripture it hath this being granted been justly rejected of all men as a meer absurdity But yet because the common Systeme of the World devised by Ptolomy hath hitherto satisfied none of the Learned hereupon a suspition is risen up amongst all even Ptolemy's followers themselves that there must be some other Systeme which is more true than this of Ptolemy For although the Phaenomena of Celestial Bodys may seem to be generally resolved by this Hypothesis yet they are found to be involved with many difficulties and referred to many devices as namely of Orbes of sundry Forms and Figures Epicicles Equations Differences Excentricks and innumerable such like fancies and Chymaera's which savour of the Ens Rationis of Logicians rather than of any Realem Essentiam Of which kinde is that of the Rapid Motion than which I finde not any thing that can be more weakly grounded and more easily controverted and disproved And such is that conceit of the Heaven void of Stars moving the inferior Heavens or Orbes All which are introduced upon occasion of the variety of the Motions of Celestial Bodyes which seemed impossible by any other way to be reduced to any certain and determinate Rule So that the Assertors of that common Opinion freely confess that in describing the Worlds Systeme they cannot as yet discover or teach the true Hypothesis thereof But that their endeavours are onely to finde out amongst many things what is most agreeable with truth and may upon better and more accomodate Reasons answer the Celestial Phaenomena Since that the Telescope an Optick Invention hath been found out by help of which many remarkable things in the Heavens most worthy to be known and till then unthought of were discovered by manifest sensation as for instance That the Moon is Mountainous Venus and Saturn Tricorporeal and Jupiter Quadricorporeal Likewise that in the Via Lactea in the Pleiades and in the Stars called Nobulosae there are many Stars and those of the greatest Magnitude which are by turns adjacent to one another and in the end it hath discovered to us new fixed Stars new planets and new Worlds And by this same Instrument it appears very probable that Venus and Mercury do not move properly about the Earth but rather about the Sun and that the Moon alone moveth about the Earth What therefore can be inferred from hence but that the Sun doth stand immovable in the Centre and that the Earth with the other Celestial Orbes is circumvolved about it Wherefore by this and many other Reasons it appears That the Opinion of Pythagoras and Copernicus doth not disagree with Astronomical and Cosmographical Principles yea that it carryeth with it a great likelihood and probability of Truth Whereas amongst the so many several Opinions that deviate from the common Systeme and devise others such as were those of Plato Calippus Eudoxus and since them of Averroe Cardanus Fracastorius and others both Antient and Modern there is not one found that is more facile more regularly ahd determinately accommodated to the Phaenomena and Motions of the Heavens without Epicycles Excentrix Homocentricks Deferents and the supputation of the Rapid Motion And this Hypothesis hath been asserted for true not onely by Pythagoras and after him by Copernicus but by many famous men as namely Heraclitus and Ecphantus Pythagoreans all the Disciples of that Sect Miceta of Syracuse Martianus Capella and many more Amongst whom those as we have said that have attempted the finding out of New Systemes for they refused both this of Pythagoras and that of Ptolemy are numberless who yet notwithstanding allowed this Opinion of Pythagoras to carry with it much probability and indirectly confirmed it inasmuch as that they rejected the common one as imperfect defective and attended with many contradictions and difficulties Amongst these may be numbered Father Clavius a most learned Jesuite who although he refutes the Systeme of Pythagoras yet acknowledgeth the Levity of the common Systeme and he ingeniously confesseth that for the removal of difficulties in which the common Systeme will not serve the turn Astronomers are forced to enquire
the Receptacles of the Imagination of the Memory and of the Understanding So that which represents it self to the meer sight is as nothing in comparison and proportion to the strange Wonders that by help of long and accurate Observations the Wit of Learned Men discovereth in Heaven And this is the substance of what I had to consider touching this particular In the next place as to those that adde That those Natural Propositions of which the Scripture still speaks in one constant tenour and which the Fathers all unanimously receive in the same sense ought to be accepted according to the naked and literal sense of the Words without glosses and interpretations and received and held for most certain and true and that consequently the Mobility of the Sun and Stability of the Earth as being such are de Fide to be held for true and the contrary opinion to be deemed Heretical I shall propose to consideration in the first place That of Natural Propositions some there are of which all humane Science and Discourse can furnish us only with some plausible opinion and probable conjecture rather than with any certain and demonstrative knowledge as for example whether the Stars be animated Others there are of which we have or may confidently believe that we may have by Experiments long Observations and Necessary Demonstrations an undubitable assurance as for instance whether the Earth and Heavens move or not whether the Heavens are Spherical or otherwise As to the first sort I doubt not in the least that if humane Ratiocinations cannot reach them and that consequently there is no Science to be had of them but only an Opinion or Belief we ought fully and absolutely to comply with the meer Verbal Sense of the Scripture But as to the other Positions I should think as hath been said above That we are first to ascertain our selves of the fact it self which will assist us in finding out the true senses of the Scriptures which shall most certainly be found to accord with the fact demonstrated for two truths can never contradict each other And this I take to be a Doctrine orthodox and undoubted for that I finde it written in Saint Augustine who speaking to our point of the Figure of Heaven and what it is to be believed to be in regard that which Astronomers affirm concerning it seemeth to be contrary to the Scripture they holding it to be rotund and the Scripture calling it as it were a Curtain determineth that we are not at all to regard that the Scripture contradicts Astronomers but to believe its Authority if that which they say shall be false and founded only on the conjectures of humane infirmity but if that which which they affirm be proved by indubitable Reasons this Holy Father doth not say that the Astronomers are to be enjoyned that they themselves resolving and renouncing their Demonstrations do declare their Conclusion to be false but saith that it ought to be demonstrated That what is said in Scripture of a Curtain is not contrary to their true Demonstrations These are his words But some object How doth it appear that the saying in our Bibles Who stretcheth out the Heaven as a Curtain maketh not against those who maintain the Heavens to be in figure of a Sphere Let it be so if that be false which they affirme For that is truth which is spoke by Divine Authority rather than that which proceeds from Humane Infirmity But if peradventure they should be able to prove their Position by such Experiments as puts it out of question it is to be proved that vvhat is said in Scripture concerning a Curtain doth in no vvise contradict their manifest Reasons He proceedeth afterwards to admonish us that we ought to be no less careful and observant in reconciling a Text of Scripture with a demonstrated Natural Proposition than wâ—th another Text of Scripture which should sound to a contrary Sense Nay methinks that the circumspection of this Saint is worthy to be admired and imitated who even in obscure Conclusions and of which we may assure our selves that we can have no knowledge or Science by humane demonstration is very reserved in determining what is to be believed as we see by that which he writeth in the end of his second Book de Genesi ad Litteram speaking whether the Stars are to be believed animate Which particular although at present it cannot easily be comprehended yet I suppose in our farther Progress of handling the Scriptures we may meet with some more pertinent places upon which it will be permitted us if not to determin any thing for certain yet to suggest somewhat concerning this matter according to the dictates of Sacred Authority But novv the moderation of pious gravity being alwaies observed vve ought to receive nothing rashly in a doubtful point least perhaps vve reject that out of respect to our Errour vvhich hereafter Truth may discover to be in no vvise repugnant to the Sacred Volumes of the Old and Nevv Testament By this and other places if I deceive not my self the intent of the Holy Fathers appeareth to be That in Natural questions and which are not de Fide it is first to be considered whether they be indubitably demonstrated or by sensible Experiments known or whether such a knowledge and demonstration is to be had which having obtained and it being the gift of God it ought to be applyed to find out the true Sences of the Sacred Pages in those places which in appearance might seem to speak to a contrary meaning Which will unquestionably be pierced into by Prudent Divines together with the occasions that moved the Holy Ghost for our exercise or for some other reason to me unknown to veil it self sometimes under words of different significations As to the other point Of our regarding the Primary Scope of those Sacred Volumes I cannot think that their having spoken alwaies in the same tenour doth any thing at all disturb this Rule For if it hath been the Scope of the Scripture by way of condescention to the capacity of the Vulgar at any time to express a Proposition in words that bear a sense different from the Essence of the said Proposition why might it not have observed the same and for the same respect as often as it had occasion to speak of the same thing Nay I conceive that to have done otherwise would but have encreased the confusion and diminished the credit that these Sacred Records ought to have amongst the Common People Again that touching the Rest and Motion of the Sun and Earth it was necessary for accommodation to Popular Capacity to assert that which the Litteral sense of the Scripture importeth experience plainly proveth For that even to our dayes people far less rude do continue in the same Opinion upon Reasons that if they were well weighed and examined would be found to be extream trivial and upon Experiments either wholly false
shall forbear to exasperate and attempt to reconcile such persons to this Hypothesis as devout esteem for Holy Scripture and dutifull Respect to Canonical Injunctions hath made to stand off from this Opinion and therefore for their sakes I have at the end of the Dialogues by way of supplement added an Epistle of Galileo to Her Most Serene Highness Christina Lotharinga the Grand Dutchesse Mother of Tuscany as also certain Abstracts of John Kepler Mathematician to two Emperours and Didacus à Stunica a famous Divine of Salamanca with an Epistle of Paulo Antonio Foscarini a learned Carmelite of Naples that shew the Authority of Sacred Scripture in determining of Philosophical and Natural Controversies hoping that the ingenious impartial Reader will meet with full satisfaction in the same And least what I have spoken of the prohibiting of these Pieces by the Inquisition may deterre any scrupulous person from reading of them I have purposely inserted the Imprimatur by which that Office licenced them And for a larger account of the Book or Author I refer you to the Relation of his Life which shall bring up the Reare in the Second Tome What remains of this is that Excellent Discourse of D. Benedetto Castelli Abbate di San Benedetto Aloysio concerning the Mensuration of Running Waters with other Treatises of that Learned Prelate of the Superintendent Corsini Some may alledge and I doe confess that I promised to publish the Life of Galileo in this place But the great miscarriages of Letters from some Friends in Italy and else where to whom I am a Debtor for several Remarques from whom I daily expect yet greater Helps concerning the History of that famous Personage these disappointments I say joyned with the undeniable Request of some Friends who were impatient to see Castelli in English together with a consideration of the disproportionate Bulk that would otherwise have bin betwixt the two Volumes perswaded me to this exchange This deviation from my Promise I hope is Venial and for the expiating of it I plead Supererrogation having in each Tome made so large Aditions though to my great expense that they make neer a third part more than I stood by promise bound to Publish That this is so will appear by comparing the Contents I here prefix with the Advertisment I formerly Printed For not to mention those Epitomes of Kepler and à Stunica the whole second and following Books of Castelli were not come to my hands at the time of my penning that Paper yet knowing how imperfect the Volume would be without them they being partly a supplement to the Theoremes and Problemes which the Abbot had formerly Printed and partly experiments that had procured him and his Doctrine a very great Reputation knowing this I say I apprehended a necessity of publishing them with the rest and hope that if you think not the service I have done therein worth your acknowledgement you will yet at least account the encrease of my expence a sufficient extenuation of the Trespass that those Additions have forced me to commit upon your Patience in point of Time As for the second Tome I have only this to assure the Generous Readers 1 that I am very confident I shall be much more punctual in publishing that than for the reasons above related I was able to be in setting forth this 2 that they shall not be abused in advancing of their moneys as hath bin used in the like case by selling the remaining Copyes at an under rate and 3 that I have a very great care that no disesteem may by my means arise unto this way of publishing Books for that it is of excellent use in ushering Great and Costly Volumes into the World To say nothing of the disadvantages of Translations in general this of mine doubtless is not without it's Errours and oversights but those of the Printer discounted I hope the rest may be allowed me upon the score of Human Imbecilitie The truth is I have assumed the Liberty to note the Mistakes in the Florid Version of Berneggerus in the Margent not so much to reproach him as to convince those who told me that they accounted my pains needless having his Latine Translation by them The like they said of the whole two Tomes but they thereby caused me to question their Understanding or Veracity For some of the Books were yet never extant As for instance the Mechanicks of Monsieur Des Cartes a Manuscript which I found amongst the many other Rarities that enrich the well-chosen Library of my Learned and Worthy Friend Dr. Charles Scarburgh the Experiments of Gravity and the Life of Galileo both my own Others were included in Volumes of great price or so dispersed that they were not to be purchased for any money as those of Kepler à Stunica Archimedes Tartaglia and the Mechanicks of Galileo And the remainder though easyer to procure were harder to be understood as Tartaglia his notes on Archimedes Torricellio his Doctrine of Projects Galileo his Epistle to the Dutchesse of Tuscany and above all his Dialogues de Motu never till now done into any Language which were so intermixt of Latine and Italian that the difficulty of the Stile joyned with the intricatnesse of the Subject rendered them Unpleasant if not wholly Vnintelligible to such as were not absolute Masters of both the Tongues To conclude according to the entertainment that you please to afford these Collections I shall be encouraged to proceed with the Publication of a large Body of Hydrography declaring the History Art Lawes and Apendages of that Princely Study of Navigation wherein I have omitted nothing of note that can be found either in Dudley Fournier Aurigarius Nonius Snellus Marsennus Baysius Morisetus Blondus Wagoner abroad or learnt amongst our Mariners at home touching the Office of an Admiral Commander Pilot Modellist Shipwright Gunner c. But order requiring that I should discharge my first Obligation before I contract a second I shall detein you no longer in the Portall but put you into possession of the Premises Novemb. 20. 1661. T. S. THE AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Judicious Reader THere was published some years since in Rome a salutiferous Edict that for the obviating of the dangerous Scandals of the present Age imposed a seasonable Silence upon the Pythagorean Opinion of the Mobility of the Earth There want not such as unadvisedly affirm that that Decree was not the production of a sober Scrutiny but of an illinformed Passion one may hear some mutter that Consultors altogether ignorant of Astronomical Observations ought not to clipp the Wings of Speculative Wits with rash Prohibitions My zeale cannot keep silence when I hear these inconsiderate complaints I thought fit as being thoroughly acquainted with that prudent Determination to appear openly upon the Theatre of the World as a Witness of the naked Truth I was at that time in Rome and had not only the audiences but applauds of the most Eminent Prelates of
each other all which it would be necessary to assign to the self same body of the Sun may be reduced to one sole and simple motion assigned the Sun upon an Axis that never changeth position and that without innovating any thing in the motions for so many other causes assigned to the Terrestrial Globe may so easily salve so many extravagant appearances in the motions of the Solar spots it seemeth really that such an Hypothesis ought not to be rejected This Simplicius is all that came into the minds of our friend and my self that could be alledged in explanation of this Phaenomenon by the Copernicans and by the Ptolomaeans in defence of their opinions Do you inferre from thence what your judgment perswades you SIMP I acknowledge my self unable to interpose in so important a decision And as to my particular thoughts I will stand neutral and yet neverthelesse I hope that a time will come when our minds being illumin'd by more lofty contemplations than these our humane reasonings we shall be awakened and freed from that mist which now is so great an hinderance to our sight SAGR. Excellent and pious is the counsel taken by Simplicius and worthy to be entertained and followed by all as that which being derived from the highest wisdome and supreamest authority may onely with security be received But yet so far as humane reason is permitted to penetrate confining my self within the bounds of conjectures and probable reasons I will say a little more resolutely than Simplicius doth that amongst all the ingenuous subtilties I ever heard I have never met with any thing of greater admiration to my intellect nor that hath more absolutely captivated my judgment alwayes excepting pure Geometrical and Arithmetical Demonstrations than these two conjectures taken the one from the stations and retrogradations of the five Planets and the other from these irregularities of the motions of the Solar spots and because they seem to me so easily and clearly to assign the true reason of so extravagant appearances shewing as if they were but one sole simple motion mixed with so many others simple likewise but different from each other without introducing any difficulty rather with obviating those that accompany the other Hypothesis I am thinking that I may rationally conclude that those who contumaciously withstand this Doctrine either never heard or never understood these so convincing arguments SALV I will not ascribe unto them the title either of convincing or non-convincing in regard my intention is not as I have several times told you to resolve any thing upon so high a question but onely to propose those natural and Astronomicall reasons which for the one and other Systeme may be produced by me leaving the determination to others which determination cannot at last but be very manifest for one of the two positions being of necessity to be true and the other of necessity to be false it is a thing impossible that alwayes confining our selves within the limits of humane doctrine the reasons alledged for the true Hypothesis should not manifest themselves as concludent as those for the contrary vain and ineffectual SAGR. It will be time therefore that we hear the objections of the little Book of Conclusions or Disquisitions which Simplicius did bring with him SIMP Here is the Book and this is the place where the Author first briefly describeth the Systeme of the world according to the Hypothesis of Copernicus saying Terram igitur unà cum Luna totoque hoc elementari mundo Copernicus c. SALV Forbear a little Simplicius for methinks that this Authour in this first entrance shews himself to be but very ill verst in the Hypothesis which he goeth about to confute in regard he saith that Copernicus maketh the Earth together with the Moon to describe the grand Orb in a year moving from East to West a thing that as it is false and impossible so was it never affirmed by Copernicus who rather maketh it to move the contrary way I mean from West to East that is according to the order of the Signes whereupon we come to think the same to be the annual motion of the Sun constituted immoveable in the centre of the Zodiack See the too adventurous confidence of this man to undertake the confutation of anothers Doctrine and yet to be ignorant of the primary fundamentals upon which his adversary layeth the greatest and most important part of all the Fabrick This is a bad beginning to gain himself credit with his Reader but let us go on SIMP Having explained the Universal Systeme he beginneth to propound his objections against this annual motion and the first are these which he citeth Ironically and in derision of Copernicus and of his followers writing that in this phantastical Hypothesis of the World one must necessarily maintain very grosse absurdities namely that the Sun Venus and Mercury are below the Earth and that grave matters go naturally upwards and the light downwards and that Christ our Lord and Redeemer ascended into Hell and descended into Heaven when he approached towards the Sun and that when Joshuah commanded the Sun to stand still the Earth stood still or the Sun moved a contrary way to that of the Earth and that when the Sun is in Cancer the Earth runneth through Capricorn and that the Hyemal or Winter Signes make the Summer and the Aestival Winter and that the Stars do not rise and set to the Earth but the Earth to the Stars and that the East beginneth in the West and the West in the East and in a word that almost the whole course of the World is inverted SALV Every thing pleaseth me except it be his having intermixed places out of the sacred Scriptures alwayes venerable and to be rever'd amongst these but two scurrilous fooleries and attempting to wound with holy Weapons those who Philosophating in jest and for divertisement neither affirm nor deny but some presupposals and positions being assumed do familiarly argue SIMP Truth is he hath displeased me also and that not a little and especially by adding presently after that howbeit the Copernichists answer though but very impertinently to these and such like other reasons yet can they not reconcile nor answer those things that follow SALV This is worse than all the rest for he pretendeth to have things more efficacious and concludent than the Authorities of the sacred Leaves But I pray you let us reverence them and passe on to natural and humane reasons and yet if he give us amongst his natural arguments things of no more solidity than those hitherto alleadged we may wholly decline this undertaking for I as to my own parricular do not think it fit to spend words in answering such trifling impertinencies And as to what he saith that the Copernicans answer to these objections it is most false nor may it be thought that any man should set him self to wast his time so unprofitably SIMP I concur with
those errors into which through ignorance I may run in this Discourse of matters pertaining to Religion but I farther declare that I desire not in these matters to engage dispute with any one although it should be in points that are disputable for my end tendeth onely to this That if in these considerations besides my own profession amongst the errours that may be in them there be any thing apt to give others an hint of some Notion beneficial to the Holy Church touching the determining about the Copernican Systeme it may be taken and improved as shall seem best to my Superiours If not let my Book be torn and burnt for that I do neither intend nor pretend to gain to my self any fruit from my writings that is not Pious and Catholick And moreover although that many of the things that I observe have been spoken in my own hearing yet I shall freely admit and grant to those that spake them that they never said them if so they please but confess that I might have been mistaken And therefore what I say let it be supposed to be spoken not by them but by those which were of this opinion The motive therefore that they produce to condemn the Opinion of the Mobility of the Earth and Stability of the Sun is that reading in the Sacred Leaves in many places that the Sun moveth that the Earth standeth still and the Scripture not being capable of lying or erring it followeth upon necessary consequence that the Position of those is Erronious and Heretical who maintain that the Sun of it self is immoveable and the Earth moveable Touching this Reason I think it fit in the first place to consider That it is both piously spoken and prudently affirmed That the Sacred Scripture can never lye when ever its true meaning is understood Which I believe none will deny to be many times very abstruce and very different from that which the bare sound of the words signifieth Whence it cometh to pass that if ever any one should constantly confine himself to the naked Grammatical Sence he might erring himself make not only Contradictions and Propositions remote from Truth to appear in the Scriptures but also gross Heresies and Blasphemies For that we should be forced to assign to God feet and hands and eyes yea more corporal and humane affections as of Anger of Repentance of Hatred nay and sometimes the Forgetting of things past and Ignorance of those to come Which Propositions like as so the Holy Ghost affirmeth they were in that manner pronounced by the Sacred Scriptures that they might be accommodated to the Capacity of the Vulgar who are very rude and unlearned so likewise for the sakes of those that deserve to be distinguished from the Vulgar it is necessary that grave and skilful Expositors produce the true senses of them and shew the particular Reasons why they are dictated under such and such words And this is a Doctrine so true and common amongst Divines that it would be superfluous to produce any attestation thereof Hence me thinks I may with much more reason conclude that the same holy Writ when ever it hath had occasion to pronounce any natural Conclusion and especially any of those which are more abstruce and difficult to be understood hath not failed to observe this Rule that so it might not cause confusion in the mindes of those very people and render them the more contumacious against the Doctrines that were more sublimely mysterious For like as we have said and as it plainly appeareth out of the sole respect of condescending to Popular Capacity the Scripture hath not scrupled to shadow over most principal and fundamental Truths attributing even to God himself qualities extreamly remote from and contrary unto his Essence Who would positively affirm that the Scripture laying aside that respect in speaking but occasionally of the Earth of the Water of the Sun or of any other Creature hath chosen to confine it self with all rigour within the bare and narrow literal sense of the words And especially in mentioning of those Creatures things not at all concerning the primary Institution of the same Sacred Volume to wit the Service of God and the salvation of Souls and in things infinitely beyond the apprehension of the Vulgar This therefore being granted methinks that in the Discussion of Natural Problemes we ought not to begin at the authority of places of Scripture but at Sensible Experiments and Necessary Demonstrations For from the Divine Word the Sacred Scripture and Nature did both alike proceed the first as the Holy Ghosts Inspiration the second as the most observant Executrix of Gods Commands And moreover it being convenient in the Scriptures by way of condescension to the understanding of all men to speak many things different in appearance and so far as concernes the naked signification of the words from absolute truth But on the contrary Nature being inexorable and immutable and never passing the bounds of the Laws assigned her as one that nothing careth whether her abstruse reasons and methods of operating be or be not exposed to the Capacity of Men I conceive that that concerning Natural Effects which either Sensible Experience sets before our eyes or Necessary Demonstrations do prove unto us ought not upon any account to be called into question much less condemned upon the testimony of Texts of Scripture which may under their words couch Senses seemingly contrary thereto In regard that every Expression of Scripture is not tied to so strict conditions as every Effect of Nature Nor doth God less admirably discover himself unto us in Nature's Actions than in the Scriptures Sacred Dictions Which peradventure Tertullian intended to express in those words We conclude God is known first by Nature and then again more particularly known by Doctrine by Nature in his Works by Doctrine in his Word preached But I will not hence affirm but that we ought to have an extraordinary esteem for the Places of Sacred Scripture nay being come to a certainty in any Natural Conclusions we ought to make use of them as most apposite helps to the true Exposition of the same Scriptures and to the investigation of those Senses which are necessarily conteined in them as most true and concordant with the Truths demonstrated This maketh me to suppose that the Authority of the Sacred Volumes was intended principally to perswade men to the belief of those Articles and Propositions which by reason they surpass all humane discourse could not by any other Science or by any other means be made credible than by the Mouth of the Holy Spirit it self Besides that even in those Propositions which are not de Fide the Authority of the same Sacred Leaves ought to be preferred to the Authority of all Humane Sciences that are not written in a Demonstrative Method but either with bare Narrations or else with probable Reasons and this I hold to be so far convenient and necessary by how far
inveigh and of whom in particular S. Hierom writeth This Scilicet the Sacred Scripture the talking old woman the doting old man the talkative Sophister all venture upon lacerate teach and that before they have learnt it Others induced by Pride diving into hard words Philosophate amongst Women touching the Holy Scriptures Others Oh shameful Learn of Women what they teach to Men and as if this were nothing in a certain facility of words I may say of confidence expound to others what they understand not themselves I forbear to speak of those of my own Profession who if after Humane Learning they chance to attain to the Holy Scriptures and tickle the ears of the people with affected and Studied expressions they affirm that all they say is to be entertained as the Law of God and not stooping to learn what the Prophets and Apostles held they force incongruous testimonies to their own Sense As if it were the genuine and not corrupt way of teaching to deprave Sentences and Wrest the Scripture according to their own singular and contradictory humour I will not rank among these same secular Writers any Theologists whom I repute to be men of profound Learning and sober Manners and therefore hold them in great esteem and veneration Yet I cannot deny but that I have a certain scruple in my mind and consequently am desirous to have it removed whilst I hear that they pretend to a power of constraining others by Authority of the Scriptures to follow that opinion in Natural Disputations which they think most agreeth with the Texts of that Holding withall that they are not bound to answer the Reasons and Experiments on the contrary In Explication and Confirmation of which their judgement they say That Theologie being the Queen of all the Sciences she ought not upon any account to stoop to accomodate her self to the Positions of the rest less worthy and inferior to her But that they ought to refer themselves to her as to their Supream Emperess and change and alter their Conclusions according to Theological Statutes and Decrees And they further add That if in the inferior Science there should be any Conclusion certain by vertue of Demonstrations or experiments to which there is found in Scripture another Conclusion repugnant the very Professors of that Science ought of themselves to resolve their Demonstrations and discover the falacies of their own Experiments without repairing to Theologers and Textuaries it not suiting as hath been said with the dignity of Theologie to stoop to the investigation of the falacies of the inferior Sciences But it sufficeth her to determine the truth of the Conclusion with her absolute Authority and by her infallibility And then the Natural Conclusions in which they say that we ought to bide by the meer Authority of the Scripture without glossing or expounding it to Senses different from the Words they affirm to be Those of which the Scripture speaketh alwaies in the same manner and the Holy Fathers all receive and expound to the same Sense Now as to these Determinations I have had occasion to consider some particulars which I will purpose for that I was made cautious thereof by those who understand more than I in these businesses and to whose judgements I alwaies submit my self And first I could say that there might possibly a certain kinde of equivocation interpose in that they do not distinguish the preheminences whereby Sacred Theologie meriteth the Title of Queen For it might be called so either because that that which is taught by all the other Sciences is found to be comprized and demonstrated in it but with more excellent means and with more sublime Learning in like manner as for example The Rules of measuring of Land of Accountantship are much more excellently contained in the Arithmatick and Geometry of Euclid than in the Practises of Surveyours and Accomptants Or because the Subject about which Theologie is conversant excelleth in Dignity all the other Subjects that are the Matters of other Sciences As also because its Documents are divulged by nobler waies That the Title and Authority of Queen belongeth to Theologie in the first Sense I think that no Theologers will affirm that have but any in-sight into the other Sciences of which there are none as I believe that will say that Geometry Astronomy Musick and Medicine are much more excellently and exactly contained in the Sacred Volumes than in the Books of Archimedes in Ptolomy in Boetius and in Galen Therefore it is probable that the Regal Preheminence is given her upon the second account namely By reason of the Subject and the admirable communicating of the Divine Revelations in those Conclusions which by other means could not be conceived by men and which chiefly concern the acquist of eternal Beatitude Now if Theologie being conversant about the loftiest Divine Contemplation and residing for Dignity in the Regal Throne of the Sciences whereby she becometh of highest Authority descendeth not to the more mean and humble Speculations of the inferior Sciences Nay as hath been declared above hath no regard to them as not concerning Beatitude the Professors thereof ought not to arrogate to themselves the Authority to determin of Controversies in those Professions which have been neither practised nor studied by them For this would be as if an Absolute Prince knowing that he might freely command and cause himself to be obeyed should being neither Phisitian nor Architect undertake to administer Medicines and erect Buildings after his own fashion to the great endangering af the lives of the poor Patients and to the manifest destruction of the Edifices Again to command the very Professors of Astronomy that they of themselves see to the confuting of their own Observations and Demonstrations as those that can be no other but Falacies and Sophismes is to enjoyn a thing beyond all possibility of doing For it is not onely to command them that they do not see that which they see and that they do not understand that which they understand but that in seeking they finde the contrary of that which they happen to meet with Therefore before that this is to be done it would be necessary that they were shewed the way how to make the Powers of the Soul to command one another and the inferior the Superior so that the imagination and will might and should believe contrary to what the Intellect understands I still mean in Propositions purely Natural and which are not de Fide and not in the Supernatural which are de Fide I would entreat these Wise and Prudent Fathers that they would withal diligence consider the difference that is between Opinable and Demonstrative Doctrines To the end that well weighing in their minds with what force Necessary Illations oblige they might the better ascertain themselves that it is not in the Power of the Professors of Demonstrative Sciences to change their Opinions at pleasure and apply themselves one while to one side and another
who maintaineth the Truth may have many sensible experiments and many necessary Demonstrations on his side whereas his Antagonist can make use of no other than deceitful appearances Paralogisms and Sophisms Now if they keeping within natural bounds producing no other Weapons but those of Philosophy pretend however to have so much advantage of their Enemy why do they afterwards in coming to engage presently betake themselves to a Weapon inevitable dreadful to terrifie their Opponent with the sole beholding of it But if I may speak the truth I believe that they are the first that are affrighted and that perceiving themselves unable to bear up against the assaults of theit Adversary go about to find out ways how to keep them far enough off forbidding unto them the use of the Reason which the Divine Bounty had vouchsafed them abusing the most equitable Authority of sacred Scripture which rightly understood and applyed can never according to the common Maxime of Divines oppose the Manifest Experiments or Necessary Demonstrations But these mens running to the Scriptures for a Cloak to their inability to comprehend not to say resolve the Reasons alledged against them ought if I be not mistaken to stand them in no stead the Opinion which they oppose having never as yet been condemned by Holy Church So that if they would proceed with Candor they should either by silence confess themselves unable to handle such like points or first consider that it is not in the power of them or others but onely in that of the Pope and of Sacred Councils to censure a Position to be Erroneous But that it is left to their freedome to dispute concerning its falsity And thereupon knowing that it is impossible that a Proposition should at the same time be True and Heretical they ought I say to imploy themselves in that work which is most proper to them namely in demonstrating the falsity thereof whereby they may see how needlesse the prohibiting of it is its falshood being once discovered for that none would follow it or the Prohibition would be safe and without all danger of Scandal Therefore first let these men apply themselves to examine the Arguments of Copernicus and others and leave the condemning of them for Erroneous and Heretical to whom it belongeth But yet let them not hope ever to finde such rash and precipitous Determinations in the Wary and Holy Fathers or in the absolute Wisdome of him that cannot erre as those into which they suffer themselves to be hurried by some particular Affection or Interest of their own In these and such other Positions which are not directly de Fide certainly no man doubts but His Holiness hath alwayes an absolute power of Admitting or Condemning them but it is not in the power of any Creature to make them to be true or false otherwise than of their own nature and de facto they are Therefore it is in my judgment more discretion to assure us first of the necessary and immutable Truth of the Fact over which none hath power than without that certainty by condemning one part to deprive ones self of that authority of freedome to elect making those Determinations to become necessary which at present are indifferent and arbitrary and rest in the will of Supreme Authority And in a word if it be not possible that a Conclusion should be declared Heretical whilst we are not certain but that it may be true their pains are in vain who pretend to condemn the Mobility of the Earth and Stability of the Sun unlesse they have first demonstrated it to be impossible and false It remaineth now that we consider whether it be true that the Place in Joshuah may be taken without altering the pure signification of the words and how it can be that the Sun obeying the command of Joshuah which was That it should stand still the day might thereupon be much lengthened Which businesse if the Celestial Motions be taken according to the Ptolomaick Systeme can never any wayes happen for that the Sun moving thorow the Ecliptick according to the order of the Signes which is from East to West which is that which maketh Day and Night it is a thing manifest that the Sun ceasing its true and proper Motion the day would become shorter and not longer and that on the contrary the way to lengthen it would be to hasten and velocitate the Suns motion insomuch that to cause the Sun to stay above the Horizon for some time in one and the same place without declining towards the West it would be necessary to accelerate its motion in such a manner as that it might seem equal to that of the Primum Mobile which would be an accelerating it about three hundred and sixty times more than ordinary If therefore Joshuah had had an intention that his words should be taken in their pure and proper signification he would have bid the Sun to have accelerated its Motion so that the Rapture of the Primum Mobile might not carry it to the West but because his words were heard by people which haply knew no other Celestial Motion save this grand and common one from East to West stooping to their Capacity and having no intention to teach them the Constitution of the Spheres but only that they should perceive the greatness of the Miracle wrought in the lengthening of the Day he spoke according to their apprehension Possibly this Consideration moved Dionysius Areopagita to say that in this Miracle the Primum Mobile stood still and this stopping all the Celestial Spheres did of consequence stay of which opinion is S. Augustine himself and Abulensis at large confirmeth it Yea that Joshua's intention was that the whole Systeme of the Celestial Spheres should stand still is collected from the command he gave at the same time to the Moon although that it had nothing to do in the lengthening of the day and under the injunction laid upon the Moon we are to understand the Orbes of all the other Planets passed over in silence here as also in all other places of the Sacred Scriptures the intention of which was not to teach us the Astronomical Sciences I suppose therefore if I be not deceived that it is very plain that if we allow the Ptolemaick Systeme we must of necessity interpret the words to some sense different from their strict signification Which Interpretation being admonished by the most usefull precepts of S. Augustine I will not affirm to be of necessity this above-mentioned since that some other man may haply think of some other more proper and more agreeable Sense But now if this same passage may be understood in the Copernican Systeme to agree better with what we read in Joshuah with the help of another Observation by me newly shewen in the Body of the Sun I will propound it to consideration speaking alwaies with those safe Reserves That I am not so affectionate to my own inventions as to
Stadia or furlongs The Cause and Reason of whose Motion neither Ptolomy nor any other Astrologers could ever comprehend And yet the Reasons of these things are most plainly explained and demonstrated by Copernicus from the Motion of the Earth with which he sheweth that all the other Phaenomena of the Universe do more aptly accord Which opinion of his is not in the least contradicted by what Solomon saith in Ecclesiastes But the Earth abideth for ever For that Text signifieth no more but this That although the succession of Ages and generations of Men on Earth be various yet the Earth it self is still one and the same and continueth without any sensible alteration For the words run thus One Generation passeth away and another Generation cometh but the Earth abideth for ever So that it hath no coherence with its Context as Philosophers shew if it be expounded to speak of the Earths immobility And although in this Chapter Ecclesiastes and in many others Holy Writ ascribes Motion to the Sun which Copernicus will have to stand fixed in the Centre of the Universe yet it makes nothing against his Position For the Motion that belongs to the Earth is by way of speech assigned to the Sun even by Copernicus himself and those who are his followers so that the Revolution of the Earth is often by them phrased The Revolution of the Sun To conclude No place can be produced out of Holy Scripture which so clearly speaks the Earths Immobility as this doth its Mobility Therefore this Text of which we have spoken is easily reconciled to this Opinion And to set forth the Wonderful power and Wisdome of God who can indue and actuate the Frame of the Whole Earth it being of a monstrous weight by Nature with Motion this our Divine pen-man addeth And the pillars thereof tremble As if he would teach us from the Doctrine laid down that it is moved from its Foundations AN EPISTLE Of the Reverend Father PAOLO ANTONIO FOSCARINI A CARMELITE Concerning The PYTHAGORIAN and COPERNICAN Opinion OF The Mobility of the EARTH AND Stability of the SVN AND Of the New Systeme or Constituion OF THE WORLD IN WHICH The Authorities of SACRED SCRIPTVRE and ASSERTIONS of DIVINES commonly alledged against this Opinion are Reconciled WRITTEN To the most Reverend FATHER SEBASTIANO FANTONI General of the Order of CARMELITES Englished from the Original BY THOMAS SALVSBVRIE So quis indiget sapientia postulet à Deo Jacobi 1. versu 5. Optaevi datus est mihi sensus Sapientiae 7. versu 7. LONDON Printed by WILLIAM LEYBOVRN MDCLXI To the Most Reverend Father SEBASTIANO FANTONI General of the Order of CARMELITES IN obedience to the command of the Noble Signore Vincenzo Carraffa a Neapolitan and Knight of S. John of Jerusalem a person to speak the truth of so great Merit that in him Nobility of Birth Affability of Manners Universal knowledge of Arts and things Piety and Vertue do all contend for preheminence I resolved with my self to undertake the Defence of the Writings of the New or rather Renewed and from the Dust of Oblivion in which it hath long lain hid lately Revived Opinion Of the Mobility of the Earth and Stability of the Sun in times past found out first by Pythagoras and at last reduced into Practice by Copernicus who likewise hath deduced the Position of the Systeme and Constitution of the World and its parts from that Hypothesis on which Subject I have formerly writ to You Most Reverend Sir But in regard I am bound for Rome to preach there by your Command and since this Speculation may seem more proper for another Treatise to wit a Volume of Cosmography which I am in hand with and which I am daily busie about that it may come forth in company with my Compendium of the Liberal Arts which I have already finished rather than now to discuss it by it self I thought to forbear imparting what I have done for the present Yet I was desirous to give in the mean time a brief account of this my Determination and to shew You Most Reverend Father to whom I owe all my indeavours and my very self the Foundations on which this Opinion may be grounded least whilst otherwise it is favoured with much probability it be found in reality to be extreamly repugnant as at first sight it seems not onely to Physical Reasons and Common Principles received on all hands which cannot do so much harm but also which would be of far worse consequence to many Authorities of sacred Scripture Upon which account many at their first looking into it explode it as the most fond Paradox and Monstrous Capriccio that ever was heard of Which thing proceeds only from an antiquated and long confirmed Custome which hath so hardened men in and habituated them to Vulgar Plausible and for that cause by all men aswell learned as unlearned Approved Opinions that they cannot be removed one step from them So great is the force of Custome which not unfitly is stiled a second Nature prevailing over the whole World that touching things men are rather pleased with delighted in and desirous of those which though evil and obnoxious are by use made familiar to them than such wherewith though better they are not accustomed and acquainted So in like manner and that chiefly in Opinions which when once they are rooted in the Mind men start at and reject all others whatsoever not only those that are contrary to but even all that ever so little disagree with or vary from theirs as harsh to the Ear discoloured to the Eye unpleasant to the Smell nauseous to the Tast rough to the Touch. And no wonder For Physical Truths are ordinarily judged and considered by men not according to their Essence but according to the prescript of some one whose description or definition of them gaines him Authority amongst the vulgar Which authority nevertheless since 't is no more than humane ought not to be so esteemed as that that which doth manifestly appear to the contrary whether from better Reasons lately found out or from Sense it self should for its sake be contemned and slighted Nor is Posterity so to be confined but that it may and dares not only proceed farther but also bring to light better and truer Experiments than those which have been delivered to us by the Ancients For the Genius's of the Antients as in Inventions they did not much surpass the Wits of our times so for the perfecting of Inventions this Age of ours seems not only to equal but far to excell former Ages Knowledge whether in the Liberal or Mechanical Arts daily growing to a greater height Which Assertion might be easily proved were it not that in so clear a case there would be more danger of obscuring than hopes of illustrating it with any farther light But that I may not wholly be silent in this point have not the several Experiments of Moderns in many things stopped the mouth