revenue; he is independent, and has perfect leisure. Even the Pope
is gracious to him when he makes a visit to Rome; while cardinals,
princes, and ambassadors rival one another in bestowing upon him
attention and honors.

But there is no' height of fortune from which a man may not fall; and it
is usually the proud, the ostentatious, and the contemptuous who do
fall, since they create envy, and are apt to make social mistakes.
Galileo continued to exasperate his enemies by his arrogance and
sarcasms. "They refused to be dragged at his chariot-wheels." "The
Aristotelian professors," says Brewster, "the temporizing Jesuits, the
political churchmen, and that timid but respectable body who at all
times dread innovation, whether it be in legislation or science, entered
into an alliance against the philosophical tyrant who threatened them
with the penalties of knowledge." The church dignitaries were especially
hostile, since they thought the tendency of Galileo's investigations was
to undermine the Bible. Flanked by the logic of the schools and the
popular interpretation of Scripture, and backed by the civil power, they
were eager for war. Galileo wrote a letter to his friend the Abbe
Castelli, the object of which was "to prove that the Scriptures were not
intended to teach science and philosophy," but to point out the way of
salvation. He was indiscreet enough to write a longer letter of seventy
pages, quoting the Fathers in support of his views, and attempting to
show that Nature and Scripture could not speak a different language. It
was this reasoning which irritated the dignitaries of the Church more
than his discoveries, since it is plain that the literal language of
Scripture upholds the doctrine that the sun revolves around the earth.
He was wrong or foolish in trying to harmonize revelation and science.
He should have advanced his truths of science and left them to take care
of themselves. He should not have meddled with the dogmas of his
enemies: not that he was wrong in doing so, but it was not politic or
wise; and he was not called upon to harmonize Scripture with science.

So his enemies busily employed themselves in collecting evidence against
him. They laid their complaints before the Inquisition of Rome, and on
the occasion of paying a visit to that city, he was summoned before that
tribunal which has been the shame and the reproach of the Catholic
Church. It was a tribunal utterly incompetent to sit upon his c