the solar eclipse did not take place as predicted by him in 1645.
[136] As it did, until 1892, when Airy had reached the ripe age of
ninety-one.
[137] _Didaci a Stunica ... In Job commentaria_ appeared at Toledo in 1584.
[138] "The false Pythagorean doctrine, absolutely opposed to the Holy
Scriptures, concerning the mobility of the earth and the immobility of the
sun."
[139] Paolo Antonio Foscarini (1580-1616), who taught theology and
philosophy at Naples and Messina, was one of the first to champion the
theories of Copernicus. This was in his _Lettera sopra l'opinione de'
Pittagorici e del Copernico, della mobilita della Terra e stabilita del
Sole, e il nuovo pittagorico sistema del mondo_, 4to, Naples, 1615. The
condemnation of the Congregation was published in the following spring, and
in the year of Foscarini's death at the early age of thirty-six.
[140] "To be wholly prohibited and condemned," because "it seeks to show
that the aforesaid doctrine is consonant with truth and is not opposed to
the Holy Scriptures."
[141] "As repugnant to the Holy Scriptures and to its true and Catholic
interpretation (which in a Christian man cannot be tolerated in the least),
he does not hesitate to treat (of his subject) '_by hypothesis_', but he
even adds '_as most true_'!"
[142] "To the places in which he discusses not by hypothesis but by making
assertions concerning the position and motion of the earth."
[143] "_Copernicus._ If by chance there shall be vain talkers who, although
ignorant of all mathematics, yet taking it upon themselves to sit in
judgment upon the subject on account of a certain passage of Scripture
badly distorted for their purposes, shall have dared to criticize and
censure this teaching of mine, I pay no attention to them, even to the
extent of despising their judgment as rash. For it is not unknown that
Lactantius, a writer of prominence in other lines although but little
versed in mathematics, spoke very childishly about the form of the earth
when he ridiculed those who declared that it was spherical. Hence it should
not seem strange to the learned if some shall look upon us in the same way.
Mathematics is written for mathematicians, to whom these labors of ours
will seem, if I mistake not, to add something even to the republic of the
Church.... _Emend._ Here strike out everything from 'if by chance' to the
words 'these labors of ours,' and adapt it thus: 'But these labors of
ours.'"
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