Page:Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia (IA cu31924012301754).pdf/113

 The first proposition was unanimously declared to be false and absurd philosophically, and formally heretical, inasmuch as it expressly contradicts the doctrines of Holy Scripture in many passages, both if taken in their literal meaning and according to the general interpretation and conceptions of the holy Fathers and learned theologians.

The second proposition was declared unanimously "to deserve the like censure in philosophy, and as regards theological truth, to be at least erroneous in the faith."

The Vatican MS. reports the further steps taken against Galileo as the chief advocate of the Copernican system, as follows:—

"Thursday, 25th February, 1616. The Lord Cardinal Mellini notified to the Reverend Fathers the Assessors and the Commissary of the Holy Office, that the censure passed by the theologians upon the propositions of Galileo—to the effect particularly that the sun is the centre of the world, and immovable from its place, and that the earth moves, and also with a diurnal motion—had been reported; and His Holiness has directed the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine to summon before him the said Galileo, and admonish him to abandon the said opinion; and in case of his refusal to obey, that the Commissary is to intimate to him, before a notary and witnesses, a command to abstain altogether from teaching or defending this opinion and doctrine, and even from discussing it; and if he do not acquiesce therein, that he is to be imprisoned."