Page:Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia (IA cu31924012301754).pdf/277

 discuss the opinion in writing or speaking, but it had no authority to extort from Galileo, or any one else, such a confession on an opinion which had not been defined by "infallible" authority.

This is openly admitted even by high theological authority: "In fact an excess of authority and an injustice did take place;" "but," the reverend gentleman hastens to add, "certainly not from malice, but from a mistake," —a lenient opinion which we are unable to share.

Whether any scruples were expressed, or any dissentient voices heard in this ecclesiastical court about the manifold illegalities in the proceedings against the famous accused, we do not know, no notes having come down to us of the private discussions and transactions of the Holy Tribunal. But there is one fact which leads us to conclude that all the judges did not consent to this procedure, and that the sentence was not unanimous: at the head of the sentence ten Cardinals are enumerated as judges, but the document is signed by seven only, and besides this there is the express remark: "So we, the undersigned cardinals, pronounce"! Singularly enough, two hundred and thirty-one years passed by, during which much that is valuable was written about Galileo, and a great deal more that was fabulous, before this significant circumstance was noticed by any author. The merit of having first called attention to it belongs to Professor Moritz Cantor, in 1864. The three cardinals who did not sign were, Caspar Borgia, Laudivio Zacchia, and Francesco Barberini, the Pope's nephew, whom we have repeatedly found to be a warm patron and protector of Galileo.

Professor Berti offers as an explanation of the absence of the three signatures, that the Congregation in the name of which the sentence was passed consisted of ten members, but that at the last sitting seven only were present, so that seven only could sign, and adds, as it appears to us unwarrantably,