Page:Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia (IA cu31924012301754).pdf/289

 Religion and Science"), it is seriously stated that Galileo was detained three years in the prisons of the Inquisition!

Thus we see that the fable of Galileo's imprisonment has been adopted by several authors without any historical foundation, and this is to a far greater extent the case with the famous story of the torture to which he is said to have been subjected. As it has held its ground, although only sporadically, even up to the most recent times, it seems incumbent on us to go more deeply into this disputed question.

Curiously enough, it is towards the end of the eighteenth century that we find the first traces of this falsehood, and from the fact that three savans, Frisi, Brenna, and Targioni, who wrote lives of Galileo at that time, raised a protest against it. Although they were not then able, as we are now, to base their arguments upon the Acts of the trial, they had even then authentic materials in their hands—the despatches between Niccolini and Cioli, then recently published by Fabroni—which rendered it utterly improbable that the old man had been placed upon the rack. These materials were thoroughly turned to account eighty years later by T. B. Biot, in his essay, "La verité sur le procès de Galilei." He clearly showed from the reports of the ambassador that Galileo had neither suffered torture during his first stay in the buildings of the Holy Office, from 12–30th April, when he daily wrote to Niccolini, and was in better health when he returned to the embassy than when he left it; nor during the three days of his second