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The Gradual Acceptance
OF THE
Copernican Theory of the Universe
DOROTHY STIMSON, Ph.D.
NEW YORK
1917
COPYRIGHT 1917 BY DOROTHY STIMSON
Trade Selling Agents
The Baker & Taylor Co.,
354 Fourth Ave.,
New York
TO MY FATHER AND MOTHER
[Illustration: THE SYSTEMS OF THE WORLD IN 1651 ACCORDING TO FATHER
RICCIOLI
(Reduced facsimile of the frontispiece in Riccioli: _Almagestum
Novum_. Bologna, 1651.)]
EXPLANATION
"Astrea, goddess of the heaven, wearing angel's wings and gleaming
everywhere with stars, stands at the right; on the left is Argus of
the hundred eyes, not tense, but indicating by the position of the
telescope at his knee rather than at the eyes in his head, that while
observing the work of God's hand, he appears at the same time to be
worshipping as in genuflexion." (Riccioli: _Alm. Nov._, _Praefatio_,
xvii). He points to the cherubs in the heavens who hold the planets,
each with its zodiacal sign: above him at the top is Mars, then
Mercury in its crescent form, the Sun, and Venus also in the crescent
phase; on the opposite side are Saturn in its "tripartite" form (the
ring explanation was yet to be given), the sphere of Jupiter encircled
by its four satellites, the crescent Moon, its imperfections clearly
shown, and a comet. Thus Father Riccioli summarized the astronomical
knowledge of his day. The scrolls quote Psalms 19:2, "Day unto day
uttereth speech and night unto night showeth knowledge."
Astrea holds in her right hand a balance in which Riccioli's theory of
the universe (an adaptation of the Tychonic, see p. 68) far outweighs
the Copernican or heliocentric one. At her feet is the Ptolemaic
sphere, while Ptolemy himself half lies, half sits, between her and
Argus, with the comment issuing from his mouth: "I will arise if only
I am corrected." His left hand rests upon the coat of arms of the
Prince of Monaco to whom the _Almagestum Novum_ is dedicated.
At the top is the Hebrew _Yah-Veh_, and the hand of God is stretched
forth in reference to the verse in the Book of Wisdom (10:20): "But
thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number and weight."
CONTENTS
ILLUSTRATIONS 7
PREFACE 8
PART I. AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE HELIOCENTRIC
THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE.
Chapter I. The Development of Astronomical Thought to 1400:
Preliminary Review 9
Chapter II. Copernicus and his Times 20
Chapter III. Later Development and Scientific Defense
of the Copernican Theory 33
PART II. THE RECEPTION OF THE COPERNICAN THEORY.
Chapter I. Opinions and Arguments in the Sixteenth Century 39
Chapter II. Bruno and Galileo 49
Chapter III. The Opposition and their Arguments 71
Chapter IV. The Gradual Acceptance of the Copernican Theory 85
Chapter V. The Church and the New Astronomy: Conclusion 95
APPENDICES: TRANSLATIONS BY THE WRITER.
A. Ptolemy: _Almagest_. Bk. I, chap. 7: That the earth has no
movement of rotation 107
B. Copernicus: _De Revolutionibus_, Dedication to the Pope 109
C. Bodin: _Universae Naturae Theatrum_, Bk. V, sections 1 and 2
in part, and section 10 entire 115
D. Fienus: _Epistolica Quaestio_: Is it true that the heavens
are moved and the earth is at rest? 124
BIBLIOGRAPHY 130
INDEX 145
ILLUSTRATIONS
Facsimile of the frontispiece "The Systems of the
World" in Riccioli: _Almagestum Novum_,
1651 _Frontispiece_
Photographic facsimile (reduced) of a page from a
copy of Copernicus: _De Revolutionibus_, as
"corrected" in the 17th century according to
the directions of the Congregations of the
Index in 1620 p. 61
Photographic facsimile (reduced) of another "corrected"
page from the same copy p. 113
PREFACE
This study does not belong in the field of astronomy, but in that of
the history of thought; for it is an endeavor to trace the changes in
people's beliefs and conceptions in regard to the universe as these
were wrought by the dissolution of superstition resulting from the
scientific and rationalist movements. The opening chapter is intended
to do no more than to review briefly the astronomical theories up to
the age of Copernicus, in order to provide a background for the better
comprehension of the work of Copernicus and its effects.
Such a study has been rendered possible only by the generous loan of
rare books by Professor Herbert D. Foster of Dartmouth College,
Professor Edwin E. Slosson of Columbia University, Doctor George A.
Plimpton and Major George Haven Putnam, both of New York, and
especially by the kindly generosity of Professor David Eugene Smith of
Teachers College who placed his unique collection of rare mathematical
books at the writer's disposal and gave her many valuable suggestions
as to available material. Professors James T. Shotwell and Harold
Jacoby of Columbia University have read parts of this study in
manuscript. The writer gratefully acknowledges her indebtedness not
only to these gentlemen, but to the many others, librarians and their
assistants, fellow-students and friends, too numerous to mention
individually, whose ready interest and whose suggestions have been of
real service, and above all to Professor James Harvey Robinson at
whose suggestion and under whose guidance the work was undertaken, and
to the Reverend Doctor Henry A. Stimson whose advice and criticism
have been an unfailing source of help and encouragement.
PART ONE
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE HELIOCENTRIC THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE.
CHAPTER I.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ASTRONOMICAL THOUGHT TO 1400 A.D.
_A Preliminary Sketch of Early Theories as a Background._
The appearances in the heavens have from earliest historic ages filled
men with wonder and awe; then they gradually became a source of
questioning, and thinkers sought for explanations of the daily and
nightly phenomena of sun, moon and stars. Scientific astronomy,
however, was an impossibility until an exact system of chronology was
devised.[1] Meanwhile men puzzled over the shape of the earth, its
position in the universe, what the stars were and why the positions of
some shifted, and what those fiery comets were that now and again
appeared and struck terror to their hearts.
[Footnote 1: The earliest observation Ptolemy uses is an Egyptian one
of an eclipse occurring March 21, 721 B.C. (Cumont: 7). [In these
references, the Roman numerals refer to the volume, the Arabic to the
page, except as stated otherwise. The full title is given in the
bibliography at the back under the author's name.]]
In answer to such questions, the Chaldean thinkers, slightly before
the rise of the Greek schools of philosophy, developed the idea of the
seven heavens in their crystalline spheres encircling the earth as
their center.[2] This conception seems to lie back of both the later
Egyptian and Hebraic cosmologies, as well as of the Ptolemaic. Through
the visits of Greek philosophers to Egyptian shores this conception
helped to shape Greek thought and so indirectly affected western
civilization. Thus our heritage in astronomical thought, as in many
other lines, comes from the Greeks and the Romans reaching Europe (in
part through Arabia and Spain), where it was shaped by the influence
of the schools down to the close of the Middle Ages when men began
anew to withstand authority in behalf of observation and were not
afraid to follow whither their reason led them.
[Footnote 2: Warren: 40. See "Calendar" in Hastings: _Ency. of
Religion and Ethics_.]
But not all Greek philosophers, it seems,[3] either knew or accepted
the Babylonian cosmology.[4] According to Plutarch, though Thales
(640?-546? B.C.) and later the Stoics believed the earth to be
spherical in form, Anaximander (610-546? B.C.) thought it to be like a
"smooth stony pillar," Anaximenes (6th cent.) like a "table."
Beginning with the followers of Thales or perhaps Parmenides (?-500
B.C.), as Diogenes Laertius claims,[5] a long line of Greek thinkers
including Plato (428?-347? B.C.) and Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) placed
the earth in the center of the universe. Whether Plato held that the
earth "encircled" or "clung" around the axis is a disputed point;[6]
but Aristotle claimed it was the fixed and immovable center around
which swung the spherical universe with its heaven of fixed stars and
its seven concentric circles of the planets kept in their places by
their transparent crystalline spheres.[7]
[Footnote 3: For a summary of recent researches, see the preface of
Heath: _Aristarchus of Samos_. For further details, see Heath: _Op.
cit._, and the writings of Kugler and Schiaparelli.]
[Footnote 4: See Plutarch: _Moralia: De placitas Philosophorum_, Lib.
I et II, (V. 264-277, 296-316).]
[Footnote 5: Diogenes Laertius: _De Vitis_, Lib. IX, c. 3 (252).]
[Footnote 6: Plato: _Timaeus_, sec. 39 (III, 459 in Jowett's
translation).]
[Footnote 7: Aristotle: _De Mundo_, c. 2 et 6 (III, 628 and 636).]
The stars were an even greater problem. Anaximenes thought they were
"fastened like nails" in a crystalline firmament, and others thought
them to be "fiery plates of gold resembling pictures."[8] But if the
heavens were solid, how could the brief presence of a comet be
explained?
[Footnote 8: Plutarch: _Op. cit._, Lib. III, c. 2 (V, 303-4).]
Among the philosophers were some noted as mathematicians whose leader
was Pythagoras (c. 550 B.C.). He and at least one of the members of
his school, Eudoxus (409?-356? B.C.), had visited Egypt, according to
Diogenes Laertius,[9] and had in all probability been much interested
in and influenced by the astronomical observations made by the
Egyptian priests. On the same authority, Pythagoras was the first to
declare the earth was round and to discuss the antipodes. He too
emphasized the beauty and perfection of the circle and of the sphere
in geometry, forms which became fixed for 2000 years as the fittest
representations of the perfection of the heavenly bodies.
[Footnote 9: Diogenes Laertius: _De Vitis_, Lib. VIII, c. 1, et 8
(205, 225).]
There was some discussion in Diogenes' time as to the author of the
theory of the earth's motion of axial rotation. Diogenes[10] gives the
honor to Philolaus (5th cent. B.C.) one of the Pythagoreans, though he
adds that others attribute it to Icetas of Syracuse (6th or 5th cent.
B.C.). Cicero, however, states[11] the position of Hicetas of Syracuse
as a belief in the absolute fixedness of all the heavenly bodies
except the earth, which alone moves in the whole universe, and that
its rapid revolutions upon its own axis cause the heavens apparently
to move and the earth to stand still.
[Footnote 10: Diogenes: _Op. cit._, Lib. VIII, c. 7 (225).]
[Footnote 11: Cicero: _Academica_, Lib. II, c. 39 (322).]
Other thinkers of Syracuse may also have felt the Egyptian influence;
for one of the greatest of them, Archimedes (c. 287-212 B.C.), stated
the theory of the earth's revolution around the sun as enunciated by
Aristarchus of Samos. (Perhaps this is the "hearth-fire of the
universe" around which Philolaus imagined the earth to whirl.[12]) In
_Arenarius_, a curious study on the possibility of expressing infinite
sums by numerical denominations as in counting the sands of the
universe, Archimedes writes:[13] "For you have known that the universe
is called a sphere by several astrologers, its center the center of
the earth, and its radius equal to a line drawn from the center of the
sun to the center of the earth. This was written for the unlearned, as
you have known from the astrologers.... [Aristarchus of Samos][14]
concludes that the world is many times greater than the estimate we
have just given. He supposes that the fixed stars and the sun remain
motionless, but that the earth following a circular course, revolves
around the sun as a center, and that the sphere of the fixed stars
having the same sun as a center, is so vast that the circle which he
supposes the earth to follow in revolving holds the same ratio to the
distance of the fixed stars as the center of a sphere holds to its
circumference."
[Footnote 12: Plutarch: _Op. cit._, Lib. II (V. 299-300).]
[Footnote 13: Archimedes: _Arenarius_, c. 1. Delambre: _Astr. Anc._,
I, 102.]
[Footnote 14: This is the only account of his system. Even the age in
which he flourished is so little known that there have been many
disputes whether he was the original inventor of this system or
followed some other. He was probably a contemporary of Cleanthes the
Stoic in the 3rd century B.C. He is mentioned also by Ptolemy,
Diogenes Laertius and Vitruvius. (Schiaparelli: _Die Vorlaufer des
Copernicus im Alterthum_, 75. See also Heath: _Op. cit._)]
These ancient philosophers realized in some degree the immensity of
the universe in which the earth was but a point. They held that the
earth was an unsupported sphere the size of which Eratosthenes (c.
276-194 B.C.) had calculated approximately. They knew the sun was far
larger than the earth, and Cicero with other thinkers recognized the
insignificance of earthly affairs in the face of such cosmic
immensity. They knew too about the seven planets, had studied their
orbits, and worked out astronomical ways of measuring the passage of
time with a fair amount of accuracy. Hipparchus and other thinkers had
discovered the fact of the precession of the equinoxes, though there
was no adequate theory to account for it until Copernicus formulated
his "motion of declination." The Pythagoreans accepted the idea of the
earth's turning upon its axis, and some even held the idea of its
revolution around the motionless sun. Others suggested that comets had
orbits which they uniformly followed and therefore their reappearance
could be anticipated.[15]
[Footnote 15: Plutarch: _Op. cit._: Bk. III, c. 2 (V, 317-318).]
Why then was the heliocentric theory not definitely accepted?
In the first place, such a theory was contrary to the supposed facts
of daily existence. A man did not have to be trained in the schools to
observe that the earth seemed stable under his feet and that each
morning the sun swept from the east to set at night in the west.
Sometimes it rose more to the north or to the south than at other
times. How could that be explained if the sun were stationary?
Study of the stars was valuable for navigators and for surveyors,
perhaps, but such disturbing theories should not be propounded by
philosophers. Cleanthes,[16] according to Plutarch,[17] "advised that
the Greeks ought to have prosecuted Aristarchus the Samian for
blasphemy against religion, as shaking the very foundations of the
world, because this man endeavoring to save appearances, supposed that
the heavens remained immovable and that the earth moved through an
oblique circle, at the same time turning about its own axis." Few
would care to face their fellows as blasphemers and impious thinkers
on behalf of an unsupported theory. Eighteen hundred years later
Galileo would not do so, even though in his day the theory was by no
means unsupported by observation.
[Footnote 16: The Stoic contemporary of Aristarchus, author of the
famous Stoic hymn. See Diogenes Laertius: _De Vitis_.]
[Footnote 17: Plutarch: _De Facie in Orbe Lunae_, (V, 410).]
Furthermore, one of the weaknesses of the Greek civilization militated
strongly against the acceptance of this hypothesis so contrary to the
evidence of the senses. Experimentation and the development of applied
science was practically an impossibility where the existence of slaves
made manual labor degrading and shameful. Men might reason
indefinitely; but few, if any, were willing to try to improve the
instruments of observation or to test their observations by
experiments.
At the same time another astronomical theory was developing which was
an adequate explanation for the phenomena observed up to that
time.[18] This theory of epicycles and eccentrics worked out by
Apollonius of Perga (c. 225 B.C.) and by Hipparchus (c. 160 B.C.) and
crystallized for posterity in Ptolemy's great treatise on astronomy,
the _Almagest_, (c. 140 A.D.) became the fundamental principle of the
science until within the last three hundred years. The theory of the
eccentric was based on the idea that heavenly bodies Following
circular orbits revolved around a center that did not coincide with
that of the observer on the earth. That would explain why the sun
appeared sometimes nearer the earth and sometimes farther away. The
epicycle represented the heavenly body as moving along the
circumference of one circle (called the epicycle) the center of which
moves on another circle (the deferent). With better observations
additional epicycles and eccentric were used to represent the newly
observed phenomena till in the later Middle Ages the universe became a
"----Sphere
With Centric and Eccentric scribbled o'er,
Cycle and Epicycle, Orb in Orb"--[19]
[Footnote 18: Young: 109.]
[Footnote 19: Milton: _Paradise Lost_, Bk. VIII, ll. 82-85.]
Yet the heliocentric theory was not forgotten. Vitruvius, a famous
Roman architect of the Augustan Age, discussing the system of the
universe, declared that Mercury and Venus, the planets nearest the
sun, moved around it as their center, though the earth was the center
of the universe.[20] This same notion recurs in Martianus Capella's
book[21] in the fifth century A.D. and again, somewhat modified, in
the 16th century in Tycho Brahe's conception of the universe.
[Footnote 20: Vitruvius: _De Architectura_, Lib. IX, c. 4 (220).]
[Footnote 21: Martianus Capella: _De Nuptiis_, Lib. VIII, (668).]
Ptolemy devotes a column or two of his _Almagest_[22] (to use the
familiar Arabic name for his _Syntaxis Mathematica_) to the refutation
of the heliocentric theory, thereby preserving it for later ages to
ponder on and for a Copernicus to develop. He admits at the outset
that such a theory is only tenable for the stars and their phenomena,
and he gives at least three reasons why it is ridiculous. If the earth
were not at the center, the observed facts of the seasons and of day
and night would be disturbed and even upset. If the earth moves, its
vastly greater mass would gain in speed upon other bodies, and soon
animals and other lighter bodies would be left behind unsupported in
the air--a notion "ridiculous to the last degree," as he comments,
"even to imagine it." Lastly, if it moves, it would have such
tremendous velocity that stones or arrows shot straight up in the air
must fall to the ground east of their starting point,--a "laughable
supposition" indeed to Ptolemy.
[Footnote 22: Ptolemy: _Almagest_, Lib. I, c. 7, (1, 21-25).
Translated in Appendix B.]
This book became the great text of the Middle Ages; its author's name
was given to the geocentric theory it maintained. Astronomy for a
thousand years was valuable only to determine the time of Easter and
other festivals of the Church, and to serve as a basis for astrology
for the mystery-loving people of Europe.
To the Arabians in Syria and in Spain belongs the credit of preserving
for Europe during this long period the astronomical works of the
Greeks, to which they added their own valuable observations of the
heavens--valuable because made with greater skill and better
instruments,[23] and because with these observations later scientists
could illustrate the permanence or the variability of important
elements. They also discovered the so-called "trepidation" or apparent
shifting of the fixed stars to explain which they added another sphere
to Ptolemy's eight. Early in the sixth century Uranus translated
Aristotle's works into Syrian, and this later was translated into
Arabic.[24] Albategnius[25] (c. 850-829 [Transcriber's Note: 929]
A.D.), the Arabian prince who was the greatest of all their
astronomers, made his observations from Aracte and Damascus, checking
up and in some cases amending Ptolemy's results.[26]
[Footnote 23: Whewell: I, 239.]
[Footnote 24: Whewell: I, 294.]
[Footnote 25: Berry: 79.]
[Footnote 26: His book _De Motu Stellarum_, translated into Latin by
Plato Tiburtinus (fl. 1116) was published at Nuremberg (1557) by
Melancthon with annotations by Regiomontanus. _Ency. Brit._ 11th.
Edit.]
Then the center of astronomical development shifted from Syria to
Spain and mainly through this channel passed on into Western Europe.
The scientific fame of Alphonse X of Castile (1252-1284 A.D.) called
the Wise, rests chiefly upon his encouragement of astronomy. With his
support the Alfonsine Tables were calculated. He is said[27] to have
summoned fifty learned men from Toledo, Cordova and Paris to translate
into Spanish the works of Ptolemy and other philosophers. Under his
patronage the University of Salamanca developed rapidly to become
within two hundred years one of the four great universities of
Europe[28]--a center for students from all over Europe and the
headquarters for new thought, where Columbus was sheltered,[29] and
later the Copernican system was accepted and publicly taught at a time
when Galileo's views were suppressed.[30]
[Footnote 27: Vaughan: I, 281.]
[Footnote 28: Graux: 318.]
[Footnote 29: Graux: 319.]
[Footnote 30: Rashdall: II, pt. I, 77.]
Popular interest in astronomy was evidently aroused, for Sacrobosco
(to give John Holywood[31] his better known Latin name) a Scotch
professor at the Sorbonne in Paris in the 13th century, published a
small treatise _De Sphaeri Mundo_ that was immensely popular for
centuries,[32] though it was practically only an abstract of the
_Almagest_. Whewell[33] tells of a French poem of the time of Edward I
entitled _Ymage du Monde_, which gave the Ptolemaic view and was
illustrated in the manuscript in the University of Cambridge with a
picture of the spherical earth with men upright on it at every point,
dropping balls down perforations in the earth to illustrate the
tendency of all things toward the center. Of the same period (13th
century) is an Arabian compilation in which there is a reference to
another work, the book of Hammarmunah the Old, stating that "the earth
turns upon itself in the form of a circle, and that some are on top,
the others below ... and there are countries in which it is constantly
day or in which at least the night continues only some instants."[34]
Apparently, however, such advanced views were of no influence, and the
Ptolemaic theory remained unshaken down to the close of the 15th
century.
[Footnote 31: _Dict. of Nat. Biog._]
[Footnote 32: MSS. of it are extremely numerous. It was the second
astronomical book to be printed, the first edition appearing at
Ferrara in 1472. 65 editions appeared before 1647. It was translated
into Italian, French, German, and Spanish, and had many commentators.
_Dict. of Nat. Biog._]
[Footnote 33: Whewell: I, 277.]
[Footnote 34: Blavatski: II, 29, note.]
Aside from the adequacy of this explanation of the universe for the
times, the attitude of the Church Fathers on the matter was to a
large degree responsible for this acquiescence. Early in the first
century A.D., Philo Judaeus[35] emphasized the minor importance of
visible objects compared with intellectual matters,--a foundation
stone in the Church's theory of an homocentric universe. Clement of
Alexandria (c. 150 A.D.) calls the heavens solid since what is solid
is capable of being perceived by the senses.[36] Origen (c. 185-c.
254.) has recourse to the Holy Scriptures to support his notion that
the sun, moon, and stars are living beings obeying God's commands.[37]
Then Lactantius thunders against those who discuss the universe as
comparable to people discussing "the character of a city they have
never seen, and whose name only they know." "Such matters cannot be
found out by inquiry."[38] The existence of the antipodes and the
rotundity of the earth are "marvelous fictions," and philosophers are
"defending one absurd opinion by another"[39] when in explanation why
bodies would not fall off a spherical earth, they claim these are
borne to the center.
[Footnote 35: Philo Judaeus: _Quis Rerum Divinarum Haeres._ (IV, 7).]
[Footnote 36: Clement of Alexandria: _Stromatum_, Lib. V, c. 14, (III,
67).]
[Footnote 37: Origen: _De Principiis_, Lib. I, c. 7, (XI, 171).]
[Footnote 38: Lactantius: _Divinarum Institutionum_, Lib. III, c. 3
(VI, 355).]
[Footnote 39: Ibid: Lib. III, c. 24, (VI, 425-428).]
How clearly even this brief review illustrates what Henry Osborn
Taylor calls[40] the fundamental principles of patristic faith: that
the will of God is the one cause of all things (voluntate Dei
immobilis manet et stat in saeculum terra.[41] Ambrose: _Hexaemeron_.)
and that this will is unsearchable. He further points out that
Augustine's and Ambrose's sole interest in natural fact is as
"confirmatory evidence of Scriptural truth." The great Augustine
therefore denies the existence of antipodes since they could not be
peopled by Adam's children.[42] He indifferently remarks
elsewhere:[43] "What concern is it to me whether the heavens as a
sphere enclose the earth in the middle of the world or overhang it on
either side?" Augustine does, however, dispute the claims of
astrologers accurately to foretell the future by the stars, since the
fates of twins or those born at the same moment are so diverse.[44]
[Footnote 40: Taylor: _Mediaeval Mind_, I, 74.]
[Footnote 41: By the will of God the earth remains motionless and
stands throughout the age.]
[Footnote 42: Augustine: _De Civitate Dei_, Lib. XVI, c. 9, (41, p.
437).]
[Footnote 43: Augustine: _De Genesi_, II, c. 9, (v. 34, p. 270).
(White's translation).]
[Footnote 44: Augustine: _Civitate Dei_, Lib. V, c. 5, (v. 41, p.
145).]
Philastrius (d. before 397 A.D.) dealing with various heresies,
denounces those who do not believe the stars are fixed in the heavens
as "participants in the vanity of pagans and the foolish opinions of
philosophers," and refers to the widespread idea of the part the
angels play in guiding and impelling the heavenly bodies in their
courses.[45]
[Footnote 45: Philastrius: _De Haeresibus_, c. 133, (v. 12, p. 1264).]
It would take a brave man to face such attitudes of scornful
indifference on the one hand and denunciation on the other, in support
of a theory the Church considered heretical.
Meanwhile the Church was developing the homocentric notion which
would, of course, presuppose the central position in the universe for
man's abiding place. In the pseudo-Dionysius[46] is an elaborately
worked out hierarchy of the beings in the universe that became the
accepted plan of later centuries, best known to modern times through
Dante's blending of it with the Ptolemaic theory in the _Divine
Comedy_.[47] Isidore of Seville taught that the universe was created
to serve man's purposes,[48] and Peter Lombard (12th cent.) sums up
the situation in the definite statement that man was placed at the
center of the universe to be served by that universe and in turn
himself to serve God.[49] Supported by the mighty Thomas Aquinas[50]
this became a fundamental Church doctrine.
[Footnote 46: Pseudo-Dionysius: _De Coelesti Ierarchia_, (v. 122, p.
10354).]
[Footnote 47: Milman: VIII, p. 228-9. See the _Paradiso_.]
[Footnote 48: Isidore of Seville: _De Ordine Creaturarum_, c. 5, sec.
3, (v. 83, p. 923).]
[Footnote 49: Lombard: _Sententia_, Bk. II, Dist. I, sec. 8, (v. 192,
p. 655).]
[Footnote 50: Aquinas: _Summa Theologica_, pt. I, qu. 70, art. 2.
(_Op. Om. Caietani_, V, 179).]
An adequate explanation of the universe existed. Aristotle, Augustine,
and the other great authorities of the Middle Ages, all upheld the
conception of a central earth encircled by the seven planetary spheres
and by the all embracing starry firmament. In view of the phrases used
in the Bible about the heavens, and in view of the formation of
fundamental theological doctrines based on this supposition by the
Church Fathers, is it surprising that any other than a geocentric
theory seemed untenable, to be dismissed with a smile when not
denounced as heretical? Small wonder is it, in the absence of the
present day mechanical devices for the exact measurement of time and
space as aids to observation, that the Ptolemaic, or geocentric,
theory of the universe endured through centuries as it did, upheld by
the authority both of the Church and, in essence at least, by the
great philosophers whose works constituted the teachings of the
schools.
CHAPTER II.
COPERNICUS AND HIS TIMES.
During these centuries, one notable scholar at least stood forth in
open hostility to the slavish devotion to Aristotle's writings and
with hearty appreciation for the greater scientific accuracy of
"infidel philosophers among the Arabians, Hebrews and Greeks."[51] In
his _Opus Tertium_ (1267), Roger Bacon also pointed out how inaccurate
were the astronomical tables used by the Church, for in 1267,
according to these tables "Christians will fast the whole week
following the true Easter, and will eat flesh instead of fasting at
Quadragesima for a week--which is absurd," and thus Christians are
made foolish in the eyes of the heathen.[52] Even the rustic, he
added, can observe the phases of the moon occurring a week ahead of
the date set by the calendar.[53] Bacon's protests were unheeded,
however, and the Church continued using the old tables which grew
increasingly inaccurate with each year. Pope Sixtus IV sought to
reform the calendar two centuries later with the aid of Regiomontanus,
then the greatest astronomer in Europe (1475);[54] the Lateran Council
appealed to Copernicus for help (1514), but little could be done, as
Copernicus replied, till the sun's and the moon's positions had been
observed far more precisely;[55] and the modern scientific calendar
was not adopted until 1582 under Pope Gregory XIII.
[Footnote 51: Roger Bacon: _Opus Tertium_, 295, 30-31.]
[Footnote 52: Ibid: 289.]
[Footnote 53: Ibid: 282.]
[Footnote 54: Delambre: _Moyen Age_, 365.]
[Footnote 55: Prowe: II, 67-70.]
What was the state of astronomy in the century of Copernicus's birth?
Regiomontanus--to use Johann Mueller's Latin name--his teacher Puerbach,
and the great cardinal Nicolas of Cues were the leading astronomers of
this fifteenth century. Puerbach[56] (1432-1462) died before he had
fulfilled the promise of his youth, leaving his _Epitome of Ptolemy's
Almagest_ to be completed by his greater pupil. In his _Theorica
Planetarum_ (1460) Puerbach sought to explain the motions of the
planets by placing each planet between the walls of two curved
surfaces with just sufficient space in which the planet could move. As
M. Delambre remarked:[57] "These walls might aid the understanding,
but one must suppose them transparent; and even if they guided the
planet as was their purpose, they hindered the movement of the comets.
Therefore they had to be abandoned, and in our own modern physics they
are absolutely superfluous; they have even been rather harmful, since
they interfered with the slight irregularities caused by the force of
attraction in planetary movements which observations have disclosed."
This scheme gives some indication of the elaborate devices scholars
evolved in order to cope with the increasing number of seeming
irregularities observed in "the heavens," and perhaps it makes clearer
why Copernicus was so dissatisfied with the astronomical hypothesis of
his day, and longed for some simpler, more harmonious explanation.
[Footnote 56: Delambre: _Moyen Age_, 262-272.]
[Footnote 57: Delambre: _Moyen Age_, 272.]
Regiomontanus[58] (1436-1476) after Puerbach's death, continued his
work, and his astronomical tables (pub. 1475) were in general use
throughout Europe till superseded by the vastly more accurate
Copernican Tables a century later. It has been said[59] that his fame
inspired Copernicus (born three years before the other's death in
1476) to become as great an astronomer. M. Delambre hails him as the
wisest astronomer Europe had yet produced[60] and certainly his renown
was approached only by that of the great Cardinal.
[Footnote 58: It has been claimed that Regiomontanus knew of the
earth's motion around the sun a hundred years before Copernicus; but a
German writer has definitely disproved this claim by tracing it to its
source in Schoener's _Opusculum Geographicum_ (1553) which states only
that he believed in the earth's axial rotation. Ziegler: 62.]
[Footnote 59: Ibid: 62.]
[Footnote 60: Delambre: _Op. cit._: 365.]
Both Janssen,[61] the Catholic historian, and Father Hagen[62] of the
Vatican Observatory, together with many other Catholic writers, claim
that a hundred years before Copernicus, Cardinal Nicolas Cusanus[63]
(c. 1400-1464) had the courage and independence to uphold the theory
of the earth's motion and its rotation on its axis. As Father Hagen
remarked: "Had Copernicus been aware of these assertions he would
probably have been encouraged by them to publish his own monumental
work." But the Cardinal stated these views of the earth's motions in a
mystical, hypothetical way which seems to justify the marginal heading
"Paradox" (in the edition of 1565).[64] And unfortunately for these
writers, the Jesuit father, Riccioli, the official spokesman of that
order in the 17th century after Galileo's condemnation, speaking of
this paradox, called attention, also, to a passage in one of the
Cardinal's sermons as indicating that the latter had perhaps
"forgotten himself" in the _De Docta Ignorantia_, or that this paradox
"was repugnant to him, or that he had thought better of it."[65] The
passage he referred to is as follows: "Prayer is more powerful than
all created things. Although angels, or some kind of beings, move the
spheres, the Sun and the stars; prayer is more powerful than they are,
since it impedes motion, as when the prayer of Joshua made the Sun
stand still."[66] This may explain why Copernicus apparently
disregarded the Cardinal's paradox, for he made no reference to it in
his book; and the statement itself, to judge by the absence of
contemporary comment, aroused no interest at the time. But of late
years, the Cardinal's position as stated in the _De Docta Ignorantia_
has been repeatedly cited as an instance of the Church's friendly
attitude toward scientific thought,[67] to show that Galileo's
condemnation was due chiefly to his "contumacy and disobedience."
[Footnote 61: Janssen: _Hist. of Ger._, I, 5.]
[Footnote 62: _Cath. Ency._: "Cusanus."]
[Footnote 63: From Cues near Treves.]
[Footnote 64: Cusanus: _De Docta Ignorantia_, Bk. II, c. 11-12:
"Centrum igitur mundi, coincideret cum circumferentiam, nam si centrum
haberet et circumferentiam, et sic intra se haberet suum initium et
finem et esset ad aliquid aliud ipse mundus terminatus, et extra
mundum esset aluid et locus, quae omnia veritate carent. Cum igitur non
sit possibile, mundum claudi intra centrum corporale et
circumferentiam, non intelligitur mundus, cuius centrum et
circumferentia sunt Deus: et cum hic non sit mundus infinitus, tamen
non potest concipi finitus, cum terminis careat, intra quos claudatur.
Terra igitur, quae centrum esse nequit, motu omni carere non potest,
nam eam moveri taliter etiam necesse est, quod per infinitum minus
moveri posset. Sicut igitur terra non est centram mundi.... Unde licet
terra quasi stella sit, propinquior polo centrali, tamen movetur, et
non describit minimum circulum in motu, ut est ostensum.... Terrae
igitur figura est mobilis et sphaerica et eius motus circularis, sed
perfectior esse posset. Et quia maximum in perfectionibus motibus, et
figuris in mundo non est, ut ex iam dictis patent: tunc non est verum
quod terra ista sit vilissima et infima, nam quamvis videatur
centralior, quo'ad mundum, est tamen etiam, eadem ratione polo
propinquior, ut est dictum." (pp. 38-39).]
[Footnote 65: Riccioli: _Alm. Nov._, II, 292.]
[Footnote 66: Cusanus: _Opera_, 549: Excitationum, Lib. VII, ex
sermone: _Debitores sumus_: "Est enim oratio, omnibus creaturis
potentior. Nam angeli seu intelligentiae, movent orbes, Solem et
stellas: sed oratio potentior, quia impedit motum, sicut oratio Josuae,
fecit sistere Solem."]
[Footnote 67: Di Bruno: 284, 286a; Walsh: _An Early Allusion_, 2-3.]
Copernicus[68] himself was born in Thorn on February 19, 1473,[69]
seven years after that Hansa town founded by the Teutonic Order in
1231 had come under the sway of the king of Poland by the Second Peace
of Thorn.[70] His father,[71] Niklas Koppernigk, was a wholesale
merchant of Cracow who had removed to Thorn before 1458, married
Barbara Watzelrode of an old patrician Thorn family, and there had
served as town councillor for nineteen years until his death in
1483.[72] Thereupon his mother's brother, Lucas Watzelrode, later
bishop of Ermeland, became his guardian, benefactor and close
friend.[73]
[Footnote 68: _Nicolaus Coppernicus_ (Berlin, 1883-4; 3 vol.; Pt. I,
Biography, Pt. II, Sources), by Dr. Leopold Prowe gives an exhaustive
account of all the known details in regard to Copernicus collected
from earlier biographers and tested most painstakingly by the
documentary evidence Dr. Prowe and his fellow-workers unearthed during
a lifetime devoted to this subject. (_Allgemeine Deutsche
Biographie._) The manuscript authority Dr. Prowe cites (Prowe: I,
19-27 and footnotes), requires the double p in Copernicus's name, as
Copernicus himself invariably used the two p's in the Latinized form
_Coppernic_ without the termination _us_, and usually when this
termination was added. Also official records and the letters from his
friends usually give the double p; though the name is found in many
variants--Koppernig, Copperinck, etc. His signatures in his books, his
name in the letter he published in 1509, and the Latin form of it used
by his friends all bear testimony to his use of the double p. But
custom has for so many centuries sanctioned the simpler spelling, that
it seems unwise not to conform in this instance to the time-honored
usage.]
[Footnote 69: Prowe: I, 85.]
[Footnote 70: _Ency. Brit._: "Thorn."]
[Footnote 71: Prowe: I, 47-53.]
[Footnote 72: These facts would seem to justify the Poles today in
claiming Copernicus as their fellow-countryman by right of his
father's nationality and that of his native city. Dr. Prowe, however,
claims him as a "Prussian" both because of his long residence in the
Prussian-Polish bishopric of Ermeland, and because of Copernicus's own
reference to Prussia as "unser lieber Vaterland." (Prowe: II, 197.)]
[Footnote 73: Prowe: I, 73-82.]
After the elementary training in the Thorn school,[74] the lad entered
the university at Cracow, his father's former home, where he studied
under the faculty of arts from 1491-1494.[75] Nowhere else north of
the Alps at this time were mathematics and astronomy in better
standing than at this university.[76] Sixteen teachers taught these
subjects there during the years of Copernicus's stay, but no record
exists of his work under any of them.[77] That he must have studied
these two sciences there, however, is proved by Rheticus's remark in
the _Narratio Prima_[78] that Copernicus, after leaving Cracow, went
to Bologna to work with Dominicus Maria di Novara "non tarn discipulus
quam adjutor." He left Cracow without receiving a degree,[79] returned
to Thorn in 1494 when he and his family decided he should enter the
Church after first studying in Italy.[80] Consequently he crossed the
Alps in 1496 and was that winter matriculated at Bologna in the
"German nation."[81] The following summer he received word of his
appointment to fill a vacancy among the canons of the cathedral
chapter at Ermeland where his uncle had been bishop since 1489.[82] He
remained in Italy, however, about ten years altogether, studying civil
law at Bologna, and canon law and medicine at Padua,[83] yet receiving
his degree as doctor of canon law from the university of Ferrara in
1503.[84] He was also in Rome for several months during the Jubilee
year, 1500.
[Footnote 74: Ibid: I, 111.]
[Footnote 75: Ibid: I, 124-129.]
[Footnote 76: Ibid: I, 137.]
[Footnote 77: Ibid: I, 141-143.]
[Footnote 78: Rheticus: _Narratio Prima_, 448 (Thorn edit.).]
[Footnote 79: Prowe: I, 154.]
[Footnote 80: Ibid: I, 169.]
[Footnote 81: Ibid: I, 174.]
[Footnote 82: Ibid: I, 175. This insured him an annual income which
amounted to a sum equalling about $2250 today. Later he received a
sinecure appointment besides at Breslau. (Holden in _Pop. Sci._,
111.)]
[Footnote 83: Prowe: I, 224.]
[Footnote 84: Ibid: I, 308.]
At this period the professor of astronomy at Bologna was the famous
teacher Dominicus Maria di Novara (1454-1504), a man "ingenio et animo
liber" who dared to attack the immutability of the Ptolemaic system,
since his own observations, especially of the Pole Star, differed by a
degree and more from the traditional ones.[85] He dared to criticise
the long accepted system and to emphasize the Pythagorean notion of
the underlying harmony and simplicity in nature[86]; and from him
Copernicus may have acquired these ideas, for whether they lived
together or not in Bologna, they were closely associated. It was here,
too, that Copernicus began his study of Greek which later was to be
the means[87] of encouraging him in his own theorizing by acquainting
him with the ancients who had thought along similar lines.
[Footnote 85: Ibid: I, 240 and note. Little is known about him today,
except that he was primarily an observer, and was highly esteemed by
his immediate successors; see Gilbert: _De Magnete_.]
[Footnote 86: Clerke in _Ency. Brit._, "Novara."]
[Footnote 87: Prowe: I, 249.]
In the spring of the year (1501) following his visit to Rome,[88]
Copernicus returned to the Chapter at Frauenburg to get further leave
of absence to study medicine at the University of Padua.[89] Whether
he received a degree at Padua or not and how long he stayed there are
uncertain points.[90] He was back in Ermeland early in 1506.
[Footnote 88: Prowe: I, 279.]
[Footnote 89: Ibid, 294.]
[Footnote 90: Ibid: I, 319.]
His student days were ended. And now for many years he led a very
active life, first as companion and assistant to his uncle the Bishop,
with whom he stayed at Schloss Heilsberg till after the Bishop's death
in 1512; then as one of the leading canons of the chapter at
Frauenburg, where he lived most of the rest of his life.[91] As the
chapter representative for five years (at intervals) he had oversight
of the spiritual and temporal affairs of two large districts in the
care of the chapter.[92] He went on various diplomatic and other
missions to the King of Poland,[93] to Duke Albrecht of the Teutonic
Order,[94] and to the councils of the German states.[95] He wrote a
paper of considerable weight upon the much needed reform of the
Prussian currency.[96] His skill as a physician was in demand not only
in his immediate circle[97] but in adjoining countries, Duke Albrecht
once summoning him to Koenigsberg to attend one of his courtiers.[98]
He was a humanist as well as a Catholic Churchman, and though he did
not approve of the Protestant Revolt, he favored reform and
toleration.[99] Gassendi claims that he was also a painter, at least
in his student days, and that he painted portraits well received by
his contemporaries.[100] But his interest and skill in astronomy must
have been recognized early in his life for in 1514 the committee of
the Lateran Council in charge of the reform of the calendar summoned
him to their aid.[101]
[Footnote 91: Prowe: I, 335-380.]
[Footnote 92: Ibid: II, 75-110, 116, 124.]
[Footnote 93: Ibid: II, 204-8.]
[Footnote 94: Ibid: II, 110.]
[Footnote 95: Ibid: II, 144.]
[Footnote 96: Ibid: II, 146.]
[Footnote 97: Ibid: II, 293-319.]
[Footnote 98: Ibid: II, 464-472.]
[Footnote 99: Ibid: II, 170-187.]
[Footnote 100: Holden in _Pop. Sci._, 109.]
[Footnote 101: Prowe: II, 67-70.]
He was no cloistered monk devoting all his time to the study of the
heavens, but a cultivated man of affairs, of recognized ability in
business and statesmanship, and a leader among his fellow canons. His
mathematical and astronomical pursuits were the occupations of his
somewhat rare leisure moments, except perhaps during the six years
with his uncle in the comparative freedom of the bishop's castle, and
during the last ten or twelve years of his life, after his request for
a coadjutor had resulted in lightening his duties. In his masterwork
_De Revolutionibus_[102] there are recorded only 27 of his own
astronomical observations, and these extend over the years from 1497
to 1529. The first was made at Bologna, the second at Rome in 1500,
and seven of the others at Frauenburg, where the rest were also
probably made. It is believed the greater part of the _De
Revolutionibus_ was written at Heilsburg[103] where Copernicus was
free from his chapter duties, for as he himself says[104] in the
Dedication to the Pope (dated 1543) his work had been formulated not
merely nine years but for "more than three nines of years." It had not
been neglected all this time, however, as the original MS. (now in the
Prague Library) with its innumerable changes and corrections shows how
continually he worked over it, altering and correcting the tables and
verifying his statements.[105]
[Footnote 102: Copernicus: _De Revolutionibus_, Thorn edit., 444. The
last two words of the full title: _De Revolutionibus Orbium
Coelestium_ are not on the original MS. and are believed to have
been added by Osiander. Prowe: II, 541, note.]
[Footnote 103: Ibid: II, 490-1.]
[Footnote 104: Copernicus: Dedication, 4. (Thorn edit.)]
[Footnote 105: Prowe: II, 503-508.]
Copernicus was a philosopher.[106] He thought out a new explanation of
the world machine with relatively little practical work of his
own,[107] though we know he controlled his results by the accumulated
observations of the ages.[108] His instruments were inadequate,
inaccurate and out of date even in his time, for much better ones were
then being made at Nuernberg[109]; and the cloudy climate of Ermeland
as well as his own active career prevented him from the
long-continued, painstaking observing, which men like Tycho Brahe were
to carry on later. Despite such handicaps, because of his
dissatisfaction with the complexities and intricacies of the Ptolemaic
system and because of his conviction that the laws of nature were
simple and harmonious, Copernicus searched the writings of the classic
philosophers, as he himself tells us,[110] to see what other
explanation of the universe had been suggested. "And I found first in
Cicero that a certain Nicetas had thought the earth moved. Later in
Plutarch I found certain others had been of the same opinion." He
quoted the Greek referring to Philolaus the Pythagorean, Heraclides of
Pontus, and Ecphantes the Pythagorean.[111] As a result he began to
consider the mobility of the earth and found that such an explanation
seemingly solved many astronomical problems with a simplicity and a
harmony utterly lacking in the old traditional scheme. Unaided by a
telescope, he worked out in part the right theory of the universe and
for the first time in history placed all the then known planets in
their true positions with the sun at the center. He claimed that the
earth turns on its axis as it travels around the sun, and careens
slowly as it goes, thus by these three motions explaining many of the
apparent movements of the sun and the planets. He retained,[112]
however, the immobile heaven of the fixed stars (though vastly farther
off in order to account for the non-observance of any stellar
parallax[113]), the "perfect" and therefore circular orbits of the
planets, certain of the old eccentrics, and 34 new epicycles in place
of all the old ones which he had cast aside.[114] He accepted the
false notion of trepidation enunciated by the Arabs in the 9th century
and later overthrown by Tycho Brahe.[115] His calculations were
weak.[116] But his great book is a sane and modern work in an age of
astrology and superstition.[117] His theory is a triumph of reason and
imagination and with its almost complete independence of authority is
perhaps as original a work as an human being may be expected to
produce.
[Footnote 106: Ibid: II, 64.]
[Footnote 107: Ibid: II, 58-9.]
[Footnote 108: Rheticus: _Narratio Prima_.]
[Footnote 109: Prowe: II, 56.]
[Footnote 110: Copernicus: Dedication, 5-6. See Appendix B.]
[Footnote 111: For a translation of this dedication in full, see
Appendix B.
In the original MS. occurs a reference (struck out) to Aristarchus of
Samos as holding the theory of the earth's motion. (Prowe: II, 507,
note.) The finding of this passage proves that Copernicus had at least
heard of Aristarchus, but his apparent indifference is the more
strange since an account of his teaching occurs in the same book of
Plutarch from which Copernicus learned about Philolaus. But the chief
source of our knowledge about Aristarchus is through Archimedes, and
the editio princeps of his works did not appear till 1544, a year
after the death of Copernicus. C.R. Eastman in _Pop. Sci._ 68:325.]
[Footnote 112: Delambre: _Astr. Mod._ pp. xi-xii.]
[Footnote 113: As the earth moves, the position in the heavens of a
fixed star seen from the earth should differ slightly from its
position observed six months later when the earth is on the opposite
side of its orbit. The distance to the fixed stars is so vast,
however, that this final proof of the earth's motion was not attained
till 1838 when Bessel (1784-1846) observed stellar parallax from
Koenigsberg. Berry: 123-24.]
[Footnote 114: _Commentariolus_ in Prowe: III, 202.]
[Footnote 115: Holden in _Pop. Sci._, 117.]
[Footnote 116: Delambre: _Astr. Mod._, p. xi.]
[Footnote 117: Snyder: 165.]
Copernicus was extremely reluctant to publish his book because of the
misunderstandings and malicious attacks it would unquestionably
arouse.[118] Possibly, too, he was thinking of the hostility already
existing between himself and his Bishop, Dantiscus,[119] whom he did
not wish to antagonize further. But his devoted pupil and friend,
Rheticus, aided by Tiedeman Giese, Bishop of Culm and a lifelong
friend, at length (1542) persuaded him.[120] So he entrusted the
matter to Giese who passed it on to Rheticus, then connected with the
University at Wittenberg as professor of mathematics.[121] Rheticus,
securing leave of absence from Melancthon his superior, went to
Nuernberg to supervise the printing.[122] This was done by Petrejus.
Upon his return to Wittenberg, Rheticus left in charge Johann Schoener,
a famous mathematician and astronomer, and Andreas Osiander, a
Lutheran preacher interested in astronomy. The printed book[123] was
placed in Copernicus's hands at Frauenburg on May 24th, 1543, as he
lay dying of paralysis.[124]
[Footnote 118: Copernicus: Dedication, 3.]
[Footnote 119: Prowe: II, 362-7.]
[Footnote 120: Ibid: II, 406.]
[Footnote 121: Ibid: II, 501.]
[Footnote 122: Ibid: II, 517-20.]
[Footnote 123: Four other editions have since appeared; at Basel,
1566, Amsterdam 1617, Warsaw 1847, and Thorn 1873. For further
details, see Prowe: II, 543-7, and Thorn edition pp. xii-xx. The
edition cited in this study is the Thorn one of 1873.]
[Footnote 124: Prowe: II, 553-4.]
Copernicus passed away that day in ignorance that his life's work
appeared before the world not as a truth but as an hypothesis; for
there had been inserted an anonymous preface "ad lectorem de
hypothesibus huius opera" stating this was but another hypothesis for
the greater convenience of astronomers.[125] "Neque enim necesse est
eas hypotheses esse veras, imo ne verisimiles quidem, sed sufficit hoc
unum, si calculum observationibus congruentem exhibeant."[126] For
years Copernicus was thought to have written this preface to disarm
criticism. Kepler sixty years later (1601) called attention to this
error,[127] and quoted Osiander's letters to Copernicus and to
Rheticus of May, 1541, suggesting that the system be called an
hypothesis to avert attacks by theologians and Aristotelians. He
claimed that Osiander had written the preface; but Kepler's article
never was finished and remained unpublished till 1858.[128] Giese and
Rheticus of course knew that the preface falsified Copernicus's work,
and Giese, highly indignant at the "impiety" of the printer (who he
thought had written it to save himself from blame) wrote Rheticus
urging him to write another "praefatiunculus" purging the book of this
falsehood.[129] This letter is dated July 26, 1543, and the book had
appeared in April. Apparently nothing was done and the preface was
accepted without further challenge.
[Footnote 125: Copernicus: _De Revolutionibus_, I. "To the reader on
the hypotheses of this book."]
[Footnote 126: "For it is not necessary that these hypotheses be true,
nor even probable, but this alone is sufficient, if they show
reasoning fitting the observations."]
[Footnote 127: Kepler: _Apologia Tychonis contra Ursum_ in _Op. Om._:
I, 244-246.]
[Footnote 128: Prowe: II, 251, note.]
[Footnote 129: Ibid: II, 537-9.]
It remains to ask whether people other than Copernicus's intimates had
known of his theory before 1543. Peucer, Melancthon's nephew, declared
Copernicus was famous by 1525,[130] and the invitation from the
Lateran Council committee indicates his renown as early as 1514. In
Vienna in 1873[131] there was found a _Commentariolus_, or summary of
his great work,[132] written by Copernicus for the scholars friendly
to him. It was probably written soon after 1530, and gives a full
statement of his views following a series of seven axioms or theses
summing up the new theory. This little book probably occasioned the
order from Pope Clement VII in 1533 to Widmanstadt to report to him on
the new scheme.[133] This Widmanstadt did in the papal gardens before
the Pope with several of the cardinals and bishops, and was presented
with a book as his reward.
[Footnote 130: Ibid: II, 273.]
[Footnote 131: Ibid: II, 286-7.]
[Footnote 132: A second copy was found at Upsala shortly afterwards,
though for centuries its existence was unknown save for two slight
references to such a book, one by Gemma Frisius, the other by Tycho
Brahe. Prowe: II, 284.]
[Footnote 133: Ibid: II, 273-4.]
In 1536, the Cardinal Bishop of Capua, Nicolas von Schoenberg,
apparently with the intent to pave the way for the theory at Rome,
wrote for a report of it.[134] It is not known whether the report was
sent, and the cardinal died the following year. But that Copernicus
was pleased by this recognition is evident from the prominence he gave
to the cardinal's letter, as he printed it in his book at the
beginning, even before the dedication to the Pope.
[Footnote 134: Prowe: II, 274, note.]
The most widely circulated account at this time, however, was the
_Narratio Prima_, a letter from Georg Joachim of Rhaetia (better known
as Rheticus), written in October, 1539, from Frauenburg to Johann
Schoener at Nuernberg.[135] Rheticus,[136] at twenty-five years of age
professor of mathematics at Wittenberg, had gone uninvited to
Frauenburg early that summer to visit Copernicus and learn for himself
more in detail about this new system. This was rather a daring
undertaking, for not only were Luther and Melancthon outspoken in
their condemnation of Copernicus, but Rheticus was going from
Wittenberg, the headquarters of the Lutheran heresy, into the
bishopric of Ermeland where to the Bishop and the King his overlord,
the very name of Luther was anathema. Nothing daunted, Rheticus
departed for Frauenberg and could not speak too highly of the cordial
welcome he received from the old astronomer. He came for a few weeks,
and remained two years to return to Wittenberg as an avowed believer
in the system and its first teacher and promulgator. Not only did he
write the _Narratio Prima_ and an _Encomium Borussae_, both extolling
Copernicus, but what is more important, he succeeded in persuading him
to allow the publication of the _De Revolutionibus_. Rheticus returned
to his post in 1541, to resign it the next year and become Dean of the
Faculty of Arts. In all probability the conflict was too intense
between his new scientific beliefs and the statements required of him
as professor of the old mathematics and astronomy.
[Footnote 135: Prowe: II, 426-440.]
[Footnote 136: Ibid: II, 387-405.]
His colleague, Erasmus Reinhold, continued to teach astronomy there,
though he, too, accepted the Copernican system.[137] He published a
series of tables (_Tabulae Prutenicae_, 1551) based on the Copernican
calculations to supersede the inaccurate ones by Regiomontanus; and
these were in general use throughout Europe for the next seventy-odd
years. As he himself declared, the series was based in its principles
and fundamentals upon the observations of the famous Nicolaus
Copernicus. The almanacs deduced from these calculations probably did
more to bring the new system into general recognition and gradual
acceptance than did the theoretical works.[138]
[Footnote 137: Ibid: II, 391.]
[Footnote 138: Holden in _Pop. Sci._, 119.]
Opposition to the theory had not yet gathered serious headway. There
is record[139] of a play poking fun at the system and its originator,
written by the Elbing schoolmaster (a Dutch refugee from the
Inquisition) and given in 1531 by the villagers at Elbing (3 miles
from Frauenburg). Elbing and Ermeland were hostile to each other,
Copernicus was well known in Elbing though probably from afar, for
there seems to have been almost no personal intercourse between canons
and people, and the spread of Luther's teachings had intensified the
hostility of the villagers towards the Church and its representatives.
But not until Giordano Bruno made the Copernican system the
starting-point of his philosophy was the Roman Catholic Church
seriously aroused to combat it. Possibly Osiander's preface turned
opposition aside, and certainly the non-acceptance of the system as a
whole by Tycho Brahe, the leading astronomer of Europe at that time,
made people slow to consider it.
[Footnote 139: Prowe: II, 233-244.]
CHAPTER III.
THE LATER DEVELOPMENT AND SCIENTIFIC DEFENSE OF THE COPERNICAN SYSTEM.
Copernicus accomplished much, but even his genius could not far outrun
the times in which he lived. When one realizes that not only all the
astronomers before him, but he and his immediate successor, Tycho
Brahe, made all their observations and calculations unaided by even
the simplest telescope, by logarithms or by pendulum clocks for
accurate measurement of time,[140] one marvels not at their errors,
but at the greatness of their genius in rising above such
difficulties. This lack of material aids makes the work of Tycho
Brahe,[141] accounted one of the greatest observers that has ever
lived,[142] as notable in its way perhaps as that of Copernicus.
[Footnote 140: Burckhardt: 8.]
[Footnote 141: The two standard lives of Tycho Brahe are the _Vita
Tychonis Brahei_ by Gassendi (1655) till recently the sole source of
information, and Dreyer's _Tycho Brahe_ (1890) based not only on
Gassendi but on the documentary evidence disclosed by the researches
of the 19th century. For Tycho's works I have used the _Opera Omnia_
published at Frankfort in 1648. The Danish Royal Scientific Society
has issued a reprint (1901) of the rare 1573 edition of the _De Nova
Stella_.]
[Footnote 142: Bridges: 206.]
His life[143] was a somewhat romantic one. Born of noble family on
December 14th, 1546, at Knudstrup in Denmark, Tyge Brahe, the second
of ten children,[144] was early practically adopted by his father's
brother. His family wished him to become a statesman and sent him in
1559 to the university at Copenhagen to prepare for that career. A
partial eclipse of the sun on August 21st, 1560 as foretold by the
astronomers thrilled the lad and determined him to study a science
that could foretell the future and so affect men's lives.[145] When he
was sent to Leipsic with a tutor in 1562 to study law, he devoted his
time and money to the study of mathematics and astronomy. Two years
later when eighteen years of age, he resolved to perform anew the task
of Hipparchos and Ptolemy and make a catalogue of the stars more
accurate than theirs. His family hotly opposed these plans; and for
six years he wandered through the German states, now at Wittenberg,
now at Rostock (where he fought the duel in which he lost part of his
nose and had to have it replaced by one of gold and silver)[146] or at
Augsburg--everywhere working on his chosen subjects. But upon his
return to Denmark (1570) he spent two years on chemistry and medicine,
till the startling appearance of the New Star in the constellation of
Cassiopaea (November, 1572) recalled him to what became his life
work.[147]
[Footnote 143: Dreyer: 11-84.]
[Footnote 144: Gassendi: 2.]
[Footnote 145: Dreyer: 13.]
[Footnote 146: Gassendi: 9-10.]
[Footnote 147: Dreyer: 38-44.]
Through the interest and favor of King Frederick II, he was given the
island of Hveen near Elsinore, with money to build an observatory and
the pledge of an annual income from the state treasury for his
support.[148] There at Uraniborg from 1576 to 1597 he and his pupils
made the great catalogue of the stars, and studied comets and the
moon. When he was forced to leave Hveen by the hostility and the
economical tendencies of the young king,[149] after two years of
wandering he accepted the invitation of the Emperor Rudolphus and
established himself at Prague in Bohemia. Among his assistants at
Prague was young Johann Kepler who till Tycho's death (on October 24,
1601) was his chief helper for twenty months, and who afterwards
completed his observations, publishing the results in the Rudolphine
Tables of 1627.
[Footnote 148: Ibid: 84.]
[Footnote 149: Ibid: 234-5.]
This "Phoenix among Astronomers"--as Kepler calls him,[150]--was the
father of modern practical astronomy.[151] He also propounded a third
system of the universe, a compromise between the Ptolemaic and the
Copernican. In this the Tychonic system,[152] the earth is motionless
and is the center of the orbits of the sun, the moon, and the sphere
of the fixed stars, while the sun is the center of the orbits of the
five planets.[153] Mercury and Venus move in orbits with radii shorter
than the sun's radius, and the other three planets include the earth
within their circuits. This system was in harmony with the Bible and
accounted as satisfactorily by geometry as either of the other two
systems for the observed phenomena.[154] To Tycho Brahe, the Ptolemaic
system was too complex,[155] and the Copernican absurd, the latter
because to account for the absence of stellar parallax it left vacant
and purposeless a vast space between Saturn and the sphere of the
fixed stars,[156] and because Tycho's observations did not show any
trace of the stellar parallax that must exist if the earth moves.[157]
[Footnote 150: Kepler: _Tabulae Rudolphinae_. Title page.]
[Footnote 151: Dreyer: 317-363.]
[Footnote 152: As stated in his Book on the Comet of 1577 (pub.
1588).]
[Footnote 153: Dreyer: 168-9.]
[Footnote 154: Schiaparelli in Snyder: 165.]
[Footnote 155: Brahe: _Op. Om._, pt. I, p. 337.]
[Footnote 156: Ibid: 409-410.]
[Footnote 157: The Tychonic system has supporters to this day. See
chap. viii.]
Though Tycho thus rejected the Copernican theory, his own proved to be
the stepping stone toward the one he rejected,[158] for by it and by
his study of comets he completely destroyed the ideas of solid
crystalline spheres to the discredit of the scholastics; and his
promulgation of a third theory of the universe helped to diminish
men's confidence in authority and to stimulate independent thinking.
[Footnote 158: Dreyer: 181.]
Copernicus worked out his system by mathematics with but slight aid
from his own observations. It was a theory not yet proven true. Tycho
Brahe, though denying its validity, contributed in his mass of
painstaking, accurate observations the raw material of facts to be
worked up by Kepler into the great laws of the planets attesting the
fundamental truth of the Copernican hypothesis.
Johann Kepler[159] earned for himself the proud title of "lawmaker for
the universe" in defiance of his handicaps of ill-health, family
troubles, and straitened finances.[160] Born in Weil, Wurtemberg,
(December 27, 1571) of noble but indigent parents, he was a sickly
child unable for years to attend school regularly. He finally left the
monastery school in Mulifontane in 1586 and entered the university at
Tuebingen to stay for four and a half years. There he studied
philosophy, mathematics, and theology (he was a Lutheran) receiving
the degree of Master of Arts in 1591. While at the university he
studied under Maestlin, professor of mathematics and astronomy, and a
believer in the Copernican theory. Because of Maestlin's teaching
Kepler developed into a confirmed and enthusiastic adherent to the new
doctrine.
[Footnote 159: The authoritative biography is the _Vita_ by Frisch in
vol. VIII, pp. 668-1028 of _Op. Om. Kep._]
[Footnote 160: Frisch: VIII, 718. [Transcriber's Note: Missing
footnote reference in original text has been added above in a logical
place.]]
In 1594 he reluctantly abandoned his favorite study, philosophy, and
accepted a professorship in mathematics at Graetz in Styria. Two years
later he published his first work: _Prodromus Dissertationum continens
mysterium cosmographicum_ etc. (1596) in which he sought to prove that
the Creator in arranging the universe had thought of the five regular
bodies which can be inscribed in a sphere according to which He had
regulated the order, the number and the proportions of the heavens and
their movements.[161] The book is important not only because of its
novelty, but because it gave the Copernican doctrine public
explanation and defense.[162] Kepler himself valued it enough to
reprint it with his _Harmonia Mundi_ twenty-five years later. And it
won for him appreciative letters from various scientists, notably from
Tycho Brahe and Galileo.[163]
[Footnote 161: Delambre: _Astr. Mod._ 314-315.]
[Footnote 162: Frisch: VIII, 999.]
[Footnote 163: Ibid: VIII, 696.]
As Kepler, a Lutheran, was having difficulties in Graetz, a Catholic
city, he finally accepted Tycho's urgent invitation to come to
Prague.[164] He came early in 1600, and after some adjustments had
been made between the two,[165] he and his family settled with Tycho
that autumn to remain till the latter's death the following November.
Kepler himself then held the office of imperial mathematician by
appointment for many years thereafter.[166]
[Footnote 164: Ibid: VIII, 699-715.]
[Footnote 165: Dreyer: 290-309.]
[Footnote 166: Frisch: VIII, 715.]
With the researches of Tycho's lifetime placed at his disposal, Kepler
worked out two of his three great planetary laws from Tycho's
observations of the planet Mars. Yet, as M. Bertrand remarks,[167] it
was well for Kepler that his material was not too accurate or its
variations (due to the then unmeasured force of attraction) might have
hindered him from proving his laws; and luckily for him the earth's
orbit is so nearly circular that in calculating the orbit of Mars to
prove its elliptical form, he could base his work on the earth's orbit
as a circle without vitiating his results for Mars.[168] That a
planet's orbit is an ellipse and not the perfect circle was of course
a triumph for the new science over the scholastics and Aristotelians.
But they had yet to learn what held the planets in their courses.
[Footnote 167: Bertrand: p. 870-1.]
[Footnote 168: The two laws first appeared in 1609 in his _Physica
Coelestis tradita commentarius de motu stellae martis_. (Frisch:
VIII, 964.) The third he enunciated in his _Harmonia Mundi_, 1619.
(Ibid: VIII, 1013-1017.)]
From Kepler's student days under Maestlin when as the subject of his
disputation he upheld the Copernican theory, to his death in 1630, he
was a staunch supporter of the new teaching.[169] In his _Epitome
Astronomiae Copernicanae_ (1616) he answered objections to it at
length.[170] He took infinite pains to convert his friends to the new
system. It was in vain that Tycho on his deathbed had urged Kepler to
carry on their work not on the Copernican but on the Tychonic
scheme.[171]
[Footnote 169: "Cor et animam meam": Kepler's expression in regard to
the Copernician theory. Ibid: VIII, 957.]
[Footnote 170: Ibid: VIII, 838.]
[Footnote 171: Ibid: VIII, 742.]
Kepler had reasoned out according to physics the laws by which the
planets moved.[172] In Italy at this same time Galileo with his optic
tube (invented 1609) was demonstrating that Venus had phases even as
Copernicus had declared, that Jupiter had satellites, and that the
moon was scarred and roughened--ocular proof that the old system with
its heavenly perfection in number (7 planets) and in appearance must
be cast aside. Within a year after Galileo's death Newton was
born[173] (January 4, 1643). His demonstration of the universal
application of the law of gravitation (1687) was perhaps the climax in
the development of the Copernican system. Complete and final proof
was adding in the succeeding years by Roemer's (1644-1710) discovery
of the velocity of light, by Bradley's (1693-1762) study of its
aberration,[174] by Bessel's discovery of stellar parallax in
1838,[175] and by Foucault's experimental demonstration of the earth's
axial motion with a pendulum in 1851.[176]
[Footnote 172: Kepler: _Op. Om._, I, 106: _Praefatio ad Lectorem_.]
[Footnote 173: Berry: 210.]
[Footnote 174: Berry: 265.]
[Footnote 175: Ibid: 359.]
[Footnote 176: Jacoby: 89.]
PART TWO
THE RECEPTION OF THE COPERNICAN THEORY.
CHAPTER I.
OPINIONS AND ARGUMENTS IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
During the lifetime of Copernicus, Roman Catholic churchmen had been
interested in his work: Cardinal Schoenberg wrote for full information,
Widmanstadt reported on it to Pope Clement VII and Copernicus had
dedicated his book to Pope Paul III.[177] But after his death, the
Church authorities apparently paid little heed to his theory until
some fifty years later when Giordano Bruno forced it upon their
attention in his philosophical teachings. Osiander's preface had
probably blinded their eyes to its implications.
[Footnote 177: See before, p. 30.]
The Protestant leaders were not quite so urbane in their attitude.
While Copernicus was still alive, Luther is reported[178] to have
referred to this "new astrologer" who sought to prove that the earth
and not the firmament swung around, saying: "The fool will overturn
the whole science of astronomy. But as the Holy Scriptures state,
Joshua bade the sun stand still and not the earth." Melancthon was
more interested in this new idea, perhaps because of the influence of
Rheticus, his colleague in the University of Wittenberg and
Copernicus's great friend and supporter; but he too preferred not to
dissent from the accepted opinion of the ages.[179] Informally in a
letter to a friend he implies the absurdity of the new teaching,[180]
and in his _Initia Doctrinae Physicae_ he goes to some pains to disprove
the new assumption not merely by mathematics but by the Bible, though
with a kind of apology to other physicists for quoting the Divine
Witness.[181] He refers to the phrase in Psalm XIX likening the sun in
its course "to a strong man about to run a race," proving that the sun
moves. Another Psalm states that the earth was founded not to be moved
for eternity, and a similar phrase occurs in the first chapter of
Ecclesiastes. Then there was the miracle when Joshua bade the sun
stand still. While this is a sufficient witness to the truths there
are other proofs: First, in the turning of a circumference, the center
remains motionless. Next, changes in the length of the day and of the
seasons would ensue, were the position of the earth in the universe
not central, and it would not be equidistant from the two poles. (He
has previously disposed of infinity by stating that the heavens
revolve around the pole, which could not happen if a line drawn from
the center of the universe were infinitely projected).[182]
Furthermore, the earth must be at the center for its shadow to fall
upon the moon in an eclipse. He refers next to the Aristotelian
statement that to a simple body belongs one motion: the earth is a
simple body; therefore it can have but one motion. What is true of the
parts applies to the whole; all the parts of the earth are borne
toward the earth and there rest; therefore the whole earth is at rest.
Quiet is essential to growth. Lastly, if the earth moved as fast as it
must if it moves at all, everything would fly to pieces.[183]
[Footnote 178: Luther: _Tischreden_, IV, 575; "Der Narr will die ganze
Kunst Astronomiae umkehren. Aber wie die heilige Schrift anzeigt, so
heiss Josua die Sonne still stehen, und nicht das Erdreich."]
[Footnote 179: "Non est autem hominis bene instituti dissentire a
consensu tot saeculorum." Praefatio Philippi Melanthonis, 1531, in
Sacro-Busto: _Libellus de Sphaera_ (no date).]
[Footnote 180: "Vidi dialogum et fui dissuassor editionis. Fabula per
sese paulatim consilescet; sed quidam putant esse egregiam
_katorthoma_ rem tam absurdam ornare, sicut ille Sarmaticus Astronomis
qui movet terram et figet solem. Profecto sapientes gubernatores
deberent ingeniorum petulantia cohercere." _Epistola B. Mithobio_, 16
Oct. 1541. P. Melancthon: _Opera_: IV, 679.]
[Footnote 181: "Quamquam autem rident aliqui Physicum testimonia
divina citantem, tamen nos honestum esse censemus, Philosophiam
conferre ad coelestia dicta, et in tanta caligine humanae mentis
autoritatem divinam consulere ubicunque possumus." Melancthon: _Initia
Doctrinae Physicae_: Bk. I, 63.]
[Footnote 182: Ibid: 60.]
[Footnote 183: Ibid: 59-67.]
Melancthon thus sums up the usual arguments from the Scriptures, from
Aristotle, Ptolemy and the then current physics, in opposition to this
theory. Not only did he publish his own textbook on physics, but he
republished Sacrobosco's famous introduction to astronomy, writing for
it a preface urging diligent study of this little text endorsed by so
many generations of scholars.
Calvin, the great teacher of the Protestant Revolt, apparently was
little touched by this new intellectual current.[184] He did write a
semi-popular tract[185] against the so called "judicial" astrology,
then widely accepted, which he, like Luther, condemns as a foolish
superstition, though he values "la vraie science d'astrologie" from
which men understand not merely the order and place of the stars and
planets, but the causes of things. In his _Commentaries_, he accepts
the miracle of the sun's standing still at Joshua's command as proof
of the faith Christ commended, so strong that it will remove
mountains; and he makes reference only to the time-honored Ptolemaic
theory in his discussion of Psalm XIX.[186]
[Footnote 184: Farrar: _Hist. of Interpretation_: Preface, xviii:
"Who," asks Calvin, "will venture to place the authority of Copernicus
above that of the Holy Spirit?"]
[Footnote 185: Calvin: _Oeuvres Francois_: _Traite ... contre
l'Astrologie_, 110-112.]
[Footnote 186: Calvin: _Op. Om._ in _Corpus Reformatorum_: vol. 25,
499-500; vol. 59, 195-196.]
For the absolute authority of the Pope the Protestant leaders
substituted the absolute authority of the Bible. It is not strange,
then, that they ignored or derided a theory as yet unsupported by
proof and so difficult to harmonize with a literally accepted Bible.
How widespread among the people generally did this theory become in
the years immediately following the publication of the _De
Revolutionibus_? M. Flammarion, in his _Vie de Copernic_ (1872),
refers[187] to the famous clock in the Strasburg Cathedral as having
been constructed by the University of Strasburg in protest against the
action taken by the Holy Office against Galileo, (though the clock
was constructed in 1571 and Galileo was not condemned until 1633).
This astronomical clock constructed only thirty years after the death
of Copernicus, he claims represented the Copernican system of the
universe with the planets revolving around the sun, and explained
clearly in the sight of the people what was the thought of the makers.
Lest no one should miscomprehend, he adds, the portrait of Copernicus
was placed there with this inscription: Nicolai Copernici vera
effigies, ex ipsius autographo depicta.
[Footnote 187: P. 78-79: "Ce planetaire ... represente le systeme du
monde tel qu'il a ete explique par Copernic."]
This would be important evidence of the spread of the theory were it
true. But M. Flammarion must have failed to see a brief description of
the Strasburg Clock written in 1856 by Charles Schwilgue, son of the
man who renovated its mechanism in 1838-1842. He describes the clock
as it was before his father made it over and as it is today.
Originally constructed in 1352, it was replaced in 1571 by an
astrolabe based on the Ptolemaic system; six hands with the zodiacal
signs of the planets gave their daily movements and, together with a
seventh representing the sun, revolved around a map of the world.[188]
When M. Schwilgue repaired the clock in 1838, he changed it to
harmonize with the Copernican system.[189]
[Footnote 188: Schwilgue: p. 15.]
[Footnote 189: Ibid: p. 48.]
But within eighteen years after the publication of the _De
Revolutionibus_, proof of its influence is to be found in such widely
separated places as London and the great Spanish University of
Salamanca. In 1551, Robert Recorde, court physician to Edward and to
Mary and teacher of mathematics, published in London his _Castle of
Knowledge_, an introduction to astronomy and the first book printed in
England describing the Copernican system.[190] He evidently did not
consider the times quite ripe for a full avowal of his own allegiance
to the new doctrine, but the remarks of the _Maister_ and the
_Scholler_ are worth repeating:[191]
"MAISTER: ... howbeit Copernicus a man of great learning, of
much experience, and of wonderfull diligence in observation,
hath renewed the opinion of Aristarchus Samius, affirming
that the earth, not onely moveth circularly about his owne
centre, but also may be, yea and is, continually out of the
precise centre of the world eight and thirty hundred
thousand miles: but because the understanding of that
controversie depends of profounder knowledge than in this
Introduction may be uttered conveniently, I wil let it passe
til some other time.
"SCHOLLER: Nay sit, in good faith, I desire not to heare
such vaine fantasies, so farre against the common reason,
and repugnant to the content of all the learned multitude of
Writers, and therefore let it passe for ever and a day
longer.
"MAISTER: You are too yong to be a good judge in so great a
matter: it passeth farre your learning, and their's also,
that are much better learned than you, to improuve his
supposition by good arguments, and therefore you were best
condemne nothing that you do not well understand: but an
other time, as I saide, I will so declare his supposition,
that you shall not onely wonder to heare it, but also
peradventure be as earnest then to credite it, as you are
now to condemne it: in the meane season let us proceed
forward in our former order...."
[Footnote 190: _Dict. of Nat. Biog._: "Recorde."]
[Footnote 191: Quoted (p. 135), from the edition of 1596 in the
library of Mr. George A. Plimpton. See also Recorde's _Whetstone of
Witte_ (1557) as cited by Berry, 127.]
This little book, reprinted in 1556 and in 1596, and one of the most
popular of the mathematical writings in England during that century,
must have interested the English in the new doctrine even before
Bruno's emphatic presentation of it to them in the eighties.
Yet the English did not welcome it cordially. One of the most popular
books of this period was Sylvester's translation (1591) of DuBartas's
_The Divine Weeks_ which appeared in France in 1578, a book loved
especially by Milton.[192] DuBartas writes:[193]
"Those clerks that think--think how absurd a jest!
That neither heavens nor stars do turn at all,
Nor dance around this great, round earthly ball,
But the earth itself, this massy globe of our's,
Turns round about once every twice twelve hours!
And we resemble land-bred novices
New brought aboard to venture on the seas;
Who at first launching from the shore suppose
The ship stands still and that the firm earth goes."
[Footnote 192: DuBartas: _The Divine Weeks_ (Sylvester's trans. edited
by Haight): Preface, pp. xx-xxiii and note.]
[Footnote 193: _Op. cit._: 72.]
Quite otherwise was the situation in the sixteenth century at the
University of Salamanca. A new set of regulations for the University,
drawn up at the King's order by Bishop Covarrubias, was published in
1561. It contained the provision in the curriculum that "Mathematics
and Astrology are to be given in three years, the first, Astrology,
the second, Euclid, Ptolemy or Copernicus _ad vota audientium_," which
also indicates, as Vicente de la Fuente points out, that at this
University "the choice of the subject-matter to be taught lay not with
the teachers but with the students, a rare situation."[194] One
wonders what happened there when the professors and students received
word[195] from the Cardinal Nuncio at Madrid in 1633 that the
Congregations of the Index had decreed the Copernican doctrine was
thereafter in no way to be held, taught or defended.
[Footnote 194: La Fuente: _Historia de la Universidades ... de
Espana_: II, 314.]
[Footnote 195: _Doc. 86_ in Favaro: 130.]
One of the graduates of this University, Father Zuniga,[196] (better
known as Didacus a Stunica), wrote a commentary on Job that was
licensed to be printed in 1579, but was not published until 1584 at
Toledo. Another edition appeared at Rome seven years later. It
evidently was widely read for it was condemned _donec corrigatur_ by
the Index in 1616 and the mathematical literature of the next half
century contains many allusions to his remarks on Job: IX: 6; "Who
shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble."
After commenting here upon the greater clarity and simplicity of the
Copernican theory, Didacus a Stunica then states that the theory is
not contradicted by Solomon in Ecclesiastes, as that "text signifieth
no more but this, that although the succession of ages, and
generations of men on earth be various, yet the earth itself is still
one and the same, and continueth without any sensible variation" ...
and "it hath no coherence with its context (as Philosophers show) if
it be expounded to speak of the earth's immobility. The motion that
belongs to the earth by way of speech is assigned to the sun even by
Copernicus himself, and those who are his followers.... To conclude,
no place can be produced out of Holy Scriptures which so clearly
speaks the earth's immobility as this doth its mobility. Therefore
this text of which we have spoken is easily reconciled to this
opinion. And to set forth the wonderful power and wisdom of God who
can indue the frame of the whole earth (it being of monstrous weight
by nature) with motion, this our Divine pen-man added; 'And the
pillars thereof tremble:' As if he would teach us, from the doctrine
laid down, that it is moved from its foundations."[197]
[Footnote 196: _Diccionario Enciclopedico Hispano-Americano de
literatura, ciencias y artes_ (Barcelona, 1898).]
[Footnote 197: Quoted in Salusbury: _Math. Coll._: I, 468-470 (1661),
as a work inaccessible to most readers at that time because of its
extreme rarity. It remained on the Index until the edition of 1835.]
French thinkers, like the English, did not encourage the new doctrine
at this time. Montaigne[198] was characteristically indifferent: "What
shall we reape by it, but only that we neede not care which of the two
it be? And who knoweth whether a hundred yeares hence a third opinion
will arise which happily shall overthrow these two praecedent?" The
famous political theorist, Jean Bodin, (1530-1596), was as thoroughly
opposed to it as DuBartas had been. In the last year of his life,
Bodin wrote his _Universae Naturae Theatrum_[199] in which he discussed
the origin and composition of the universe and of the animal,
vegetable, mineral and spiritual kingdoms. These five books (or
divisions) reveal his amazing ideas of geology, physics and astronomy
while at the same time they show a mind thoroughly at home in Hebrew
and Arabian literature as well as in the classics. His answer to the
Copernican doctrine is worth quoting to illustrate the attitude of one
of the keenest thinkers in a brilliant era:
"THEORIST: Since the sun's heat is so intense that we read
it has sometimes burned crops, houses and cities in
Scythia,[200] would it not be more reasonable that the sun
is still and the earth indeed revolves?
"MYSTIC: Such was the old idea of Philolaus, Timaeus,
Ecphantes, Seleucus, Aristarchus of Samos, Archimedes and
Eudoxus, which Copernicus has renewed in our time. But it
can easily be refuted by its shallowness although no one has
done it thoroughly.
"THE.: What arguments do they rely on who hold that the
earth is revolved and that the sun forsooth is still?
"MYS.: Because the comprehension of the human mind cannot
grasp the incredible speed of the heavenly spheres and
especially of the tenth sphere which must be ten times
greater than that of the eighth, for in twenty-four hours it
must traverse 469,562,845 miles, so that the earth seems
like a dot in the universe. This is the chief argument.
Besides this, we get rid entirely of epicycles in
representing the motions of the planets and what is taught
concerning the motion of trepidation in the eighth sphere
vanishes. Also, there is no need for the ninth and tenth
spheres. There is one argument which they have omitted but
which seems to me more efficacious than any, viz.: rest is
nobler than movement, and that celestial and divine things
have a stable nature while elemental things have motion,
disturbance and unrest; therefore it seems more probable
that the latter move rather than the former. But while
serious absurdities result from the idea of Eudoxus, far
more serious ones result from that of Copernicus.
"THE.: What are these absurdities?
"MYS.: Eudoxus knew nothing of trepidation, so his idea
seems to be less in error. But Copernicus, in order to
uphold his own hypothesis, claims the earth has three
motions, its diurnal and annual ones, and trepidation; if we
add to these the pull of weight towards the center, we are
attributing four natural motions to one and the same body.
If this is granted, then the very foundations of physics
must fall into ruins; for all are agreed upon this that each
natural body has but one motion of its own, and that all
others are said to be either violent or voluntary.
Therefore, since he claims the earth is agitated by four
motions, one only can be its own, the others must be
confessedly violent; yet nothing violent in nature can
endure continuously. Furthermore the earth is not moved by
water, much less by the motion of air or fire in the way we
have stated the heavens are moved by the revolutions of the
enveloping heavens. Copernicus further does not claim that
all the heavens are immobile but that some are moved, that
is, the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. But
why such diversity? No one in his senses, or imbued with the
slightest knowledge of physics, will ever think that the
earth, heavy and unwieldy from its own weight and mass,
staggers up and down around its own center and that of the
sun; for at the slightest jar of the earth, we would see
cities and fortresses, towns and mountains thrown down. A
certain courtier Aulicus, when some astrologer in court was
upholding Copernicus's idea before Duke Albert of Prussia,
turning to the servant who was pouring the Falernian, said:
"Take care that the flagon is not spilled."[201] For if the
earth were to be moved, neither an arrow shot straight up,
nor a stone dropped from the top of a tower would fall
perpendicularly, but either ahead or behind. With this
argument Ptolemy refuted Eudoxus. But if we search into the
secrets of the Hebrews and penetrate their sacred
sanctuaries, all these arguments can easily be confirmed;
for when the Lord of Wisdom said the sun swept in its swift
course from the eastern shore to the west, he added this:
Terra vero stat aeternam. Lastly, all things on finding
places suitable to their natures, remain there, as Aristotle
writes. Since therefore the earth has been alloted a place
fitting its nature, it cannot be whirled around by other
motion than its own.
"THE.: I certainly agree to all the rest with you, but
Aristotle's law I think involves a paralogism, for by this
argument the heavens should be immobile since they are in a
place fitting their nature.
"MYS.: You argue subtly indeed, but in truth this argument
does not seem necessary to me; for what Aristotle admitted,
that, while forsooth all the parts of the firmament changed
their places, the firmament as a whole did not, is
exceedingly absurd. For either the whole heaven is at rest
or the whole heaven is moved. The senses themselves disprove
that it is at rest; therefore it is moved. For it does not
follow that if a body is not moved away from its place, it
is not moved in that place. Furthermore, since we have the
most certain proof of the movement of trepidation, not only
all the parts of the firmament, but also the eight spheres,
must necessarily leave their places and move up and down,
forward and back."[202]
[Footnote 198: Montaigne: _Essays_: Bk. II, c. 2: _An Apologie of
Raymonde Sebonde_ (II, 352).]
[Footnote 199: This book, published at Frankfort in 1597, was
translated into French by M. Fougerolles and printed in Lyons that
same year. It has become extremely rare since its "atheistic
atmosphere" (Peignot: _Dictionnaire_) caused the Roman Church to place
it upon the Index by decree of 1628, where it has remained to this
day.]
[Footnote 200: Cromer in History of Poland.]
[Footnote 201: Cromer in History of Poland.[A]]
[Footnote A: I could not find this reference in either of Martin
Kromer's books; _De Origine et Rebus Gestis Polonorum, ad 1511_, or in
his _Res Publicae sive Status Regni Poloniae_.]
[Footnote 202: Bodin: _Univ. Nat. Theatrum_: Bk. V, sec. 2 (end).]
This was the opinion of a profound thinker and experienced man of
affairs living when Tycho Brahe and Bruno were still alive and Kepler
and Galileo were beginning their astronomical investigations. But he
was not alone in his views, as we shall see; for at the close of the
sixteenth century, the Copernican doctrine had few avowed supporters.
The Roman Church was still indifferent; the Protestants clinging to
the literal interpretation of the Bible were openly antagonistic; the
professors as a whole were too Aristotelian to accept or pay much
attention to this novelty, except Kepler and his teacher Maestlin
(though the latter refused to uphold it in his textbook);[203] while
astronomers and mathematicians who realized the insuperable objections
to the Ptolemaic conception, welcomed the Tychonic system as a _via
media_; and the common folk, if they heard of it at all, must have
ridiculed it because it was so plainly opposed to what they saw in the
heavens every day. In the same way their intellectual superiors
exclaimed at the "delirium" of those supporting such a notion.[204]
One thinker, however was to see far more in the doctrine than
Copernicus himself had conceived, and by Giordano Bruno the Roman
Church was to be aroused.
[Footnote 203: Delambre: _Astr. Mod._: I, 663.]
[Footnote 204: Justus-Lipsius: _Physiologiae Stoicorum_: Bk. II,
dissert. 19 (Dedication 1604, Louvain), (IV, 947); "Vides deliria,
quomodo aliter appellent?"]