The Influence of Science

Abstract

IN his letter to NATURE (July 15, p. 78) Sir George Greenhill does well in directing attention to the fact that the quarrel between Galileo and the Holy Office was largely a domestic quarrel between two opposing schools of thought. It is historically a fallacy, though a very common one, to suppose that the freedom of experimental inquiry was secured in consequence of the action of the Roman Curia in the case of Galileo. So long as scientific investigators confined themselves to their own legitimate subjects of study, and left doctrinal and Scriptural matters alone, freedom of experimental inquiry was never interfered with by ecclesiastical authority. Nicholas Copernicus was a devout Catholic priest, and his heliocentric doctrine was freely taught, even in ecclesiastical colleges, until Galileo interested himself as a champion of the system.