Two Systems

Sagredo, do not sneer at this prudent scheme, which it seems to me you propose sarcastically. For it is

Not long a famous philosopher composed a book on the soul in which, discussing Aristotle’s opinion as to its mortality or immortality, he adduced many texts beyond those already quoted by Alexander.

As to those, he asserted that Aristotle was not even dealing with such matters there, let alone deciding anything about them, and he gave others which he himself had discovered in various remote places and which tended to the damaging side. Being advised that this would make trouble for him in getting a license to publish it, he wrote back to his friend that he would nevertheless get one quickly, since if no other obstacle came up he would have no difficulty altering the doctrine of Aristotle; for with other texts and other expositions he could maintain the contrary opinion, and it would still agree with the sense of Aristotle.

We need guides in forests and in unknown lands, but on plains and in open places only the blind need guides. It is better for such people to stay at home, but anyone with eyes in his head and his wits about him could serve as a guide for them. In saying this, I do not mean that a person should not listen to Aristotle; indeed, I applaud the reading and careful study of his works, and I reproach only those who give themselves up as slaves to him in such a way as to subscribe blindly to everything he says and take it as an inviolable decree without looking for any other reasons. This abuse carries with it another profound disorder, that other people do not try harder to comprehend the strength of his demonstrations. And what is more revolting in a public dispute, when someone is dealing with demonstrable conclusions, than to hear him interrupted by a text (often written to some quite different purpose) thrown into his teeth by an opponent? If, indeed, you wish to continue in this method of studying, then put aside the name of philosophers and call yourselves historians, or memory experts; for it is not proper that those who never philosophize should usurp the honorable title of philosopher.

But we had better get back to shore, lest we enter into a boundless ocean and not get out of it all day. So put forward the arguments and demonstrations, Simplicio–either yours or Aristotle’s–but not just texts and bare authorities, because our discourses must relate to the sensible world and not to one on paper. And since in yesterday’s argument the earth was lifted up out of darkness and exposed to the open sky, and the attempt to number it among the bodies we call heavenly was shown to be not so hopeless and prostrate a proposition that it remained without a spark of life, we should follow this up by examining that other proposition which holds it to be probable that the earth is fixed and utterly immovable as to its entire globe, and see what chance there is of making it movable, and with what motion.

Now because I am undecided about this question, whereas Simplicio has his mind made up with Aristotle on the side of immovability, he shall give the reasons for his opinion step by step, and I the answers and the arguments of the other side, while Sagredo shall tell us the workings of his mind and the side toward which he feels it drawn.

I beg you to do so. I believe that writers on the subject have left out few of the easier and, so to speak, more material considerations, so that only those are lacking and may be wished for which are subtler and more recondite. And to look into these, what ingenuity can be more fitting than that of Sagredo’s acute and penetrating wit?

Then let the beginning Of OUT reflections be the consideration that whatever motion comes to be attributed to the earth must necessarily remain imperceptible to us and as if nonexistent, so long as we look only at terrestrial objects; for as inhabitants of the earth, we consequently participate in the same motion. But on the other hand it is indeed just as necessary that it display itself very generally in all other visible bodies and objects which, being separated from the earth, do not take part in this movement.

So the true method of investigating whether any motion can be attributed to the earth, and if so what it may be, is to observe and consider whether bodies separated from the earth exhibit some appearance of motion which belongs equally to all. For a motion which is perceived only, for example, in the moon, and which does not affect Venus or Jupiter or the other stars, cannot in any way be the earth’s or anything but the moon’s.

Now there is one motion which is most general and supreme over all, and it is that by which the sun, moon, and all other planets and fixed stars–in a word, the whole universe, the earth alone excepted–appear to be moved as a unit from east to west in the space of twenty-four hours. This, in so far as first appearances are concerned, may just as logically belong to the earth alone as to the rest of the universe, since the same appearances would prevail as much in the one situation as in the other.

Thus it is that Aristotle and Ptolemy, who thoroughly understood this consideration, in their attempt to prove the earth immovable do not argue against any other motion than this diurnal one, though Aristotle does drop a hint against another motion ascribed to it by an ancient writer of which we shall speak in the proper place.

This is very reasonably questioned, and when we come to treat of the other movement you Will see how greatly Copernicus surpassed Ptolemy in acuteness and penetration of mind by seeing what the latter did not-I mean the wonderful correspondence with which such a movement is reflected in all the other heavenly bodies. But let us postpone this for the present and return to the first consideration, With respect to which I shall set forth, commencing with the most general things, those reasons which seem to favor the earth’s motion, so that we may then hear their refutation from Simplicio.

First, let us consider only the immense bulk of the starry sphere in contrast With the smallness of the terrestrial globe, which is contained in the former so many millions of times. Now if we think of the velocity of motion required to make a complete rotation in a single day and night, I cannot persuade myself that anyone could be found who would think it the more reasonable and credible thing that it was the celestial sphere which did the turning, and the terrestrial globe which remained fixed.

I have not seen any difference, and so there can be no difference.

Motion exists relatively:

• to things that lack motion and
• among things which all share equally in any motion

In both cases, motion does not act, and seems to not not exist.

Thus the goods in a ship leaving Venice for Aleppo stand still and do not move with the ship.

But relative to the sacks, boxes, and bundles in the ship and the ship itself, the motion from Venice to Syria is as nothing.

• It does not alter their relation among themselves.

This is so because it is common to all of them and all share equally in it.

If, from the cargo in the ship, a sack were shifted from a chest one single inch, this alone would be more of a movement for it than the two-thousand-mile journey made by all of them together.

Motion which is common to many moving things is:

• idle and inconsequential to the relation of these movables among themselves, nothing being changed among them
• operative only in the relation that they have with other bodies lacking that motion, among which their location is changed.

We divided the universe into 2:

1. The necessarily movable
2. The motionless

It is the same thing to make the earth alone move, and to move all the rest of the universe, so far as concerns any result which may depend upon such movement.

For the action of such a movement is only in the relation between the celestial bodies and the earth, which relation alone is changed.

If the earth is fixed while the universe has one motion then it does not make sense for the whole universe to move around it.

Every one of these variations which you recite to me is nothing except in relation to the earth.

To see that this is true, remove the earth; nothing remains in the universe of rising and setting of the sun and moon, nor of horizons and meridians, nor day and night and in a word from this movement there will never originate any changes in the moon or sun or any stars you please, fixed or moving.

All these changes are in relation to the earth, all of them meaning nothing except that the sun shows itself now over China, then to Persia, afterward to Egypt, to Greece, to France, to Spain, to America, etc.

The same holds for the moon and the rest of the heavenly bodies, this effect taking place in exactly the same way if, without embroiling the biggest part of the universe, the terrestrial globe is made to revolve upon itself

If this great motion is attributed to the heavens, it has to be made in the opposite direction from the specific motion of all the planetary orbs, of which each one incontrovertibly has its own motion from west to east, this being very gentle and moderate, and must then be made to rush the other way; that is, from east to west, with this very rapid diurnal motion. Whereas by making the earth itself move, the contrariety of motions is removed, and the single motion from west to east accommodates all the observations and satisfies them all completely.

Does Aristotle demonstrate that, or does he just say it because it suits certain designs of his? If, as he himself declares, contraries are those things which mutually destroy each other, I cannot see how two movable bodies meeting each other along a circular line conflict any less than if they had met along a straight line.

“Contrary” or “not contrary,” these are quibbles about words, but I know that with facts It is a much simpler and more natural thing to keep everything with a single motion than to introduce two, whether one wants to call them contrary or opposite. But I do not assume the introduction of two to be impossible, nor do I pretend to draw a necessary proof from this; merely a greater probability.

The improbability I . s shown for a third time in the relative disruption of the order which we surely see existing among those heavenly bodies whose circulation is not doubtful, but most certain. This order is such that the greater orbits complete their revolutions in longer times, and the lesser in shorter; thus Saturn, describing a greater circle than the other planets, completes it in thirty years; Jupiter revolves in its smaller one in twelve years, Mars in two; the moon covers its much smaller circle in a single month.

And we see no less sensibly that of the satellites of Jupiter (stelle, Medicee), (note: Galileo had named the moons he discovered the “Medicean stars” in honor of his patron, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, to whom this book was dedicated.) the closest one to that planet makes its revolution in a very short time, that is in about forty-two hours, the next, in three and a half days; the third in seven days and the most distant in sixteen. And this very harmonious trend will not be a bit altered if the earth is made to move on itself in twenty-four hours.

But if the earth is desired to remain motionless, it is necessary, after passing from the brief period of the moon to the other consecutively larger ones, and ultimately to that of Mars in two years, and the greater one of Jupiter in twelve, and from this to the still larger one of Saturn, whose period is thirty years–it is necessary, I say, to pass on beyond to another incomparably larger sphere, and make this one finish an entire revolution in twenty-four hours. Now this is the minimum disorder that can be introduced, for if one wished to pass from Saturn’s sphere to the stellar, and make the latter so much greater than Saturn’s that it would proportionally be suited to a very slow motion of many thousands of years, a much greater leap would be required to pass beyond that to a still larger one and then make that revolve in twenty-four hours.

But by giving mobility to the earth, order becomes very well observed among the periods; from the very slow sphere of Saturn one passes on to the entirely immovable fixed stars, and manages to escape a fourth difficulty necessitated by supposing the stellar sphere to be movable. This difficulty is the immense disparity between the motions of the stars, some of which would be moving very rapidly in vast circles, and others very slowly in little tiny circles, according as they are located farther from or closer to the poles. This is indeed a nuisance, for just as we see that all those bodies whose motion is undoubted move in large circles, so it would not seem to have been good judgment to arrange bodies in such a way that they must move circularly at immense distances from the center, and then make them move in little tiny circles.

Not only will the size of the circles and consequently the velocities of motion of these stars be very diverse from the orbits and motions of some others, but (and this shall be the fifth difficulty) the same stars will keep changing their circles and their velocities, since those which two thousand years ago were on the celestial equator, and which consequently described great circles with their motion, are found in our time to be many degrees distant, and must be made slower in motion and reduced to moving in smaller circles. Indeed, it is not impossible that a time will come when some of the stars which in the past have always been moving will be reduced, by reaching the pole, to holding fast, and then after that time will start moving once more; whereas all those stars which certainly do move describe, as I said, very large circles In their orbits and are unchangeably preserved in them.

For anyone who reasons soundly, the unlikelihood is increased–and this is the sixth difficulty–by the incomprehensibility of what is called the “solidity” of that very vast sphere in whose depths are firmly fixed so many stars which, without changing place in the least among themselves, come to be carried around so harmoniously with such a disparity of motions. If, however, the heavens are fluid (as may much more reasonably be believed) so that each star roves around in it by itself, what law will regulate their motion so that as seen from the earth they shall appear as if made into a single sphere" For this to happen, it seems to me that it is as much more effective and convenient to make them immovable than to have them roam around, as it is easier to count the myriad tiles set in a courtyard than to number the troop of children running around on them.

Finally, for the seventh objection, if we attribute the diurnal rotation to the highest heaven, then this has to be made of such strength and power as to carry with it the innumerable host of fixed stars, all of them vast bodies and much larger than the earth, as well as to carry along the planetary orbs despite the fact that the two move naturally in opposite ways. Besides this, one must grant that the element of fire and the greater part of the air are likewise hurried along, and that only the little body of the earth remains defiant and resistant to such power. This seems to me to be most difficult; I do not understand why the earth, a suspended body balanced on its center and indifferent to motion or to rest, placed in and surrounded by an enclosing fluid, should not give in to such force and be carried around too. We encounter no such objections if we give the motion to the earth, a small and trifling body in comparison with the universe, and hence unable to do it any violence.