DEFENSE FOR GALILEO.

mathematical, astronomical, and logical sciences, and is said to have disputed concerning all physical things in 1 Kings 4 original: "3. Reg. 4." In the Vulgate, the books of Kings are numbered differently; this refers to 1 Kings in modern Bibles. and to have written, as others maintain, about herbs, birds, stones, and fishes. And for this reason, the world was called from the beginning the "Wisdom of God" (as was revealed to Saint Bridget Saint Birgitta of Sweden, a 14th-century mystic) and a book, so that we might all read within it. Hence Saint Leo says in his seventh sermon on the fast of the tenth month: “Through the very elements of the world, as if through public pages, we receive the signaling of the divine will.” original: "Per ipſa... elementa mundi, tanquam per publicas paginas, diuinæ voluntatis ſignificationem accipimus." And in his eighth sermon, he proves the same from the fact that the heavens declare the glory of God, etc., and the invisible things of God are understood through those things which have been made, etc. References to Psalm 19 and Romans 1:20. Indeed, as Cyril Cyril of Alexandria, a 5th-century Bishop and Doctor of the Church says in his first book against Julian, “philosophy is a catechism leading to faith: he who scorns it, opposes faith.” And for this reason Bernard Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, a 12th-century mystic and abbot says in the sermon "I will hear what the Lord speaks within me," that the world is God's own book codex — a bound book or manuscript; here used metaphorically for nature as a scripture. in which we ought to read continually. Saint Anthony said the same, as witnessed by Nicephorus, as did Chrysostom John Chrysostom, a 4th-century Archbishop famous for his eloquent preaching regarding that verse of Psalm 147: He has not done so for every nation. This is so that no one can be excused for not having received the law. For their sound has gone out into all the earth.

COROLLARY. And since those things which are more marvelous and excellent represent God their author more fully, they must be investigated with greater zeal for this very reason—and because the divinity of the human soul is proven by this study. Of this kind are the heavens, the stars, and the greater systems of the world. Thus Anaxagoras A pre-Socratic Greek philosopher said that man was made so that he might look up at the sky. And Ovid A Roman poet is greatly praised for saying this by all theologians, especially by Lactantius An early Christian author (c. 250–325 AD) who used classical rhetoric to defend Christianity, when speaking of God:

While other animals look down prone toward the earth,

He gave to man an uplifted face, and ordered him to gaze at the sky,

And to raise his upright countenance toward the stars.

A famous passage from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book I.

Moreover, David, giving the reason in Psalm 18, sings: The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims the works of his hands. And in Psalm 8: Since I shall see your heavens, the works of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have founded. Plato also in the Epinomis and in the Axiochus (if indeed it is not by Xenophon), argues from the knowledge of celestial things—such as the stars, equinoxes, eclipses, and the like—for the immortality of the soul, the dignity of man, and his deification; and we have written more on this in our Antimachiavel Campanella’s own work, "Antimachiavellismus," defending Christian politics against Machiavelli. Furthermore, Ovid bears witness, speaking to the astronomers:

Happy are the souls, whose first care it was to know these things,

And to scale the heavenly dwellings.