tion and support when his longer tarriance at Pisa had become impossible; deserted his noble friends, Fra Paol Sarpi, Francesco Sagredo, and others; and proceeded to the capital of the court of Tuscany on the lovely banks of the Arno, where at first, it is true, much honour was done him, but where afterwards envy, jealousy, narrowness, ill will, and fanaticism combined together to his destruction. One of his most devoted friends, Francesco Sagredo, foresaw it. When Galileo left Venice he was in the East, in the services of the republic, and did not return till the spring of 1611, when he wrote a remarkable letter to his friend at Florence. After having heartily expressed his regret at not finding Galileo on his return home, he states his doubts about the step his friend had taken. He asks, among other things, "where will he find the same liberty as in the Venetian territory? And notwithstanding all the generous qualities of the young rulers, which permitted the hope that Galileo's merits will be justly valued, who can promise with any confidence that, if not ruined, he may not be persecuted and disquieted on the surging billows of court life, by the raging storms of envy?" It is evident from another passage in the letter that Galileo's behaviour had made a bad impression at Venice, where they had not long before raised his salary to a thousand florins, and conferred his professorship on him for life; towards the end of the letter Sagredo lets fall the ominous words that he "was convinced that as Galileo could not regain what he had lost, he would take good care to hold fast what he had gained."[1]
Only a month after Galileo's arrival at Florence he made a fresh discovery in astronomy which eventually contributed to confirm the Copernican theory, namely, the varying crescent form of the planet Venus. With this the important objection to the new system seemed to be removed, that Venus and Mercury did not exhibit the same phases of light as the moon, which must be the case if the earth moved, for they would
- ↑ Op. viii.p. 146-150
