Pioneers of Science Part 7

The fact that things near the earth fall 16 feet in the first second proves that the intensity of ordinary terrestrial gravity is 32 British units of force per pound of matter.

The fact that all bodies fall at the same rate (when the resistance of the air is eliminated), proves that weight is proportional to ma.s.s; or more explicitly, that the gravitative attraction of the earth on matter near its surface depends on the amount of that matter, as estimated by its inertia, and on nothing else.

LECTURE IV

GALILEO AND THE INVENTION OF THE TELESCOPE

Contemporary with the life of Kepler, but overlapping it at both ends, comes the great and eventful life of Galileo Galilei,[5] a man whose influence on the development of human thought has been greater than that of any man whom we have yet considered, and upon whom, therefore, it is necessary for us, in order to carry out the plan of these lectures, to bestow much time. A man of great and wide culture, a so-called universal genius, it is as an experimental philosopher that he takes the first rank. In this capacity he must be placed alongside of Archimedes, and it is pretty certain that between the two there was no man of magnitude equal to either in experimental philosophy. It is perhaps too bold a speculation, but I venture to doubt whether in succeeding generations we find his equal in the domain of purely experimental science until we come to Faraday. Faraday was no doubt his superior, but I know of no other of whom the like can unhesitatingly be said. In mathematical and deductive science, of course, it is quite otherwise. Kepler, for instance, and many men before and since, have far excelled Galileo in mathematical skill and power, though at the same time his achievements in this department are by no means to be despised.

Born at Pisa three centuries ago, on the very day that Michael Angelo lay dying in Rome, he inherited from his father a n.o.ble name, cultivated tastes, a keen love of truth, and an impoverished patrimony. Vincenzo de Galilei, a descendant of the important Bonajuti family, was himself a mathematician and a musician, and in a book of his still extant he declares himself in favour of free and open inquiry into scientific matters, unrestrained by the weight of authority and tradition.

In all probability the son imbibed these precepts: certainly he acted on them.

Vincenzo, having himself experienced the unremunerative character of scientific work, had a horror of his son's taking to it, especially as in his boyhood he was always constructing ingenious mechanical toys, and exhibiting other marks of precocity. So the son was destined for business--to be, in fact, a cloth-dealer. But he was to receive a good education first, and was sent to an excellent convent school.

Here he made rapid progress, and soon excelled in all branches of cla.s.sics and literature. He delighted in poetry, and in later years wrote several essays on Dante, Ta.s.so, and Ariosto, besides composing some tolerable poems himself. He played skilfully on several musical instruments, especially on the lute, of which indeed he became a master, and on which he solaced himself when quite an old man. Besides this he seems to have had some skill as an artist, which was useful afterwards in ill.u.s.trating his discoveries, and to have had a fine sensibility as an art critic, for we find several eminent painters of that day acknowledging the value of the opinion of the young Galileo.

Perceiving all this display of ability, the father wisely came to the conclusion that the selling of woollen stuffs would hardly satisfy his aspirations for long, and that it was worth a sacrifice to send him to the University. So to the University of his native town he went, with the avowed object of studying medicine, that career seeming the most likely to be profitable. Old Vincenzo's horror of mathematics or science as a means of obtaining a livelihood is justified by the fact that while the University Professor of Medicine received 2,000 scudi a year, the Professor of Mathematics had only 60, that is 13 a year, or 7-1/2_d._ a day.

So the son had been kept properly ignorant of such poverty-stricken subjects, and to study medicine he went.

But his natural bent showed itself even here. For praying one day in the Cathedral, like a good Catholic as he was all his life, his attention was arrested by the great lamp which, after lighting it, the verger had left swinging to and fro. Galileo proceeded to time its swings by the only watch he possessed--viz., his own pulse. He noticed that the time of swing remained as near as he could tell the same, notwithstanding the fact that the swings were getting smaller and smaller.

By subsequent experiment he verified the law, and the isochronism of the pendulum was discovered. An immensely important practical discovery this, for upon it all modern clocks are based; and Huyghens soon applied it to the astronomical clock, which up to that time had been a crude and quite untrustworthy instrument.

The best clock which Tycho Brahe could get for his observatory was inferior to one that may now be purchased for a few shillings; and this change is owing to the discovery of the pendulum by Galileo. Not that he applied it to clocks; he was not thinking of astronomy, he was thinking of medicine, and wanted to count people's pulses. The pendulum served; and "pulsilogies," as they were called, were thus introduced to and used by medical pract.i.tioners.

The Tuscan Court came to Pisa for the summer months, for it was then a seaside place, and among the suite was Ostillio Ricci, a distinguished mathematician and old friend of the Galileo family. The youth visited him, and one day, it is said, heard a lesson in Euclid being given by Ricci to the pages while he stood outside the door entranced. Anyhow he implored Ricci to help him into some knowledge of mathematics, and the old man willingly consented. So he mastered Euclid and pa.s.sed on to Archimedes, for whom he acquired a great veneration.

His father soon heard of this obnoxious proclivity, and did what he could to divert him back to medicine again. But it was no use.

Underneath his Galen and Hippocrates were secreted copies of Euclid and Archimedes, to be studied at every available opportunity. Old Vincenzo perceived the bent of genius to be too strong for him, and at last gave way.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 36.--Two forms of pulsilogy. The string is wound up till the swinging weight keeps time with the pulse, and the position of a bead or of an index connected with the string is then read on a scale or dial.]

With prodigious rapidity the released philosopher now a.s.similated the elements of mathematics and physics, and at twenty-six we find him appointed for three years to the University Chair of Mathematics, and enjoying the paternally dreaded stipend of 7-1/2_d._ a day.

Now it was that he pondered over the laws of falling bodies. He verified, by experiment, the fact that the velocity acquired by falling down any slope of given height was independent of the angle of slope.

Also, that the height fallen through was proportional to the square of the time.

Another thing he found experimentally was that all bodies, heavy and light, fell at the same rate, striking the ground at the same time.[6]

Now this was clean contrary to what he had been taught. The physics of those days were a simple reproduction of statements in old books.

Aristotle had a.s.serted certain things to be true, and these were universally believed. No one thought of trying the thing to see if it really were so. The idea of making an experiment would have savoured of impiety, because it seemed to tend towards scepticism, and cast a doubt on a reverend authority.

Young Galileo, with all the energy and imprudence of youth (what a blessing that youth has a little imprudence and disregard of consequences in pursuing a high ideal!), as soon as he perceived that his instructors were wrong on the subject of falling bodies, instantly informed them of the fact. Whether he expected them to be pleased or not is a question. Anyhow, they were not pleased, but were much annoyed by his impertinent arrogance.

It is, perhaps, difficult for us now to appreciate precisely their position. These doctrines of antiquity, which had come down h.o.a.ry with age, and the discovery of which had reawakened learning and quickened intellectual life, were accepted less as a science or a philosophy, than as a religion. Had they regarded Aristotle as a verbally inspired writer, they could not have received his statements with more unhesitating conviction. In any dispute as to a question of fact, such as the one before us concerning the laws of falling bodies, their method was not to make an experiment, but to turn over the pages of Aristotle; and he who could quote chapter and verse of this great writer was held to settle the question and raise it above the reach of controversy.

It is very necessary for us to realize this state of things clearly, because otherwise the att.i.tude of the learned of those days towards every new discovery seems stupid and almost insane. They had a crystallized system of truth, perfect, symmetrical--it wanted no novelty, no additions; every addition or growth was an imperfection, an excrescence, a deformity. Progress was unnecessary and undesired. The Church had a rigid system of dogma, which must be accepted in its entirety on pain of being treated as a heretic. Philosophers had a cast-iron system of truth to match--a system founded upon Aristotle--and so interwoven with the great theological dogmas that to question one was almost equivalent to casting doubt upon the other.

In such an atmosphere true science was impossible. The life-blood of science is growth, expansion, freedom, development. Before it could appear it must throw off these old shackles of centuries. It must burst its old skin, and emerge, worn with the struggle, weakly and unprotected, but free and able to grow and to expand. The conflict was inevitable, and it was severe. Is it over yet? I fear not quite, though so nearly as to disturb science hardly at all. Then it was different; it was terrible. Honour to the men who bore the first shock of the battle!

Now Aristotle had said that bodies fell at rates depending on their weight.

A 5 lb. weight would fall five times as quick as a 1 lb. weight; a 50 lb. weight fifty times as quick, and so on.

Why he said so n.o.body knows. He cannot have tried. He was not above trying experiments, like his smaller disciples; but probably it never occurred to him to doubt the fact. It seems so natural that a heavy body should fall quicker than a light one; and perhaps he thought of a stone and a feather, and was satisfied.

Galileo, however, a.s.serted that the weight did not matter a bit, that everything fell at the same rate (even a stone and a feather, but for the resistance of the air), and would reach the ground in the same time.

And he was not content to be pooh-poohed and snubbed. He knew he was right, and he was determined to make every one see the facts as he saw them. So one morning, before the a.s.sembled University, he ascended the famous leaning tower, taking with him a 100 lb. shot and a 1 lb. shot.

He balanced them on the edge of the tower, and let them drop together.

Together they fell, and together they struck the ground.

The simultaneous clang of those two weights sounded the death-knell of the old system of philosophy, and heralded the birth of the new.

But was the change sudden? Were his opponents convinced? Not a jot.

Though they had seen with their eyes, and heard with their ears, the full light of heaven shining upon them, they went back muttering and discontented to their musty old volumes and their garrets, there to invent occult reasons for denying the validity of the observation, and for referring it to some unknown disturbing cause.

They saw that if they gave way on this one point they would be letting go their anchorage, and henceforward would be liable to drift along with the tide, not knowing whither. They dared not do this. No; they _must_ cling to the old traditions; they could not cast away their rotting ropes and sail out on to the free ocean of G.o.d's truth in a spirit of fearless faith.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 37.--Tower of Pisa.]

Yet they had received a shock: as by a breath of fresh salt breeze and a dash of spray in their faces, they had been awakened out of their comfortable lethargy. They felt the approach of a new era.

Yes, it was a shock; and they hated the young Galileo for giving it them--hated him with the sullen hatred of men who fight for a lost and dying cause.

We need scarcely blame these men; at least we need not blame them overmuch. To say that they acted as they did is to say that they were human, were narrow-minded, and were the apostles of a lost cause. But _they_ could not know this; _they_ had no experience of the past to guide them; the conditions under which they found themselves were novel, and had to be met for the first time. Conduct which was excusable then would be unpardonable now, in the light of all this experience to guide us. Are there any now who practically repeat their error, and resist new truth? who cling to any old anchorage of dogma, and refuse to rise with the tide of advancing knowledge? There may be some even now.

Well, the unpopularity of Galileo smouldered for a time, until, by another n.o.ble imprudence, he managed to offend a semi-royal personage, Giovanni de Medici, by giving his real opinion, when consulted, about a machine which de Medici had invented for cleaning out the harbour of Leghorn. He said it was as useless as it in fact turned out to be.

Through the influence of the mortified inventor he lost favour at Court; and his enemies took advantage of the fact to render his chair untenable. He resigned before his three years were up, and retired to Florence.

His father at this time died, and the family were left in narrow circ.u.mstances. He had a brother and three sisters to provide for.

He was offered a professorship at Padua for six years by the Senate of Venice, and willingly accepted it.

Now began a very successful career. His introductory address was marked by brilliant eloquence, and his lectures soon acquired fame. He wrote for his pupils on the laws of motion, on fortifications, on sundials, on mechanics, and on the celestial globe: some of these papers are now lost, others have been printed during the present century.

Kepler sent him a copy of his new book, _Mysterium Cosmographic.u.m_, and Galileo in thanking him for it writes him the following letter:--[7]

"I count myself happy, in the search after truth, to have so great an ally as yourself, and one who is so great a friend of the truth itself. It is really pitiful that there are so few who seek truth, and who do not pursue a perverse method of philosophising. But this is not the place to mourn over the miseries of our times, but to congratulate you on your splendid discoveries in confirmation of truth. I shall read your book to the end, sure of finding much that is excellent in it. I shall do so with the more pleasure, because _I have been for many years an adherent of the Copernican system_, and it explains to me the causes of many of the appearances of nature which are quite unintelligible on the commonly accepted hypothesis. _I have collected many arguments for the purpose of refuting the latter_; but I do not venture to bring them to the light of publicity, for fear of sharing the fate of our master, Copernicus, who, although he has earned immortal fame with some, yet with very many (so great is the number of fools) has become an object of ridicule and scorn. I should certainly venture to publish my speculations if there were more people like you. But this not being the case, I refrain from such an undertaking."

Kepler urged him to publish his arguments in favour of the Copernican theory, but he hesitated for the present, knowing that his declaration would be received with ridicule and opposition, and thinking it wiser to get rather more firmly seated in his chair before encountering the storm of controversy.