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ference in the manner and circumstances of their pro-mulgation.

Copernicus cautiously kept his opinions, at first, withinthe circle of his personal acquaintance, and afterwardsallowed them silently to make their way among astro-nomers, without any public discussion or appeal to po-pular judgment; and his writings were too profound,too dry and abstruse, to attract the notice of generalreaders.

Foscarinus manifested the most devout submission tothe authority of the church ; and insinuated the Co-pernican theory, under the shelter of an attempt to re-concile it with the dogmas of the theologian.

Galileo , on the other hand, as we have seen, couldnot refrain from plainly and publicly expounding thetruths he had discovered, and that, too, in the mostpopular form of illustration. He not only attacked thetenets of Aristotle in abstruse disputations, but turnedhim into ridicule before crowded assemblies. His writ-ings were of a nature to be read by every one: com-posed in a lively and pleasing style, they display byturns all the depths of science, the charms of eloquence,and the keenness of satirical humour, and cannot fail toanimate every reader with a portion of the author’sspirit.

Bruno, without any attempt at concealment or con-ciliation, boldly upheld the truths of inductive science,and vehemently denounced the errors of the schools.

Kepler even went out of his way to combat the po-sitions of the priests, on points unconnected with hisdiscoveries ; though there can be no doubt that therewere passages enough in his writings to ensure his con-demnation with them.

Copernicus was hardly known for any other investi,gations than those connected with the solar system.Galileo acquired a widely extended and popular famefrom the more tangible invention of the telescope, andthe train of brilliant discoveries to which it gave rise:all this conferred a celebrity on his more abstruse spe-n 4