Jesuit College at Rome against the adherents of the new doctrine, by Father Spinola, and some time afterwards he sent him a copy of it;[1] but as it attacked all those who did not profess to be followers of an antiquated Peripateticism, it made but little impression on Galileo, and that little was entirely effaced when Mgr. Ciampoli wrote to him, on 28th December, 1625, that he had acquainted the Pope with several passages of his reply to Ingoli, and that he had highly approved them.[2]
Before long Guiducci found out how bitterly he had been deceived in Grassi, and what a miserable game he had been playing with him as Galileo's friend. The memory of the favours by which the Pope had distinguished the great Tuscan when at Rome had scarcely died away when Grassi threw aside the mask, and "Lothario Sarsi" exhibited himself in a new and revised edition, fulminating rage and venom against Galileo and his system. Notwithstanding the hypocritical moderation exhibited to Guiducci, he had not forgotten the mortifying defeat which "Il Saggiatore" had subjected him to, and, though circumstances had prevented him from defending himself at once, he had by no means given up the intention of doing so. Two years having elapsed since Galileo's visit to Rome, Grassi thought he might venture, under pretext of a reply to "Il Saggiatore," to publish a new attack on its author. It was entitled, in bad Latin; "Ratio ponderum Libræ et Simbellæ, etc. Autore Lothario Sarsi Sigensano." It contained many personal accusations against Galileo, and the work altogether was characterized by a blind hatred, which repeatedly led the author into very foolish statements. For instance, Grassi tried incidentally to prove by very ingenious arguments that Galileo's physics would lead to the denial of the real presence in the Lord's Supper![3] But the
