of being taken in a good sense, and were not of that nature that they could be said to deviate from Catholic doctrine.[1]
Meanwhile a papal mandate had been issued, under date of 19th March, to summon Caccini as a witness, as being specially well informed about Galileo's errors.[2] He appeared before the holy tribunal the very next day, and eloquently poured forth his accusations; but, although upon oath, he did not adhere very strictly to truth. For not only did he denounce the opinion of Copernicus as guasi heretical, being opposed to all scholastic theology and to the customary interpretation of many passages of Scripture, and assert that these doctrines were to be found both in the letter to Castelli and in the purely scientific treatise on the solar spots, but added the far more serious charge that he had heard that Galileo maintained the three following propositions: "God is not a self existent being, but an accident; God is sentient because the Divine sentiments reside in Him; the miracles said to be performed by the saints are not real miracles." He further says that Galileo is at any rate "suspicious in religious matters," because he belongs to "a certain Accadémia dei Lincei," and corresponds with the godless Fra Paolo Sarpi at Venice, and with many dissolute Germans. More absurd deductions from real facts can hardly be conceived. To make a hotbed of heresy out of an academy founded by Prince Cesi, a man of known piety, and to place Galileo's religion in doubt on account of his scientific correspondence with magnates of science like Sarpi, Welser, Kepler, etc., was almost like madness.[3]
In confirmation of his damaging statements Caccini appealed to the testimony of a Dominican, Ferdinand Ximenes, and a young nobleman, Attavanti. Both of them were afterwards called in November of the same year. It then came out that Caccini was not only an eavesdropper but a bad listener.
