A.D. White’s War upon Galileo
The premise
behind Andrew Dickson White’s argument is that the Church conducted a Holy War
against the works of Galileo and against the man himself in order to keep
secure its socio-political position in the hierarchy of seventeenth century
Europe and to prevent the spread of anti-papal and Reformist sentiment. White believes that the Church stands for all
that is superstitious and against logic and reason, while Galileo, and his
contemporaries, represent the March of
Science through the use of rational, philosophic thinking. White believes that the Church has
intentionally attacked “almost every man who has ever done anything new for his
fellow-men” through the use of weapons
such as “infidel” and “atheist” (White 135).
According to him, the betterment of man has been continually betrayed by
the Catholic Church and that the story of Galileo’s silence is the pinnacle of
this dark treachery (130).
