Summary
The monk is disturbed by Galileo's suggestion that the Church uses religion to pacify the poor and says, "We have the highest of all motives for keeping our mouths shut—the peace of mind of the less fortunate." This does little to persuade Galileo, who insists that the monk admit that Galileo's calculations are accurate and useful. The monk is not so easily persuaded and suggests that "the truth will get through without us, so long as it's true," but Galileo disagrees, saying, "The only truth that gets through will be what we force through."
Galileo tells the monk that the impoverished would be better served to understand how the world works. "I see your people's divine patience," he says, "but where is their divine anger?" Galileo hands him a bundle of manuscripts, which the monk pores over. As the monk reads, Galileo bemoans the fact that he must spout the truths of the world to disbelieving ears. The monk tells Galileo he does not understand a sentence, and Galileo tells him he will explain it.
Scene 9. "After keeping silent for eight years, Galileo is encouraged by the accession of a new pope, himself a scientist, to resume his researches into the forbidden area: the sunspots."
At Galileo's house in Florence, he teaches Federzoni, the little monk from the previous scene, and Andrea Sarti, who is now a bit older. Virginia and Mrs. Sarti are also nearby, preparing the trousseau for Virginia's wedding. Virginia discusses the trousseau and the fact that her mother-in-law does not like Galileo's theories.
A middle-aged scholar, Filippo Mucius, enters and asks to speak to Galileo. When Galileo comes to see him, he wants to explain something about his book to Galileo. "Someone who doesn't know the truth is just thick-headed. But someone who does know it and calls it a lie is a crook," says Galileo, before sending Mucius away.
Mrs. Sarti warns Virginia not to talk to Galileo about her wedding, as he "hasn't got half a scudo's worth of shame in his make-up." She advises Virginia to go to an astrologer to get her horoscope read, and Virginia tells her she has. She is an Aries and Ludovico is a Leo, which is supposed to be a sensual match.
Mr. Gaffone, the Rector of the University comes to visit them, with a book about sunspots for Galileo. Andrea questions why Galileo does not produce more work, since he is now such a celebrity, and Galileo assures him that he cannot release something until he is sure of it.
Galileo asks the monk about a passage from Aristotle in which Aristotle writes, "A broad flat piece of ice will float on water whereas an iron needle will sink." The men discuss the phenomena of a piece of ice floating, determining that ice must be lighter than water in order to float, and that anything that sinks is heavier than water.
Ludovico comes in with a servant and embraces Virginia, telling her he was in the area inspecting his vineyards. When he asks Galileo what he is working on, Galileo tells him, "Routine stuff." Mrs. Sarti and Andrea bring wine out and they all gather around the table, as Ludovico mentions, "Christopher Clavius said he's afraid the whole earth-round-the-sun act will start up again because of these sunspots." He then tells the group that His Holiness is dying and that Cardinal Barberini will likely take his place.
Galileo is heartened by the news that Cardinal Barberini may take over and says, "Federzoni, we may yet see the day when we no longer have to look over our shoulder like criminals every time we say two and two equals four." Galileo says he loves the wine they are drinking and rejoices at the fact that he will be able to pursue his study of the earth's rotation around the sun again, with Barberini as the new pope.
Galileo and Ludovico have a tense discussion of the fact that Ludovico and his mother do not like Galileo's theories, and Ludovico tells Galileo that as his wife, Virginia will have to go to church with him. "You think your peasants will go by the saintliness of their mistress in deciding whether to pay rent or not?"
"In a sense, yes," Ludovico replies. Galileo sends Andrea and the monk to get a brass reflector and a screen, as Ludovico reminds Galileo that he signed a form saying he would stop researching the orbit of the earth around the sun. As Ludovico protests more and more, the monk comes to Galileo's aid, saying, "God made the physical world, Ludovico; God made the human brain; God will permit physics."
Mrs. Sarti speaks up and urges Galileo not to get in the way of Virginia's happiness by continuing forward with his work. Ludovico then confronts Galileo about the fact that his studies will cause unrest among the people who work for him, calling his servants "little better than animals." "They truly are like beasts, you can hardly imagine it. If rumour says a pear has been seen on an apple tree they will drop their work and hurry off to gossip about it," Ludovico says, and Galileo notes that Ludovico has little respect for people of the lower classes. "You whip other things than dogs for the sake of discipline, don't you, Marsili?"
Galileo goes on to say that his studies and the realities of the world are of especial interest to the workers of the world, saying, "...the people who make the bread will understand that nothing moves unless it has been made to move." Ludovico takes his leave, and Galileo and his associates all mock his snobbery and politically backward beliefs.
Galileo gives a speech to his associates that they ought to approach their hypotheses with a great deal of skepticism, in order to ensure that their proof is flawless. He suggests that they should operate under the assumption that the earth is stationary, while the sun is mobile, and wait until they "have been utterly and hopelessly beaten and are licking our wounds in the profoundest depression."
As they begin to look through the telescope, Virginia runs in in her wedding dress, realizing that Galileo sent Ludovico away. She faints.
Scene 10. "During the next decade Galileo's doctrine spreads among the common people. Ballad-singers and pamphleteers everywhere take up the new ideas. In the carnival of 1632 many Italian cities choose astronomy as the theme for their guilds' carnival processions."
At a fairground, a carnival is going on. A man sings a song about the "horrible doctrine and opinions of Messer Galileo Galilei." The song concerns the fact that as Galileo's ideas have become more prevalent, it has caused insolence among the servants. The song is long and has many parts, and at one point the singer sings, "People must keep their place, some down and some on top." A woman and her child do an absurd performance of Galileo's theory about the earth's orbit around the sun.
Then a small cart with an absurd effigy of the Grand-Duke of Florence looking through a telescope enters the square and the crowd laughs at the display.
Scene 11. 1633. "The Inquisition summons the world-famous scientist to Rome." Galileo and Virginia wait to be admitted by the Grand Duke. Virginia notes that there is a man who has been following them, just as Rector Gaffone appears, barely greeting them as he walks past.
Vanni, the ironfounder, for whom Galileo designed a furnace, comes up and greets them. He tells Galileo that he and the other manufacturers are in support of Galileo, saying, "The same sort of people as are trying to block you are stopping the Bologna doctors from dissecting bodies for medical research." He adds, "If anybody ever tries launching anything against you, please remember you've friends in every branch of business." Vanni advises Galileo to go to Venice, where there are fewer clerics, telling Galileo that he is not popular in Florence, least of all with the Grand Duke.
Analysis
While Galileo's perspective is considered controversial, counterproductive to the plight of mankind, he sees it as quite the opposite. While the more conservative members of his set warn him against stirring the status quo too much, urging him to embrace the mystery of life, he argues that "the victory of reason will be the victory of people who are prepared to reason, nothing else." He sees his work as helpful to humankind, as putting people in touch with reason and truth, when they are being fed nothing but lies.
Galileo's role as a truth-teller is a liberating one in some respects, but it also is burdensome to him as well. As the monk looks at the manuscripts he gives him, Galileo bemoans his position, saying, "...the worst thing is that what I know I have to tell people, like a lover, like a drunkard, like a traitor. It is an absolute vice and leads to disaster. How long can I go on shouting it into the void, that's the question." In this, we see that Galileo takes his role as society's truth-teller (reminiscent of Socrates' idea of the philosopher as a gadfly) to be a kind of nuisance, almost an addiction that he would rather abandon than continue to pursue.
Galileo's work is connected to the class conflict taking place in Italy at that time, as narrated rather malevolently by Ludovico. He describes the fact that should the peasants who work at his villa, whom he describes as "beasts," ever get wind of the work that Galileo is doing, they will immediately start gossiping about it and they will neglect their work. Thus we see that Galileo's work is not only in conflict with the church, but with the hierarchical economic and political conditions of the region, all of which are upheld by the church. In his scientific discoveries lies the possibility of political upheaval and resistance, the possibility that peasants and servants might rise up and resist their enslavement.
So dogged is Galileo's pursuit of the truth that he is unwilling to compromise his presentation in order to sweeten his daughter's engagement to the upper-class Ludovico. He attacks Ludovico's rather heartless philosophy of how the world works and defies his future son-in-law's pleas for him to tone down his theorizing. Galileo's chief loyalty is to ideas, even more than to his eligible daughter, and he compromises her happiness for the pursuit of truth.
The play is very straightforward, plotting the sequential events of Galileo's life in order, to portray the ways he was at odds with his time. In each scene, we see a new step in Galileo's journey. Throughout, his ethic of staying true to his own ideas remains. In this way, the play is an almost rhetorical exercise, a meditation on the importance of reason and the way that reason creates an opportunity for social critique.
