Scientific Revolution DBQ

The learned and unlearned alike may see that I shrink from no man’s criticism. It is to your Holiness  rather than to anyone else that I have chosen to dedicate these studies of mine. In this remote  corner of the Earth in which I live, you are regarded as the most eminent by virtue of the dignity of  your Office, and because of your love of letters and science. You, by your influence and judgment,  can readily hold the slanderers from biting. Mathematics are for mathematicians, and they, if I be  not wholly deceived, will hold that my labors contribute even to the well being of the Church.

Moses wrote in a popular style things which, without instruction, all ordinary persons endowed with  common sense, are able to understand; but astronomers investigate with great labor whatever the  wisdom of the human mind can comprehend. This study should not be prohibited, nor this science  condemned, because some frantic persons boldly reject whatever is unknown to them. For  astronomy is not only pleasant, but also very useful: it cannot be denied that this art unfolds the  admirable wisdom of God.

Your opinion of the phenomena of light and shade on the clear and spotted surfaces of the Moon  assumes some analogy between the Earth and the Moon. Someone adds to this and says you assume  that the Moon is inhabited by humans. Then another starts discussing how they could be descended  from Adam or how they could have gotten out of Noah’s ark, and many other extravagant ideas that  you never even dreamed of. It is indispensable, therefore, to remove the possibility of malignant  rumors by repeatedly showing your willingness to defer to the authority of those who have  jurisdiction over the human intellect in matters of the interpretation of Scripture.

My book is still in your hands and subject to your private judgment. If you object to anything, I am  ready to remove it entirely. Know however, that you will not find a single word which is not true in  my experiments, which many times confirm those of the great Galileo. Whatever may be, the whole thing is up to you. At least I am assured my experiments have been repeated more than 30 times,  and some more than 100 times, before reliable witnesses, all who agree with my conclusions.

The doctrine of what is right and wrong is perpetually disputed both by the pen and by the sword,  but geometry is not. Why? Because in geometry few men care what the truth may be, since it affects  no one’s ambition, profit, or lust. But if Euclid’s proposition that the three angles of a triangle are  equal to the two angles of a square conflicted with the interest of those who rule, I know it would be  suppressed.

Were it allowable for our sex, I might set up my own school of natural philosophy. But I, being a  woman, do fear they would soon cast me out of their schools. For though the Muses, Graces, and  Sciences*are all of the female gender, yet they are more esteemed in former ages than they are now.  Nay, could it be done handsomely, they would turn all from females into males, so great is grown the  self-conceit of the masculine and the disregard of the female sex.

Drawing to commemorate Louis XIV’s visit to the French Royal Academy, published 1671.

The drawing demonstrates interest of the powerful sovereign like Louis XIV in supporting scientific enterprises. Depicted are scientific instruments and specimens used in astronomy, biology, navigation, geography, etc.