The Sleepwalkers (77 page)

No
wonder
that
the
emotional
shock
caused
by
reading
this
preface
(assuming
that
he
did
read
it)
is
supposed
to
have
hastened
Copernicus'
end.
Yet
there
can
be
no
doubt
that
Osiander
was
acting
with
the
best
of
intentions.
Two
years
earlier,
when
Copernicus
was
still
hesitating
whether
to
publish
the
book,
he
had
written
to
Osiander
to
pour
out
his
anxieties
and
to
ask
for
advice.
⁶⁰
Osiander
had
replied:

"For
my
part
I
have
always
felt
about
hypotheses
that
they
are
not
articles
of
faith
but
bases
of
computation,
so
that
even
if
they
are
false,
it
does
not
matter,
provided
that
they
exactly
represent
the
phenomena...
It
would
therefore
be
a
good
thing
if
you
could
say
something
on
this
subject
in
your
preface,
for
you
would
thus
placate
the
Aristotelians
and
the
theologians
whose
contradictions
you
fear."
⁶¹

On
the same day, Osiander had written on the same lines to Rheticus, who
was then in Frauenburg:

"The
Aristotelians
and
theologians
will
easily
be
placated
if
they
are
told
that
several
hypotheses
can
be
used
to
explain
the
same
apparent
motions;
and
that
the
present
hypotheses
are
not
proposed
because
they
are
in
reality
true,
but
because
they
are
the
most
convenient
to
calculate
the
apparent
composite
motions."

Prefatory
remarks
of
this
kind
would
induce
in
the
opponents
a
more
gentle
and
conciliatory
mood;
their
antagonism
will
disappear
"and
eventually
they
will
go
over
to
the
opinion
of
the
author."
⁶²

Neither
Copernicus'
nor
Rheticus'
answer
to
Osiander's
suggestion
has
been
preserved.
According
to
Kepler,
who
saw
some
of
the
correspondence
before
it
was
destroyed,
Copernicus
rejected
Osiander's
proposal:
"Strengthened
by
a
stoical
firmness
of
mind,
Copernicus
believed
that
he
should
publish
his
convictions
openly."
⁶³
But
Kepler
did
not
quote
the
text
of
Copernicus'
answer,
and
his
remark,
which
occurs
in
a
polemical
text,
should
not
be
given
undue
weight.
^*
Kepler
fought
fanatically
for
the
heliocentric
theory,
worshipped
Copernicus,
and
credited
him
with
a
"stoical
firmness"
which
he
did
not
possess.

______________

The
wording
of
the
preface
was
certainly
most
unfortunate.
For
one
thing,
it
did
not
make
it
sufficiently
clear
that
it
was
not
written
by
Copernicus
himself.
It
is
true
that
in
one
sentence
it
referred
to
the
author
of
the
book
in
the
third
person
and
in
a
laudatory
manner;
but
the
scholars
of
that
age
did
not
suffer
from
undue
modesty,
and
it
required
close
scrutiny
of
the
text
to
discover
that
it
was
written
by
an
alien
hand.
So
much
so,
that
although
Osiander's
authorship
was
discovered
and
revealed
by
Kepler
in
1609,
and
mentioned
in
Gassendi's
biography
of
1647,
the
later
editions
of
the
Revolutions
(
Basle
1566,
and
Amsterdam
1617)
took
over
Osiander's
preface
without
comment,
leaving
the
reader
under
the
impression
that
it
was
by
Copernicus.
Only
the
Warsaw
edition
of
1854
mentioned
Osiander's
authorship.

The
mystery
of
the
preface,
which
survived
three
centuries,
is,
of
course,
quite
in
keeping
with
Canon
Koppernigk's
oblique
ways,
his
cult
of
Pythagorean
secrecy,
and
the
esoteric
motto
of
his
book:
For
mathematicians
only
.
Legend
has
it
that
Copernicus
was
the
victim
of
a
perfidious
trick
by
Osiander;
but
the
internal
evidence,
and
also
a
statement
by
Rheticus,
to
which
I
shall
come
presently,
speak
against
this.
Since
Osiander
knew
of
Copernicus'
hesitations
to
publish
his
manuscript
for
"four
times
nine
years"
^63a
;
of
his
insistence
that
in
the
narratio
prima
his
authorship
should
remain
anonymous;
of
his
attempt
to
publish
only
his
planetary
tables
without
the
theory
behind
them,
he
must
have
assumed
that
Copernicus
would
agree
with
his
cautious
and
conciliatory
approach,
which
was
merely
reiterating
the
classical
doctrine
that
physics
and
sky-geometry
were
matters
apart.
We
have
no
reason
to
doubt
that
Osiander
acted
in
good
faith,
intending
both
to
reassure
the
anxious
Canon,
and
to
smooth
the
path
for
his
work.