Sir Thomas More vs Galileo Galilei

The manner in which Sir Thomas More and Galileo Galilei met their end is extremely different, and yet, their lives share some striking parallels; both of which serve as valuable case studies in how to conduct yourself—or not, as the case may be—in the face of tyranny and censorship. Both men fell afoul of the religious and political orthodoxies of their day, but they chose to respond to it in very divergent ways. Let’s take a brief look at the details, and how they might serve to inform our present day struggles against lies and gaslighting and cancel culture.

At its most fundamental level, the aspect of leftist, globalist wokery that grinds my gears the most, the thing that I cannot abide, the element which I refuse to accept, is that they require us to believe and perpetuate lies. They require us—exactly as Big Brother required Winston Smith—to accept a lie, then actively perpetuate that lie, and even to subsequently inform on those who are still not yet toeing the line. For example, the lie that diversity is a strength; it is not enough for them just to speak lies, but that, regardless of reason, we must outwardly agree with that lie, or else face ostracism, cancellation, and eventually incarceration. Even that is not enough. Again, as in 1984’s Airstrip One, a thought crime has been committed if you don’t inwardly accept the lie. This is pure malevolence. 

Both Thomas More and Galileo, in their own ways, faced these same types of obstacles. Yet, ultimately, they responded in opposite fashion. Sir Thomas refused to yield, and thus was martyred by having his head separated from his body. Galileo folded, recanted, and so was allowed to keep breathing, albeit under permanent house arrest. Both men were painted into a rhetorical corner until they were forced to search deep inside themselves and decide if their intellectual integrity was worth more or less than their own skin.

Thomas More exited this mortal coil roughly thirty years before Galileo was born, and was destroyed not by the small mindedness of a Pope and papacy, but by the inflexibility of a king and that king’s insistence upon his own supremacy. Though I personally dislike or even despise many aspects of Thomas More’s character and world view—he had people tortured and advocated for something approaching a police state—that does not mean I cannot admire the manner in which he chose to meet his fate. Henry VIII was of course hellbent on breaking England away from Rome so he might have his divorce and continue his mission to sire a male heir. In so doing, Henry had passed the so-called Acts of Supremacy which placed him above the Bishop of Rome and his Holy See, insisting that the Crown of England sat above the Apostolic tiara. Henry then insisted that everyone of note in his kingdom sign their names to this new status quo, and failure to do so was seen as a direct challenge to the royal authority.

As Henry’s chancellor, then as his ex-chancellor, More was of course required to sign. The king, in effect, was asking him to renounce various aspects of his Catholic faith. At least in his own mind, he was being asked to deny reality, to lie, and commanded to betray his own intellectual integrity; to stand brazenly against a thousand years of tradition which he saw no fault with. Thomas More attempted valiantly to avoid being forced to openly repudiate his doctrine, but when his obfuscations were thwarted, he was brought to trial. There he was required to repudiate and deny his own intellectual integrity. After much prevarication, and when utterly left without recourse, More finally reaffirmed his loyalty to Rome and the Pope: a scene depicted well in both A Man for All Seasons and Wolf Hall. Thus, in the eyes of Henry and his sycophants, More now stood revealed as a traitor. Though burning at the stake was the usual punishment for his type of crime, Henry commuted the sentence to a beheading. 

Before his execution, various people pleaded with More to abandon his principles, even in part, to save himself from the block. This More would not do. All that he was, all that he ever owned, was the ground he stood upon; ie, his abstract sense of truth and integrity. For those principles More would not bend. For those tenets he would sacrifice his life. More drew a line in the sand, and nothing could force him to cross it.

Since then, some have characterised More’s gesture as pointless or infantile or just wrong-headed. I admire it. I recognise a man who valued his own sense of truth and integrity above his own safety. His will could not be crushed.

The story of Galileo and his downfall took a very different turn. In Galileo’s case, he had used the newly realised technology of ground lenses to construct the first telescopes, with which he was promptly able to illustrate Nicolaus Copernicus’ theory that the Sun was at the centre of the solar system, not the Earth. The problem was that the Copernican Heliocentric model was at odds with the Ptolemaic Geocentric model, which the Catholic Church had adopted as dogma deep in antiquity.

So, in the eyes of the Church, the Pope, and the Roman Inquisition, if Galileo continued to teach or publish his findings, he would be setting himself against the immaculate knowledge and wisdom of the Papal establishment. He would effectively be calling the Church’s doctrine incorrect. This, after years of prevarication—and even multiple audiences with the Pope himself—eventually ended when Galileo was forced to endure a type of closed trial, in which he had no hope of acquitting himself, and finally being shown the instruments of torture which would be used against his person if he did not recant his findings.

Much like Thomas More, then, Galileo was faced with a choice. He could abandon the truth and his own sense of intellectual integrity, but keep his life. Or, he could remain loyal to empirical reason and thus likely face a very painful, very gruesome death; something he always knew was a possibility.

Yet when Signore Galilei was actually faced with the implements of his bodily destruction, he lost his nerve. In essence he utterly capitulated. Here is the text of his ‘confession’, 

I, Galileo Galilei, son of the late Vincenzio Galilei of Florence, aged seventy years, being brought personally to judgment, and kneeling before you, Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lords Cardinals, General Inquisitors of the Universal Christian Commonwealth against heretical depravity, having before my eyes the Holy Gospels which I touch with my own hands, swear that I have always believed, and, with the help of God, will in future believe, every article which the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome holds, teaches, and preaches. But because I have been enjoined, by this Holy Office, altogether to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the Sun is the centre and immovable, and forbidden to hold, defend, or teach, the said false doctrine in any manner ... I am willing to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and of every Catholic Christian, this vehement suspicion rightly entertained towards me, therefore, with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith, I abjure, curse, and detest the said errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect contrary to the said Holy Church; and I swear that I will never more in future say, or assert anything, verbally or in writing, which may give rise to a similar suspicion of me; but that if I shall know any heretic, or any one suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office.

It is difficult to entirely condemn Galileo’s submission—nor do I want to—as it takes a very special, very particular type of turbo-courage to stand firm in the face of torture and death. I do not think I would have the testicular fortitude to do such a thing. Just like Winston Smith in his Room 101, very few people are capable of emulating Sir Thomas More’s level of integrity. It is rare in the extreme; which makes it all the more remarkable.

In a limited sense, though, we are all increasingly being forced to face these types of dilemmas. The threat of actual torture and death are not on the table, but the pressure to accept lies and to denounce those who refuse is an increasing reality; on pain of cancellation. We are increasingly being painted into a corner where it is not permissible to remain entirely neutral. So, we must make our choices. We can look at examples from the past to guide and inspire us. I just hope the example of Sir Thomas More’s bottomless pit of willful stubbornness serves to inspire at least a few of us in the face of leftist censorship and threats of social cancellation.