Cartesius Page #10

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the Swedes and his child died.

His heir, the sole hope

for continuing his line.

Three years ago, in 1630, I found

myself at Ratisbona for trade

and precisely during those days,

the Diet of the German nobility

requested and obtained the sacking

of Wallenstein from the Emperor,

who had any way been one

of his great fighters.

His troops were hated

throughout all Germany.

Never had such arrogant and violent

soldiers ever been seen. Ever.

And I remember that

no one could be found

with the courage to

take him the news

of his destitution,

but once destitute,

they had to clamorously

recall him when

after so many defeats there

was no longer any one else

capable of leading the

Catholic Imperial troops

against the army of

Gustavo Adolfo of Sweden

who had reached as far as the Danube.

Wallenstein was able

to stop Gustavo Adolfo

only because Gustavo Adolfo

died on the battlefield.

This was the fortune of the

Hapsburgs and of the Catholic League.

Didn't you return any

longer to Bavaria?

Just once, to Munich, to sell

a large batch of spices,

but since the struggle

between the armies

of the Catholic princes against the

Protestant princes started again,

I have preferred to send my agents.

The roads are not very safe

and then there are entire regions

afflicted by famine and plague,

every where,

from Augusta to Wurttemberg,

from Turingia to the Palatinate.

One of my agents told me that

he had seen wolf-packs

in Bohemia advancing right

inside the cities.

It is incredible that such terrible

wars are fought here in Europe

right when the world is

becoming ever larger

and when there would be

more space for everyone.

The West and East Indies

regurgitate wealth

we could all profit from.

The fortune of we Dutch ,

is that the European princes

while warring among each other,

failed to notice that,

the East Indies Company and

the West Indies Company

have brought us in the

last thirty years

so much business and money

that the safes of our banks

are much richer than those

of the King of Spain.

The English have noticed this too.

Our fleet is much more

powerful than their fleet

and our sailors are

certainly much better.

Come, I want to present a friend to you

who arrived yesterday from the East Indies.

They are the models of the

ships my husband has constructed.

This is the Beatrice weighing

one thousand tons,

one of the largest ships

built in Holland

and carrying my daughter's name.

Ah.

This, instead is the second,

the Muyden, which now finds

itself in the East Indies.

The ships slip between the sea

and the fluid of the skies

following the curve of the

terrestrial spheres.

Mr Descartes, I am certain that you

would very much like an automaton

my husband bought from a

Bohemian mechanic.

Certainly.

Sirs, do you already

know my automaton.

Yes.

Sirs, would you like to

come and see my automaton?

Ah.

See, Mr Descartes,

it's almost magic.

It doesn't spill even one drop.

Everyone who has seen it says

that such a perfect automaton

doesn't exist any where

else in the world.

What do you say about

it Mr Descartes?

Ah, I wouldn't dare

to contradict you Madam.

It's a perfect mechanism.

By using weights, counterweights,

levers, joints, gears,

wheels of different

dimensions and tie-bars

it can impress even any movement

on an inanimate material

by making it perform

gestures similar

to those of men or animals.

But the bones and muscles

of a man are a real machine.

The largest machine however,

is the heavens.

Mr Descartes certainly

agrees with me.

Astronomer Ciprus and

Costantino Wigens.

Do you know each other?

- Yes, Yes, of course.

- Oh Yes, we know each other.

You are right, the entire

universe is a large machine.

Excuse me if I interrupted you,

but I wanted to advise Mr Descartes

that I am going to begin my new

astronomical observations tomorrow.

Oh, you are very kind.

And you would do me a great

honour in assisting me.

I will certainly do so, I thank you.

In fact, I'm very interested

in the mechanics of the skies.

Observe.

This is a very delicate

instrument and it can be moved

in any direction without

any oscillation.

When the sun falls,

I will begin my observations.

Gentlemen.

The telescope has revealed

the movements of the skies.

As Bacon says, man is the

minister and interpreter

of nature and he can understand

it only by observing its

order through experience

and intellect.

Man doesn't know better

and couldn't know better.

Nothing , truly nothing.

And it is ignorance of the causes that

removes from us knowledge of the effects

and impedes us from acting on

nature according to its laws,

and this therefore prevents

us from subjugating it.

This is also one of Bacon's thoughts

Because the only way to win

over nature is by obeying her,

and when we ignore the

causes our explanations

of natural phenomenon are

born from our imagination

and God knows how

false our fantasy is.

Every century has its fashions,

but then fashions pass,

and the world remains

always the same.

I admire you greatly

astronomer Ciprus,

you are the most expert

astronomer I know,

but if you permit me to say,

at the moment you are following

a pernicious fashion,

incited by the madness

of certain innovators

who I do not approve of at all.

Well, don't you think you're

exaggerating a little?

I esteem your doctrine,

but I cannot approve

when you expect to go and

discover new planets in the skies

with your new instruments

that we do not know to be

more or less false

than the human eye,

and above all when you claim

to add new planets

to the already existing

ones without any prudence.

I cannot understand

how discovering a new planet

could be an imprudence.

It's very serious imprudence,

because it is by acting like this

that those such as yourself

have ruined astrology and have

destroyed all its connections

with medicine.

They have added new stars

to the patterns of the skies

without thinking of

the consequences.

They have ruined the

order of the Zodiac,

they have upset the known

qualities of the fixed stars,

the calculation of the

formation of the embryo,

the influence and the motives of the

stars during the critical days,

and other innumerable

truths that all depend,

on the septenary number

of the planets.

In your opinion therefore,

we should stop

all scientific progress just

because it is irksome to some

to re-order their old manuals?

We should not be afraid

of writing new treatises

new summae, new explanations

of the structure of the world.

Otherwise we reach the

paradox of Martin Forkey.

I've never heard this

gentleman spoken of.

He is a presumptuous man because

when through the telescope he saw

the real pattern of the

skies he was disturbed

because what he saw didn't correspond

to the patterns of the stars

he had studied in the manuals.

So, he then wrote to Keplero

that when the telescope is aimed at

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