“GALILEO A new age has dawned, a great age, and it’s a joy to be alive.
SARTI I see. I hope we’ll be able to pay the milkman in the new age, Mr Galilei.”
“...I once again examined the moral of the play, which has always worried me a bit; because here I had been trying to follow the story rather than being guided by moral concerns, and what emerged here was a kind of moral that I am not satisfied with. galileo is no more able to resist telling the truththan he can resist devouring a tempting meal: for him it is a sensual pleasure. and he constructs his personality just as passionately and wisely as he does his worldview. he actually fails twice. first, when he suppresses or retracts the truthin a life-threatening situation, and then a second time, when he seeks it and spreads it again in spite of the danger to his life. he is ruined by the results of his activities, and now I am annoyed to hear that I supposedly thought it was right that he publicly retracted his theory, because doing so allowed him to continue his work in secret. this is too flat and cheap. after all, galileo ruined not only himself as a person, but also the most valuable part of his scientific work. the church (that is, the authorities) defended the teaching of the bible solely to protect itself, its authority, and its capabilities for oppression and exploitation. the people were only interested in galileo’s theory of astronomy because they were suffering under the rule of the church. when he retracted his views, galileo cast true progress aside and betrayed the people. astronomy returned once again to being a branch of science, an apolitical, isolated field of work for scientists. the church separated these celestial ‘problems’ from earthly ones, consolidated its control, and then readily accepted the new theories.”
(6 April 1944 – excerpt from Brecht’s Work Diary)
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