Wrongly
the seventeenth century is generally perceived by common people as an
epoch of low instances and scarce achievements. As matter of fact, in
the history of humanity it lies mashed between the sparkling sixteenth
century of Renaissance and the eighteenth age of Enlightenment.
But
if we seriously focus only some of the great thinkers who lived in
the sixteenth century then it will be easy for us to realize the big
mistake which is to misevaluate the baroque century.
In
this very century, I set the first part of my novel “Ten days which
never happened”, where fourteen main writers and their friends of the
Academia of Celati (Academy of Hidden Writers) in Lamole - Tuscany, are
compelled to hide away from Holy Inquisition because they have decided
to translate in to vulgar language the Sacred Scripture against the 1596
Pope Clemente VII’s Decree, who wanted the Holy Bible still to be
published only in Latin ancient language (incomprehensible to most
people).
Still
remains a great question: up to where can manhood push his thirst of
knowledge? Is it right to go beyond anyway? Is it correct to restraint
the longing of manhood to break all the frontiers of knowledge? And who
is titled to check scientist, poets and all the men who feel free to
research the truth anyway and anywhere? Such questions are still of
topical actuality and is not in the intentions of our magazine to dare
to give any answers to them. I can personally only say that when I was
much younger than today, my answer would be simply aimed to deny any
chance of control or censorship.
But now I’m not so sure anymore.
Between
the Most Influential People of the 17th Century we must number Galileo
Galilei (1564-1642) and Isaac Newton (1643-1727). Without them we
would still be one hundred years behind where we are now.
Angelo
Ruggeri shows in his analysis of Milton’s masterpiece “The lost
Paradise” how the English author (another great mind of the seventeenth
century) has been influenced by Galilei’s theory that earth is not the
center of the universe but in fact it revolves around the sun.
Copernicus had laid out this theory almost a century before Galileo came
around, but Galileo was the man who was able to prove this using his
telescope and observations of the planetary movements.
He
also shows in a selection of works, how Milton, Giordano Bruno, Galileo
Galilei, Torquato Tasso and other great minds of this century, have
handle and dealt with such a sensitive subject and why the established
power counteracted their thoughts.
He
finally gives evidence of how Giordano Bruno, Torquato Tasso and
Galileo Galilei influenced Milton’s masterpiece “The lost Paradise”.
Galileo
was even convicted by the Church because he thought we did not need a
higher authority to provide us with knowledge, but in fact, we could
seek knowledge for ourselves.
And
what about Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) and Rene Descartes (1596-1650)?
Kepler was one of the most important scientists of his age. Kepler was
able to describe how planets moved around specific orbits. His ideas
were fundamental in putting together the puzzle of what our universe
actually is while Descartes was a mover and shaker on two fronts, one
being his great advancements in mathematics and in Philosophy too.
Also
John Locke (1632-1704) and Francis Bacon (1561-1626) belong to this
great gallery of geniuses; and I don’t need, I’m sure, to talk you
about William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) and William Harvey (1578-1657)
two of the most great minds of any time, one in the field of
Literature, the second in Medicine subject.
by Ignazio Salvatore Basile
