So at the end of June[228] Galileo returned to Florence with his MS. and the ecclesiastical _imprimatur_, which was granted _bona fide_ for Rome without reserve. There were indeed sundry conditions attached to it, to be arranged privately; but they seemed to present so little difficulty, that a few days after he left on 29th June, Niccolini reported to Cioli that Signor Galileo left last Wednesday, perfectly satisfied, and with his affairs quite settled.[229]
But events were now at hand which long deferred Galileo’s ardent desire to see the results of his unwearied researches and labours speedily given to the world, and which involved complications afterwards taken advantage of by his enemies to effect the ruin of their great opponent.
Death of Prince Cesi.—Dissolution of the Accadémia dei Lincei.—Galileo advised to print at Florence.—Difficulties and Delays.—His Impatience.—Authorship of the Introduction.—The _Imprimatur_ granted for Florence.—Absurd Accusation from the style of the Type of the Introduction.
Six weeks had scarcely elapsed after Galileo’s return from Rome, when he received from his friend Francesco Stelluti the startling intelligence of the death of his influential patron, Prince Cesi, who had been snatched away on 1st August by an attack of fever, after a few days’ illness.[230] This was a great blow to Galileo. It was not only that he lost in the prince an adherent, as influential as he was devoted, but his death just then was of the greatest moment on account of the “Dialogues.” There was, perhaps, no one so well qualified to forward their publication as Cesi, who, as president of the Accadémia dei Lincei, seemed just the man for it. The Academy, deprived of its strongest support, was gradually dissolved, after the hand was wanting which knew how to weave its multitudinous threads into a firm and solid fabric.
Only the third week after the prince’s death, Galileo felt the first effects of his heavy loss. In a letter of 24th August, Castelli urgently advised him “for many most weighty reasons which he did not wish just then to commit to paper, to have the work printed at Florence, and as soon as possible.”[231] Castelli added that he had inquired of Father Visconti whether this would present any difficulties, to which he had replied that there was nothing to prevent, and he (Visconti) desired above all things that the work should see the light. Galileo was the more ready to fall in with this proposition because the plague, which had made fearful ravages in North Italy, had now made its appearance in Tuscany, and the precautionary measures taken by the neighbouring States made all intercourse with them, and especially with the States of the Church, very tedious and often impossible. Galileo therefore at once took the needful steps for publishing his book at Florence. He applied to the Inquisitor-General of the city, to the Vicar-General, and to the political authorities for permission, and it was granted without hesitation on 11th September, 1630.[232]