Whether Copernicus actually protested against the wording of the Preface we do not know; but it is hard to believe that Osiander would have refused to alter the wording in defiance of the author's wishes. Perhaps it was too late; the Preface was written around November 1542, and in that last winter of his life Canon Koppernigk was a very sick man. Perhaps considerations on the lines mentioned in the previous paragraph made him realize that he had really no cause for protest; more likely he procrastinated, as he had done all his life. 70
There is a strangely consistent parallel between Copernicus' character, and the humble, devious manner in which the Copernican revolution entered through the back door of history, preceded by the apologetic remark: "Please don't take seriously – it is all meant in fun, for mathematicians only, and highly improbable indeed."
13. The Betrayal of Rheticus
There was a second, and more personal scandal aroused by the publication of the book; it concerned Rheticus.
The great moment in the disciple's life is the master's death. It is the moment when he reaches his full stature, and acquires a new dignity as the keeper of the tradition, the preserver of the legend. In this particular case the death of the master coincided, moreover, with the long-awaited publication of his book. One would have expected that Rheticus, the prime mover of this event, would now become more active than ever as a prophet and propagandist. What an opportunity to indulge in personal reminiscences and intimate detail, no longer restrained by the domine praeceptor's mania for secrecy! During his last stay in Frauenburg, Rheticus had actually written a biography of the master, which was the more needed as virtually nothing was known in the learned world about Canon Koppernigk's person and career. Rheticus was the legitimate heir and executor of the Copernican doctrine – destined, so it seemed, to become to the departed what Plato had been to Socrates, Boswell to Dr. Johnson, Max Brod to Kafka.
To the surprise of his contemporaries and the vexation of posterity, the moment Rheticus left Nuremberg and handed over the editorship to Osiander, he suddenly and completely lost interest in Copernicus and his teachings. His biography of Copernicus was never published, and its manuscript was lost. The same fate befell a pamphlet which he wrote to prove that the Copernican theory was not at variance with Holy Scripture. Professor Rheticus lived on for another thirty-odd years; but the Apostle Rheticus had died even before his Teacher. He had died, more precisely, at the age of twenty-eight, some time in the summer of 1542, while the Book of Revolutions was being printed.
What caused this sudden extinction of the flame? Again one can only guess, but there is a plausible guess at hand. Copernicus' own introduction to the book, in the form of a Dedication to Paul III, was written in June 1542, 71 and sent to Rheticus in Nuremberg, while he was still in charge of the printing. It was probably the text of this Dedication which killed the apostle in Rheticus. It explained how the book came to be written; how Copernicus hesitated to publish it, for fear of being ridiculed, and thought of abandoning the whole project. The Dedication then continued:
"But my misgivings and protests were overcome by my friends. Foremost among them was Nicolaus Schoenberg, Cardinal of Capua, distinguished in every department of learning. Next was one who loved me well, Tiedemann Giese, Bishop of Kulm, a devoted student of sacred and all other good literature, who often urged and even importuned me to publish this work... The same request was made to me by many other eminent and learned men... Yielding then to their persuasion, I at last permitted my friends to publish that work which they have so long demanded..."
Here the dedication trailed off to other matters. Rheticus' name was not mentioned in the Dedication – nor anywhere else in the book.
It must have been a nasty shock. The omission was so fantastic and preposterous that the gentle Giese wrote, after Copernicus' death, an embarrassed apology to Rheticus, referring to:
"the unpleasant oversight that thy teacher omitted to mention thee in the preface to his book. Truly this was not due to indifference towards thee but to his clumsiness and inattention; for his mind was already rather dulled, and paid, as thou knowest, scant attention to anything not pertaining to philosophy. I know very well how highly he esteemed thy constant helpfulness and self-sacrifice... Thou assistest like a Theseus his heavy labours... How much we all owe thee for thy relentless fervour is as clear as the day." 72
But these well-meaning excuses carried no conviction, for Copernicus' Dedication to the Pope betrays neither "clumsiness" nor "dull-mindedness". It is an extremely shrewd and calculated document. The deliberate omission of Rheticus' name can only be explained by the fear that the mention of a Protestant might create an unfortunate impression on Paul III. But if so, Copernicus could, of course, have mentioned Rheticus at some other place, either in the prefatory matter or anywhere in the text itself. To pass his name in complete silence was an act as abject as it was futile, since Copernicus' name was already publicly linked with Rheticus' by the narratio prima, and by the fact that the book was being printed in Protestant Nuremberg under Rheticus' editorship.
Copernicus' dedication must have reached Rheticus some time in June or July. On 15 August, a small booklet by Rheticus himself, containing two of his lectures on astronomy and physics, 73 was published by Petreius. In the preface to it Rheticus reminisced about his first acquaintance with the master:
"When I heard about the great reputation of Dr. Nicolai Copernicus in Northern Germany, I had just been appointed professor of these sciences at the University of Nuremberg, but I thought that I should not accept this post until I had acquired some additional knowledge from his teaching. No obstacle could prevent me from setting out on the journey, neither money, nor the itinerary, nor other molestations. * I placed a great value on seeing his work, for here was a man advanced in years who was driven by a youthful audacity to communicate his mature ideas on this science to the whole world. And all other scholars will judge as I did when the book which we now have in the press at Nuremberg is published."
____________________
*
Probably an allusion to the fact that he risked the displeasure of Melanchton and Luther by visiting Copernicus, and that, on the other hand, he was travelling to a Catholic land whose Bishop had just published an edict against Lutheranism.
How depressing that this last affirmation of the pupil's loyalty coincided in time with the master's betrayal of him.
14. Bishop Dantiscus
The previous sections were concerned with the prolonged labour pains and caesarian delivery of the Revolutions, which took place in Nuremberg. We must now return again to the Cathedral fortress of Frauenburg on the Baltic, to complete the story of Canon Koppernigk's last years.
They were even less happy than the earlier ones had been. In addition to the doubts and worries concerning the publication of the book, the Canon had become involved in an absurd conflict with his new Bishop. This Bishop, Johannes Dantiscus, weighed as heavily on the end of Canon Nicolas' life as Bishop Lucas had weighed on its beginning. In all other respects, the radiant Dantiscus was as complete a contrast to the sombre Lucas as could be invented.
He was one of the outstanding diplomats of the Renaissance, a poet laureate who composed erotic verse in his youth and religious hymns in his old age; * a traveller, humanist, conversational charmer, and altogether a character of great attractiveness and complexity. Bishop Lucas had been by twenty-six years Nicolas' senior, Bishop Dantiscus was by twelve years his junior, yet Nicolas was as submissive to the latter as he had been to the former. This submission to authority – to Lucas and Dantiscus on the one hand, to Ptolemy and Aristotle on the other – is perhaps the main clue to Copernicus' personality. It undermined his independence of character and his independence of thought, kept him in self-imposed bondage, and singled him out as an austere relic of the Middle Ages among the humanists of the Renaissance.
r /> ____________________
*
The Encyclopaedia Britannica ranks his later work "with the best Latin poetry of modern Europe". 74
Old age seems in some cases to repeat the pattern of youth, or rather to bring out again the pattern, which was blurred during the active years. If Dantiscus was a kind of revenant, stepping into the place of Uncle Lucas – was not Rheticus, the adventurer and firebrand, in some respects a reincarnation of brother Andreas? Andreas had been the black sheep of the family, Rheticus was a heretic; Andreas was a leper, Rheticus was a sodomite. Their recklessness and intrepidity both fascinated and frightened the timid Canon; and this ambivalent attitude may explain his betrayal of both.
Johannes Flachsbinder, destined to become the bane of Canon Koppernigk's old age, was the son of a brewer in Danzig, hence the name, Dantiscus. By the age of twenty, he had fought in campaigns against the Turks and the Tartars, had studied at the University in Cracow, travelled in Greece, Italy, Arabia, and the Holy Land. On his return, he became confidential secretary to the King of Poland, and at the age of twenty-three, the King's special envoy to various Prussian Diets. It was in that period that he first became acquainted with Canon Koppernigk, then secretary to Bishop Lucas on similar missions. But their orbits soon parted: Copernicus remained in Ermland for the rest of his life, whereas Dantiscus, during the next seventeen years, travelled all over Europe as Polish Ambassador to the Emperors Maximilian and Charles V. He was a favourite of both Emperors as well as of his own King; Maximilian appointed him poet laureate and made him a knight, Charles gave him a Spanish title, and both borrowed him occasionally for missions of their own – as Maximilian's special envoy to Venice, and Charles V's to François I in Paris. Yet this son of a beer brewer from the outskirts of the civilized world, who succeeded in highly delicate diplomatic missions, was neither a snob nor even particularly ambitious. At the age of forty-five, at the height of his career, he retired, at his own request, to his provincial land of birth, and spent the rest of his life there – first as Bishop of Kulm, then of Ermland.
During his ambassadorial years, Dantiscus' main interests had been poetry, women and the company of learned men, apparently in that order. His correspondence, of Erasmian dimensions, extended even to the new Continent of America – he exchanged letters with Cortez in Mexico. His amorous relationships were equally cosmopolitan, ranging from his Tyrolian "Grinea", in Innsbruck, to Ysope de Galda in Toledo, who bore him a beautiful daughter. His celebrated poem ad Grineam was a charming elegy on the splendours and decline of virility, but he was equally devoted to his Toledan paramour and their daughter, Dantisca; he sent them, after his return to Ermland, a regular allowance through the banking houses of the Fuggers and Welsers in Augsburg, and received a portrait of Dantisca through the good offices of the Emperor's Spanish Ambassador. He remained loyal to his former friends and mistresses even when he became a devout Catholic; and his warm friendship towards Melanchton, the Lutheran leader, remained equally unaffected by his conversion. In January 1533, when Dantiscus was already a Bishop in Kulm, Melanchton wrote to him, across the front-lines, as it were, that he would all his life remain in Dantiscus' debt; and he added that more than Dantiscus' brilliant gifts, he admired his profound humanity. 75 Another contemporary summed up the general opinion prevailing among Lutheran scholars on the Catholic Bishop of Kulm: Dantiscum ipsam humanitatem esse – he is humanity. 76 The subsequent conflict between Dantiscus and Copernicus must be judged against this background.
In 1532, then, Dantiscus was established in the bishopric of Kulm, about a day's journey on horseback from Frauenburg. Moreover, he had also been made a Canon of the Frauenburg Chapter, and thus a confrater to Canon Nicolas. One would have thought that the arrival of such an illustrious humanist, in the provincial backwoods hidden by the "vapours of the Vistula", would become a joyous event in the lonely Copernicus' life. There was hardly a person in Ermland, let alone in Frauenburg, with whom he could talk science and astronomy, except for Giese, who in these matters was not a great light. Dantiscus, on the other hand, apart from his other attractions, was keenly interested in science, corresponded with several scholars (including the great mathematician Gemma Frisius), possessed several globes and astronomical instruments, a map of America, and even three timepieces, one of which he carried on a chain around his neck.
Immediately after settling down in Kulm, Dantiscus made overtures to Copernicus – which, for some unfathomable reason were primly rejected. Among the altogether sixteen private letters by Copernicus which are preserved, ten are addressed to Dantiscus. 77 They make depressing reading. The first is dated 11 April, 1533, that is, a few months after Dantiscus had been installed in his Bishopric. The letter is a refusal, on the grounds of official business occupations, of Dantiscus' invitation to visit him at Loebau Castle. 78
"Reverendissime in Christo Pater et Domine!
I have received Your Most Reverend Lordship's letter and I understand well enough Your Lordship's grace and good will towards me; which he has condescended to extend not only to me, but to other men of great excellence. It is, I believe, certainly to be attributed not to my merits, but to the well-known goodness of Your Rev. Lordship. Would that some time I should be able to deserve these things. I certainly rejoice, more than can be said, to have found such a Lord and Patron. However, regarding Your Rev. Lordship's invitation to join him on the 20th of this month (and that I should most willingly do, having no little cause to visit so great a friend and patron), misfortune prevents me from doing so, as at that time certain business matters and necessary occasions compel both Master Felix and me to remain at this place. Therefore I request that Your Rev. Lordship take in good part my absence at that time. I am in other respects most ready, as it is fitting, to oblige Your Rev. Lordship, as I am in duty bound to do innumerable other things, in whatever way Your Rev. Lordship will indicate to me at another time what it is that he desires. To whom I now confess that I am bound not to grant his requests, but rather to obey his commands."
Since Dantiscus knew exactly the nature and amount of the "official business' transacted at the Frauenburg Chapter, of which he himself was a member, the excuse was unconvincing. The second letter is dated three years later – 8 June, 1536. It is again a refusal of an invitation from Dantiscus to attend the marriage celebrations of a female relative of the Bishop's. The Excuse is again "official business": 79
"Reverendissime in Christo Pater et Domine Domine Clementissime!
I have Your Rev. Lordship's letter, full of humanity and favour, in which he reminds me of that familiarity and favour with Your Rev. Lordship which I contracted in my youth; [we remember that Copernicus is twelve years older than Dantiscus] which I know to have remained just as vigorous up to now. And since I am thus to be numbered among his intimates, he has deigned to invite me to the marriage of his kinswoman. Truly, Your Rev. Lordship, I ought to obey Your Lordship and present myself from time to time to so great a Lord and Patron. But now being in fact occupied with business, which the Most Reverend Lord of Ermland has imposed on me, I am unable to absent myself. Wherefore let him deign to take this my absence in good part, and to preserve that ancient opinion of me, though absent; since the union of souls is wont to count for more than that of bodies. Your Rev. Lordship, in all felicity, to whom I commend my humble dudes, and to whom I wish perpetual good health."
The tone of these and all subsequent letters, compared to the correspondence between contemporary humanists, and particularly Dantiscus' own, is astonishing and pathetic. The man who removed the earth from the centre of the universe writes to the poet laureate and former Ambassador at large, in the style of an obsequious clerk, submissive yet sour, nagged by some obscure jealousy, or resentment, or mere inability to loosen up and enter into a human relationship.
The third letter, dated a year later, 9 August, 1537, is in a different, but not in a brighter vein. It was written after the death of the
Bishop of Ermland, Mauritius Ferber, when it was a foregone conclusion that Dantiscus would be elected his successor. It contains some indifferent political gossip which had reached Copernicus in letters from Breslau two full months earlier; among other items, a rumour about an armistice between the Emperor and Francois I, which happened to be unfounded. It is hard to see what reason Canon Koppernigk had for sending this outdated, second-hand information on to Dantiscus who had correspondents at the four corners of the earth – except the reason that Dantiscus was on the point of becoming his immediate superior.
On 20 September, 1537, the Canons of Frauenburg Chapter solemnly assembled in the Cathedral to elect their new Bishop. The privilege to nominate the candidates was held, according to the intricate ecclesiastical procedure in Ermland, by the Polish King, while the election itself was the privilege of the Chapter. In fact, however, the candidates on the royal list had been previously agreed upon between the Chapter and the Chancellery, with Dantiscus as go-between. The list comprised Dantiscus himself (on whose election all parties had previously agreed), and three other candidates. The others were Canons Zimmerman and von der Trank, who do not concern us, and Canon Heinrich Snellenburg.
Now this Canon Snellenburg had some twenty years earlier incurred a debt of a hundred Marks to Canon Koppernigk, and had only repaid ninety. Canon Koppernigk thereupon had written a dusty epistle (one of the sixteen precious extant letters) to the Bishop of that time, petitioning him to make Snellenburg pay up the ten Marks. The outcome of the affair we do not know; the years had gone by, and now the lazy debtor Snellenburg was nominated as a candidate for the Bishop's See. It was a purely formal nomination since Dantiscus was to be elected, yet it gave rise to a grotesque little episode. Tiedemann Giese, the devoted, angelic Giese, wrote a letter to Dantiscus asking him to take Snellenburg off the list of candidates because he "would expose the Chapter to ridicule", and to put Canon Koppernigk's name in his place. Dantiscus, who evidently could not care less, obliged. Copernicus had the satisfaction of being a candidate to the Bishopric, and Dantiscus was elected unanimously, including Copernicus' vote.