FOOD FOR THOUGHT: AVOID ENVY, JEALOUSY, AND PRETENSE

Dan Hofstadter, The Earth Moves: Galileo and the Roman Inquisition (Great Discoveries) (New York & London: Atlas Books/ W.W. Norton, 2009) ('Envy is the feeling of spite that others have what you do not have. In the catalogue of the sins it has several variations, chiefly jealousy, which is the fear that another will take or has already taken what is yours. Another variation, one might say, is pretense, or the claim that things are as you see them, and the refusal or incapacity to see them in any other, usually less flattering, way. Envy, jealousy, and pretense are all inspired by self-love. When Galileo and his supporters talk about Invidia, they are to some degree talking about the pretense of those who will not look at the world as God has made it, but only at the world as they, for their own vain purposes, would prefer it to be. In subtly warning Christians to avoid such contortions, Galileo was surely not thinking altruistically of the welfare of the Church: mostly he was aiming to protect his own scientific pursuits. But his argument was very sound advice." Id. at 211.).