Copernicus Quotes

It was not just the Church that resisted the heliocentrism of Copernicus.

— Tycho Brahe

The physical doctrine of the atom has got into a state which is strongly suggestive of the epicycles of astronomy before Copernicus .

— Alfred North Whitehead

Why does it [government] always crucify Christ, and excommunicate Copernicus and Luther, and pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?

— Henry David Thoreau

“I don’t believe in astronomy. Or is it astrology? I always get those two confused. But I’ll tell you, that Copernicus was…

— Jarod Kintz

What Copernicus really achieved was not the discovery of a true theory but of a fertile new point of view.

— Ludwig Wittgenstein

The world is kept alive only by heretics: the heretic Christ, the heretic Copernicus, the heretic Tolstoy. Our symbol of faith is…

— Yevgeny Zamyatin

Who will venture to place the authority of Copernicus above that of the Holy Spirit?

— John Calvin

People give ear to an upstart astrologer [Copernicus]...this fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy

— Martin Luther

Louis Kelso's formula sounds like Lydia Pinkham's Vegetable Compound. The whole theory sounds crazy. But, then, one may recall, they said all…

— James J. Kilpatrick

Modern neurosis began with the discoveries of Copernicus. Science made men feel small by showing him that the earth was not the…

— Mary McCarthy

No one can read the history of astronomy without perceiving that Copernicus, Newton, Laplace, are not new men, or a new kind…

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

Harvey , Galileo , Copernicus do not seem occult to us, but they did so to their contemporaries, hierophants of the mysteries…

— Kenneth Rexroth

Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and…

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

I live on the other side of Copernicus and Galileo; I can no longer conceive of God as sort of above the…

— John Shelby Spong

[Copernicus] did not ignore the Bible, but he knew very well that if his doctrine were proved, then it could not contradict…

— Galileo Galilei

The world is kept alive only by heretics: the heretic Christ, the heretic Copernicus, the heretic Tolstoy. Our symbol of faith is…

— Yevgeny Zamyatin

Since Copernicus, man seems to have got himself on an inclined plane-now he is slipping faster and faster away from the center…

— Friedrich Nietzsche

The following passage is one of those cited by Copernicus himself in his preface to De Revolutionibus: "The Syracusan Hicetas, as Theophrastus…

— Marcus Tullius Cicero

“With hindsight, it is truly remarkable that, as early as the sixteenth century, Copernicus and his disciple Georg Joachim Rheticus (1514–74) resolved…

— Gary B. Ferngren

In the index to the six hundred odd pages of Arnold Toynbee's A Study of History, abridged version, the names of Copernicus,…

— Arthur Koestler

Yet in this my stars were not Mercury as morning star in the angle of the seventh house, in quartile with Mars,…

— Johannes Kepler

Some also deny that the earth is in the middest of the world, and some affirme that it is mouable, as also…

— Thomas Blundeville

“There are men whose sense of humour is so ill developed that they still bear a grudge against Copernicus because he dethroned…

— W. Somerset Maugham

“The Christians who engaged in infamous persecutions and shameful inquisitions were not evil men but misguided men. The churchmen who felt they…

— Martin Luther King Jr

“It is only rather recently that science has begun to make peace with its magical roots. Until a few decades ago, it…

— Philip Ball

“It has often been noted that three major revolutions in thought have threatened the idea of human centrality. First, Copernicus demonstrated that…

— Irvin D. Yalom

“When in 1863 Thomas Huxley coined the phrase 'Man's Place in Nature,' it was to name a short collection of his essays…

— Homer W. Smith

“There is talk of a new astrologer [Nicolaus Copernicus] who wants to prove that the earth moves and goes around instead of…

— Martin Luther

“I esteem myself happy to have as great an ally as you in my search for truth. I will read your work…

— Galileo Galilei

“Copernicus theorized that the Earth revolved around the sun, but it was not until he lay on his deathbed that he published…

— Rob Dunn

“A man that is of Copernicus ’ Opinion, that this Earth of ours is a Planet, carry’d round and enlightn’d by the…

— Christiaan Huygens

“So this is where all the vapid talk about the 'soul' of the universe is actually headed. Once the hard-won principles of…

— Christopher Hitchens

“If the people of Europe had known as much of astronomy and geology when the bible was introduced among them, as they…

— Robert G. Ingersoll

“Is it possible that the Pentateuch could not have been written by uninspired men? that the assistance of God was necessary to…

— Robert G. Ingersoll

“Humanity has in the course of time had to endure from the hands of science two great outrages upon its naive self-love.…

— Sigmund Freud

I am a Christian which means that I believe in the deity of Christ, like Tycho de Brahe, Copernicus, Descartes, Newton, Leibnitz,…

— Augustin-Louis Cauchy

The reformer is careless of numbers, disregards popularity, and deals only with ideas, conscience, and common sense. He feels, with Copernicus, that…

— Wendell Phillips

Matter is real to my senses, but they aren't trustworthy. If Galileo or Copernicus had accepted what they saw, they would never…

— Albert Einstein

Five centuries ago, Copernicus upset humanity's applecart with the news that the Earth is not the center of the cosmos. It could…

— Seth Shostak

“Who will venture to place the authority of Copernicus above that of the Holy Spirit? [Lutheran theologian Abraham Calovius illustrating his objection…

— Abraham Calovius