Heresy Read Free Page B

little crafts, wherries, and small white-sailed boats crisscrossing the shining water in the spring sun that illuminated the fronts of the handsome brick-and-timber buildings along the opposite bank, a glorious panorama with the great spire of St. Paul’s church towering over the rooftops far to the north. I thought what a magnificent city London was in our age, and how fortunate I was to be here at all, and in such company. I waited for Sidney to elaborate.
    “I have something for you from my future father-in-law, Sir FrancisWalsingham,” he whispered, his eyes still fixed on the river. “See what a knighthood gets me, Bruno—a job as your errand boy.” He drew himself upright and looked about, shielding his eyes with his hand as he peered toward the mooring place of our craft, before reaching for the oilskin bag he carried and pulling from it a bulging leather purse. “Walsingham sent this for you. You may incur certain expenses in the course of your enquiries. Call it an advance against payment.”
    Sir Francis Walsingham. Queen Elizabeth’s principal secretary of state, the man behind my unlikely presence on this royal visitation to Oxford; even his name made my spine prickle.
    We walked a little farther from the body of the crowd gathered to marvel as the barge was decked with flowers for our departure. Beside it, a group of musicians had struck up a dance tune, and we watched the crowd milling around them.
    “But now tell me, Bruno—you have not set your sights upon Oxford merely to debate Copernicus with a host of dull-witted academicians,” Sidney continued, in a low voice. “I knew as soon as I heard you had come to England that you must be on the scent of something important.”
    I glanced quickly around to be sure no one was within earshot.
    “I have come to find a book,” I said. “One I have sought for some time, and now I believe it was brought to England.”
    “I knew it!” Sidney grabbed my arm and drew me closer. “And what is in this book? Some dark art to unlock the power of the universe? You were dabbling in such things in Padua, as I recall.”
    I could not tell whether he was mocking me still, but I decided to trust to what our friendship had been in Italy.
    “What would you say, Philip, if I told you the universe was infinite?”
    He looked doubtful. “I would say that this goes beyond even the Copernican heresy, and that you should keep your voice down.”
    “Well, this is what I believe,” I said, quietly. “Copernicus told only half the truth. Aristotle’s picture of the cosmos, with the fixed stars and the sixplanets that orbit the earth—this is pure falsehood. Copernicus replaced the earth with the sun as the centre of the cosmos, but I go further: I say there are many suns, many centres—as many as there are stars in the sky. The universe is infinite, and if this is so, why should it not be populated with other earths, other worlds, and other beings like ourselves? I have decided it will be my life’s work to prove this.”
    “How can it be proved?”
    “I will see them,” I said, looking out over the river, not daring to watch his reaction. “I will penetrate the far reaches of the universe, beyond the spheres.”
    “And how exactly will you do this? Will you learn to fly?” His voice was sceptical now; I could not blame him.
    “By the secret knowledge contained in the lost book of the Egyptian sage Hermes Trismegistus, who first understood these mysteries. If I can trace it, I will learn the secrets necessary to rise up through the spheres by the light of divine understanding and enter the Divine Mind.”
    “Enter the mind of
God
, Bruno?”
    “No, listen. Since I saw you last I have studied in depth the ancient magic of the Hermetic writings and the Cabala of the Hebrews, and I have begun to understand such things as you would not believe possible.” I hesitated. “If I can learn how to make the ascent Hermes describes, I will glimpse what lies beyond the