Hitzler would not admit him to Communion unless he would agree to ratify the Formula of Concord. Kepler was outraged. "Do you require this condition of every Communicant?"

Hitzler stared at him out of an aquatic eye, perhaps wondering if he were wading into depths wherein he might be drowned by this excitable heretic. "I require it of u, sir. "

"If I were a swineherd, or a prince of the blood, would you require it?"

"You have denied the omnipresence of the body of Christ and admitted that you agree with the Calvinists."

"There are some things, some things, mark you, on which I do not disagree with them. I reject the barbarous doctrine of predestination."

"You are set apart by your action in designating the Communion as a sign for that creed which was set down in the Formula of Concord, while at the same time contradicting this sign and defending its opposite." Hitzler fancied himself an orator. Kepler gagged.

"Pah! My argument, sir priest, is only that the preachers are become too haughty and do not abide by the old simplicity. Read the Church Fathers! The burden of antiquity shall be my justification."

"You are neither hot nor cold, Doctor, but tepid. " It went on for years. They met in Kepler's house, in Hitzler's, arguing into the night. They strolled by the river, Hitzler grave in his black cloak and Kepler waving his arms about and shouting, enjoying themselves despite all, and in a way playing with each other. When the Church representatives of Linz moved to dismiss Kepler from his post at the district school, and he was saved only by the influence of the barons, who approved his stand, Hitzler made no effort to help him, though he was a school inspector. The play ended there. What angered Kepler most was the hypocrisy. When he went out of the city, to the villages around, he was not refused Communion. There he found kind and simple priests, too busy curing the sick or delivering their neighbours' calves to bother with the doctrinal niceties of the Hitzlers. Kepler appealed his case to the Stuttgart Consistory. They sided against him. His last hope was to go in person to Tübingen and seek support from Matthias Hafenref-fer, Chancellor of the university.

Michael Mästlin was greatly aged since Kepler had last seen him. He had a distracted air, as if his attention were all the time being called away to something more pressing elsewhere. As Kepler recounted his latest woes the old man would now and then bestir himself, furtively apologetic, striving to concentrate. He shook his head and sighed. "Such difficulties you bring upon yourself! You are no longer a student, arguing in the taverns and shouting rebellion. Thirty years ago Iheard this talk from you, and nothing has changed. "

"No," said Kepler, "nothing has changed, not I nor the world. Would you have me deny my beliefs, or lie and say I accept whatever is the fashion of the day, in order to be comfortable?"

Mästlin looked away, pursing his lips. In the college grounds below his window the tawny sunlight of late autumn was burnishing the trees. "You think me an old fool and an old pander," Mästlin said, "but I have lived my life honestly and not without honour, as best I could. I am not a great man, nor have I attained the heights which you have-O, you may sigh, but these things are true. Perhaps it is your misfortune, and the cause of your troubles, that you did great things and made yourself prominent. The theologians will not worry if I flout the dogmas, but you, ah, that is a different thing. "

To that, Kepler had no reply. Presently Hafenreffer arrived. He had been Kepler's teacher here at Tübingen, and almost a friend. Kepler had never needed him before as he did now, and it made them shy of each other. If he could win the Chancellor to his side, and with him the theology faculty, the Consistory in Stuttgart would have to relent, for Tübingen was the seat of the Lutheran conscience. But Kepler saw, even before the Chancellor spoke, that his cause was lost. Matthias Hafenreffer also had aged, but with him the accumulation of years had been a refining process, honing him like a blade. He was what Hitzler played at being. His greeting was bland, but he bent on Kepler a keen glance. Mästlin was nervous of him, and began to fuss, calling plaintively for his servants. When none came, he rose himself and set out for his guests a jug of wine and a platter of bread, mumbling apologies for the poor fare. Hafenreffer smiled, eyeing the table. "A very suitable feast, Professor." Mästlin peered at him nervously, quite baffled. The Chancellor turned to Kepler. "Well, Doctor, what is all this I hear?" "That man Hitzler-"

"He is enthusiastic, yes: but scrupulous also, and a fine pastor."

"He has denied me Communion!"

"Unless you ratify the Concord, yes?"

"In God's name, he is excluding me because of the frankness with which I recognise that in this one article, of the omnipresence of the body of Christ, the early Fathers are more conclusive than your Concord! I can name in my support Origen, Fulgentius, Vigilius, Cyril, John of…"

"Yes, yes, no doubt; we are aware of the breadth of your scholarship; But you incline to the Calvinist conception in the doctrine of Communion. "

"I hold it self-evident that matter is incapable of transmutation. The body and soul of Christ are in Heaven. God, sir, is not an alchemist. "

In the stillness there was the sense of phantom witnesses starting back, shocked, their hands to their mouths. Hafenreffer sighed. "So. That is clear and honest. But I wonder, Doctor, if you have considered the implication of what you say? I mean in particular the implication that by this… this doctrine, you diminish the sacrament of Communion to a mere symbol. "

Kepler considered. "I should not say mere. Is not the symbol something holy, being at once itself and something other, greater? It is what may also be said, may it not, of Christ himself?"

That, he supposed afterwards, decided it. The affair dragged on for another year, but in the end Hitzler won, Kepler was excommunicated, and Hafenreffer broke with him. If you love me, the Chancellor wrote, then eschew this passionate excitement. It was sound advice, but ah, without passion he would not have been who he was. He packed his bags and set out for Ulm, where the Tabulae Rudolphinae were to be printed.

Elsewhere too the Keplers had been attracting the gigant's bloodshot glare. In the winter of 1616, after years of muttering and threats, the Swabian authorities moved officially to try his mother for a witch. She fled to Linz with her son Christoph. Kepler was appalled. "Why have you come? It will be taken for an admission of guilt. "

"There has been worse already, " Christoph said. "Tell him, mother."

The old woman looked away, sniffing.

"What worse?" Kepler asked, not really wanting to know. "What has happened?"

"She tried to bribe the magistrate, Einhorn," said Christoph, smoothing a wrinkle from his doublet.

Kepler groped behind him for a chair and sat down. Susanna laid a hand on his shoulder. Einhorn. All his life he had been hounded by people with names like that. "To bribe him? Why? How?"

Christoph shrugged. He was fifteen years younger than the astronomer, short and prematurely stout, with a low forehead and eyes of a peculiar violet tint. He had come to Linz chiefly to see his brother sweat over the bad news. "A wench," he said, "the daughter of this Reinbold woman, claims she suffered pains after our mother touched her on the arm. Einhorn was preparing a report of the matter for the chancery, and she offered him a silver cup if he would omit it. Didn't you, ma?"

"Jesus God," said Kepler faintly. "And what was the result?"