The telescope was invented in 1608 by a Dutchman, though Galileo was the first to apply the telescope to the study of the skies. His telescope magnified objects a thousand times. Galileo was the first to establish the law of falling bodies, the first to invent the thermometer. Galileo refused to declare that the Copernican theory was nothing but a hypothesis not yet proved by science and was brought to trial by the Inquisition.