Thaumaturgia; Or, Elucidations of the Marvellous

by Oxonian

JUDICIAL ASTROLOGY—ITS CHEMICAL APPLICATION TO THE PROLONGATION OF LIFE AND HEALTH—ALCHYMICAL DELUSIONS.

The study of astrology, so flattering to human curiosity got into favour with mankind at a very early period,—especially with the weak and ignorant. The first account, of it we meet with is in Chaldea; and at Rome it was known by the name of the "Babylonish calculation," against which Horace very wisely cautioned his readers.[66] It was doubtless the first method of divination, and probably prepared the mind of man for all the various methods since employed of searching into futurity; a brief view therefore of the rise of this pretended science cannot he improper in this place, especially as the history of these absurdities is the best method of confuting them. Others have ascribed the invention of this deception to the Arabs;—be this as it may, Judicial Astrology[67] has been too much used by the priests and physicians of all nations to encrease their own power and emolument. They maintain that the heavens are one great book, in which God has written the history of the world; and in which every man may read his own fortune and the transactions of his time. In this department of astrology (judicial) we meet with all the idle conceits about the horary reign of planets, the doctrine of horoscopes, the distribution of the houses, the calculation of nativities, fortunes, lucky and unlucky hours, and other ominous fatalities. They assert that it had its rise from the same hands as astronomy itself;—that while the ancient Assyrians, whose serene unclouded sky favoured their celestial, observations, were intent on tracing the paths and periods of the heavenly bodies, they discovered a constant settled relation or analogy between them and things below; hence they were led to conclude these to be the fates or destinies (Parcae) so much talked of, which preside at our birth, and dispose of our future state.

The Egyptians, who derived their astrological superstitions from the Chaldeans, becoming ignorant of the astronomical hieroglyphics, by degrees looked upon the names of the signs as expressing certain powers with which they were invested, and as indications of their several offices. The sun, on account of its splendour and enlivening influence, was imagined to be the great mover of nature; the moon held the second rank of powers, and each sign and constellation a certain share in the government of the world. The ram, (Aries [symbol: Aries]) had a strong influence over the young of the flocks and herds; the balance, (Libra [symbol: Libra]) could inspire nothing but inclinations to good order and justice; and the scorpion, (Scorpio [symbol: Scorpio]) to excite only evil dispositions. In short, each sign produced the good or evil intimated by its name.

Thus, if a child happened to be born at the instant when the first star of the ram rose above the horizon, (when, in order to give this nonsense the air of a science, the star was supposed to have its greatest influence,) he would be rich in cattle; and he who should enter the world under the crab, would meet with nothing but disappointments, and all his affairs go backwards and downwards. The people were to be happy whose king entered the world under the sign Libra; but completely wretched if he should light under the horrid sign scorpion. Persons born under capricorn ([symbol: Capricorn]) especially if the sun at the same time ascended the horizon, were sure to meet with success, and rise upwards like the wild goat and the sun which then ascends for six months together. The lion, (Leo [symbol: Leo]) was to produce heroes; and the virgin (Virgo [symbol: Virgo]) with her ear of corn to inspire chastity, and to unite virtue with abundance. Could anything he more extravagant and ridiculous!

The case was exactly the same with respect to the planets, whose influence is only founded on the wild supposition of their being the habitations of the pretended deities, whose names they bear, and the fabulous characters the poets have given them. Thus, to Saturn, [symbol: Saturn], they gave languid and even destructive influences, for no other reason but because they had been pleased to make this planet the residence of Saturn, who was painted with grey hairs and a scythe. To Jupiter [symbol: Jupiter] they gave the power of bestowing crowns and distributing long life, wealth, and grandeur, merely because it bears the name of the father of life. Mars [symbol: Mars] was supposed to inspire a strong inclination for war, because it was believed to be the residence of the god of war. Venus [symbol: Venus] had the power of rendering men voluptuous and fond of pleasure, because they had been pleased to give it the name of one who by some was thought to be the mother of pleasure. Mercury [symbol: Mercury], though almost always invisible, would never have been thought to superintend the property of states, and the affairs of wit and commerce, had not men, without the least reason, given it the name of one who was supposed to be the inventor of civil polity.

According to Astrologers, the power of the ascending planet is greatly increased by that of an ascending sign; then the benign influences are all united, and fall together on the head of all the happy infants who at that moment enter the world; yet can anything be more contrary to experience, which shews us, that the characters and events produced by persons born under the same aspect of the stars, are so far from being alike, that they are directly opposite.

"What completes the ridicule," says the Abbé La Pluche, to whom we are obliged for these judicious observations, "is, that what astronomers call the first degree of the ram, the balance, or of sagitarius, is no longer the first sign, which gives fruitfulness to the flocks, inspires men with a love of justice, or forms the hero. It has been found that all the celestial signs have, by degrees, receded from the vernal equinox, and drawn back to the East: notwithstanding this, the point of the zodiac that cuts the equator is still called the first degree of the ram, though the first star of the ram be thirty degrees beyond it, and all the other signs in the same proportion. When, therefore, any one is said to be born under the first degree of the ram, it was in reality one of the degrees of pisces that then came above the horizon: and when another is said to be born with a royal soul and heroic disposition, because at his birth the planet Jupiter ascended the horizon, in conjunction with the first star of sagitary, Jupiter was indeed at that time in conjunction with a star thirty degrees eastward of sagitary, and in good truth it was the pernicious scorpion that presided at the birth of this happy, this incomparable child." And so it would, as Shakspeare says, "if my mother's cat had kittened. This," says our sagacious bard, "is the excellent foppery of the world, that when we are sick in fortune, (after the surfeit of our own behaviour) we make guilt of our disasters, the sun, the moon, and the stars; as if we were villains by necessity; fools, by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, (traitors) by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in by a divine thrusting on; an admirable evasion of a whoremaster to lay his goatish tricks to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa major; so that it follows I am rough and treacherous.—Tut! I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled at my bastardizing." Thus it is evident, that astrology is built upon no principles, that it is founded on fables, and on influences void of reality. Yet absurd as it is, and even was, it obtained credit; and the more it spread, the greater injury was done to the cause of virtue. Instead of the exercise of prudence and wise precautions, it substituted superstitious forms and childish practices; it enervated the courage of the brave by apprehensions grounded on puns, and encouraged the wicked, by making them lay to the charge of a planet those evils which only proceeded from their own depravity.

But not content with such absurdities, which destroyed the very idea of liberty, they asserted that these stars, which had not the least connection with mankind, governed all the parts of the human body, and ridiculously affirmed that the ram presided over the head, the bull over the gullet, the twins over the breast, the scorpion over the entrails, the fishes over the feet, etc. The juggles of astrology have been admirably ridiculed by Butler in the following lines:

Some by the nose with fumes trepan 'em,
As Dunstan did the devil's grannam;
Others, with characters and words,
Catch 'em, as men in nets do birds;
And some with symbols, signs, and tricks,
Engrav'd in planetary nicks,
With their own influence will fetch 'em
Down from their orbs, arrest and catch 'em;
Make 'em depose and answer to
All questions, ere they let them go.
Bombastus kept a devil's bird
Shut in the pummel of his sword,
And taught him all the cunning pranks
Of past and future mountebanks.
Hudibras, part ii. canto 3.

By means of the zodiac, astrologers pretended to account for the various disorders of the body, which were supposed to be in a good or had disposition, according to the different aspects[68] of these signs. To mention only one instance, they pretended that great caution ought to be used in taking medicine under Taurus, or the bull; because, as this animal chews his cud, the person would not be able to keep it in his stomach.

Each hour of the day had also its presiding star. The number seven, as being that of the planets, became of mighty consequence. The seven days in the week,—a period of time handed down by tradition, happened to correspond with the number of the planets: and therefore they gave the name of a planet to each day; and from thence some days in the week were considered more fortunate or unlucky than the rest; and hence seven times seven, called the climacterical period of hours, days, or years, were thought extremely dangerous, and to have a surprising effect on private persons, the fortunes of princes, and the government of states. Thus the mind of man became distressed by imaginary evils, and the approach of these moments, in themselves as harmless as the rest of their lives, has by the strength of the imagination, brought on the most fatal effects.

Nay, the influence of the planets were extended to the bowels of the earth, where they were supposed to produce metals. From hence it appears that when superstition and folly are once on foot, there is no setting hounds to their progress. Gold, as a matter of course, must be the production of the sun, and the conformity in point of colour, brightness, and value, was a sensible proof of it. By the same mode of reasoning, the moon produced all the silver, to which it was related by colour; Mars, all the iron, which ought to be the favourite metal of the god of war. Venus presided over copper, which she might be well supposed to produce, since it was found in abundance in the isle of Cyprus, the supposed favourite residence of this goddess. In the same strain, the other planets presided over the other metals. The languid Saturn domineered over the lead mines, and Mercury, on account of his activity, had the superintendency of quicksilver; while it was the province of Jupiter to preside over tin, as this was the only metal left him, it would appear, a kind of "Hobson's choice."

This will explain the manner in which the metals obtained the names of the planets; and from this opinion, that each planet engendered its own peculiar metal, they at length formed an idea that, as one planet was more powerful than another, the metal produced by the weakest was converted into another by the predominating influence of a stronger orb.

Lead, though really a metal, and as perfect in its kind as any of the rest, was considered only half a metal, which, in consequence of the languid influences of old Saturn, was left imperfect; and, therefore, under the auspices of Jupiter, it was converted into tin; under that of Venus, into copper: and at last into gold, under some particular aspects of the sun. From hence, at length, arose the extravagant opinion of the alchymists, who, with amazing sagacity, endeavoured to find out means for hastening these changes or transmutations, which, as they conceived, the planets performed too slowly. The world, however, became at length convinced that the art of the alchymist was as ineffectual as the influences of the planets, which, in a long succession of ages, had never been known to change a mine of lead to that of tin or any other metal.[69]

The first author we are acquainted with who talks of making gold by the transmutation of one metal, by means of an alcahest[70] into another, is Zozimus the Pomopolite, who lived about the commencement of the fifth century, and who has a treatise express upon it, called, "The divine art of making gold and silver," in manuscript, and is, as formerly, in the library of the King of France.

As regards the universal medicine, said to depend on alchemical research, we discover no earlier or plainer traces than in this author, and in Aeneas Gazeus, another Greek writer, towards the close of the same century;[71] nor among the physicians and materialists, from Moses to Geber the Arab,[72] who is supposed to have lived in the seventh century. In that author's work, entitled the "Philosopher's stone," mention is made of medicine that cures all leprous diseases. This passage, some authors suppose, to have given the first hint of the matter, though Geber himself, perhaps, meant no such thing; for, by attending to the Arabic style and diction of this author, which abounds in allegory, it is highly probable that by man he means gold, and by leprous, or other diseases, the other metals, which, with relation to gold, are all impure.

The origin and antiquity of alchymy have been much controverted. If any credit may be placed on legend and tradition, it must be as old as the flood—nay, Adam himself is represented to have been an alchymist. A great part, not only of the heathen mythology, but of the Jewish Scriptures, are supposed to refer to it. Thus, Suidas[73] will have the fable of the philosopher's stone to be alluded to in the fable of the Argonauts; and others find it in the book of Moses, as well as in other remote places. But, if the era of the art be examined by the test of history, it will lose much of its fancied antiquity. The manner in which Suidas accounts for the total silence of alchymy among the old writers is, that Dioclesian procured all the books of the ancient Egyptians to be burnt; and that it was in these the great mysteries of chemistry were contained.[74] Kercher asserts, that the theory of the philosopher's stone is delivered at large in the table of Hermes, and the ancient Egyptians were not ignorant of the art, but declined to prosecute it.