APPENDIX
NO. I
ALMAGEST;
BOOK VIII, CHAP. IV
The various constellations of the fixed stars having now been duly described, their aspects remain to be investigated.
Independently of the steadfast and immutable aspects which the said stars preserve among themselves, either rectilinearly, or triangularly, or by other similar forms,[284] they have also certain aspects considered as referring exclusively to the planets and the Sun and Moon, or parts of the zodiac; certain others to the earth only; and others, again, to the earth, the planets and the Sun and Moon, or parts of the zodiac, combined.
With regard to the planets only, and parts of the zodiac, aspects are properly considered as made to them by the fixed stars, when the said planets and fixed stars may be posited on one and the same of those circles which are drawn through the poles of the zodiac; or, also, if they be posited on different circles, provided a trinal or sextile distance between them may be preserved; that is to say, a distance equal to a right angle and a third part more, or a distance equal to two-thirds of a right angle; and provided, also, that the fixed stars be on such parts of the circle as are liable to be transited by any one of the planets. These parts are situated within the latitude of the zodiac, which circumscribes the planetary motions. And as far as the five planets are concerned, the aspects of the fixed stars depend upon the visible mutual conjunctions, or configurations, made in the forms above prescribed; but, with respect to the Sun and Moon, they depend on occultations, conjunctions, and succedent risings of the stars. Occultation is when a star becomes invisible by being carried under the rays of the luminary; conjunction, when it is placed under the luminary’s centre; and succedent rising, when it begins to reappear on issuing out beyond the rays.
In regard to the earth only, the aspects of the fixed stars are four in number, and are known by the common term of angles: to speak, however, more particularly, they are the oriental horizon, the meridian or mid-heaven above the earth, the occidental horizon, and the meridian or mid-heaven below the earth. And in that part of the earth where the equator is in the zenith, the whole of the fixed stars are found to rise and set, and to be above as well as below the earth, once in each revolution; because the situation of the poles of the equator, being in this manner on the plane of the horizon, thereby prevents the constant visibility or invisibility of any one of the parallel circles. But in other parts of the earth, where the pole of the equator is in the zenith, the fixed stars can never set nor rise; because the equator itself is then on the plane of the horizon, and circumscribes the two hemispheres (which it thus creates, one above and the other below the earth) in such a manner, that in one revolution every star must twice transit the meridian, some of them above, others below the earth. In other declinations, however, between these extreme positions of the equator, as just mentioned, there are certain of the circles always visible, and others never visible; consequently, the stars intercepted between the first of such circles and the poles can neither rise not set, but must, in the course of one revolution, twice transit the meridian; above the earth, if the said stars be on a circle always visible; but below the earth, if on a circle never visible. The other stars, however, situated on the greater parallels, both rise and set, and are found in each revolution once on the meridian above the earth, and once on that below the earth. In all these cases, the time occupied in proceeding round from any angle to the same again, must be everywhere equal in its duration, for it is marked by one sensible revolution; and the time occupied in passing from either meridianal angle to the angle diametrically opposite, is also everywhere equal; because it is marked by the half of one revolution. So, also, the passage from either horizontal angle to its opposite angle is again effected in the same equal portion of time, wherever the equator may be in the zenith, for it is then likewise marked by the half of an entire revolution; because on such a position of the equator, all the parallels are then divided, as well by the horizon as by the meridian, into two equal parts. But in all other declinations, the time of passage of a semicircle above the earth is not equal to that of its passage below the earth, except only in the case of the equinoctial circle itself, which, in an oblique sphere, is the only one divided by the horizon into two equal parts, all others (its parallels) being bisected into dissimilar and unequal arcs. It follows, accordingly, that the time contained in the space between rising or setting, and either meridian, must be equal to the time between the same meridian and rising and setting; because the meridian divides equally such portions of the parallels as are above or under the earth. But in proceeding in an oblique sphere, from rising or setting to either meridian, the time occupied must be unequal; and in a right sphere, equal, because the entire portions above the earth are, in a right sphere only, equal to those below the earth; whence, for instance, in a right sphere, whatever stars may be together on the meridian must also all rise and set together, until their progress becomes perceptible by the poles of the zodiac; while, on the other hand, in an oblique sphere, whatever stars may be together on the meridian can neither all rise together nor set together; for the more southern stars must always rise later than those which are more northern, and set earlier.[285]
The aspects made by the fixed stars, in regard to the planets or parts of the zodiac, and the earth combined, are considered, in a general manner, by the rising, or meridianal position, or setting of the same fixed stars in conjunction with any planet or part of the zodiac; but their aspects are properly distinguishable, by means of the Sun, in the nine following modes:—
1. The first is called matutine subsolar, when the star is found together with the Sun in the oriental horizon. Of this aspect, one species is called the oriental, invisible, and succedent rising; when the star, at the commencement of its occultation, rises immediately after the Sun: another is called the precise oriental co-rising; when the star is found in partile conjunction with the Sun in the oriental horizon: another is the oriental, precedent, and visible rising; when the star, beginning to appear, rises before the Sun.
2. The second aspect is termed matutine location in the mid-heaven; when the star is found on the meridian, either above or below the earth, while the Sun is on the oriental horizon. And of this aspect, one species is called a succedent and oriental location in the mid-heaven, invisible; when, immediately after the Sun’s rising, the star shall be found on the meridian: another is the precise oriental location in the mid-heaven; when, exactly as the Sun rises, the star is at the same time on the meridian; another is the oriental precedent location in the mid-heaven; when the star first shall come to the meridian above the earth, and the Sun may then immediately rise.
3. The third, called matutine setting, is when the Sun may be actually in the oriental horizon, but the star in the occidental. One of the forms of this aspect is called the oriental, succedent setting, invisible; when the star sets immediately after the Sun’s rising: another is the precise oriental co-setting, when the star sets at the moment of the Sun’s rising: another is the oriental, precedent, and visible setting, when the Sun does not rise until immediately after the setting of the star.
4. The fourth aspect is named meridianal subsolar, and takes place when the Sun is actually on the meridian, but the star on the oriental horizon. Of this, one is diurnal and invisible; when the star rises while the Sun is posited on the meridian above the earth: another is nocturnal and visible; when the star rises while the Sun is placed on the meridian below the earth.
5. The fifth is called meridianal location in the mid-heaven; when the Sun, as well as the star, may be at the same time on the meridian. Of this aspect, two sorts are diurnal and invisible; when the star is on the meridian above the earth, together with the Sun, or on that below the earth, diametrically opposite to the Sun. Two also are nocturnal, and of these, one is invisible; when the star is on the meridian under the earth, together with the Sun: the other, however, is visible; when the star is on the meridian above the earth, diametrically opposite to the Sun.
6. The sixth is meridianal setting; when the star is found on the occidental horizon, while the Sun is on the meridian. Of this, one species is diurnal and invisible; when the star sets while the Sun is above the earth on the meridian: the other is nocturnal and visible; when the star sets while the Sun is on the meridian below the earth.
7. The seventh aspect is called vespertine subsolar; when the star is found on the oriental horizon, while the Sun is posited on the occidental horizon. One form of this aspect is the vespertine succedent rising, visible; when the star rises immediately after sunset: another is the precise vespertine co-rising; when the star rises and the Sun sets at one and the same time: another is the precedent, vespertine rising, invisible; when the star rises immediately before the Sun sets.
8. The eighth is named vespertine location in the mid-heaven; when the star is on the meridian, either above or below the earth, while the Sun is placed on the occidental horizon. Of this aspect, one kind is called a visible vespertine location in the mid-heaven; when the star is found there immediately after sunset: another is the precise vespertine location in the mid-heaven; when the star is found there at the moment of sunset; another is the vespertine precedent location in the mid-heaven, invisible; when the star arrives there immediately before sunset.
9. The ninth aspect is called vespertine setting; when the star, together with the Sun, is on the occidental horizon. One form of this aspect is the vespertine, succedent and visible setting; when the star, at the commencement of its occultation, sets immediately after the Sun: another is the precise vespertine setting; when the star sets at the same moment with the Sun: another is the precedent, invisible setting; when the star, before it emerges from its occultation, sets before the Sun.
NO. II
ALMAGEST; BOOK II.
EXTRACT FROM CHAP. IX
Of Circumstances regulated by Ascensions
In any climate whatever, the magnitude of a given day or night is to be computed by the number of ascensional times proper to that particular climate. For example, the magnitude of the day will be ascertained by numbering the times between the Sun’s zodiacal degree and the degree diametrically opposite, in the succession of the signs; and that of the night, by numbering the times, from the degree diametrically opposite to the Sun, onwards, in the order of the signs, to be the degree actually occupied by the Sun: because, by dividing the respective amounts of these times so obtained, by fifteen, the number of equatorial hours belonging to each space will be exhibited; and if the division be made by twelve, instead of fifteen, the result will show the numbers of degrees equivalent to one temporal hour of either of the said spaces respectively.[286]
The magnitude of any temporal hour may be, however, more easily found by referring to the annexed [Table of Ascensions], and taking the difference between the respective aggregate numbers, inserted therein under the heads of the equinoctial parallel or right sphere, and of any particular climate for which the magnitude of the temporal hour is required; and, if the said hour be a diurnal hour, the aggregate times as stated against the zodiacal degree occupied by the Sun; but, if nocturnal, those stated against the degree diametrically opposite, are to be compared; and the sixth part of the difference between them is to be added, if the said degree be in the northern signs, to the fifteen times of an equatorial hour; but subtracted therefrom, if in the southern signs. The amount thus obtained will be the required number of degrees of the temporal hour in question.[287]
And if it be required to reduce the temporal hours of any given day or night, in a certain climate, into equatorial hours, they must be multiplied by their proper horary times, whether diurnal or nocturnal, as the case may be; the product is then to be divided by fifteen, and the quotient will necessarily be the number of equatorial hours in the climate in question, on the given day or night.[288] On the other hand, equatorial hours are also to be reduced into temporal hours by being multiplied by fifteen, the product of which is to be divided by the horary times proper to the given day or night in the said climate.
The degree ascending in the ecliptic, at any given temporal hour, may also be ascertained by multiplying the number of temporal hours since sunrise, if the given hour be diurnal, but if nocturnal, since sunset, by their proper horary times; and the product is to be added, in the succession of the signs, to the aggregate number (as shown by the ascensions proper to the climate) of the Sun’s degree, if the given hour be diurnal, but, if nocturnal, to that of the degree diametrically opposite, and that particular degree of the ecliptic which shall correspond with the total number thus found in the ascensions of the climate will be the degree then ascending.[289]
But, in order to ascertain the degree on the meridian above the earth, the number of temporal hours since the preceding noon are also to be multiplied by their proper horary times, and the product is to be added to the aggregate number of the Sun’s right ascension; and that degree of the ecliptic, with which the total number as found in the aggregate times of right ascension shall correspond, will then be on the meridian.[290] The degree on the oriental horizon will, however, also show what degrees occupy the meridian; for, by subtracting 90 times (the amount of the quadrant) from the aggregate number ascribed to the said ascending degree in the Table proper to the climate, the number so reduced will be found, in the aggregate times of the Table of Right Ascension, to correspond with the degree on the meridian. And again, on the other hand, by adding 90 to the aggregate times ascribed by right of ascension to the degree on the meridian above the earth, the degree ascending may be obtained, for it will be that degree which corresponds to that total number, as stated in the Table proper to the climate.[291]
The Sun always preserves an equal distance in equatorial hours from all parts of the same meridian; but his distance in equatorial hours from different meridians varies according to the degrees of distance between meridian and meridian.
The foregoing extracts have been made to show the entire agreement between the astronomy of the Tetrabiblos and that of the Almagest. The Tables herein given from the latter work are, of course, now, in some degree, superseded by others of modern calculation, infinitely more complete.
Table of Latitudes, as Shown by the
Duration of the Longest Day
[From the Almagest.]
| LONGEST DAY. | LATITUDE. | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| H. | M. | D. | M. |
| 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 12 | 15 | 4 | 15 |
| 12 | 30 | 8 | 25 |
| 12 | 45 | 12 | 30 |
| 13 | 0 | 16 | 27 |
| 13 | 15 | 20 | 14 |
| 13 | 30 | 23 | 51 |
| 13 | 45 | 27 | 40 |
| 14 | 0 | [292]30 | 22 |
| 14 | 15 | 33 | 18 |
| 14 | 30 | 36 | 0 |
| 14 | 45 | 38 | 35 |
| 15 | 0 | 40 | 56 |
| 15 | 15 | 43 | 5 |
| 15 | 30 | 45 | 1 |
| 15 | 45 | 46 | 51 |
| 16 | 0 | 48 | 32 |
| 16 | 15 | 50 | 15 |
| 16 | 30 | [293]51 | 35 |
| 16 | 45 | 52 | 50 |
| 17 | 0 | 54 | 1 |
| 17 | 15 | 55 | 0 |
| 17 | 30 | 56 | 0 |
| 17 | 45 | 57 | 0 |
| 18 | 0 | 58 | 0 |
| 18 | 30 | 59 | 30 |
| 19 | 0 | 61 | 0 |
| 19 | 30 | 62 | 0 |
| 20 | 0 | 63 | 0 |
| 21 | 0 | 64 | 30 |
| 22 | 0 | 65 | 30 |
| 23 | 0 | 66 | 0 |
| 24 | 0 | 66 | 10 |
Extract from the Table of Ascension
(Contained in the Almagest),
Calculated for every Tenth Degree
of the Zodiac.
| SIGNS | Tenth Degree | In a Right Sphere under the Equator, Diurnal Arc 12 Hours. | 3rd Climate, thro’ Lower Ægypt, Lat. 30° 22′ N. Diurnal Arc 14 Hours. | 8th Climate thro’ Southern Britain, Lat. 51° 30′ N. Diurnal Arc 16 Hs. 20 Mts. | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Times of Ascen. | Aggregate Times. | Times of Ascen. | Aggregate Times. | Times of Ascen. | Aggregate Times. | ||
| D. | M. | D. | M. | D. | M. | ||
| Aries | 10 | 9.10 | 9.10 | 6.48 | 6.48 | 4.05 | 4.05 |
| 20 | 9.15 | 18.25 | 6.55 | 13.43 | 4.12 | 8.17 | |
| 30 | 9.25 | 27.50 | 7.10 | 20.53 | 4.31 | 12.48 | |
| Taurus | 10 | 9.40 | 37.30 | 7.33 | 28.26 | 4.56 | 17.44 |
| 20 | 9.58 | 47.28 | 8.02 | 36.28 | 5.34 | 23.18 | |
| 30 | 10.16 | 57.44 | 8.37 | 45.05 | 6.25 | 29.43 | |
| Gemini | 10 | 10.34 | 68.18 | 9.17 | 54.22 | 7.29 | 37.12 |
| 20 | 10.47 | 79.05 | 10.00 | 64.22 | 8.49 | 46.01 | |
| 30 | 10.55 | 90.00 | 10.38 | 75.00 | 10.14 | 56.15 | |
| Cancer | 10 | 10.55 | 100.55 | 11.12 | 86.12 | 11.36 | 67.51 |
| 20 | 10.47 | 111.42 | 11.34 | 97.46 | 12.45 | 80.36 | |
| 30 | 10.34 | 122.16 | 11.51 | 109.37 | 13.39 | 94.15 | |
| Leo | 10 | 10.16 | 132.32 | 11.55 | 121.32 | 14.07 | 108.22 |
| 20 | 9.58 | 142.30 | 11.54 | 133.26 | 14.22 | 122.44 | |
| 30 | 9.40 | 152.10 | 11.47 | 145.13 | 14.24 | 137.08 | |
| Virgo | 10 | 9.25 | 161.35 | 11.40 | 156.53 | 14.19 | 151.27 |
| 20 | 9.15 | 170.50 | 11.35 | 168.28 | 14.16 | 165.45 | |
| 30 | 9.10 | 180.00 | 11.32 | 180.00 | 14.15 | 180.00 | |
| Libra | 10 | 9.10 | 189.10 | 11.32 | 191.32 | 14.15 | 194.15 |
| 20 | 9.15 | 198.25 | 11.35 | 203.07 | 14.18 | 208.33 | |
| 30 | 9.25 | 207.50 | 11.40 | 214.47 | 14.19 | 222.52 | |
| Scorpio | 10 | 9.40 | 217.30 | 11.47 | 226.34 | 14.24 | 237.16 |
| 20 | 9.58 | 227.28 | 11.54 | 238.28 | 14.22 | 251.38 | |
| 30 | 10.16 | 237.44 | 11.55 | 250.23 | 14.07 | 265.45 | |
| Sagittarius | 10 | 10.34 | 248.18 | 11.51 | 262.14 | 13.39 | 279.24 |
| 20 | 10.47 | 269.05 | 11.34 | 273.48 | 12.45 | 292.09 | |
| 30 | 10.55 | 270.00 | 11.12 | 285.00 | 11.36 | 303.45 | |
| Capricornus | 10 | 10.55 | 280.55 | 10.38 | 295.38 | 10.14 | 313.59 |
| 20 | 10.47 | 291.42 | 10.00 | 305.38 | 8.49 | 322.48 | |
| 30 | 10.34 | 302.16 | 9.17 | 314.55 | 7.29 | 330.17 | |
| Aquarius | 10 | 10.16 | 312.32 | 8.37 | 323.32 | 6.25 | 336.42 |
| 20 | 9.58 | 322.30 | 8.02 | 331.34 | 5.34 | 342.16 | |
| 30 | 9.40 | 332.10 | 7.33 | 339.07 | 4.56 | 347.12 | |
| Pisces | 10 | 9.25 | 341.35 | 7.10 | 346.17 | 4.31 | 351.43 |
| 20 | 9.15 | 350.50 | 6.55 | 353.12 | 4.12 | 355.55 | |
| 30 | 9.10 | 360.00 | 6.48 | 360.00 | 4.05 | 360.00 | |
NO. III
THE CENTILOQUY,
OR
HUNDRED APHORISMS OF CLAUDIUS PTOLEMY[294];
OTHERWISE CALLED,
THE FRUIT OF HIS FOUR BOOKS
I. Judgment must be regulated by thyself, as well as by the science; for it is not possible that particular forms of events should be declared by any person, however scientific; since the understanding conceives only a certain general idea of some sensible event, and not its particular form. It is, therefore, necessary for him who practices herein to adopt inference. They only who are inspired by the deity can predict particulars.
II. When an enquirer shall make mature search into an expected event, there will be found no material difference between the event itself and his idea of it.
III. Whosoever may be adapted to any particular event or pursuit, will assuredly have the star indicative thereof very potent in his nativity.
IV. A mind apt in knowledge will discover truth more readily than one practised in the highest branches of science.
V. A skilful person, acquainted with the nature of the stars, is enabled to avert many of their effects, and to prepare himself for those effects before they arrive.
VI. It is advantageous to make choice of days and hours at a time well constituted by the nativity. Should the time be adverse, the choice will in no respect avail, however favourable an issue it may chance to promise.
VII. The mingled influences of the stars can be understood by no one who has not previously acquired knowledge of the combinations and varieties existing in nature.
VIII. A sagacious mind improves the operation of the heavens, as a skilful farmer, by cultivation, improves nature.
IX. In their generation and corruption forms are influenced by the celestial forms, of which the framers of talismans consequently avail themselves, by observing the ingresses of the stars thereupon.
X. In the election of days and hours, make use of the malefics, to the same moderate extent as the skilful physician would use poisons in order to perform cures.
XI. A day and hour are not to be elected until the quality of the object proposed shall be known.
XII. Love and hatred prohibit the true accomplishment of judgments; and, inasmuch as they lessen the most important, so likewise they magnify the most trivial things.
XIII. In every indication made by the constitution of the heavens, secondary stars, whether auxiliary or injurious thereto, are also to be used.
XIV. The astrologer will be entangled in a labyrinth of error, when the seventh house and its lord shall be afflicted.
XV. Signs cadent from the ascendant of any kingdom are the ascendants of that kingdom’s enemies. But the angles and succedent houses are the ascendants of its friends. It is the same in all doctrines and institutions.
XVI. When the benefics may be controlled in the eighth house, they bring mischief by means of good men: if, on the other hand, they be well affected, they will prevent mischief.
XVII. Give no judgment as to the future life of an aged person, until the number of years he may live shall have been reckoned.
XVIII. If, while a benefic may ascend, both the luminaries should be in the same minute[295], the native will be equally and highly prosperous in all things which can befall him. So, likewise, if the luminaries be mutually opposed by the east and west. But the contrary effect will be produced, should a malefic be on the ascendant.
XIX. The efficacy of purgation is impeded by the Moon’s conjunction with Jupiter.
XX. Pierce not with iron that part of the body which may be governed by the sign actually occupied by the Moon.
XXI. When the Moon may be in Scorpio or Pisces, purgation may be advantageously used, provided the lord of the ascendant be coupled with some star posited below the earth. If he be coupled with a star placed above the earth, the potion swallowed will be vomited up.
XXII. Neither put on nor lay aside any garment for the first time, when the Moon may be located in Leo. And it will be still worse to do so, should she be badly affected.
XXIII. Aspects between the Moon and stars give the native much activity; and, if the stars be in power, they indicate an efficient, but if weak an inert, excitation to action.
XXIV. An eclipse of the luminaries, if in the angles of the nativity, or of an annual revolution, is noxious; and the effects take place according to the space between the ascendant and the place of eclipse. And as, in a solar eclipse, a year is reckoned for an hour, so likewise, in a lunar eclipse, a month is reckoned for an hour.
XXV. The progression of a significator, posited in the mid-heaven, is to be made by right ascension; of another posited in the ascendant, by the oblique ascension of the particular latitude.
XXVI. There is obvious concealment in the case, if the star significative of any particular affair be in conjunction with the Sun, either under the earth or in a place foreign to its own nature. On the other hand, there is manifestation, should the star be raised to elevation out of its depression, and be located in its own place.
XXVII. Venus gives pleasure to the native in that part of the body which may be ruled by the sign she occupies. It is the same with other stars.
XXVIII. When the Moon may not hold a familiarity with two planets, as is desirable, care should be taken to connect her, if possible, with some fixed star combining their qualities.
XXIX. The fixed stars grant extremely good fortune, unconnected with the understanding; but it is most commonly marked by calamities, unless the planets also agree in the felicity.
XXX. Observe the creation of the first king of any dynasty; for if the ascendant at that creation should agree with the ascendant of the nativity of the king’s son, he will succeed his father.
XXXI. When the star ruling over any kingdom shall enter into a climacterical place, either the king, or some one of the chief men of his kingdom, will die.
XXXII. Concord between two persons is produced by an harmonious figuration of the stars, indicative of the matter whereby good will is constituted, in the nativity of either person.
XXXIII. Love and hatred are discernible, as well from the concord and discord of the luminaries, as from the ascendants of both nativities: but obeying signs increase good will.
XXXIV. If the lord of the place of the new Moon be in an angle, he is indicative of the events liable to happen in that month.
XXXV. When the Sun arrives at the place of any star, he excites the influence of that star in the atmosphere.
XXXVI. In the foundation of cities, consider the fixed stars which may seem to contribute thereto; but in the erection of houses, observe the planets. The kings of every city which has Mars in culmination will most commonly perish by the sword.
XXXVII. If Virgo or Pisces be on the ascendant, the native will create his own dignity; but if Aries or Libra is on the ascendant, he will cause his own death. The other signs are to be contemplated in the same way.
XXXVIII. Mercury, if established in either house of Saturn, and in power, gives the native a speculative and inquisitive intellect: if in a house of Mars, and especially if in Aries, he gives eloquence.
XXXIX. Affliction of the eleventh house, in the creation of a king, indicates damage in his household and his treasury: affliction of the second house denotes the detriment of his subject’s wealth.
XL. When the ascendant is oppressed by the malefics, the native will delight in sordid things, and approve ill-favoured odours.
XLI. Beware the affliction of the eighth house and its lord, at a time of departure; and that of the second house and its lord, at a time of return.
XLII. Should a disease begin when the Moon may be in a sign occupied at the birth by some malefic, or in quartile or opposition to any such sign, such disease will be most severe; and if the malefic also behold the said sign, it will be dangerous. On the other hand, there will be no danger if the Moon be in a place held at the time of birth by some benefic.
XLIII. The malefic figures of a nation are strengthened by adverse figurations of existing times.
XLIV. It is an evil case if the ascendant of a sick person resist the figuration of his own nativity; and if the time should not bring up any benefic.
XLV. If the ascendant, or principal significators, be not in human signs, the native himself will be also estranged from human nature.
XLVI. In nativities much happiness is conferred by the fixed stars; and also by the angles of the new Moon, and by the place of a kingdom’s Part of Fortune, should the ascendant be found in any of them.
XLVII. If a malefic in one nativity fall on the place of a benefic in another nativity, he who has the benefic will suffer damage from him who has the malefic.
XLVIII. If the mid-heaven of a prince be the ascendant of his subject, or if their respective significators be configurated in a benevolent form, they will continue long inseparable. It will be the same, also, should the sixth house of a subject or servant be the ascendant of his prince or master.
XLIX. If the ascendant of a servant be the mid-heaven in his master’s nativity, the master will place so much confidence in that servant as to be ruled by him.
L. Overlook none of the hundred and nineteen conjunctions; for on them depends the knowledge of worldly operations, whether of generation or of corruption.
LI. Make the sign occupied by the Moon at the time of birth the sign ascending at the conception; and consider that in which she may be posited at the conception, or the opposite one, as the sign ascending at the birth.
LII. Men of tall stature have their lords of nativity in elevation, and their ascendants in the beginnings of signs; but the lords of men of short stature will be found in declination.[296] It must also be seen whether the signs be right or oblique.
LIII. The lords of nativity of slight or thin men have no latitude, but those of stout or fat men have; and, if the latitude be south, the native will be active; if north, inactive.
LIV. In the construction of a building, the principal rulers, if coupled with a star below the earth, will impede the erection.
LV. Mars’ evil influence over ships is diminished if he be neither in the mid-heaven nor in the eleventh house; but if in either of those places, he renders the ship liable to be captured by pirates. And if the ascendant be afflicted by any fixed star of the nature of Mars, the ship will be burned.
LVI. While the Moon is in her first quarter, withdrawing from her conjunction with the Sun, the bodily humours expand until her second quarter: in her other quarters they decrease.
LVII. If, during a sickness, the seventh house and its lord be afflicted, change the physician.
LVIII. Observe the place of an aspect, and its distance from the ascendant of the year; for the event will happen when the profection may arrive thither.
LIX. Before pronouncing that an absent person shall die, observe whether he may not become intoxicated; before declaring that he shall receive a wound, see whether he may not be let blood; and before saying that he shall find treasure, examine whether he may not receive his own deposit; for the figures of all these things may be similar.
LX. In cases of sickness, observe the critical days, and the Moon’s progress in the angles of a figure of sixteen sides. If those angles be well affected, it is favourable for the invalid; if they be afflicted, unfavourable.
LXI. The Moon is significative of bodily matters, which, in respect of motion, resemble her.
LXII. By marking exactly the beginning of a conjunction,[297] judgment may be made of the variation of the weather in the ensuing month. It will depend upon the lord of the angle of every figure, for he controls the nature of the atmosphere; assuming also at these times the quality of the existing weather.
LXIII. In the conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, pronounce according to the nature of that one which may be higher in elevation. Follow the same rule with other stars.
LXIV. After ascertaining the lord of the inquiry, see what power he may have in the annual revolution, or in the ascendant of the new Moon; and pronounce accordingly.
LXV. In the least conjunction, the difference of the mean conjunction, and in the mean conjunction the difference of the greatest conjunction.[298]
LXVI. Consider no profection by itself alone, but make reference also to the qualifications and impediments of the stars.
LXVII. Years are diminished by the imbecility of the receiver.
LXVIII. A malefic, when matutine, signifies an accident; when vespertine, a disease.
LXIX. The native’s sight will be impaired if the Moon be opposed to the Sun, and joined with nebulous stars; and if the Moon be in the western angle, and both the malefic stars in the eastern angle, the Sun being in an angle also, the native will become blind.
LXX. Insanity is produced if the Moon have no connection with Mercury; and, if neither of them be connected with the ascendant, Saturn being in occupation of the angle by night, but Mars by day, especially if in Cancer, Virgo, or Pisces, a dæmoniac affection will be produced.
LXXI. If both luminaries may be in masculine signs, in the nativities of males, their actions will be consonant with nature; but if so placed in the nativities of females, they increase their action. And Mars and Venus, if matutine, incline to the masculine gender; if vespertine, to the feminine.
LXXII. Matters of education are to be considered by the ascending lords of triplicity; matters of life, by the lords of the conditionary luminary’s triplicity.
LXXIII. If the Sun be found with the Gorgon’s head (Caput Medusæ), and not aspected by any benefic star, and if there be no benefic present in the eighth house, and the lord of the conditionary luminary be opposed to Mars, or in quartile to him, the native will be beheaded. If the luminary culminate, his body will be maimed or mangled; and if the aspect in quartile be from Gemini or Pisces, his hands and feet will be amputated.
LXXIV. Mars, if ascending, uniformly gives a scar in the face.
LXXV. If the Sun be in conjunction with the lord of the ascendant, in Leo, and Mars has no prerogative in the ascendant, and if there be no benefic in the eighth house, the native will be burned.
LXXVI. If Saturn hold the mid-heaven, and the conditionary luminary be opposed to him, the native will perish in the ruins of buildings, provided the sign on the lower heaven be an earthly sign; if it be a watery sign, he will be drowned or suffocated by water: if a human sign, he will be strangled by men, or will perish by the halter or the scourge. Should there, however, be a benefic in the eighth house, he will not suffer death, although he will be brought near it.
LXXVII. Profection of the ascendant is to be made for matters affecting the body; of the Part of Fortune, for extrinsic circumstances; of the Moon, for the connection between the body and the spirit; and of the mid-heaven, for the employment or profession.
LXXVIII. A star often dispenses influence in a place in which it has no prerogative, thus bringing unexpected advantage to the native.
LXXIX. Whoever has Mars in the eleventh house, does not govern his master.
LXXX. If Venus be in conjunction with Saturn, and have any lord of house in the seventh house, the native will be of spurious origin.
LXXXI. Times are reckoned in seven ways; viz. by the space between two significators; by the space between their mutual aspects; by the approach of one to the other; by the space between either of them and the place appropriated to the proposed event; by the descension of a star, with its addition or diminution; by the changing of a significator; and by the approach of a planet to its place.
LXXXII. When a figure may be equipoised, observe the horoscope (or figure) at the new or full moon, and, if that also be equipoised, be not hasty in giving judgment.
LXXXIII. The time of obtaining a grant indicates the affection between the applicant and his prince; but the seat[299] shows the nature of the office;—
LXXXIV. And if Mars be lord of the ascendant at the time of entering on possession, and posited in the second house, or coupled with the lord of the second, he brings much mischief.
LXXXV. Should the lord of the ascendant be configurated with the lord of the second house, the prince will spontaneously create many charges.
LXXXVI. The Sun is the source of the vital power; the Moon, of the natural power.
LXXXVII. Monthly revolutions are made in twenty-eight days, two hours and about eighteen minutes. Judgment is also made by some persons by means of the Sun’s progress; that is to say, by his partial equations to that degree and minute which he might hold at the beginning.
LXXXVIII. In making profection of the part of Fortune for a whole annual revolution, a space equal to that between the Sun and Moon is to be reckoned from the ascendant.
LXXXIX. Consider the grandfather’s affairs from the seventh house and the uncle’s from the sixth.
XC. Should the significator be in aspect to the ascendant, the hidden event or object will correspond in its nature with the ascendant; but if the ascendant be not so aspected, the nature of the event will accord with that of the place in which the significator is posited. The lord of the hour shows its colour; the place of the Moon its time; and, if above the earth, it will be a novel thing; if below, old. The part of Fortune indicates its quantity, whether long or short. The lords of the terms, and of the lower heaven and mid-heaven, and of the Moon, shows its substance or value.
XCI. Should the ruler of a sick person be combust, it is an evil portent; and especially if the part of Fortune be afflicted.
XCII. Saturn, if oriental, is not so highly noxious to a sick person; nor Mars, if occidental.
XCIII. Judgment is not to be drawn from any figure until the next conjunction shall have been considered: for principles are varied by every conjunction; and therefore, to avoid error, both the last and the next should be combined.
XCIV. The place of the more potent significator indicates the thoughts of the inquirer.
XCV. The stars rising with the tenth house prove how far the native may be fitted to the occupation which he follows.
XCVI. In an eclipse, such significations as are made nearest the angles, show the events decreed. The nature of the stars in accordance with the eclipse, plants as well as fixed stars, and also the appearances co-ascending, are likewise to be considered, and judgment is to be given accordingly.
XCVII. The event inquired about will be speedily accomplished, should the lord of the new or full Moon be in an angle.
XCVIII. Shooting stars, and meteors like flowing hair, bear a secondary part in judgments.
XCIX. Shooting stars denote the dryness of the air; and, if they are projected to one part only, they indicate wind therefrom: if to various parts, they indicate diminution of waters, a turbulent atmosphere, and incursions of armies.
C. If comets, whose distance is eleven signs behind the Sun, appear in angles, the king of some kingdom, or one of the princes or chief men of a kingdom, will die. If in a succedent house, the affairs of the kingdom’s treasury will prosper, but the governor or ruler will be changed. If in a cadent house, there will be diseases and sudden deaths. And if comets be in motion from the west towards the east, a foreign foe will invade the country: if not in motion, the foe will be provincial, or domestic.
End of the Centiloquy
NO. IV
THE ZODIACAL PLANISPHERE
The Reader is desired to refer to the Plate at end of book containing diagrams of the Zodiacal Planisphere, which has been spoken of in the [Note in p. 99].
[Fig. 1] is the Planisphere adjusted for the northern latitude of 30° 22′ (where the longest day consists of fourteen equatorial hours), agreeably to the “Exemplification” given by Ptolemy in Chapter XV, Book 3. It represents that portion of the celestial sphere which is contained between the tropics: the central horizontal line is the equator; the curved line extending longitudinally from east to west is the ecliptic; the central perpendicular line is the meridian, or cusp of the 10th house; the other short lines, cutting the equator transversely, are the cusps of the other houses; that of the 1st house being the eastern horizon; that of the 7th, the western horizon. Hence, the distance from the 1st house to the meridian, or from the meridian to the 7th house, shows the semi-diurnal arc of any parallel of declination in the ecliptic; and the distance of the 7th house to the 4th, or from the 4th to the 1st, shows the semi-nocturnal arc. The distance from the cusp of one house to that of the next, taken on the same parallel, is also equal to two temporal hours; thus, for instance, in the latitude above quoted, the semi-diurnal arc of 0° ♊ is 6 h. 50 m., or 102° 39′ of the equator; consequently the diurnal temporal hour is equal to one equatorial hour and eight minutes, or to 17° 6′ of the equator.
In his first example, Ptolemy directs 0° ♉ to be placed on the ascendant, so that the beginning of ♑ may be on the mid-heaven; 0° ♊ must, therefore, fall on the point A, distant from the mid-heaven 147° 44′ of the equator, as measured by the line AB; because every point in the sphere always preserves one and the same parallel with the equator; and 0° ♊, in passing to the mid-heaven, must proceed along the line AB. In the present case, however, it is required to know how long 0° ♊ will be in coming to the ascendant, the given position of 0° ♉. Now 0° ♊ will be on the ascendant when it arrives at the point G; therefore the distance from A to C is the amount of the prorogation between 0° ♉ (when posited on the ascendant) and 0° ♊, and it is equal to 45° 5′ of the equator. In the second example, 0° ♉ is placed on the mid-heaven, which position must be at D, so that 0° ♊ must necessarily be at E; and the distance from E to B, equal to 57° 44′ of the equator, is the prorogation between 0° ♉ and 0° ♊, when 0⁴ ♉ is on the mid-heaven. In the third example, 0° ♉ is supposed to be on the 7th house, descending, at F, so that ♓ is on the mid-heaven, and 0° ♊ at the point G, in advance of the mid-heaven 32° 16′ of the equator, as shown by the distance BG. Now it is required to bring 0° ♊ to the 7th house (the place of 0° ♉), and it will be there on arriving at H, distant from B 102° 39′ of the equator; but as 0° ♊ is already at G, the distance from G to H, equal to 70° 23′ of the equator, is the amount of the prorogation between 0° ♉ and 0° ♊, when 0° ♉ is on the 7th house. The fourth example places 0° ♉ at I, three temporal hours past the meridian; 0° ♊ therefore falls on the point K, at the distance of 13 equatorial degrees before the meridian or mid-heaven, and will be three temporal hours past the meridian (the position of 0° ♉) on arriving at L, distant 51 equatorial degrees from the mid-heaven: the whole distance from K (the first position of 0° ♊) to L, its second position, equal to 64 degrees of the equator, is therefore the prorogation between 0° ♉ and 0° ♊, when 0° ♉ is past the meridian at the distance of three temporal hours. Ptolemy has also instanced two other positions for 0° ♉; viz. at two temporal hours past the meridian, and at two temporal hours before the occidental angle; or, in other words, on the cusp of the 9th house, and on that of the 8th. Now, if 0° ♉ be on the cusp of the 9th house, it must be at M, and 0° ♊ will be at N, distant 62 equatorial degrees from Q, which is also on the cusp of the 9th. If 0° ♉ be on the cusp of the 8th, it must be at O, and 0° ♊ will be at P, distant 66 equatorial degrees from R, which is also on the cusp of the 8th: these two several numbers of degrees will be the respective prorogations between 0° ♉ and 0° ♊, when 0° ♉ is placed on the 9th and 8th houses.
Ptolemy’s “Exemplification” has been followed thus minutely in order to show how perfectly Mr. Ranger’s invention is adapted to assist (if not to supersede) arithmetical calculation; for, after the Planisphere has once been accurately laid down, a line drawn parallel to the equator, from the significator to the promittor, or to the promittor’s pole of position, and measured by degrees of the equator, will accomplish the whole operation of ascertaining the amount of prorogation.
[Fig. 2] is the Equator extended, in plano, on a scale proportionate to the planispheres in Figs. 1 and 3: it is divided into 360 degrees, and into equal time, as measured by the 24 hours of the earth’s daily rotation on its axis, and by smaller portions of four minutes each, corresponding with degrees of the equator.
[Fig. 3] is the Planisphere set for the latitude of Southern Britain, 51° 30′ N., where the longest day is 16 h. 30 m., the semi-diurnal arc of 0° ♊ being consequently 7 h. 52 m., or 118° of the equator, and its diurnal temporal hour equal to one hour and nearly nineteen minutes of equatorial time, or to 19° 40′ of the equator. In applying Ptolemy’s examples, given in Chapter XV, Book 3, to this latitude, it will follow that, when 0° ♉ may be on the ascendant, 0° ♊ will be at A, and will subsequently arrive at the ascendant at C, after the passage of 29° 43′ of the equator. When 0° ♉ may be on the mid-heaven at D, 0° ♊ will be at E, and will arrive at B, on the mid-heaven, after the passage of 57° 44′ of the equator, as in [Fig. 1]. When 0° ♉ may be on the 7th house, at F, 0° ♊ will be at G, and will come to the 7th house, at H, after the passage of 85° 45′ of the equator. If 0° ♉ be three temporal hours past the meridian, at I, 0° ♊ would be at K, again 13 equatorial degrees before the meridian, as in [Fig. 1], and will be three temporal hours past the meridian, a position similar to that assumed for 0° ♉, on arriving at L, distant from the mid-heaven 59 equatorial degrees; thus making the whole distance, from K to L, 17 equatorial degrees. If 0° ♉ be on the 9th house, at M, 0° ♊ will be at N, distant from Q (also on the 9th house) about 67 equatorial degrees. If 0° ♉ be on the 8th house, at O, 0° ♊ will be at P, distant from R (also on the 8th house) about 76 equatorial degrees.
By taking the trouble to calculate the distances between the several positions given by Ptolemy, the Reader may satisfy himself of the sufficiency of this Planisphere for the purpose for which it was first projected; viz. for the more expeditious measurement of the arcs of direction. The [Tables of Ascensions], extracted from the Almagest, in p. 152, will show that the arcs, as measured in [Figs. 1] and [2] of the plate, exactly tally with the amounts of distance obtained by calculating arithmetically, according to the respective latitudes, as quoted in the Tables.
The slight view which has been here given of the Zodiacal Planisphere invented by Mr. Ranger, must not be considered as pretending to offer a complete idea of its powers: they are so manifold and various, that another volume would be required to detail them fully; and it has now been used only in order to give a better illustration of Ptolemy’s examples of the spaces of prorogation than mere words can do. To persons conversant with the mathematical part of astronomy, the facility with which a complete representation of zodiacal latitude, declination, the poles of position, crepusculine circles, and other phenomena, may be made by this Planisphere, will be sufficiently obvious from the accompanying Figures.
Finis
Fig. 1.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 3.
Footnotes:
[1] Sir Isaac Newton has the following remarks in regard to the origin of Astrology:—“After the study of Astronomy was set on foot for the use of navigation, and the Ægyptians, by the heliacal risings and settings of the stars, had determined the length of the solar year of 365 days, and by other observations had fixed the solstices, and formed the fixed stars into asterisms, all which was done in the reigns of Ammon, Sesac, Orus, and Memnon,” (about 1000 years before Christ), “it may be presumed that they continued to observe the motions of the planets, for they called them after the names of their gods; and Nechepsos, or Nicepsos, King of Sais,” (772 b.c.), “by the assistance of Petosiris, a priest of Ægypt, invented astrology, grounding it upon the aspects of the planets, and the qualities of the men and women to whom they were dedicated;† and in the beginning of the reign of Nabonassar, King of Babylon, about which time the Æthiopians, under Sabacon, invaded Ægypt” (751 b.c.), “those Ægyptians who fled from him to Babylon, carried thither the Ægyptian year of 365 days, and the study of astronomy and astrology, and founded the æra of Nabonassar, dating it from the first year of that king’s reign” (747 b.c.), “and beginning the year on the same day with the Ægyptians for the sake of their calculations. So Diodorus: ‘they say that the Chaldæan in Babylon, being colonies of the Ægyptians, became famous for astrology, having learned it from the priests of Ægypt.’”—Newton’s Chronology, pp. 251, 252.
Again, in p. 327: “The practice of observing the stars began in Ægypt in the days of Ammon, as above, and was propagated from thence, in the reign of his son Sesac, into Afric, Europe, and Asia, by conquest; and then Atlas formed the sphere of the Libyans” (956 b.c.), “and Chiron that of the Greeks (939 b.c.); and the Chaldæans also made a sphere of their own. But astrology was invented in Ægypt by Nichepsos, or Necepsos, one of the Kings of the Lower Ægypt, and Petosiris his priest, a little before the days of Sabacon, and propagated thence into Chaldæa, where Zoroaster, the legislator of the Magi, met with it: so Paulinus;
‘Quique magos docuit mysteria vana Necepsos.’”
The arcana of Astrology constituted a main feature in the doctrines of the Persian Magi; and it further appears, by Newton’s Chronology, p. 347, that Zoroaster (although the æra of his life has been erroneously assigned to various remoter periods) lived in the reign of Darius Hystaspis, about 520 b.c., and assisted Hystaspes, the father of Darius, in reforming the Magi, of whom the said Hystaspes was Master. Newton adds, p. 352, that “about the same time with Hystaspes and Zoroaster, lived also Ostanes, another eminent Magus: Pliny places him under Darius Hystaspis, and Suidas makes him the follower of Zoroaster: he came into Greece with Xerxes about 480 b.c., and seems to be the Otanes of Herodotus. In his book, called the Octateuchus, he taught the same doctrine of the Deity as Zoroaster.”
Having quoted thus far from Newton, it seems proper to subjoin the following extract from the “Ancient Universal History:”—“In the reign of Gushtasp” (the oriental name of Darius Hystaspis), “King of Persia, flourished a celebrated astrologer, whose name was Gjamasp, surnamed Al Hakim, or the wise. The most credible writers say that he was the brother of King Gushtasp, and his confidant and chief minister. He is said to have predicted the coming of the Messiah; and some treatises under his name are yet current in the East. Dr. Thomas Hyde, in speaking of this philosopher, cites a passage from a very ancient author, having before told us that this author asserted there had been among the Persians ten doctors of such consummate wisdom as the whole world could not boast the like. He then gives the author’s words: ‘Of these, the sixth was Gjamasp, an astrologer, who was counsellor to Hystaspis. He is the author of a book intitled Judicia Gjamaspis, in which is contained his judgment on the planetary conjunctions. And therein he gave notice that Jesus should appear; that Mohammed should be born; that the Magian religion should be abolished, etc.; nor did any astrologer ever come up to him.’ (E. lib. Mucj. apud Hyde.) Of this book there is an Arabic version, the title of which runs thus: The Book of the Philosopher Gjamasp, containing Judgments on the Grand Conjunctions of the Planets, and on the Events produced by them. This version was made by Lali; the title he gave it in Arabic was Al Keranai, and he published it a.d. 1280. In the preface of his version it is said that, after the times of Zoroaster, or Zerdusht, reigned Gushtasp, the son of Lohrasp,†† a very powerful prince; and that in his reign flourished in the city of Balch, on the borders of Chorassan, a most excellent philosopher, whose name was Gjamasp, author of this book; wherein is contained an account of all the great conjunctions of the planets which had happened before his time, and which were to happen in succeeding ages; and wherein the appearances of new religions and the rise of new monarchies were exactly set down. This author, throughout his whole piece, styles Zerdusht, or Zoroaster, our Prophet. (D’Herbelot, Bibl. Orient. Art. Gjamasp.) The notion of predicting the rise and progress of religions from the grand conjunctions of the planets, has been likewise propagated in our western parts: Cardan was a bold assertor of this doctrine. The modern Persians are still great votaries of astrology, and although they distinguish between it and astronomy, they have but one word to express astronomer and astrologer; viz. manegjim, which is exactly equivalent to the Greek word αςτρολογος. Of all the provinces of Persia, Chorassan is the most famous for producing great men in that art; and in Chorassan there is a little town called Genabed, and in that town a certain family which, for 6 or 700 years past, has produced the most famous astrologers in Persia; and the king’s astrologer is always either a native of Genabed, or one brought up there. Sir John Chardin affirms that the appointments in his time for these sages amounted to six millions of French livres per annum.—Albumazar of Balch scholar of Alkendi, a Jew, who was professor of judicial astrology at Bagdad, in the Caliphate of Almamoum††† became wonderfully famous. He wrote expressly from the Persian astrologers, and it may be from the works of Gjamasp, since he also reports a prediction of the coming of Christ in the following words: viz. ‘In the sphere of Persia, saith Aben Ezra, there ariseth upon the face of the sign Virgo a beautiful maiden, she holding two ears of corn in her hand, and a child in her arm: she feedeth him, and giveth him suck, &c. This maiden,’ saith Albumazar, ‘we call Adrenedefa, the pure Virgin. She bringeth up a child in a place which is called Abrie (the Hebrew land), and the child’s name is called Eisi (Jesus).’ This made Albertus Magnus believe that our Saviour, Christ, was born in Virgo; and therefore Cardinal Alliac, erecting our Lord’s nativity by his description, casteth this sign into the horoscope. But the meaning of Albumazar was, saith Friar Bacon, that the said virgin was born, the Sun being in that sign, and so it is noted in the calendar; and that she was to bring up her son in the Hebrew land. (Mr. John Gregory’s Notes on various Passages of Scripture.)”—Ancient Universal History, vol. 5, pp. 415 to 419.
† It is maintained by astrologers, that the planets, having been observed to produce certain effects, were consequently dedicated to the several personages whose names they respectively bear.
†† This caliph reigned in the earlier part of the 9th century, and caused Ptolemy’s Great Construction to be translated into Arabic, as hereafter mentioned.
††† This seems to be a mistake of the Arabian author, for Gushtasp was identical with Darius Hystaspis, and Lohrasp (otherwise Cyaxares) was father of Darius the Mede, who was overcome by Cyrus, 536 b.c.—See Newton.
[2] To this view of the case, the following remarks seem not inapplicable: they are taken from a periodical work of deserved reputation:—
“The study of astrology itself, as professing to discover, by celestial phenomena, future mutations in the elements and terrestrial bodies, ought, perhaps, not to be despised.† The theory of the tides, for example, is altogether an astrological doctrine, and, long before the days of Sir Isaac Newton, was as well understood as it is at this moment. The correspondence alleged by the ancient physicians to exist between the positions of the Moon and the stages of various diseases, is so far from being rejected by the modern faculty, that it has been openly maintained.”†† The writer then recounts sundry incidents, asserted by the astrologers to be dependent on the Moon, and he adds these words: “The fact of these allegations might be so easily ascertained, that it is surprising they should still be pronounced incredible, and denied rather than contradicted.”
† “Sir Christopher Heydon’s Defence of Astrology, p. 2, edit. 1603.”
†† “Dr. Mead on the Influence of the Sun and Moon upon Human Bodies. See also Edinb. Rev. vol. 12, p. 36—Balfour on Sol-Lunar Influence.” Blackwood’s Magazine for Dec., 1821, Part 2, No. 59.
[3] In the 51st No. of the Quarterly Review, Art. “Astrology and Alchymy,” the following observations are made:—
“Certainly, if man may ever found his glory on the achievements of his wisdom, he may reasonably exult in the discoveries of astronomy; but the knowledge which avails us has been created solely by the absurdities which it has extirpated. Delusion became the basis of truth. Horoscopes and nativities have taught us to place the planet in its sure and silent path; and the acquirements which, of all others, now testify the might of the human intellect, derived their origin from weakness and credulity” (p. 181). Again; “Astrology, like alchymy, derives no protection from sober reason; yet, with all its vanity and idleness, it was not a corrupting weakness. Tokens, predictions, prognostics, possess a psychological reality. All events are but the consummation of preceding causes, clearly felt, but not distinctly apprehended. When the strain is sounded, the most untutored listener can tell that it will end with the key-note, though he cannot explain why each successive bar must at last lead to the concluding chord. The omen embodies the presentiment, and receives its consistency from our hopes or fears.” (p. 208).
It may, perhaps, be difficult to assent to all of the propositions involved in these extracts; but there are among them some which are clearly unquestionable.
[4] This edition was printed in double columns, one containing Proclus’s Greek Paraphrase, the other the Latin translation of Leo Allatius; and William Lilly (no light authority in these matters) thus wrote of it in the year 1647: “Indeed Ptolemy hath been printed in folio, in quarto, in octavo, in sixteens: that lately printed at Leyden” (where cthe Elzevirs were established) “I conceive to be most exact; it was performed by Allatius.” To the said edition is prefixed an anonymous address to the reader, in Latin, and to the following effect:—
“I have reckoned it part of my duty to give you, benevolent reader, some short information as to the publication of this little work, which, having hitherto existed only in Greek,† is now, in its Latin dress, accessible to the curiosity of all persons. This Paraphrase of Proclus on the Tetrabiblos of Ptolemy was translated a few years ago by Leo Allatius, a Greek by birth, eminently skilled in the learning of his own nation, as well as in Latin literature, and already celebrated for other writings in both languages. He lives, I have understood, in Rome, in the family of Cardinal Biscia, and holds some office in the Vatican Library. He undertook his present work, however, for his own private gratification, and that of certain friends; but when writings compiled with this view have once quitted their author’s hands, it will often happen that they have also, at the same time, escaped his control. So this offspring of Allatius, having emerged from Rome, arrived at Venice, from whence it was forwarded to me by a certain great personage of illustrious rank, in order that I might cause it to be printed. The names of Ptolemy and Proclus, so celebrated among mathematicians and philosophers, besides the subject of the work itself, seemed to me a sufficient warrant for committing it to the press. Whereupon I delayed not to avail myself of the advantages I possessed in having access to our excellent and most accurate typographers, the Elzevirs, and I earnestly solicited them to publish it: they, in their love for the commonwealth of letters, took upon themselves the charge of printing it in the form you see. You will learn from it, inquisitive Reader, how much power the stars have over the atmosphere and all sublunary things: for the stars, and those brighter bodies of heaven, must not be imagined to be idle. The whole doctrine of the stars is not, however, here treated of, but only that distinct part of it which the Greeks call judicial and prognostic, and which, while confined within certain limits is as entertaining as it is useful, and is partly considered to be agreeable to nature. But should it pretend to subject to the skies such things as do not depend thereupon, and should it invite us to foresee by the stars such things as are above the weakness of our apprehension, it will assuredly deserve to be reprehended as a vain and empty art, which has been demonstrated in many learned books by the great Picus of Mirandola. The Chaldæans, Genethliacs, and Planetarians, have been always held in disrepute, because they professed to know not only more than they actually did know, but also more than is allowed to man to know. Even Ptolemy, while he employs himself in his present work upon the Doctrine of Nativities, is scarcely free from the charge of superstition and vanity: perhaps, in a Pagan, this may be forgiven; but it is hardly to be tolerated, that persons professing Christianity should be led away by such an empty study, in which there is no solid utility, and the whole pleasure of which is puerile. Finally, I warn you that some persons doubt whether this was really produced by Ptolemy††: nevertheless, it has certainly appeared to Porphyry and Proclus (who were doubtless great philosophers, although hostile to the Christian faith) to be worthy of receiving elucidation by their Commentaries upon it.††† Peruse it, however, friendly reader, with caution, having first shaken off the weakness of credulity, for the sinew of wisdom is not to believe rashly. Farewell.”
In addition to the remarks made in the foregoing address regarding Leo Allatius, it may be observed that he was appointed Keeper of the Vatican Library by Pope Alexander VII, with whom he was in high favour. It is said of him, that he had a pen with which he had written Greek for forty years, and that he shed tears on losing it. Another story of him states, that the Pope had often urged him to take holy orders, that he might be advanced in the church, and one day asked him why he had not done so: “Because,” said Allatius, “I would be free to marry.”—“Why, then, do you not marry?”—“Because I would be free to take orders.”—Chalmer’s Biographical Dictionary.
† This assertion is applicable only to Proclus’s Paraphrase. There were several prior translations of the original Tetrabiblos in Latin and Arabic; and it appears by an extract from the Bibliotheca Græca of Fabricius (which will be found in a subsequent page), that a Latin version, done from the Arabic, was printed at Venice as early as the year 1493.
†† The reader is again referred to the extract from Fabricius (inserted in a subsequent page), containing that learned person’s account of this book among the other works of Ptolemy.
††† Their Commentaries were printed at Basle, in 1559.
[5] This translation from the Perugio press has been serviceable in presenting certain various readings; but it does not seem to possess any other peculiar merit. It professes to be a translation from the original text of Ptolemy; and so likewise does the translation printed at Basle, as above quoted.
[6] It appears by the printed works of this author, that he was named Didacus Placidus de Titis. He was a native of Bologna, by profession a monk, and was styled Mathematician to the Archduke Leopold William of Austria. He wrote in the earlier part of the 17th century, and his work, now cited, is considered to contain the most successful application of Ptolemy’s astrological rules to practice. The original is extremely scarce; but a new English edition, by Cooper, may be had of the Publishers of this work.
[7] Printed at Basle, 1541.
[8] Chalmer’s Biographical Dictionary.
[9] In France, about the beginning of the 16th century, Oronce Finé, the Royal Reader, attempted, under the patronage of Francis I, to produce an astronomical clock, in which everything moved according to the principles of Ptolemy. It was kept, about fifty years ago, in the monastery of St. Geneviéve, at Paris. In Lilly’s Catalogue of Astrological Authors, Orontius Finæus is mentioned as the writer of a work on the twelve houses of heaven, printed in Paris, 1553.
[10] Spectacle de la Nature.
[11] The objection which has been urged against astrology, that the signs are continually moving from their positions, cannot invalidate this conclusion. That objection has, in fact, no real existence; for Ptolemy seems to have been aware of this motion of the signs, and has fully provided for it in the 25th Chapter of the 1st Book of the Tetrabiblos. From that chapter it is clear that the respective influences he ascribes to the twelve signs (or divisions of the zodiac) were considered by him as appurtenant to the places they occupied, and not to the stars of which they were composed. He has expressly and repeatedly declared that the point of the vernal equinox is ever the beginning of the zodiac, and that the 30 degrees following it ever retain the same virtue as that which he has in this work attributed to Aries, although the stars forming Aries may have quitted those degrees: the next 30 degrees are still be accounted as Taurus, and so of the rest. There is abundant proof throughout the Tetrabiblos, that Ptolemy considered the virtues of the constellations of the zodiac distinctly from those of the spaces they occupied.
[12] The French say 813, but 827 is the date given by English chronologists.
[13] This scientific man was a Mathurine Friar, and a professor in the University of Paris: he died in 1256. It is pointed out in the Edinburgh Review, No. 68, that he was a native of Yorkshire, and his real name John Holywood, euphonized, in Paris, into Sacrobosco.
[14] Chalmers.—The Tetrabiblos was among these works.
[15] To such readers as may be curious to know in what manner this book was promulgated in Europe, after the revival of letters, the following extract from the Bibliotheca Græca of Fabricius will furnish information:—
“Lib. IV. Cap. XIV. §4. Τετραβιβλος, Συνταξις Μαθηματικη Quadripartitum, sive quatuor libri de apotelesmatibus et judiciis astrorum, ad Syrum (h). Græce primum editi a Joachimo Camerario, cum versione suâ duorum priorum librorum, et præcipuorum e reliquis locorum. Norimb. 1535, 4to.—Hinc cum versione Phil. Melancthonis, qui in præfat, ad Erasmum Ebnerum Senatorem Norimbergensem testatur se editionem Camerarii multis mendis purgasse, tum numeros in locis apheticis tam Græci quam Latini textus emendasse. Basil, 1553; 8vo.—Latine pridem verterat Ægidius Tebaldinus, sive latino-barbaré ex Hispanica versione, Alfonsi Castellæ Regis jussu, ex Arabico (i) confectâ. Vertit et Antonius Gogava, Lovan. 1548, 4to; Patavii, 1658, 12mo; Pragæ, 1610, 12mo. Commentario illustravit Hieron. Cardanus prioribus duobus libris Camerarii, posterioribus Gogavæ versione servatâ, Basil, 1554, fol.; 1579, fol.; Lugd. 1555, 8vo, et in Cardani opp.—Georgii Vallæ commentarius, anno 1502 editus, nihil aliud est, quam Latina versio scholiorum Græcorum, sive exegeseos jejunæ Demophili in tetrabiblon, quæ cum Porphyrii sive Antiochi isagoge, Græce et Latine, addita Hieron Wolfii versione, lucem vidit Basil. 1559, his scholiis Dorotheus allegatur, p. 48, 110, et 139; Cleopatra, p. 88; Porphyrius Philosophus, p. 169. Meminit et auctor Petosiridis ac Necepso, p. 112:—λεγει δε παλαιον τον Νεχεψω (ita leg, pro χεψω ut p. 112) και Πετοσιριν, ουτοι χαρ πρωτοι το δι αςρολογιας εχηπλωσαν προγνωςικον† Paraphrasin tetrabibli a Proclo concinnatam Græce edidit Melancthon, Basil. 1554, 8vo. Græce et Latine cum versione suâ Leo Allatius, Lugd. Batav. 1654,†† 8vo. Locum Ptolemæi e codice Græco MS. in collegio Corporis Christi Oxon, feliciter restituit Seldenus, p. 35 ad Marmora Arundeliana. Haly Heben Rodoan Arabis commentarium laudat Cardanus, cum Demophilo Latine editum.”
“(h) Schol. Græc.—Προσφωνει τω Συρω ο Πτολεμαιος το βιβλιον, προς ον και τας αλλας αντου πασας πραγματειας προσφωνησεν. Λεγουσι δε τινες ως πεπλαςαι αυτο το του Συρω ονομα. Αλλοι δε οτι ον πεπλαςαι, αλλ’ ιατρος ην ουτος αχθεις και δια τουτων των μαθηματων.”
“(i) Selden. Uxor Hebr. p. 342. Cæterum de Alphonsi Regis curâ in promovenda Arabica Quadripartiti versione, vide, si placet, Nic: Antonium in Bibl. veteri Hispana, t. 2, p. 55, vel Acta Erud. A. 1697, p. 302. Latino versio ex Arabico facta lucem vidit Venet, 1493, fol. Viderit porro Gassendus qui in Philosophia Epicuri, ubi contra Astrologos disputat. t. 2, p. 501, contendit tetrabiblon indignum esse Ptolemæi genio et subdititum. Equidem Jo. Pico judice, l. 1, contra Astrologos, p. 285, Ptolemæus malorum sive Apotelesmaticorum est optimus.”
† “Nechepsos and Petosiris are anciently spoken of, for they first explained prognostication by Astrology.”
†† This was perhaps a reprint of the edition of 1635, from which the present translation has been made; unless there may have been an error of the press in stating 1654 instead of 1635, which seems probable, as the edition of 1635 is unnoticed by Fabricius.
[16] It will be seen by the preceding note, that Proclus’s Paraphrase of the Tetrabiblos should properly be considered as superior to the other readings of that book; since it appears, on the authority of Fabricius, that Melancthon, after having been at the pains of correcting and republishing, in 1553 (with his own emendations), the edition of Camerarius, containing the reputed original text, still deemed it advisible, in the following year, to edit Proclus’s Paraphrase. This Paraphrase must, therefore, necessarily have had claims to his attention not found in the text he had previously edited.†
† “Ptolemy addresses the book to Syrus, to whom he has also addressed all his other treatises. Some say that this name of Syrus was feigned; others, that it was not feigned, but that he was a physician, and educated in these sciences.”
[17] Chalmer’s Biographical Dictionary.
[18] It will, of course, be understood that this Commentary is distinct from his Paraphrase, now translated.
[19] The Almagest, or Magna Constructio.
[20] The following extract from an old geographical work, framed on the rules of Ptolemy, explains the system on which this action of the æther is made to depend:—
“Chap. 2. The world is divided into two parts, the elemental region and the æthereal. The elemental region is constantly subject to alteration, and comprises the four elements; earth, water, air and fire. The æthereal region, which philosophers call the fifth essence, encompasses, by its concavity, the elemental; its substance remains always unvaried, and consists of ten spheres; of which the greater one always spherically environs the next smaller, and so on in consecutive order. First, therefore, around the sphere of fire, God, the creator of the world, placed the sphere of the Moon, then that of Mercury, then that of Venus, then that of the Sun, and afterwards those of Mars, of Jupiter, and of Saturn. Each of these spheres, however, contains but one star: and these stars, in passing through the zodiac, always struggle against the primum mobile, or the motion of the tenth sphere; they are also entirely luminous. In the next place follows the firmament, which is the eighth or starry sphere, and which trembles or vibrates (trepidat) in two small circles at the beginning of Aries and Libra (as placed in the ninth sphere); this motion is called by astronomers the motion of the access and recess of the fixed stars.” (Probably in order to account for the procession of the equinoxes.) “This is surrounded by the ninth sphere, called the chrystalline or watery heaven, because no star is discovered in it. Lastly, the primum mobile, styled also the tenth sphere, encompasses all the before-mentioned æthereal spheres, and is continually turned upon the poles of the world, by one revolution in twenty-four hours, from the east through the meridian to the west, again coming round to the east. At the same time, it rolls all the inferior spheres round with it, by its own force; and there is no star in it. Against this primum mobile, the motion of the other spheres, running from the west through the meridian to the east, contends. Whatever is beyond this, is fixed and immovable, and the professors of our orthodox faith affirm it to be the empyrean heaven which God inhabits with the elect.”—Cosmographia of Peter Apianus (named Benewitz), dedicated to the Archbishop of Salzburg, edited by Gemma Frisius, and printed at Antwerp 1574.
[21] It will be recollected that the Ptolemaic astronomy attributes motion and a regular course to those stars which we now call fixed, but which the Greeks merely termed απλανεις, undeviating.
[22] There seems reason to suppose that this was a favourite speculation among the ancients. In Scipio’s Dream, as related by Cicero, the phantom of his illustrious grandfather is made to speak of this entire return of all the celestial bodies to some original position which they once held, as being the completion of the revolution of one great universal year: and the phantom adds, “but I must acquaint you that not one-twentieth part of that great year has been yet accomplished.”
This quotation is from memory, and perhaps may not be verbally correct.
[23] In this passage the author seems to have anticipated, and exposed the absurdity of an argument now considered very forcible against astrology: viz. that “if the art were true, then any two individuals born under the same meridian, in the same latitude, and at the same moment of time, must have one and the same destiny; although one were born a prince, and the other a mendicant.” Such a monstrous conclusion is nowhere authorized by any astrological writer; it is, on the contrary, always maintained by all of them, that the worldly differences and distinctions, alluded to in the text, inevitably prevent this exact resemblance of destiny; and all that they presume to assert is, that, in their respective degrees, any two individuals, so born, will have a partial similarity in the leading features of their fate. Whether their assertion is uniformly borne out, I will not take upon me to determine, but it would be unfair not to subjoin the following fact:—
In the newspapers of the month of February, 1820, the death of a Mr. Samuel Hemmings is noticed: it was stated that he had been an ironmonger, and prosperous in trade; that he was born on the 4th of June, 1738, at nearly the same moment as his late Majesty, and in the same parish of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields; that he went into business for himself in October, 1760; that he married on the 8th September, 1761; and finally, after other events of his life had resembled those which happened to the late King, that he died on Saturday, the 29th January, 1820.
These coincidences are, at least, highly remarkable.
[24] The Greek word for this, γοναι, though found in the Elzevir edition from which this translation is made, does not appear in other copies; the Basle edition of 1553 says merely, η τε τιμη και το αξιωμα, “honour and rank,” which is the sense also given in the Latin translation of Perugio, 1646, without any mention of “offspring.”
[25] In allusion to the sympathetic powers anciently attributed to certain stones.
[26] Whalley, in translating this chapter, makes the following remark on this mention of the magnet: “However much later it was that the loadstone became known in Europe, what is mentioned of it in this chapter makes it evident that it was known in Ægypt, where Ptolemy lived, in his time.”—That worthy translator forgot (if indeed he ever knew) that the loadstone’s property of attracting iron was known to Thales, and commented on by Plato and Aristotle, all of whom lived some centuries, more or less, before Ptolemy. It is its polarity that was not known until the 11th or 12th century; and the French say that the earliest notice of that polarity is found in a poem of Guyot of Provence, who was at the Emperor Frederick’s Court at Mentz in 1181.—See the French Encyclopædia, &c.
[27] Respecting the effect here asserted to be produced on the magnet by garlick, I have found the following mention in a book called “The Gardener’s Labyrinth,” printed at London in 1586. “Here also I thought not to ouerpasse the maruellous discord of the adamant-stone and garlike, which the Greeks name to be an Antipatheia or naturall contrarietie betweene them; for such is the hatred or contrarietie between these two bodies (lacking both hearing and feeling), that the adamant rather putteth away, than draweth to it, iron, if the same afore be rubbed with garlike; as Plutarchus hath noted, and, after him, Claudius Ptolemæus. Which matter, examined by divers learned, and founde the contrarie, caused them to judge, that those skilful men (especially Ptolemie) ment the same to be done with the Egyptian Garlike; which Dioscorides wrote to be small garlike, and the same sweete in taste, possessing a bewtifull head, tending unto a purple colour. There be which attribute the same to Ophioscoridon, which Antonius Microphonius Biturix, a singular learned man, and wel practised in sundry skilles, uttered this approoued secrete to a friend whom he loued.”
In the same book, the “Ophioscoridon” is thus spoken of: “There is another wild garlike which the Greeks name Ophioscoridon; in English Ramsies; growing of the owne accord in the fallow fieldes.”
Cornelius Agrippa (according to the English translation) has stated that the presence of the diamond also neutralizes the attractive power of the magnet. But as that great magician was somewhat inclined to quibbling, it is not impossible that by the word he uses for “diamond” (viz. adamas) he may mean the adamant or loadstone; which would reduce his assertion merely to this, that one magnet will counteract another.
[28] This seems to explain the origin of the old alliance between medicine and astrology, so universally preserved until almost within the last century.
[29] It will be recollected that the Ptolemaic hypothesis considers the Sun as a planetary orb, in consequence of his apparent progress through the zodiac.
[30] “Astronomers call the planets matutine, when, being oriental from the Sun, they are above the earth when he rises; and vespertine, when they set after him.” Moxon’s Mathematical Dictionary.
[31] Whalley here appends the following note: “To this chapter may be properly added, that a planet is said to be diurnal, when, in a diurnal nativity, above the earth; and, in a nocturnal nativity, under the earth: but nocturnal, when, in a nocturnal nativity, above the earth; or, in a diurnal nativity, under the earth.”
[32] Although all the positions mentioned in this paragraph are not applicable to Venus and Mercury, which can never rise at night, that is to say, at sunset, and although the author in the beginning of the chapter speaks only of the Moon and the three superior planets, there yet seems no reason why the orbits of Venus and Mercury should not be similarly divided by their inferior and superior conjunctions, and their greatest elongations.
The following is from Whalley: “The first station, in this chapter mentioned, is when a planet begins to be retrograde; and the second station when, from retrogradation, a planet becomes direct. They” (the planets) “begin to rise at night when in opposition to the Sun.”
[33] The little Torch; now known by the name of Aldebaran.
[34] Castor.
[35] Pollux.
[36] Cor Leonis.
[37] Called by the ancients χηλαι, Chelæ, or the claws of Scorpio; which sign they made to consist of 60 degrees, omitting Libra. Thus Virgil in the first Georgic, line 33, &c.
Quo locus Erigonen inter, Chelasque sequentes
Panditur: ipse tibi jam brachia contrahit ardens
Scorpius, et cœli justâ plus parte reliquit.
Ovid, likewise, takes the following notice of Scorpio:—
Porrigit in spatium signorum membra duorum.
Met. 2, l. 198.
[38] Adams’s Treatise on the Globes calls this star “Kalb al Akrab, or the Scorpion’s heart,” and adds, that “the word Antares (if it is not a corruption) has no signification.” But it should be observed that Ptolemy states that this star partakes of the nature of Mars: it seems therefore not improbable that Antares may be a regular Greek word, compounded of αντι pro and αρης Mars, and signifying Mars’s deputy, or lieutenant, or one acting for Mars.
[39] Salmon, in his “Horæ Mathematicæ, or Soul of Astrology” (printed by Dawks, 1679) divides each sign of the zodiac into six faces of five degrees each, “because that in every sign there are various stars of differing natures”; and he gives a particular description to each face, depending on its ascension or culmination. This seems an attempt to adapt Ptolemy’s signification of the several stars, composing the different signs, to some general rule or mode of judgment: but it does not merit the implicit assent of astrologers. It is understood that Salmon was not the inventor of this division of the signs into faces, but that it came originally from the Arabian schools.
[40] Canis Minor.
[41] “Of the fixed stars in general,” Whalley says, “Those of the greatest magnitude are the most efficacious; and those in, or near, the ecliptic, more powerful than those more remote from it. Those with north latitude and declination affect us most. Those in the zenith, influence more than others, more remote. Likewise such as are in partial conjunction with, or in the antiscions of any planets, or which rise and set, or culminate with any planet, or are beheld by any planet, have an increase of power: but of themselves the fixed stars emit no rays.”
[42] This sentence shows the futility of the objection raised against astrology (and mentioned in the Preface to this translation) that the signs have changed and are changing places. It is clear from this sentence that Ptolemy ascribes to the 30 degrees after the vernal equinox, that influence which he has herein mentioned to belong to Aries; to the next 30 degrees, the influence herein said to belong to Taurus; and so of the rest of the zodiac. We should rather say that the stars have changed places, than that the parts of heaven, in which they were once situated, have done so. Ptolemy himself seems to have foreseen this groundless objection of the moderns, and has written, in the 25th chapter of this book, what ought completely to have prevented it. It has certainly been one of the misfortunes of astrology to be attacked by people entirely ignorant of its principles.
[43] In other words, the Sun then begins to diminish his declination, which, at the first points of the said signs, is at its greatest amount.
[44] Whalley, in his note upon this chapter, seems to have been surprised that no mention is made here by Ptolemy of the conjunction; but he overlooked the fact that the chapter treats only of parts of the zodiac configurated with each other; and that it was not possible for Ptolemy to conceive how any part could be configurated with itself. It is, therefore, by no means wonderful that the conjunction is not inserted here along with the rest of the aspects; although it is frequently adverted to in subsequent chapters, and its efficacy particularly described.
[45] From the tenor of this chapter it was formerly doubted whether the author intended to admit in his theory only zodiacal aspects, and to reject those which are called mundane; but Placidus has referred to the 4th Chapter of the 8th Book of the Almagest (which will be found in the Appendix to this translation) to prove that Ptolemy distinctly taught two kinds of aspect; one in the zodiac and one in the world. Whalley quotes the opinion of Placidus, which he says is farther confirmed by the 12th Chapter of the 3rd Book of this very treatise, where it is stated that the ascendant and the eleventh house are in sextile to each other; the ascendant and the mid-heaven in quartile; the ascendant and the ninth house in trine; and the ascendant and the occidental angle in opposition; all which certainly seems to be applicable to mundane aspects in particular.
[46] Whalley has a very lengthy note upon this and the preceding chapter, to show that Ptolemy here speaks of zodiacal parallels, or parallels of declination, and to point out the necessity of observing a planet’s latitude, in order to ascertain its true parallels. It is, however, to be recollected, that the parallels now alluded to are distinct from the mundane parallels, which are equal distances from the horizon or meridian, and are considered by Ptolemy in the 14th and 15th Chapters of the 3rd Book of this work; although not under the express name of mundane parallels.
[47] It has never been very clearly shown how the followers of Ptolemy have reconciled the new aspects (called the semiquadrate, quintile, sesquiquadrate, biquintile, &c.) with the veto pronounced in this chapter. Kepler is said to have invented them, and they have been universally adopted; even Placidus, who has applied Ptolemy’s doctrine to practice better than any other writer, has availed himself of them,† and, if the nativities published by him are to be credited, he has fully established their importance.
Salmon, in his “Horæ Mathematicæ,” before-mentioned, gives a long dissertation (from p. 403 to p. 414) on the old Ptolemaic aspects, illustrative of their foundation in nature and in mathematics; and, although his conclusions are not quite satisfactorily drawn, some of his arguments would seem appropriate, if he had but handled them more fully and expertly; particularly where he says that the aspects are derived “from the aliquot parts of a circle, wherein observe that, although the zodiac may have many more aliquot parts than these four (the sextile, quartile, trine, and opposition), yet those other aliquot parts of the circle, or 360 degrees, will not make an aliquot division of the signs also, which in this design was sought to answer, as well in the number 12, as in the number 360.” The passage in which he endeavours to show that they are authorized by their projection, also deserves attention.
All Salmon’s arguments, however, in support of the old Ptolemaic aspects, militate against the new Keplerian ones; and so does the following extract from the “Astrological Discourse” of Sir Christopher Heydon: “For thus, amongst all ordinate planes that may be inscribed, there are two whose sides, joined together, have pre-eminence to take up a semicircle, but only the hexagon, quadrate, and equilateral triangle, answering to the sextile, quartile, and trine irradiated. The subtense, therefore, of a sextile aspect consisteth of two signs, which, joined to the subtense of a trine, composed of four, being regular and equilateral, take up six signs, which is a complete semicircle. In like manner, the sides of a quadrate inscribed, subtending three signs, twice reckoned, do occupy likewise the mediety of a circle. And what those figures are before said to perform” (that is, to take up a semicircle) “either doubled or joined together, may also be truly ascribed unto the opposite aspect by itself; for that the diametral line, which passeth from the place of conjunction to the opposite point, divideth a circle into two equal parts: the like whereof cannot be found in any other inscripts; for example, the side of a regular pentagon” (the quintile) “subtendeth 72 degrees, of an octagon” (the semiquadrate) “but 45; the remainders of which arcs, viz. 108 and 135 degrees, are not subtended by the sides of any ordinate figure.”
† Except the semiquadrate, which he has not at all noticed.
[48] Saturn being also malefic in his nature.
[49] The planets, having two houses, are said to be more powerful in one by day and in the other by night: thus,
| Saturn’s | day house is | Aquarius, | his night house | Capricorn |
| Jupiter’s | Sagittarius | Pisces | ||
| Mars’s | Aries | Scorpio | ||
| Venus’s | Taurus | Libra | ||
| Mercury’s | Gemini | Virgo |
The above is from Whalley; but the same disposition is to be found in all modern astrological writers.
[50] The “lunar condition” here spoken of refers to the position of Aries (Mars’s house) in the lunar semicircle.
[51] Capricorn being in the solar semicircle.
[52] The reason for making Saturn diurnal lord of this triplicity may be found in Chap. vii.
[53] This familiarity seems to arise from the sextile aspect between Aquarius, the diurnal house of Saturn, and Sagittarius, the diurnal house of Jupiter.
[54] In reference to the terms of the planets, Placidus has these words (according to Cooper’s translation): “The dignity of the planets in the signs and their parts, which are called the bounds and terminations” (quasi, terms), “have a real and natural foundation; to wit, the powerful aspect or proportional influxes to the movable points in which the stars begin to produce the primary qualities. So that, according to those things we have explained in the philosophy of the heavens, these are found to agree so well with the Ægyptian boundaries” (terms), “that they are highly deserving of admiration.”
[55] This total is the 360 degrees of the zodiac, requiring to be divided according to correspondent portions of the equator; by which all time is reckoned.
[56] The degrees here mentioned are degrees of the equator.
[57] [See, in the Appendix, an extract from these tables]; the whole of which are to be found in the Almagest.
[58] The cause of this disposition is that Cancer, the house of the Moon, partakes of moisture, and counteracts Mars’s dryness; while Leo, the Sun’s house, is hot, and counteracts Saturn’s cold.—[Vide Chap. iv], and conclusion of [Chap. vii] of this book.
It may further be observed, that Jupiter’s right, by triplicity, to the first degrees in Leo, is of course surrendered to Saturn, on the principle that the malefics have greater potency in the houses of the luminaries.
[59] Vide [Chapters xii] and [xiv of this Book].
[60] [Vide Chapter xx]. It of course follows that Saturn is in his proper face when he is five signs, or in quintile, after the Sun or before the Moon; that Jupiter is so when in trine; Mars when in quartile; Venus when in sextile; and Mercury when only one sign (or in modern phrase, in semi-sextile), after the Sun or before the Moon.
[61] This has been understood to mean, when the planets or luminaries are within each other’s orbs; Saturn’s orb being 10 degrees, Jupiter’s 12, Mars’s 7 degrees 30 minutes, the Sun’s 17 degrees, Venus’s 8, Mercury’s 7 degrees 30 minutes, and the Moon’s 12 degrees 30 minutes.
[62] Astrologers generally agree, that the inferior planets always apply to the superior, but the superior never to the inferior, except when the inferior be retrograde. In the present instance it seems most probable that the author means the planet which is more occidental, by “the planet which precedes.” He often uses “precedent” as equivalent to “occidental” in regard to the daily revolution of the heavens: and thus a planet in the first degree of Aries would precede, and be more occidental than one in the sixth degree of Aries, to which latter it would, by the regular planetary motion, be applying.
[63] On this, Whalley says that “the less the difference of latitude of the planets in conjunction, the more powerful will be the influence: for if two planets in conjunction have each considerable latitude of different denomination, the influence of such conjunction will be much lessened.”
[64] Τουτ εσι επι το κεντρον της γης. The precise meaning of the word κεντρον is “centre,” rather than “angle”; but Ptolemy uses it throughout this work, in speaking of the four angles of heaven, and I conceive he uses it here to signify an angle at, or on, the earth. The following definition of an aspect, by Kepler, strengthens my opinion: “An aspect is an angle formed on the earth, by the luminous rays of two planets; efficacious in stimulating sublunary nature.”
[65] Placidus (Cooper’s translation) says that “the three superiors are supposed to be stronger, if they are found to be matutine, or eastern, from the Sun; the three inferiors, vespertine, or western; for then they have a greater degree of light, in which consists their virtual influence, and then they are called oriental; but occidental if otherwise. Every one knows how largely, yet to no purpose, authors have treated of the orientality of the planets.”
Moxon’s Mathematical Dictionary has the following words on the same subject: “Now the three superior planets are strongest, being oriental and matutine; but the three inferior when they are occidental and vespertine. The reason is, because the first in the first case, but the last in the second, do then descend to the lowest part of their orbit, are increased in light, and approaching nearer the earth; and so on the contrary, the inferiors matutine, the superiors vespertine are weakened.”
[66] In a note on the 6th Chapter of this Book, Whalley says that, “according to Ptolemy, such as are between the ascendant and mid-heaven obtain the first place of strength, and are said to be in their oriental orientality: but, between the western horizon and the lower heaven, in their occidental orientality, which is the second place of strength: between the lower heaven and the ascendant, in their oriental occidentality, the first degree of weakness; and between the mid-heaven and western horizon, in their occidental occidentality, the weakest place of all.” This is all very pretty jargon, but certainly not “according to Ptolemy,” who distinctly says, on the contrary, that if a planet “is on the actual horizon, or succedent to the horizon, it is also powerful, and particularly if in the eastern quarter.” The last member of this sentence, as well as the conclusion of this 27th Chapter, shows that Ptolemy did not consider a situation between the mid-heaven and western horizon to be “the weakest place of all.”
[67] [Vide Chap. iii, Book I, pp. 13-14].
[68] “Under the Bears,” in the Greek.
[69] Or, perhaps, Bastarnia, a part of the ancient European Sarmatia.
[70] This should probably be understood to mean in a mundane point of view, agreeably to Chaps. VI and XV, Book I. For when Aries is on the ascendant, it is, of course, oriental and masculine; and Sagittarius must consequently then be in the eighth house, occidental, and therefore feminine.
[71] The customs of nations have, in some degree, altered since Ptolemy made this severe charge against us and our brethren in the north and west of Europe. The following passage also occurs in this part of the original text:—Προς δε τας συνουσιας των αρσενικων ανακινουμενοι και ζηλουντες, και μητε αισχρον μητε αναλδρον τουτο νομιζοντες. δια τουτο ουδε εκλυονται, οτι ουδε ως πασχοντες διακεινται επι τοντω, αλλα φυλαττουσι τας ψυχας ανδρειους.
[72] The Greek is as follows: και τα μορια αυτων τα γεννητικα ανατιθεασι τοις θεοις· διοτι ο σχηματισμος των ειρημενων αςερων φυσει σπερματικος εσιν· Follies, similar in their kind to these, are still practised by the Faquirs of Hindostan, and by other religious sects in Asia.
[73] Φανερως ποιουμενοι τας προς τας γυναικας συνουσιας·
[74] The author gives a singular reason for this incest: μισουσι δε τας (συνουσιας) προς τους αρσενας. δια τουτο και οι πλειςοι αυτων εκ των μητερων τεκνοποιουσι·
[75] The epithet is remarkable, not only as being, in the opinion of a Gentile, merited by the Jews, among other nations, but also at a period scarcely exceeding a century after their most heinous crime had been committed, expressly under the cloak of religion. It seems, however, that the Jews were charged with atheism by other writers also, and on account of their neglect of the false gods of the heathens; viz. “falsorium deorum neglectus: quam candem causam etiam Judæis maledicendi Tacitus habuit, et Plinius Major, cui Judæi dicuntur gens contumeliâ numinum insignis.” See Clark’s Notes on Grotius de Verit. Relig. Christ. Lib. 2, §2.
[76] Other editions say “Saturn.”
[77] It is usually understood that the male deity, coupled by the Phrygians with Cybele, “the mother of the Gods,” was called by them Atys; and that Adonis was the name used by the Phœnicians in addressing the associate of Venus. It has been said that these divinities were identical with the Isis and Osiris of the Ægyptians.
[78] The name of Africa was, in Ptolemy’s time, limited to those parts of the coast on the Mediterranean which contained the ancient Utica, and in which Tunis now stands. Josephus says the name is derived from Afer (one of the posterity of Abraham by Cethurah), who is stated to have led an army into Libya, and to have established himself in the country. This Afer is, of course, the same with Epher, mentioned in the fourth verse of the 25th chapter of Genesis, as a son of Midian, one of the sons of Abraham by his concubine Keturah.
[79] It does not appear why this practice should have been remarked as a national peculiarity, unless in distinction from the custom of burning the dead among the Greeks and Romans. Interment is recorded as having been usual among the Jews, and it is known to have been common among many ancient barbarous nations.
A conjecture may perhaps be allowed, that the author, when he wrote this passage, had in his mind the magnificent subterranean palaces, constructed for the dead, in parts of the region in question; some of which have been recently made known to the modern world by the sagacity and enterprise of the celebrated Belzoni.
[80] Τινες δε και καταφρονουσι των γεννητικων μελων.—The “contempt” here expressed by καταφρονουσι has been taken by all translators (except Whalley) to signify “mutilation.”
[81] History warrants the high enconium here given to the natives of these countries. Ægypt was the acknowledged mother of the arts and sciences, and at one time the great depot of all the learning of the world: her school of astronomy (a science which our author may be supposed to have placed in the first rank), founded at Alexandria by Ptol. Philadelphus, maintained its superior reputation for a thousand years. Cyrenaica gave birth to many illustrious philosophers, and, among them, to Eratosthenes, who is said to have invented the armillary sphere. This great man measured the obliquity of the ecliptic, and, though he erroneously reckoned it at only 20½ degrees, it should be recollected that he lived 200 years before the Christian æra. He also measured a degree of the meridian, and determined the extent of the earth, by means similar to those adopted by the moderns.
[82] Whalley remarks on this passage, that the gradual progress of the fixed stars “from one sign to another, is in an especial manner to be regarded in considering the mutations, manners, customs, laws, government, and fortune of a kingdom.”
[83] As shown in the [Table at page 51].
[84] It does not appear that the text here warrants the conclusion which Whalley has drawn from it, viz. “that wherever eclipses are not visible, they have no influence, and therefore subterranean eclipses cannot have any.” Ptolemy declares, that all countries in familiarity with the ecliptical place will be comprehended in the event; and, with regard to the visibility or invisibility of the eclipse, he says merely that its effects will be principally felt in such of the said countries as might have obtained a view of the eclipse.
[85] Temporal or solar hours are duodecimal parts of the Sun’s diurnal or nocturnal arc, and are numbered by day from sunrise to sunset; by night, from sunset to sunrise.
[86] Equatorial hours are the twenty-four hours of the earth’s revolution on its axis. Each of them is equal in duration to the passage of 15 degrees of the Equator; and they are numbered from noon to noon. A particular explanation of the astronomical use, both of temporal and equatorial hours, is to be found in the 9th Chapter of the second Book of the Almagest; an extract from which is given in the [Appendix].
[87] The three periods of four months each, stated in this paragraph, are applicable to solar eclipses only; for lunar eclipses, these periods may be reckoned at ten days each; that number of days bearing the same proportion to a month, as four months to a year. On this point, Whalley, with his usual inaccuracy, has asserted, that “in eclipses of the Moon, two days, or thereabouts, are equal to the four months” here reckoned in eclipses of the Sun. He adds, however, what perhaps may be true, that “lunar eclipses are by no means so powerful as those of the Sun, although more so than any other lunation.”
[88] That is to say, from any combinations of the Sun and Moon which may take place after the date of the eclipse, but before the close of its effect.
[89] The edition of Allatius does not contain the words here marked by inverted commas; but they are found in other editions of the text, and seem necessary to complete the sense of the passage.
[90] “When planets, in election for Lords of the eclipse, are found of equal strength and dignity, those which are direct are to be preferred before those which are retrograde; and the oriental before the occidental.”—Whalley’s “Annotations.”
[91] That is to say, in the Almagest, Book VIII, Chap. IV; which chapter is given, entire, in the [Appendix].
[92] “In electing fixed stars, Cardan directs to observe the angle which the eclipse follows, and that which it precedes: as, if the eclipse be between the seventh house” (or occidental angle) “and the mid-heaven, the stars which are in the seventh shall be preferred; and next, those in the mid-heaven; but, if between the mid-heaven and the ascendant, those in the mid-heaven shall have the preference; and next, those in the ascendant.”—Whalley’s “Annotations.”
[93] It is perhaps unnecessary to remark, that, in speaking of ruling places, as liable to be situated in Aquila, Delphinus or Argo, Ptolemy alludes only to the places of the fixed stars in dominion: since the ecliptical place and the planets must be confined to the zodiacal signs.
[94] According to Whalley, Cardan, in reference to the nine modes of configuration, applicable to the fixed stars, says, “When a fixed star is with any planet, or in any angle, consider whether it be by any of these ways; if not, it is most weak; if it be, consider whether it be with the Sun, and not to be seen; then it is very weak. Or if it is to be seen, and is with the Sun occidental, it is indifferent. Or if it be seen, and is not with the Sun, it is stronger; or if it be seen, and is oriental, then it is strongest.”
[95] That is to say (technically speaking), by reception, or by being posited in a sign in which another planet has a certain dignity or prerogative.
[96] In conformity to the rule laid down in Chap. VI of this Book, those individuals whose nativities may thus resemble the position of the heavens at the time of an eclipse, and who are here stated to be chiefly liable to the effects of the eclipse, will be more affected by it, if it should be visible to them.
To the precepts contained in this chapter, Placidus makes the following allusion in his remarks on the nativity of Cardinal Pancirole. “Any significator whatever, together with the other stars, whilst they are moved by a converse universal motion, change the aspect alternately, and consequently the mundane rays, as it likewise happens when they acquire parallels: the rays thus acquired are of a long continuance, and denote a certain universal disposition of the things signified, either good or bad, according to the nature of the aspecting stars; as it happened to this Cardinal, who some years before his death was always sickly: and this observation is wonderful in the changes of the times and weather; for this principle Ptolemy adhered to in the Almagest, lib. VIII, cap. 4; and this doctrine he also mentions in the 2nd Book of Judgments, in the chapter on the Nature of Events.”—(Cooper’s Translation, p. 272.)
[97] When a comet appears out of the zodiac, a line should be drawn from one zodiacal pole to the other, through the spot where it appears; and that spot is to be considered as being in familiarity with the same countries as those parts of the zodiac which may be on the same line.—[Vide Chap. IV of this Book], relative to the manner in which fixed stars out of the zodiac hold familiarity with certain regions and countries.
[98] The Neomenia, or new Moon, was observed as a festival with much solemnity in earlier ages and by the most ancient nations. It was celebrated by the Israelites, as well as by Pagan; and it may perhaps be gathered from the 5th and 6th verses of the 20th Chapter of the 1st Book of Samuel, that it was kept once in a year with greater ceremony than at other times: this was done, probably, at the “New Moon of the Year,” as Ptolemy calls it; or, in other words, at the new Moon nearest to the vernal equinox.
[99] That is to say, at the new and full Moon taking place during the Sun’s progress through each sign.
[100] The passage marked thus “ ” is not in the Greek, but is found in two Latin translations.
[101] According to Wing, in his “Instructions to the Ephemerides,” printed in 1652, the signs, as mentioned in this chapter by Ptolemy, are to be considered in their quality as constellations, and not as spaces of the heavens. This opinion, however, seems to me to be erroneous; for Ptolemy has already devoted a chapter in the 1st Book to the detail of the influences of the several stars in the respective constellations of the zodiac; and he moreover speaks, in the present chapter, of the operation of Aries, as owing to the presence of the Equinox. This he could not have done, had he spoken of the signs as constellations instead of spaces.
[102] The temperaments here alluded to are, probably, heat and cold.
[103] “Before.” Although I have thus Englished the word, προ, I think it properly requires to be here rendered, by “at” or “near to” rather than “before.” Firstly, because my author (in speaking of the commencement of each quarter of the year, in the 11th Chapter, [p. 93]), has expressly stated that “the spring is to be dated from the new or full Moon taking place when the Sun is nearest (εγγιζα) to the first point of Aries; the summer from that, when he is nearest the first point of Cancer,” &c., &c.; and ([in p. 94]) he states that certain general effects are brought about by the new or full Moon occurring at (κατα) the aforesaid points. Secondly, because, in a few lines further on, in speaking of the monthly consideration, [p. 98], he again uses only εγγιζα, in reference to the present passage, in which, however, he has used only προ. Thirdly, it is a proper inference that he meant to point out here the new or full Moon which may happen nearest to the tropical or equinoctial points, because he has previously and explicitly taught that the principal variation of all things depends upon those points. Lastly, Allatius has here rendered the word by no other than proximé, which is also the word given in the Perugio Latin of 1646.
On the other hand, Whalley, in his note on the present chapter, says, that “according to this Prince of Astrologers” (meaning Ptolemy), “we are to observe the new or full Moon preceding the ingress, only, for our judgment on the succeeding quarter, and not the lunation succeeding: and the reason I conceive to be, because the lunation, which immediately precedes the ingress, carries its influence to the very position of the ingress itself, but not so that which follows the ingress.” Wing, in his Introduction to the Ephemerides (London, 1652) also says, that “for the knowledge of the weather, it is requisite to observe the conjunction or opposition of the luminaries next preceding the Sun’s ingress into the first point of Aries.”
Now, if a new or full Moon happen immediately after the Sun’s transit or ingress, the previous full or new Moon must have happened a fortnight before the said transit or ingress; and, after considering the other parts of Ptolemy’s doctrine, I do not conceive, that he intended to teach, in this chapter, that a previous lunation, when at so great a distance before the important ingress, would have a greater influence over the ensuing quarter of the year, than a subsequent lunation taking place so closely after the said ingress.
[104] “Both the places.” These are the places of the new or full Moon, and of the following angle; as before mentioned with regard to the quarterly consideration.
[105] Similar precepts may be found finely illustrated in Virgil’s 1st Georgic, vide I, 433 et infra:
“Sol quoque et exoriens et cum se condit in undas
Signa dabit:”——
[106] Virgil has said almost the same thing in these beautiful lines:
“At si virgineum suffuderit ore ruborem
Ventus erit: vento semper rubet aurea Phœbe.”—Georg. I, l. 430.
See also the whole passage, beginning at l. 424:
“Si vero Solem ad rapidum Lunasque sequentes
Ordine respicies,” &c.
[107] At this place, the following sentence, not found in the Greek, is inserted in a Latin translation:
“If the northern of the two stars, situated one on each side of the Præsepe, and called the Asini, should not appear, the north wind will blow: but, if the southern one be invisible, the south wind.”
[108] These coruscations are, perhaps, similar to those now known by the name of the Aurora Borealis.
[109] Virgil again:
“Sæpe etiam stellas vento impendente videbis
Præcipites cœlo labi.”—&c. Georg. I, l. 365.
A great part of the 1st Georgic consists of astrological rules for predicting the weather, closely resembling the precepts here given by Ptolemy. Virgil is said to have adopted his doctrine from Aratus.
[110] The Division of Time is subsequently laid down by the author, in the last Chapter of the fourth Book.
[111] The words, thus marked “ ”, are not in the Greek, but in two Latin translations.
[112] It is, perhaps, needless to remark that modern improvements in science have superseded the use of this and other ancient instruments here mentioned.
[113] Although the “clepsydra,” or water-clock, was commonly used among the ancients for various purposes, it appears, from Martian (a Latin writer, who lived about a. d. 490), that there was also a clepsydra in special use as an astrological engine.
[114] “The Doctrine of Ascensions,” in allusion to the method of calculating the actual position of the ecliptic.
[115] “Phase or configuration.” Or, holding some authorized aspect to the degree in question.
[116] Or, on the ascendant.
[117] The precepts delivered in this Chapter have obtained the name of Ptolemy’s Animodar: the term is probably Arabic, if it be not a corruption of the Latin words animum, or animam, dare, “giving animation or life”; yet this meaning seems scarcely close enough.
[118] In House, Triplicity, Exaltation, Term or Face.
[119] Δορυφορια· This word has been heretofore rendered “satellitium” and “satellites,” but, as these terms do not seem sufficiently precise in their meaning, and are already in use to signify the minor orbs which revolve round a principal planet, I have ventured to anglicize the Greek word; the usual signification of which is a “bodyguard.”
[120] Or, in other words, “should the stars, which attend the Sun, be such as rise before him; and those, which attend the Moon, such as rise after her.”
[121] As described in Chap. XXVI, Book I.
[122] Saturn being applicable to the father, and Venus to the mother.
[123] The Perugio Latin translation, of 1646, inserts here, “and provided Saturn and the Sun are not impeded by being posited in unfortunate or unsuitable places.”
[124] “Elevated.” Moxon’s Mathematical Dictionary gives the following definition of this astrological term. “Elevated. A certain pre-eminence of one planet above another; or, a concurrence of two to a certain act, wherein one being stronger, is carried above the weaker, and does alter and depress its nature and influence: But wherein this being elevated consists, there are several opinions; some say when a planet is nearest the zenith, or meridian; others will have it only that planet is highest; or nearest to the Apogæon of his eccentric or epicycle. And Argol admits of all these, and several other advantages, and thence advises to collect the several testimonies, and that that planet, who has most, shall be said to be elevated above the other.” According to Whalley, Cardan’s opinion was that “that planet is most elevated which is more occidental and ponderous.” For myself, I conceive this opinion to be inaccurate, because, if Ptolemy meant to signify only the greater occidentality of the planet, he would (as in other instances) have used the word “preceding” instead of “elevated above”; and I incline to think, that greater proximity to the zenith is the truer, as well as more simple, meaning of the term “elevated.”
[125] By the quartile or opposition, as before mentioned.
[126] On this passage, Whalley remarks that “Ptolemy teacheth, from the child’s nativity, to erect schemes for the father and mother, and thence to give judgment, as if it were their proper nativities; the rule is this: If the nativity be diurnal, for the father, observe the degree the Sun is in, in the child’s nativity; and make that the degree ascending for the father; and conformable to that, order the cusps of all the other houses. If for the mother, use Venus. But if the nativity be nocturnal, for the father, take the place of Saturn; and for the mother, that of the Moon.” Whalley adds, that what in this chapter hath relation to the parents, is what shall happen to them after the nativity, and not before.
[127] Or, at the actual time of nativity.
[128] In spite of this declaration of the author, it seems, by Whalley’s note on this chapter, that Cardan maintained that the particular circumstances, liable to affect the brothers and sisters, might be inferred by adopting, as an ascendant, the degree of the planet holding chief dominion over the place of brethren, and erecting a scheme thereby; in a mode similar to that allowed by Ptolemy in the case of the parents.
[129] That is to say, from the angles in quartile (and therefore hostile also) to the mid-heaven.
[130] The text does not show whether it be necessary that Saturn and Mars should both be in the ascendant, in order to produce the effect described; nor whether the same effect would not follow, if one of them should be in the ascendant, and the other in the occidental angle, or even in some other position.
[131] [Vide Chapter VI, Book I].
[132] The planet here alluded to, seems to be that which may be connected with most of the ruling places.
[133] I have looked in many other books for this word “Anactores” (plural of ανακτωρ), as designating three particular individuals born at the same birth; for which signification it is here used by Ptolemy; but my search has been in vain. Cicero has, however, written a passage, in which a word, very nearly resembling it, occurs, and which would seem to relate to the very persons alluded to by Ptolemy: viz. “The godship of the Dioscuri was established in various modes among the Greeks, and applied to various persons. One set consisted of three persons, who were styled at Athens the Anactes, and were the sons of Jupiter, the most ancient king, and Proserpine; their several names were Tritopatreus, Eubuleus and Dionysius.” De Nat. Deor., lib. 3, cap. 21.
[134] This is the second set of the Dioscuri, as stated by Cicero: they were the children of the third, or Cretan Jupiter (the son of Saturn) and Leda; their names were Castor, Pollux, and Helena. Helena, however, is not mentioned by Cicero.
[135] Core is a name of Proserpine; Liber, of Bacchus. And, although the mention here made of Ceres, Proserpine and Bacchus, as being the offspring of one and the same birth, does not accord with the usual notion of the genealogy of these divinities, it seems that Ptolemy did not so represent them without some reason. For, in cap. 24, lib. 2, De Nat. Deor., Cicero speaks of Liber as having been deified conjointly with Ceres and Libera (another name of Proserpine); and adds, that “it may be understood, from the rites and mysteries of the worship, how the deification took place.” It appears also, by Davies’s notes on Cicero, that Livy and Tacitus both speak of the copartnership in divinity exercised by Liber, Libera and Ceres. There is not, however, any occasion at present to dive deeper into the question of the generation of these deities; for our author has advertised to them only to point out that so many males or females will be produced at one birth, under certain configurations of the stars.
[136] Whalley says here, “chiefly the ascendant and mid-heaven.”
[137] Whichever might have been nearer in time.
[138] It is perhaps superfluous to mention that the two kinds of animals here named (as well as many others) were venerated by the Ægyptians.
[139] The Greek says “enigmatical.”
[140] One Latin translation has rendered this word “stammerers”; and, as Harpocrates was the god of silence, Ptolemy has probably used the epithet to signify defect of speech.
[141] “Dumb.” The Greek is οδοντων εςερημενον, “deprived of teeth,” and Allatius has so translated it: but other translations render these words by dumb, which, considering the nature of Mercury, seems their preferable signification.
[142] A prorogator is either a luminary, planet, or a certain degree of the zodiac, which determines the duration of life, or the time of the accomplishment of any event: it is hereafter fully treated of in the 13th Chapter of this Book; which shows that, in the instance now mentioned, it would be a luminary, either in the ascendant, or in the mid-heaven.
[143] The epithet anæretic is a term of art, adopted from the Greek, signifying fatal, or destructive.
[144] The Latin translation, printed at Perugio in 1646, has here the following passage in addition: “But it must be seen which luminary may follow the other in the succession of the signs; for if the Moon should so follow the Sun, the part of Fortune is also to be numbered from the horoscope or ascendant, according to the succession of the signs. But if the Moon precede the Sun, the part of Fortune must be numbered from the ascendant, contrary to the succession of the signs.”
There is a long dissertation on the part of Fortune, in Cooper’s Placidus, from pp. 308 to 318; and, among the directions there given for computing its situation, the following seem the most accurate and simple: viz. “In the diurnal geniture, the Sun’s true distance from the east is to be added to the Moon’s right ascension, and in the nocturnal, subtracted; for the number thence arising will be the place and right ascension of the part of Fortune: and it always has the same declination with the Moon, both in number and name, wherever it is found. Again, let the Sun’s oblique ascension, taken in the ascendant, be subtracted always from the oblique ascendant of the ascendant, as well in the day as in the night, and the remaining difference be added to the Moon’s right ascension; the sum will be the right ascension of the part of Fortune, which will have the Moon’s declination.” It is shown also by this dissertation, that the situation of the part of Fortune must be necessarily confined to the lunar parallels; that it can but rarely be in the ecliptic; and that its latitude is ever varying. Cooper also adds, from Cardan’s Commentaries on the Tetrabiblos, that “if the Moon is going from the conjunction to the opposition of the Sun, then the Moon follows the Sun, and the part of Fortune is always under the Earth, from the ascendant; but if the Moon has passed the opposition, she goes before the Sun, and the part of Fortune is before the ascendant, and always above the earth.” This remark of Cardan’s is, in effect, exactly equivalent to what is stated in the additional passage inserted in the Perugio Latin translation, and given above.
In the Primum Mobile of Placidus (Cooper’s translation, p. 45), the following remark and example are given: “The part of Fortune is placed according to the Moon’s distance from the Sun; and you must observe what rays the Moon has to the Sun, for the latter ought to have the same, and with the same excess or deficiency, as the part of Fortune to the horoscope. As the Moon is to the Sun, so is the part of Fortune to the horoscope; and as the Sun is to the horoscope, so is the Moon to the part of Fortune. So, in the nativity of Charles V, the Moon applies to the ultimate sextile of the Sun, but with a deficiency of 7° 45′: I subtract the 7° 45′ from 5° 34′ of Scorpio, the ultimate sextile to the horoscope, and the part of Fortune is placed in 28° 9′ of Libra.” N.B.—In this nativity, according to Placidus, the Sun is in the second house, in 14° 30′ of Pisces: the Moon in the ascendant, in 6° 45′ of Capricorn; the ascendant is 5° 34′ of Capricorn; and the part Fortune is in the ninth house, in 28° 9′ of Libra.
[145] According to her position in the scheme of the nativity.
[146] Placidus, in remarking on the nativity of John di Colonna, after stating his opinion that it is an error to suppose that a malign influence to the horoscope, when the horoscope has not the primary signification of life is anæretic, says, that “the order and method which Ptolemy lays down for the election of a prorogator are quite absurd, unless life be at the disposal of a sole prime significator only.” He proves by other arguments also, and by instances of the fact, that “one only signifies life, elected according to Ptolemy’s method.” (Cooper’s translation, p. 184.)
[147] “Horary proportion.” So the Perugio Latin of 1646; the Greek word, however, is ωριμαιαν, which seems to be compounded of ωρα and ιμαω; and, if so, the literal signification would be “extraction of hours.”
[148] By the apparent motion of the planetary system. On this passage, Placidus has the following observations: “In directing the significator to the west, you must consider what stars or mundane rays are intercepted between the significator and the west; if fortunate, add their arc to the significator’s arc of direction to the west; if unfortunate, subtract it from the same, and it will give the arc of direction, augmented or diminished according to Ptolemy. How largely and differently authors have spoken of this direction of the significator to the west, putting various constructions on the words of Ptolemy, is known to every one. See Cardan in his Commentaries, Maginus in Prim. Mob. and the Use of Legal Astrology in Physic, c. viii, where he delivers the sentiments of Naibod. Argol censures wholly this doctrine of Ptolemy’s, of directing the moderator of life to the west, as vain and useless; but I say it is worthy of remark, and altogether comformable to truth; because then the rays and intermediate stars of the malign only lessen the arc of direction to the west, and do not destroy life, when, by a right direction, the moderator or life does not remain at the same time with the malignant planet: for, should this happen, they kill, without any manner of doubt.” (Cooper’s translation, pp. 106 and 108.)
[149] “Horary times.” These are the number of equatorial degrees which any degree of the zodiac may appear, in a certain latitude on the earth, to transit in an equatorial hour.
[150] By the apparent motion of the planetary system.
[151] In reference to this passage, Placidus, in speaking of the death of Octavian Vestrius of Rome, has these words: “the Moon is found in a parallel declination of Mars, and Saturn with the opposition of Mars; the sextile of Jupiter to the Sun could give no assistance, because Jupiter is cadent, and the ray sextile is very weak, especially when it is the principal ray: for which reason, Ptolemy, in the chapter of Life, when he mentions the planets that are able to save in the courses of the infortunes, does not name the sextile, but the quartile, trine, and opposition; because the sextile ray is feeble, particularly when it is less than 60°: neither could Venus assist, as she was cadent from the house, and in a sign inimical to the Sun,” &c. (Cooper’s Translation, p. 286.)
[152] Literally, and perhaps more properly, “its meeter.”
[153] That is to say, orbs, in contradistinction to prorogations made by aspects or degrees merely.
[154] Of the stars and places brought into configuration.
[155] Whalley’s translation of this passage is in direct contradiction to the sense: and even that of Allatius, as well as other Latin ones, are (if strictly correct) confused in their meaning.
[156] “Ascensional times.” These are, in other words, the number of degrees of the equator, equivalent to a certain number of zodiacal degrees, ascending in any particular latitude. They are also otherwise called the oblique ascension of such zodiacal degrees.
[157] “Equatorial times” here signify degrees of the equator, by which all time is measured.
[158] That is to say, of the preceding and of the succeeding body of degree.
[159] Which may be intercepted in the arc between them.
[160] This number is that of the oblique descensional times of the intercepted arc, or of the oblique ascensional times of the arc opposite to it. The whole of the instructions in this paragraph are fully exemplified in the following chapter.
[161] Or, times to be reckoned in another manner.
[162] On this passage, there has been founded (to use Whalley’s words) “what we call Mundane Parallels, or parallels in the world. And, as zodiacal parallels are equal distances from the tropical or equinoctial circles, so mundane parallels are a like equal distance from the horizontal or meridianal points or circles. And as zodiacal parallels are measured by the zodiacal circle, so those mundane parallels are measured by the diurnal or nocturnal arcs: and just so long as the Sun or any other planet is, in proceeding from the cusp of the twelfth House to the cusp of the tenth, the same Sun or other planet will be in proceeding from the cusp of the tenth to the cusp of the eighth House. And the distance between Sun-rising and setting, is the diurnal arc which the meridian cuts in two equal parts. In directions, these mundane parallels have a twofold consideration: first, simple; secondly, according to the rapt motion of the earth, or the primum mobile: all which have been largely explained by the learned Monk, Placidus,” &c. That Author has certainly stated, in one of his Theses, that “those seats, or parts of the circle, are to be received, in which the stars, having a different declination, effect equal temporal hours” (p. 22, Cooper’s Translation), and he has fully exemplified this principle in other parts of his “Primum Mobile”; but Ptolemy here speaks only of one of the semicircles between the horizon and meridian, without reference to any other semicircle, corresponding in distance from the horizon and mid-heaven; and all that he has said on the subject amounts only to this, that the prorogation is completed when the succeeding place arrives at the same semicircle on which the preceding place had been posited.
[163] The ascendant, mid-heaven, and western horizon; as mentioned in the preceding paragraph.
[164] Vide [Note ², p. 95.]
[165] This, in the Northern Hemisphere, would be the latitude of Alexandria (where Ptolemy flourished), or, in his own words, that of the 3rd Climate, passing through Lower Egypt, numbered 30° 22′.—[Vide extracts from the Tables of the Almagest], inserted in the Appendix.
[166] This is the magnitude of the diurnal temporal hour of the first point of Gemini in the latitude prescribed.
[167] By right ascension, as shown by the Extract, inserted in the Appendix, from the [Tables of Ascensions] in the Almagest. The exact distance, however, according to that Table, is 147° 44′.
[168] Or rather, according to the Table, 102° 39′.
[169] That is to say, of the oblique ascension, which is here required to be reckoned; because the prorogatory and preceding place is in the ascendant. [Vide p. 95], and [Note ² in p. 94.] And the first point of Gemini, on arriving at the ascendant, will be distant from the mid-heaven 102° 39′ by right ascension; the 13th degree of Aquarius being then in culmination in the prescribed latitude. The oblique ascensions in the latitude 30° 22′ N. are also shown in the extract referred to in the preceding note: and it thereby appears, that Aries and Taurus ascend in 45° 5′, instead of 46°.
[170] Or, rather, 57° 44′—by right ascension.—Vide extract above referred to.
[172] Or on the cusp of the 7th House.
[173] Or, rather, 32° 16′—by right ascension again.—Vide extract as before.
[174] By right ascension. The amount according to the Table is, however, 102° 39′, as before stated.
[175] On which the 10th degree of Virgo will then be posited.
[176] By oblique descension and ascension: [Vide p.95].—The Table shows the amount to be 70° 23′.
[177] In reference to [p. 95], and [Note ¹ in the same page.]
[178] The 18th degree of Cancer being then in culmination.
[179] Or semi-diurnal arcs, each equal to six temporal hours.
[180] The amount of the progressive difference of the times of prorogation, as here mentioned, is of course only applicable to the parallel of declination of the first point of Gemini, in the latitude before quoted. It must necessarily vary in all other parallels of declination, and also in all other latitudes.
[181] Oblique ascension.
[182] The times of oblique descension of any arc of the zodiac are equal to the times of oblique ascension of its opposite arc; as before explained.
[183] That is to say, at the time of the 1st point of Aries transiting the cusp of each angle respectively.
[184] The calculation of time may be greatly facilitated by the use of a zodiacal planisphere, said to have been invented about thirty years ago by Mr. Ranger, who died without making his invention public. The invention consists of a set of instruments perfectly adapted, as far as relates to the zodiac, for astronomical, as well as astrological, purposes; and the completeness with which it solves, in the most intelligible and expeditious manner, all the astronomical problems of the zodiac, deserves attention. Whether a similar planisphere was known in the days of Placidus, I am not aware; but it is worthy of remark that the following words occur in his “Primum Mobile,” and seem almost to have been predicted of Mr. Ranger’s planisphere:—“If any one would provide himself with a Ptolemaic planisphere, with the horary circles, crepuscules, the zodiac’s latitude, and all other things requisite, it would be of very great service towards foreseeing the aspects.” (Cooper’s Translation, p. 87.) In the [Appendix will be found a plate], containing diagrams drawn by the instruments in question, which, though not completely filled up, will show how easily, and, at the same time, how accurately, the measure of time in directions may be ascertained. The said diagrams have been adapted to the “exemplification” here given by Ptolemy; one of them being laid down for the latitude of Alexandria, and the other for the latitude of southern Britain (51° 30′ N.), with similar positions of the preceding and succeeding places adverted to in the text.
[185] These meetings and descensions are technically termed “directions.”
[186] On these words Placidus has the following remark: “The revolutions may possess some virtue, but only according to the constitution of the stars to the places of the prorogators of the nativity, and their places of direction, but no farther; as Ptolemy was of opinion, and briefly expresses himself in his Chapter of Life. ‘Those who are afflicted, both in the places and conclusions of the years, by the revolution of the stars infecting the principal places, have reason to expect certain death.’” (Cooper’s Translation, p. 127.)
[187] Of the significators before mentioned.
[188] That of the ascendant, and that of the Moon.
[189] The original word is (in the accusative plural) αιγοηους, which Allatius has rendered, by “pedibus caprinis,” goat-footed, as if it were compounded of αιξ capra and πους pes; but the preferable derivation seems to be from αιξ and ωψ vultus; meaning “goat-faced.”
[190] From any one of the said planets.
[191] [Vide Chap. VIII, Book I].
[192] The Greek is ποιουμενοι φασεις; literally “making apparition”; but the subsequent context seems to require the meaning I have adopted.
[193] The parts of the signs in which the planets are posited.
[194] For the operative qualities of the other constellations, vide [Chapters X] and [XI, Book I].
[195] The sixth house.
[196] This seems to imply, if Saturn be in one of Venus’s places of dignity, and Venus in one of Saturn’s. Such a counterposition is technically termed “mutual reception.”
[197] In her extreme latitude, whether north or south.
[198] Της ιερας νοσου; literally, “the holy disease,” which authors have explained to mean epilepsy. Perhaps the disease was anciently called holy, because the patient, when possessed by the fit, seemed to be under the influence of some supernatural agency.
[199] That is to say, in the commencement of her separation from the aspect or conjunction of such stars.
[200] The Greek is μεταμελητικους, which means “penitent,” or “prone to repentance,” or “to subsequent regret.” It is difficult to convey its precise meaning in the text.
[201] [Vide Chapter XXVI, Book I].
[202] That of Mercury, and that of the Moon.
[203] This seems to imply, if well placed in elevation; as, in the mid-heaven, for instance, or in a conspicuous situation; and in possession of dignities.
[204] Or, persons: the Greek is φιλοσωματους.
[205] Or, persons: μισοσωματονς.
[206] Πρσς μιξιν θηλειων και αρρενων διακειμενσυς.
[207] Προς αρρενας δε κεκιννμενους και ζηλοτυπους.
[208] Παιδων διαφθορεας.
[209] That is to say, in her extreme latitude, whether south or north.
[210] Epilepsy is defined to be “a conclusive motion of the whole body, or some parts of its parts, accompanied with a loss of sense.” The knowledge of this latter effect probably induced the author to rank it among diseases of the mind.
[211] Of Mercury, the Moon, and the ascendant.
[212] Εσπερινοι; perhaps, more properly, nocturnal; the word being used in contrast to ημερινοι, diurnal.
[213] That is to say, such events as are independent of the will, and not necessarily consequent on any peculiar conformation of the mind or body.
[214] [Vide Chapter XIII of the 3rd Book].
[215] I have considered the words, γυναικειων δωρερεων, as comprising “the dowry of wives,” as well as other “gifts from women.”
[216] That is to say, its duration will depend on the time requisite to complete the arc of direction or prorogation between the stars, operating the loss, and the places which give the wealth. And the calculation is to be made as pointed out in the 14th and 15th Chapters of the 3rd Book.
[217] It seems that there have been different opinions on this point. Placidus makes the following remark on the subject: “I do not take the dignities from the horoscope, but from the Sun and Medium Cœli, according to Ptolemy and others.” (Cooper’s Translation, p. 121.)
[218] The Perugio Latin, of 1646, says, “If either both luminaries, or only that one of the chief quality” (which Whalley defines to be the Sun by day, and the Moon by night) “be in an angle,” &c.
[219] Doryphory. [Vide Chapter V of the 3rd Book] On the present passage, Placidus has the following words: “You are not to observe what is generally alleged by professors, respecting the satellites” (quasi doryphory) “of the luminaries, for dignities; viz. that the satellites are those planets which are found within 30°, on either side of the luminaries; but that a satellite is (also) any kind of aspect of the stars to the luminaries of what kind soever: which, if it be made by application, its power extends inwardly over the whole orb of light of the aspecting planet, and the more so, as the proximity is greater; but, by separation, it is not so. This doctrine may be seen in several chapters of Ptolemy; for, an aspecting star influences the significator, and disposes him to produce effects co-natural to him, by a subsequent direction. But a star of no aspect does not predispose the significator, and produces very little or no effect of its nature, by a subsequent direction; this is the true doctrine of the stars.” (Cooper’s Translation, pp. 124, 125.)
[220] The angle of the mid-heaven; see the first note to this Chapter.
[221] See the 4th Chapter of the 8th Book of the Almagest [inserted in the Appendix].
[222] The Greek says merely “that one having the dominion,” without specifying the place of dominion: the Latin printed at Perugio, is, however, “dominum accipe medii cœli,” which is certainly the sense required by the tenor of the previous instructions. Whalley also has similarly rendered it.
[223] Among the ancients, a garland was an indispensable decoration at all public ceremonies, whether civil or religious, and at private banquets. The making of garlands was, therefore, a considerable employment.
[224] It would seem, from “garland-wearers” being placed here in connection with “prize-wrestlers” (αθληται), that the author intended to point out persons competent to obtain the victors’ wreath in public exhibitions. But it appears that the word σεφανηφορος, garland-wearer, also signifies a person who was annually chosen by the priests to superintend religious ceremonies, an office similar to that of high priest. According to Athenæus, the Stephanephorus of Tarsos was invested with a purple tunic, edged or striped with white, and wore the laurel chaplet, which Plato, in the treatise de Legibus, describes as being constantly worn by these officers, although the other priests wore it only during the performance of the ceremonies.
[225] Meaning probably “if in mutual reception,” which position has been before explained.
[226] Or makers of hieroglyphics—ιερογλυφοι.
[227] That is to say, the mid-heaven; as stated in the 4th Chapter of the 3rd Book, and in the commencement of the present Chapter.
[228] This mode of divination, as practised by the Greeks, is mentioned by Potter. It is likewise described by a learned Doctor of Medicine, Geo. Pictorius Vigillanus (in his Treatise “de Speciebus Magiæ Ceremonialis,” printed at Strasburgh, 1531), as being used “when the fraudulent vanity of a dæmon renders things more like each other than eggs are to eggs.” And, according to this writer, it is practised by exorcising water, and pouring it into a basin, wherein the vain and refractory dæmon is immersed: the said dæmon will sometimes remain at the bottom, and sometimes raise himself to the surface, sending forth a slender hissing; out of which the desired responses are to be formed.
[229] Κρασεσι των χρωματων.—These words have been rendered literally, but they seem to contain some figurative meaning, rather than a literal one. Perhaps the preferable sense of them is, “by a mixture of views,” or “from various pursuits being blended together.”
[230] The words marked with inverted commas are not in the Greek; they are found, however, in two Latin translations; that of Basle, 1541, and that of Perugio, 1646.
[231] In other Editions, “whether by conjunction or aspect.”
[232] “Saturn.” Not found in the Elzevir edition, but in others.
[233] The words thus marked “ ” are not found in the Elzevir edition, but appear in the Latin one of Basle, 1541.
[234] Πεpi παιδας επιθυμητικους.
[235] That is to say, from the new and the full Moon.
[236] By mutual reception; according to Whalley, and also according to the Latin copy of Perugio, 1646.
[237] Meaning, probably, if the Moon in the husband’s nativity should be in the same position as the Sun in the wife’s nativity, or harmoniously configurated with that position.
[238] The exaltation of Venus being in Pisces, and that of Mars in Capricorn. Vide [Chapters XXI] and [XXII, Book I].
[239] Libra being Venus’s house, and in Saturn’s triplicity; and Capricorn being Saturn’s house, and in Venus’s triplicity. Vide [Chapters XX] and [XXI, Book I].
[240] [Vide Note ¹ in p. 126.]
[241] Instead of the Moon.
[242] [Vide Note ¹ in p. 126.]
[243] Of the planets before specified.
[244] These are such signs as are connected with each other in any manner similar to that before described, as connecting Capricorn with Pisces, and with Libra; or, in other words, signs common to the planets configurated.
[245] The following also occurs here: “και ει μεν o εις τωνασερων δυτικος, o δε ετερος ανατολικος εσι, και προς ανδρας και γυναικας εσονται διακειμενοι, ουχ’ υπερβολικως δε, ει δε αμφοτεροι οι ασερες δυτικοι ευρεθωσι, προς μονον το θηλυ εσονται καταφερεις. θηλυκων δε των ζωδιων υπαρχοντων εν οις οι ασερες, και αυτοι παοχειν ανεξονται τα του θηλυος. ει δε αμφοτεροι ανατολικοι ωσι, προς μονον το αρρεν ερμητικως εξουσι. των δε ζωδιον αρσενικων οντων, προς πασαν αρσενικην ηλικιαν.”
[246] To this the following sentence succeeds: εαν δε αρρενικως διακειμενοι ωσιν οι ασερες, και προς το ποιειυ.
[247] The angle of the mid-heaven.
[248] The meaning, apparent from the commencement of the chapter, is this: “Should such planets be in the mid-heaven or its succedent house, or configurated with either.”
[249] Μοναδικην, single, or one at a birth.
[250] Διδυμογωνιαν, double, or two at a birth.
[251] That on the mid-heaven, and that on the eleventh house.
[252] Or, regard each other within the distance of seventeen degrees.
[253] That is to say; if the places of the Sun, &c., in one nativity be configurated with such parts of the zodiac as are occupied by the Sun, &c., in the other nativity.
[254] Of any of the four places above described.
[255] Than the rest of the places.
[256] Those of the Sun, Moon, Ascendant, and part of Fortune, as before mentioned.
[257] “—and the attachment, or disagreement, subsisting between them and their masters”;—so Allatius, and the Latin translation printed at Perugio.
[258] The twelfth house.
[259] The probable meaning is, “if not acting in concert”: but the Latin of Perugio says, “si sint oppositi secundum longitudinem.”
[260] There seems a misprint here in the original: δυσωδιων, “foul vapours,” instead of δυσοδων, “wildernesses.”
[261] On the places indicative of travelling.
[262] Vide the 14th Chapter of the 3rd Book; on the number of the modes of prorogation.
[263] That is to say, the sign and degree on the occidental horizon.
[264] See a subsequent note, [p. 135], which gives an instance of the mode in which Placidus applied the power of the terms, in an anæretic direction.
[265] Δια σηψεων. Perhaps more properly, putridity or rottenness. The Perugio Latin translation renders it by “cancer.”
[266] Placidus, in treating of the nativity of Lewis, Cardinal Zachia, uses these words: “This example also teaches us what the sentiments of Ptolemy were concerning a violent death; when, in a peremptory place, both the enemies meet together, it is to be understood, that in the nativity the violence is sometimes first pre-ordained from the unfortunate position of the Apheta; at other times quite the contrary. But, because the direct direction happened to be in the terms of Mercury, the sickness was attended with a delirium and lethargy, so that you may perceive this to have been the true cause of the native’s death.” (Cooper’s Translation, pp. 198, 199.)
[267] Ειδε ανθωροσκοπησει προσοιον δηποτε των φωτων: which Allatius has translated, “if he should be in the ascendant opposed to either of the luminaries” (si in horoscopo alteri luminum opponatur); but the Latin copy of Basle, 1541, as well as that of Perugio, 1646, give the passage as now rendered. And it appears in a subsequent place, p. 201 (where the word ανθωροσκοπων occurs), that it can only be properly translated “in opposition to the ascendant.”
[268] Caput Medusæ.
[269] Ανθωροσκοπων. [Vide note ³ in p. 135.]
[270] That is to say, the lower heaven, or imum-cœli. Whalley has translated it, “above the earth,” instead of “below”; mistaking νπο for νπερ.
[271] On this chapter Whalley makes the following annotations: “One direction, how malevolent soever, rarely kills; and, in most nativities, there is required a train of malevolent directions to concur to death: where several malevolent directions concur so together, without the aid of intervenings of the benevolents, they fail not to destroy life.”
“In such trains of directions, the author here distinguisheth between the killing planet and the causer of the quality of death; for one planet doth not give both. The foremost of the malevolent train is the killing place, and shows the time of death; but the following directions, though benevolent, show the quality. If the train fall altogether, and none follow, for the quality observe those which precede, though at a distance and benevolent also; for, though the benevolent contribute to the preservation of life, yet they frequently specify the disease which is the cause of death. And with these, our author tells us, concur the configurating stars, the quality of the stars and signs, and the terms in which the lords happen. In violent deaths, the genethliacal positions of the lights are to be observed, and how the malefics affect them, and (how they) are also concerned by directions in the quality or death.” [See also Chap. XIV, Book II].
[272] With respect to the periodical divisions of time.
[273] It will, of course, be remembered, that the Sun, in the Ptolemaic astronomy, is counted as a planetary orb.
[274] The Latin copy of Basle, 1541, says, “to marriages.”
[275] “Bodily,” or in conjunction.
[276] On this passage, Whalley remarks, “we are to observe in direction, that the star in exact ray with the prorogator shall be ruler until the prorogator meets another ray; that then the planet whose ray it is shall take the dominion, and so on. But if no planet aspect the hyleg (prorogator) exactly, that which casts its rays before the prorogator is to be taken for ruler of the time, till another planet’s ray comes in by direction. And the lord of the term, in which the direction falls, must be considered as a co-partner in this dominion.”
[277] [Vide Chap. XIV, Book 3].
[278] The Greek is simply εις τα επομενα κατα ξωδιον; but the context proves that the entire meaning must be as now given, although the Latin translation of Perugio renders it “one year to each degree.” Whalley explains that by annual periods “the author intends profections: for the taking of which, for every year from the birth, add one sign to the sign in which the aphetics are at birth, and the sign which ends at the year desired is the sign profectional for that year, and the lord of that sign is chronocrator (arbitor) for that year; so far as the degrees of that sign reach.” For example, if a prorogator at birth be in 15° of Gemini, to 15° of Cancer serves the first year; but the first six months are ruled by Mercury, and the last six by the Moon and Jupiter; and so on.
[279] The Latin translation of Basle, 1541, says, “the lord of that sign in which the number shall terminate.”
[280] Whalley says here, “let a sign be added for each month to the sign of the year. So, in the example before proposed, the last 15° of Gemini, and the first 15° of Cancer, shall serve for the first month: the last 15° of Cancer and the first 15° of Leo, for the second month; and so on. And for days, from 15° of Gemini to 15° of Cancer, rules two days and eight hours after birth, &c.”
Placidus is of opinion, “that Ptolemy, speaking of annual places, is to be understood of the places of secondary directions; and that when he speaks of the menstrual, he hints at the places of progressions.” (Cooper’s Translation, pp. 25 and 57.)
[281] Placidus says, that “active ingresses, if they be similar, to the pre-ordained effects, cause them to influence; if dissimilar, they either diminish or retard; as Ptolemy has it in the last Chapter of Book IV.” (Cooper’s Translation, p. 27.)
[282] Placidus observes, that “the primary directions of the significators to their promittors, and the lords of the terms, Ptolemy calls the General Arbiters of Times, because they pre-ordain the general times of their effects; which, as its motion is slow and its perseverance long, discovers its effects after a very long time; that is, after months and years. In order that we may know, in this extent of time, on what particular month and day the effects appear, Ptolemy proposes these motions for observation, wherein, when the majority of the causes agree together, then doubtless the effect is accomplished, or most clearly manifests itself.” (Cooper’s Translation, p. 109.) And he says afterwards, in speaking of secondary directions, progressions, ingresses, &c., “these subsequent motions of the causes demand our greatest attention.” (Ibid., p. 110.) In the Appendix to the same book, at p. 438, the proper equation of time, or measurement of the arcs of direction, is also treated of, in reference to the 16th canon of Placidus, which is as follows:—
“To equate the Arc of Direction. Add the arc of direction to the right ascension of the natal Sun; look for this sum in the table of right ascensions under the ecliptic, and take the degree and minute of longitude corresponding with that sum; then, in the best ephemeris, reckon in how many days and hours the Sun, from the day and hour of birth, has arrived at that degree and minute. The number of days indicate as many years; every two hours over, reckon a month.” (Ibid., p. 55.)
[283] Whether general or annual.
[284] That is to say, by the opposition, trine, &c.
[285] On this side of the equator.
[286] Thus (according to the [Table inserted at p. 152]), in the climate or latitude of Lower Ægypt, the times of ascension between the first point of Gemini and the first point of Sagittarius, diametrically opposite, are 205° 18′, which, being divided by 15, give 13 hours 41 minutes and a fraction of equatorial time, as the length of the day of the first point of Gemini. And the same number of times of ascension, divided by 12, give 17° 6′ and a fraction of the equator, as the length of the diurnal temporal hour. In the latitude of Southern Britain, the times of ascension between the same points as above mentioned are 236° 2′, which, divided by 15, give 15 hours 44 minutes and a fraction of equatorial time, as the length of the day of the first point of Gemini; and, if divided by 12, they produce 19° 40′ and a fraction of the equator, as the length of the diurnal temporal hour.
[287] Thus, the aggregate times of ascension, in a right sphere, of the first point of Gemini are 57° 44′; and, in the climate of Lower Ægypt, 45° 5′: the sixth part of the difference between them is 2° 6′ and a fraction, which, added to 15°, again makes the diurnal temporal hour of the first point of Gemini equal to 17° 6′ and a fraction of the equator. In the climate of Southern Britain, the aggregate times of ascension of the first point of Gemini are 29° 43′: the sixth part of the difference between that sum and 57° 44′ of right ascension is 4° 40′ and a fraction, which, added to 15°, makes the diurnal temporal hour of the first point of Gemini, in South Britain, equal to 19° 40′ and a fraction of the equator, as before shown.
[288] For example,
| Diurnal horary times of the first point of | |
| Gemini in the latitude of Alexandria | 17° 6′ 30″ |
| Number of temporal hours | 12 |
| 15)205 18 0 | |
| Diurnal equatorial hours of the first point of | |
| Gemini in the latitude of Alexandria | 13 41 12 |
| Diurnal horary times of the first point of | |
| Gemini in the latitude of Southern Britain | 19° 40′ 10″ |
| Number of temporal hours | 12 |
| 15)236 2 0 | |
| Diurnal equatorial hours of the first point of | |
| Gemini in the latitude of Southern Britain | 15 44 8 |
[289] Let the first point of Gemini be on the meridian above the earth; the number of temporal hours since sunrise will then be 6, by which 17° 6′ 30″ are to multiplied. The product will be 102° 39′: this, added to 45° 5′, the aggregate number of the first point of Gemini in the latitude of Alexandria, will give 147° 44′, which, in the ascensions of the climate in question, will correspond to the 3d degree of Virgo, and show that to be the degree ascending. In the latitude of Southern Britain the total number would still amount to the same, viz. 147° 44′, but it would show 7° and about 30′ of Virgo to be ascending.
[290] Let the first point of Gemini be three temporal hours past the meridian; these hours reduced to degrees, in the latitude of Alexandria, will give 51° 19′, which, added to the right ascension of the first point of Gemini, make 109° 3′, showing the 18th degree of Cancer on the meridian. In the latitude of Southern Britain, these hours would produce 59°, which, added to the right ascension, would make 116° 44′, and show the 25th degree of Cancer on the meridian.
[291] Thus, in the latitude of Alexandria, when the first point of Gemini is three temporal hours past the meridian, the 16th degree of Libra will be on the ascendant, and the aggregate times of ascension of that degree in the said latitude are 109° 3′: by subtracting 90 from this sum, the remainder will be 19° 3′, the right ascension of the mid-heaven answering to the 18th degree of Cancer. In the latitude of Southern Britain, the 18th degree of Libra would be on the ascendant, of which degree the aggregate times of ascension in that latitude are 206° 44′, from which, if 90 be subtracted, the remainder will be 116° 44′, the right ascension of the mid-heaven answering to the 25th degree of Cancer. The converse of these operations seems too obvious to need explanation.
[292] Alexandria.
[293] Southern Britain.
[294] Moxon’s Mathematical Dictionary says, that the “Centiloquium is a book containing one hundred astrological aphorisms, commonly ascribed to Ptolemy, as its author, but by some to Hermes Trismegistus.” This account, however, seems to be inaccurate; for the Centiloquy attributed to Osiris’s contemporary and counsellor (eulogized by Lilly as having been “one of the wisest of all mortal men, and as ancient as Moses”), is very different from that known by the name of the Καρπος, or “Fruit of the Tetrabiblos.” Whether this latter Centiloquy be really the work of Ptolemy is another question: it has been usually edited as his, but some of the aphorisms seem to relate to horary questions only, which are not adverted to in the Tetrabiblos, and there are others also which do not appear to result from the doctrine of that book.
[295] Of the same degree and sign.
[296] Or in obscure situations.
[297] Of the Sun and Moon.
[298] On this aphorism Partridge has said, “how Ptolemy meant it to be understood, I know not; and so I leave it.”
[299] Or part of heaven indicating the grant.
Transcriber’s Notes:
The cover image was created by the transcriber, and is in the public domain.
Uncertain or antiquated spellings or ancient words were not corrected.
The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate.
Typographical and punctuation errors have been silently corrected.