Next proceed to attempt a description of the chief personal traits of the Subject, following in succession with a well-considered judgment on the constitution, hereditary tendencies, the health and pathological predispositions, the mental traits and disposition, considering these latter in relation to the state of health indicated. Then pass to a consideration of the environing conditions of life; the financial condition and outlook; the position in life; the occupation; prospects and conditions of marriage; of progeny. Judge next concerning voyages and journeys. Finish with a statement regarding the predominance of friends or enemies, and select dates by Solar positions, as already instructed. In cases where it is not objected to, an approximation may be made to the time and nature of death.
Throughout the whole of this judgment, the periods when these predicted effects will come into force should be made by reference to the rising, setting, and meridian passage of the planets, the solar aspects, and transits.
Care should be taken to weigh justly and impartially the evidence set before you in the figure of the heavens for birth. Major importance should be given to those planets which are in angles, and those which are in elevation, for the nearer a planet may be to the Midheaven, the greater is its influence for good or ill, according to its nature and aspect.
Read what you see, not what you imagine should be the destiny of an individual. If you are in complete ignorance of his person, position, and environment, so much the better. If you follow carefully the various rules which are contained in this book, you may at first make some errors of judgment, but as you become familiar with the task, even these errors will become few and far between, and in the end the language of the horoscope will become so intelligible and clear that it will interpret itself, and the whole trend and potentiality for good or ill of any birth-figure will force itself upon you in just the same way as when a man walks into your presence with his character clearly stamped upon his face, so that you have only to look and know.
Having become proficient in the judgment of birth-figures, you will do well to proceed to a closer study of the mathematics of astrology, making yourself proficient in the various methods of directing, so that you may at any time refine upon your general prognostics, and make predictions which are clear, sharp, and to the point.
Undoubtedly there is a modicum of intuitive perception at work in the judgment of any horoscope, which will enable you to seize upon the small details and exact pointing of any matter, and this perhaps constitutes the whole difference between the rule of thumb worker and the inspirational reasoning of the intuitive worker. The one exhausts the books and the other embellishes them. It is so with science in every department. The books will take you up to a certain point of proficiency, and a strict regard for the formulæ will keep you within the bounds of safety. But if you are ever to make a discovery or become a recognised exponent of any science, you must be naturally gifted with what is called the “scientific imagination,” another name for intuition. But at no point does true intuition part company with exact reasoning. There is no lesion. The one is an extension of the other. It is the higher reason, which argues from the known to the unknown. And the Astrologer is in this respect as the poet, “born, not made.” But a moment’s reflection will suffice to convince you that the more facile you may become with the book-learning and technique of Astrology, the more you will leave the intuition free to act. When a lad is struggling with his multiplication tables, his appreciation of the binomial theorem or the differential calculus cannot be said to amount to much. And, in the same way, a person who is stuffing down the Alphabet of Astrology cannot be expected to intuit anything concerning the potential of the Sun’s direction to the quadrature of Saturn.
CHAPTER IV
HOW TO BECOME A SUCCESSFUL ASTROLOGER
I take it that nobody nowadays can afford to fritter away time in the study of subjects which are not likely to become a source of benefit to himself and others. If there be such people among my readers, which I consider unlikely, I may dismiss them offhand with the remark that they will never become successful astrologers, for the first word of practical astrology is Utility. If the science had not its practical application to the affairs of everyday life, if its principles contained no word of assurance and hope for the myriad toilers of this world, no word of admonition for the self-indulgent parasites of modern social life, if, in short, it did not make for the betterment of human life and thought, it would never have attracted the attention of Aristotle, Cicero, Galen, Claudius Ptolemy, Thales, and others of the old world, and such men as Bacon, Cardan, Archbishop Usher, Naibod, Mercator, Ashmole, Kenelm Digby, Sir Christopher Heydon, Dryden, Dr. John Butler, Sir George Wharton, Vincent Wing, George Witchel, Tycho Brahe, Kepler, and Flamstead of more recent biography. Indeed, in whatever age or country we may elect to make our inquiries concerning Astrology, there are to be found a host of intelligent and even illustrious advocates in every department of life and learning. Suffice it to say that the modern student of this most ancient of all sciences is at all times in very good company.