Astrologically we are able to distinguish the psychically gifted by the presence of the planets in the lower meridian, but especially Sun and Mercury, Saturn and the Moon. This answers to the point of magnetic intensity at the maximum which is registered about midnight, and this observation leads to the conclusion that the planets do not of necessity influence us by their direct rays, but by the changes that they cause in the earth’s magnetic aura at various points in the circle of the visible heavens. Primarily the Sun must be the cause of the normal magnetic aura of the earth, and the planets would in this sense be moderators, which is the old name applied to them by Ptolemy. Thus the presence of several planets or the luminaries in the lower meridian at the time of a person’s birth will render that person particularly negative or sensitive to the changes taking place in the auric consensus of environment, and those who are in the habit of classifying and collating horoscopes will have abundant proof at hand that this is the case. On the other hand, we find extremely positive people to be produced by the presence of planets in the 10th House, near the South Meridian, and especially such as have Mars (colour, red) reinforcing the natural auric colour of that part of the heavens. Two examples come readily to my mind, that of Kaiser Wilhelm, in whose horoscope both Neptune and Mars are in the Mid-heaven, and that of the late William T. Stead, in whose horoscope Mars and Uranus are close to the Mid-heaven.
In effect we have the earth as the centre of a vast kaleidoscope, undergoing changes of colour from hour to hour by reason of the Sun’s passage from one rising to the next. Obviously there can be no universal red or blue since the Mid-heaven of one place is the horizon of another that is 90° East or West of it. Consequently there must be some factor that produces local colouring, which at the zenith produces vibrations which manifest as red and at the nadir as blue. This factor must be the Sun, since it is the only cosmic factor that has a constant relation to any part of the earth at the same hour each day. The planets in their courses will then intervene to bring about modifications of the colours or vibrations instituted by the Sun, and of these the Moon, as the quickest moving in its orbit, will be the chief. Mercury will come next, and then Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, so that in effect we have the Chaldean order of interpretation once more.
The question then arises as to whether that part of the earth’s aura where the Sun is at any moment should not always be taken as the positive maximum answering to noon and the colour red. If so, then it follows that the time of birth becomes a very important factor in the constitution of what may be called the magnetic constitution of a person. The whole subject is full of suggestions of the utmost significance, but hardly at this date in a condition to admit of dogmatic statement. The subject is therefore better left for future consideration.
CHAPTER XVIII
VULCAN THE CHAIN MAKER
There is an aspect of Mars which has an interest for us as prisoners in this house of flesh. Vulcan or Hephæstus, son of Jupiter and Juno, is the artificer of human bonds. By some he is thought to be allied to Pluto, the god of the Infernos, and in the Kabalistic conception, Malcuth, or the Earth, is the lowest of the heavens and the highest of the hells, being in fact in a state of equilibrium between the Superior and Inferior worlds and therefore, as Swedenborg suggests, it is in a state of freedom from that circumstance. But can so much be said of those that dwell therein? I doubt it. The Oriental doctrine of Samsara pictures man as a mere “Butterfly on the Wheel,” bound by the chains of his own desires to the wheel of cyclic rebirth into a world of suffering.
“Ye suffer from yourselves, none else compels,
None other holds you that ye lag and stay,
And whirl upon the wheel, and hug and kiss
Its spokes of agony, its tyre of tears,
Its nave of nothingness!”