“Place a child in the centre of a circle, upon the circumference of which the stars are disposed as at the moment of his conception, or birth. Their influences concentrate upon him, and confer on him a fixed and unalterable destiny. He will be virtuous or vicious, prosperous, or unfortunate in this world, according to the configuration of the planets.”
According to the moral character of the stars, the Sun is benevolent and auspicious; Saturn, dull, morose, and cold; the Moon moist and melancholy; Jupiter, temperate, and his influences kindly; Mars, dry and fervent; Venus prolific and affable; Mercury, inconstant and variable.
Astrologers assigned twelve houses to the zodiac, appropriated to the different planets. The first was consecrated to life and the body; from whence emanates the white, black, and copper coloured races, giants, dwarfs, albinos, idiots, and men of genius. The second house is devoted to the interests of society in general; and in the third house, family affairs between relatives of different degrees, excepting testamentary dispositions, to which they devoted a fourth house. To pass from grave to gay, enter the fifth house, where all is mirth, pleasure, and infantine pastimes. Lackies and sempstresses occupy the sixth house, but they have but little repose if the wall between it and the next house be not tolerably thick; being inhabited by beautiful women, envy, hatred, and malice. The eighth house of the zodiac is the cemetery; the ninth, the head-quarters of voyages, missions, and processions; whilst the tenth is the resort of the highest society, the nobility and dignitaries of state. The eleventh house is destined for the prosperous, who pass their lives in the delights of wit and friendship. The twelfth differs from the preceding, being devoted to the groans of the wretched in their dungeons, and the haunt of treason and shame. In building these zodiacal houses, the representative form of certain Governments had not been anticipated, or a better balance of power might have been effected.
Such were the chimeras of antiquity, as handed down to modern times. Plutarch relied so much on the efficacy of the stars, that he prevented the Lacedemonians from going into battle before the full moon; and Cæsar and Pompey frequently consulted the astrologers. The Emperor Augustus, born under the sign Capricorn, had a medal struck in honour of his natal star. Caracalla had the horoscope drawn of all those he employed; while his policy, favour, and misgivings were uniformly decided by the stars. When the horoscope of any influential person augured ill, Caracalla had him put to death;—a fine triumph for astrology!
Phrenology has now usurped the throne of astrology; and were sovereigns or judges to form their judgments after the theory of Dr. Gall, they would save themselves a world of trouble.
The reign of Catherine de Medicis was the triumph of astrology in France. Not a high-born dame but had her Baron, a name assigned to the family astrologer, who was as much a matter of course as, in other times, a family confessor.
The astrological rage subsided during the reign of Louis XIV; but disappeared only under the Regency. Voltaire, writes in 1757, when he was sixty, that in his youth, the last adepts of astrology, Count Boulainvilliers and the Italian Calonna, foretold his end at thirty years of age. Voltaire remarks, “I have done them by thirty years!”—to which the sequel added upwards of twenty more.
When the Europeans first penetrated the vast regions of Asia, astrology was found to be much in vogue in Persia and China. In the latter country, the Emperor, on his accession, has his horoscope drawn. The Japanese consult the stars previous to undertaking any enterprise. If they succeed, they thank their stars; if they fail, they resign themselves to their irresistible influence.
Astrology had its hero, a Cato or Vatel, in the astrologer Cardan; who, having predicted his death to the day and the hour, and failed in his calculations, killed himself for the credit of science! A more judicious prediction was that of the astrologer to Louis XI.; his master, who having inquired of him the hour of his own death: “Two after that of your Majesty!” replied he; and the oracle became a safeguard over his days.
Human pride often stimulates the influence of superstition. Napoleon once pointed out his star to Cardinal Fesch, who could not make it out. “It is lost upon you,” said the Emperor, “but I see it plainly enough!” Napoleon affected reliance upon an influence which was known to be auspicious to his fortunes. Had the Cardinal, in return, pretended to similar distinction, he would probably have answered as Jean Jacques Rousseau did to a shopkeeper, who complained of his stars. “How, Sir, do such people as you pretend to have stars?” Were astrologers in general, like Cardan, content to exercise their art upon themselves, we should not oppose their proceedings. But their predictions have been known to produce a panic throughout an entire population. For instance, a German mathematician, named Stoffler, whose audacity was only equalled by the credulity of his proselytes, predicted, towards the end of the fifteenth century, another Deluge for the month of February, 1524. “How was it possible,” he argued, “to escape from the calamity, when at that particular period Mars and Pisces, Saturn and Jupiter were to be in conjunction.” Upon the eve of this awful event, in various countries of Europe, carpenters could scarcely be found in sufficient numbers to build the arks in preparation.