Thaumaturgia Part 8

It was also pretty generally believed and maintained, that a sort of intimate relation or sympathy subsisted between metals and plants: hence the names of the latter were given to the former, in order to denote this supposed connexion and affinity. The corresponding metals were melted into a common ma.s.s, under a certain planet, and were formed into small medals, or coins, with the firm persuasion, that he who carried such a piece about his person, might confidently expect the whole favour and protection of the planet, thus represented.[78] Thus we perceive how easy the transition is from one degree of folly to another; and this may help to account for the shocking delusions practised in the manufacturing and wearing of metallic amulets of a peculiar mould, to which were attributed, by a sort of magic influence, the power and protection of the respective planet: these charms were thought to possess virtue sufficient to overrule the bad effects presaged by an unlucky hour of birth, to promote to places of honour and profit, and to be of potent efficacy in matters of commerce and matrimony. The German soldiers, in the dark and superst.i.tious ages, believed that if the figure of Mars, cast and engraved under the sign of the Scorpion, were worn about the neck, it would render them invulnerable, and insure success to their military enterprises--hence the reason why amulets were then found upon every soldier, either killed in battle or taken prisoner.

We shall so far conclude these observations on the chimera of astrology and medicine with the following remarks in the words of Chamber against Knight's work,[79] which defends this fanciful science, if science it may be called. "It demonstrates nothing while it defends every thing. It confutes, according to Knight's own ideas: it alleges a few scattered facts in favour of astrological productions, which may be picked up in that immensity of fabling which disgraces history. He strenuously denies, or ridicules, what the greatest writers have said of this fanciful art, while he lays great stress on some pa.s.sages from obscure authors, or what is worse, from authors of no authority."--The most pleasant part, however, is at the close where he defends the art from the objections of Mr. Chamber by recrimination. Chamber had enriched himself by medical practice, and when he charges the astrologers by merely aiming to gain a few beggarly pence, Sir Christopher catches fire, and shews by his quotations, that if we are to despise an art by its professors attempting to subsist, or for the objections which may be raised against its vital principles, we ought by this argument most heartily to despise the medical science, and medical men; he gives all here he can collect against physic and physicians, and from the confessions of Galen and Hippocrates, Avicenna and Agrippa, medicine is made to appear a vainer science than even astrology itself.

Lilly's opinions, and his pretended science, were such favourites of the age, that the learned Gataker[80] wrote professedly against this popular delusion. At the head of his star-expounding friends, Lilly not only formally replied to, but persecuted Gataker annually in his predictions, and even struck at his ghost, when beyond the grave.

Gataker died in July 1654, and Lilly, having written in his almanack for that year, for the month of August, the following barbarous latin line--

Hoc in tumbo, jacet presbyter et nebulo!

Here in this tomb lies a presbyter and a knave,

had the impudence to a.s.sert, that he had predicted Gataker's death! But the truth is, it was an empty epitaph to the "Lodgings to let:" it stood empty, reader, for the first pa.s.senger that the immortal ferryman should carry over the Styx.

But hear that arch imposter Old Patridge of more modern date whose _gulleries_ appear to have no end. "The practice of astrology is divided into speculative and theoretical." (Astronomy and judicial astrology).

The first teaches us how to know the stars and planets, and to find their places and motions. The second directs us to the knowledge of the influence and operations of the stars and planets upon sublunary bodies, and without this last the former is of little use. Astronomy cannot direct and inform us of the secret influences and operations of the stars and planets, without the a.s.sistance of' the _most sublime_ art of astrology. For astronomy is conversant about the subject of this art, and doth furnish the astrologer with matter whereon to exercise his judgment, but astrology disposes this matter into predictions, or rational conjectures, as time and occasion require.

"The practice again is subdivided into two parts, or quadripart.i.te, as Ptolomy (lib. 2) declares: the first considers the general state of the world, and from eclipses and comets, great conjunctions, annual revolutions, quarterly ingressions and lunations, also the rising, culminating, and setting of the fixed stars, together with the configurations of the planets both to the sun and among themselves, judgment is deduced, and the astrologer doth frame his annual predictions of all sensitive and vegetative things lying in the air, earth, or water; of plague, plenty, dearth, mutations of the air, wars, peace, and other general accidents of countries, provinces, cities, etc.

"The second of these subdivided parts, in particular, respects only the private state of every single man and woman, which must be performed from the scheme of the nativity, the knowledge of which is of most excellent use to all persons. Therefore let the nativities of children be diligently observed for the future, that is to say, the day, hour, and minute of birth as near as can be, which will be of use to the astrological physician, for the most princ.i.p.al conjecture of the malignity of the disease, whether it be curable, or shall end with death, depends upon the knowledge of the nativity; and very rarely any disease invades a person, but some unfortunate direction of the luminaries or ascendant to the body, or beams of malignant planets preceded the same, or did then operate, or at least some evil revolution, profection or transit, which cannot be discovered by any other way but by astrology. Moreover, it would be convenient that the true time of the first falling sick be observed precisely, and by that, together with the nativity, be judiciously compared, the physician shall gain more credit than by all his other skill; and herein, the astrologer's foresight shall often contradict the judgment of the physician; for when the astrologer foretells a phlegmatic man, that at such a time he shall be afflicted with a choleric disease, the doctor will perceive by his physical symptoms, the astrologer, from his knowledge in more secret causes of nature, hath excelled him in his art.

"Now if G.o.d Almighty do not countermand or check the ordinary course of nature, or the matter of elementary bodies here below be not unproportionable, and thereby unapt to receive their impressions, there is no reason why, in a natural and physical necessity, astrological predictions should not succeed and take effect, and by how much the knowledge which we have by the known causes is more demonstrative and infallible than that which we have either by signs or effects, so much by this companion doth Astrology appear worthy to be preferred before Physic." Cardan, who was an excellent physician saith: "If by the art of Astrology he had not better attained to the knowledge of his diseases, than the physician that would have administered to him by his skill, he had been a.s.suredly cured by death, rather than preserved alive by physic. (Vide his Comment. upon Ptol. Quidrepart.) From hence it appears it is necessary that the physician should be skilful in astrology, but on the contrary, _ex quovis legno non fit Mercurius_, every astrologer cannot be a physician; if the nativity be but precisely known, or if, but _tempus ablatum_ or _suppositum_, and withal some notable accidents of sickness, danger of drowning, peril by fire, marriage, or other, the like accidents may be foreseen."

The astrologers were a set of cunning, equivocal rogues; the more cautious of whom only uttered their prognostications in obscure and ambiguous language, which might be applied to all things, times, princes, and nations whatever. An almanack maker, a Spanish friar, predicted, in clear and precise words, the death of Henry the Fourth of France; and Pierese, though he had no faith in star-gazing, yet, alarmed at whatever menaced the life of a beloved sovereign, consulted with some of the king's friends, and had the Spanish almanack laid before his Majesty, who courteously thanked them for their solicitude, but utterly slighted the prediction: the event occurred, and in the following year, the Spanish _Lilly_ spread his own fame in an new almanack. This prediction of the friar, was the result either of his being acquainted with the plot, or from his being made an instrument for the purposes of those who were.

Cornelius Agrippa rightly designates astrologers "a perverse and preposterous generation of men, who profess to know future things, but in the meantime are altogether ignorant of past and present; and undertaking to tell all people most obscure and hidden secrets abroad, at the same time, know not what happens in their own houses."

But this Agrippa, for profound And solid lying, was renown'd: The Anthroposophus, and Floud, And Jacob Behmen, understood; Knew many an amulet and charm That would do neither good nor harm.

He understood the speech of birds As well as they themselves do words; Could tell what subtlest parrots mean That speak and think contrary, clean; What member 'tis of whom they talk, Why they cry, rope and--walk, knave, walk.

He could foretell whatever was By consequence to come to pa.s.s; As death of great men, alterations, Diseases, battles, inundations: All this without th' eclipse o' th' sun, Or dreadful comet, he hath done By inward light, a way as good, And easy to be understood: But with more lucky hit than those That use to make the stars depose As if they were consenting to All mischief in the world men do: Or like the devil, did tempt and sway 'em To rogueries, and then betray 'em.

We shall conclude our astrological strictures with the following advertis.e.m.e.nt, which affords as fine a satirical specimen of quackery as is to be met with. It is extracted from "poor Robin's" almanack for 1773; and may not be without its use, to many at the present day. We will vouch for it being harmless, but as we are not in the secret of all that it contains, our readers must endeavour to get the information that may be wanted, on certain important points, from other quarters. It will shew, however, that the almanack astrologers did not live upon the best terms, but like their predecessors, were constantly abusing and attacking each other.

ADVERTIs.e.m.e.nT.

"The best time to cut hair. How moles and dreams are to be interpreted.

When most proper season to bleed. Under what aspect of the moon best to draw teeth, and cut corns. Pairing of nails, on what day unlucky. What the kindest sign to graft or inoculate in; to open bee-hives, and kill swine. How many hours boiling my Lady Kent's pudding requires. With other notable questions, fully and faithfully resolved, by me Sylvester Patridge, student in physic and astrology, near the Gun in Moorfields."

"Of whom likewise may be had, at reasonable rates, trusses, antidotes, elixirs, love-powders. Washes for freckles, plumpers, gla.s.s-eyes, false calves and noses, ivory-jaws, and a new receipt to turn red hair into black."

Old Robin's almanack was evidently the best of the time, and free from all the astrological cant with which Patridge's Merlinus Liberatus was filled; against which Poor Robin did not a little declaim. The motto to his t.i.tle runs thus:--

"We use no weather-wise predictions Nor any such-like airy fictions; But (which we think is much the best) Write the plain truth, or crack a jest: And (without any further pretence) Confess we write, and think of the pence: For that's the aim of all who write, Profit to gain, mixed with delight."

Poor old Robin attacked the astrologers of his day with no little vehemence: "How different a task is it," says he, "for man to behave so in this world as to please all the people that inhabit it! A man who makes use of his best endeavours to please every body is sure to please but very few, and by that means displease a great many; which may very possibly be the case with poor Robin this year. But (be that as it will) _old Bob_ is sometimes well pleased, when rogues, p.r.i.c.k-eared c.o.xcombs, fools, and such like, are the most displeased at him: be it therefore known, that it is only men of sense and integrity, (whether they have much money or no money) that he has any, (the least) regard for: I see very plainly, that an humble man is (generally) accounted _base_; if otherwise, he is esteemed _proud_; a bold look is looked upon as _impudence_; if modest, (then to be sure) he must be _hypocritical_; if his behaviour is grave, it is owing to a _sullenness_ of temper; if affable, he is but _little_ regarded; if strictly just, then _cruel_ must be his character; but, if merciful and forbearing, then (of consequence) a silly, sheepish-headed fool! Now, I challenge all the a.s.s-TROLOGERS and CONJURERS, throughout the whole kingdom, to demonstrate that all the whimsey-headed opinions which different men retain of different actions, together with their being so vastly different at different times, one from another; I say, I call upon them ALL to prove, that they are (wholly) owing to the STARRY influences!

There being, (I believe) in general as many different ideas and conceptions in the mind of mankind, as there are variety of complexions and countenances."

His observations on the four _unequal_ quarters of the year, as he terms them, are no less satirical, humorous, and full of truth, and so much in "opposition" with others of the trade, that poor old Robin, in good sense and trite remarks, carries away the palm from all his predecessors and contemporaries; indeed, he is so little of an astrologer, that, instead of consulting the angles, aspects, conjunctions and trines, of the planets, he is vulgar enough to attach more importance to the substantials and doings of this nether world. We present our readers with the following as a specimen, which, though in his usual way, a little rough-mouthed, occasionally is free from that almanack-cant which characterises the vocations of his fellow-labourers in the same field.

SPRING,

which, being the most delightful season in the whole year, as it comes the next after a long and cold winter makes it as welcome as it is delightful; for now the lengthening days afford full time for every body but drunkards and watchmen to finish their respective day's works by day-light, besides some time to spare to walk abroad, to see the fine new livery with which Dame Flora has now decked out Mother Earth. In the opening of the Spring, when all nature begins to recover herself, the same animal pleasure which makes the bird sing, and the whole brute creation rejoice, rises very sensibly in the hearts of mankind. This quarter will bring whole shoals of mackerel, and plenty of green pease; likewise gooseberries, cherries, cheese-cakes, and custards.

But, let us now moralize,--and improve these vernal delights into real virtue; and, when we find within ourselves a secret satisfaction arising from the beauties of the creation, may we consider to whom we stand indebted for all these various gratifications and entertainments of sense; who it is that opens thus his hand, and fills the world with good! But so soon as this quarter is ended; i.e. there, or then, or thereabout, for in this case a day or two can break no great squares--I say this quarter (as usual) will be followed by the

SUMMER,

when, and at which time the days will have attained their greatest, and consequently the nights the shortest lengths. June, in which month this quarter is said to begin, will retain some likeness, if not exhibit the perfections of the Spring; but the two next succeeding months will perhaps have less vigour, but a greater degree of heat; for, as they pa.s.s on, they will be ripening the fruits of the earth; whilst the Dog star is shooting his rays amongst, the industrious farmer will have business enough upon his hands: for now he expects to be reaping and gathering together the returns of his labour; but then he must expect, nevertheless, to bear the heat and burthen of the day.

This quarter very justly represents a man in the full vigour of health and strength; the beauty of the Spring is gone! The strength of Summer is of short continuance! It will very soon be succeeded by Autumn: thus, and thus (O reader) do then consider, hast thou seen the seasons, two, three, or four times return in regular succession: remember that the time is coming, when all opportunities of this sort will be for ever hid from thine eyes: remember if forty years have pa.s.sed thee, I say, I would have thee remember, that thy spring is gone, thy summer almost spent! Have then, therefore, a very serious retrospective view of thy past, and, (if it please G.o.d) a fixed resolution to amend thy prolonged life: then being now arrived almost on the eve of

AUTUMN

which begins this year (as usual) when, or then, or thereabouts, the time the Summer quarter ends--namely, when the nights begin to grow longer and the days shorter: this is the time when the barns are filled with wheat, which soon must be thrashed out, in order to be sowed again.

This also is the time when the orchards abound with fruits of the kind, and consequently the properest time to make cider.

Lamentable now must be the case of those poor women who, in this quarter, happen to long for green pease or strawberries; for I dare a.s.sure them, upon the _honest word_ of an astrologer, that they can get none on this side of next Easter. Some now-abouts under the notion of soldiers, shall sally out at night upon _Pullen_, or perhaps lie in embuscade for a rope of onions, as if they were Welsh freebooters. Loss of time and money may be recovered by industry: but to be a fool-born, or a rogue in nature, are diseases incurable.

Remember that in any quarter of the year, this is almost always a certain presage of a wedding, when all parties are agreed, and the parson in readiness; and then you must be sure to have money in readiness too, or your intended marriage may happen to prove a miscarriage. But those who are able to pay for tying the knot, when it is fairly tied, may go home to dinner and be merry; go to the tavern and be merry; go to supper and be merry; rise next morning and be merry: and let the world know, that a married life is a plentiful life, when people have good estates; a fruitful life when they have many children; and an happy life, when man and wife love each other as they ought to do, and never quarrel nor disagree.

OF THE WINTER QUARTER.

But now comes on the cold, dirty, dithering, pouting, rainy, s.h.i.+vering, freezing, blowing, stormy, bl.u.s.tering, cruel quarter called winter; the very thoughts of it are enough to fright one; but that it very luckily happens to be introduced (this year) by a good, fat merry Christmas: yet it is the last and worse, and very much resembles extreme old age accompanied by poverty; this quarter is also pretty much like Pharoah's lean kine; for it generally (we find) eats up and devours most of the produce of the preceding seasons: now the sun entering the southern tropic, affords us the least share of his light, and consequently the longest long nights: yet, nevertheless, in this uncomfortable quarter, you may possibly pick up some crumbs of comfort, provided you have good health, good store of the ready Rhino, a good wife, and other good things about you: and especially a good conscience: for then the starry influences must necessarily appear very benign, notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather; for in such cases there will be frequent _conjunctions_ of sirloins and ribs of beef; _aspects_ of legs and shoulders of mutton, with _refrenations_ of loins of veal, s.h.i.+ning near the watery triplicity of plumb-porridge--together with trine and s.e.xtile of minced pies; collared brawn from the Ursus major, and sturgeon from Pisces--all for the honour of Christmas: and I think it is a much pleasanter sight than a Covent-Garden comedy, to see a dozen or two of husbandmen, farmers, and honest tenants, at a n.o.bleman's table (who never raised their rents) worry a sirloin, and hew down, (I mean cut up) a goose like a log: while a good Ches.h.i.+re cheese, and plenty of nappy ale, and strong March beer, washes down the merry goblets, sets all their wit afloat, and sends them to their respective homes, as happy as kings.

And now, kind loving readers, every one, G.o.d send y'a good new-year, when the old one 's gone.

FOOTNOTES:

[75] The following prediction, and the verification of it are of so recent a date, that we cannot resist giving it a place in our pages. In the account of the late Captain Flinder's voyage of discovery, is the melancholy relation of the loss of the master, Mr. Thistle, with seven others, in a boat, on the inhospitable sh.o.r.es of Terra Australia. To this narrative, the following note is subjoined, which we shall here quote in Captain Flinder's own words: "This evening, Mr. Fowler, the lieutenant, told me a circ.u.mstance which I thought very extraordinary, and it afterwards proved to be more so. While we were lying at Spithead, Mr. Thistle was one day waiting on sh.o.r.e, and having nothing else to do, went to a certain old man, named Pine, to have his fortune told. The cunning man informed him that he was going on a long voyage, and that the s.h.i.+p, on arriving at her destination, would be joined by another vessel. That such was intended, he might have learnt privately; but he added that Mr. Thistle would be lost before the other vessel joined. As to the manner of his loss the magician refused to give any information.

My boat's crew, hearing what Mr. Thistle said, went to consult the wise man, and after the prefatory information of a long voyage, they were told that they would be s.h.i.+pwrecked, but not in the s.h.i.+p they were going out in; whether they would escape and return to England, he was not permitted to reveal. This tale Mr. Thistle often told at the mess-table; and I remarked, with some pain, in a future part of the voyage, that every time my boat's crew went to embark in the Lady Nelson, there was some degree of apprehension amongst them, that the time of the predicted s.h.i.+pwreck was arrived. I make no comment, (says Capt. Flinders,) upon this story, but to recommend a commander, if possible, to prevent any of his crew from consulting fortune-tellers."--It should be observed that, strange as it may appear, every particular of these predictions came exactly to pa.s.s, for the master and his boat's crew were lost before the Investigator was joined by the Lady Nelson, from Port-Jackson; and when the former s.h.i.+p was condemned, the people embarked with their commander on board the Porpoise, which was wrecked on a coral reef, and nine of the crew were lost.

[76] In 1670, the pa.s.sion for horoscopes and expounding the stars, prevailed in France among the first rank. The new-born child was usually presented naked to the astrologer, who read the first lineaments in its forehead, and the transverse lines in its hands, and thence wrote down its future destiny. Catherine de Medicis carried Henry IV, when a child, to old Nostradamus, who antiquaries esteem more for his Chronicle of Provence than for his vaticinating powers. The sight of the revered seer, with a heard which "streamed like a meteor in the air," terrified the future hero, who dreaded a whipping from so grave a personage.

[77] The Chaldean Sages were nearly put to the route by a quarto pack of artillery, fired on them by Mr. John Chamber, in 1691. Apollo did not use Marsyas more inhumanly than his scourging pen this mystical race; and his personalities made them sorely feel it. However, a Norwich knight, the very Quixote of Astrology, arrayed in the enchanted armour of his occult authors, encountered this pagan in a most stately carousal. He came forth with "A Defence of Judicial Astrologye, in answer to a treatise lately published by Mr. John Chamber. By Christopher Knight. Printed at Cambridge, 1693."

[78] Vide Amulets pa.s.sim.

[79] Lilly's work, a voluminous quarto monument of the folly of the age, was sold originally for four guineas; it is ent.i.tled "Christian Astrology," modestly treated, in three books, by William Lilly, student in Astrology, 2nd. edition 1659. Every page is embellished with a horoscope which, sitting on the pretending tripod, he explains with the utmost facility. There is also a portrait of this arch rogue and star-gazer, an admirable ill.u.s.tration for Lavater. As to Lilly's great skill in prophecy, there goes a pleasant story related by a kinsman of Dr. Case, his successor--namely--that a person wanting to consult him on a certain point coming to his house one morning, Lilly himself going to the door, saw a piece of filthy carrion which some one, who had more wit than manners, had left there: and being much offended at its unsightly appearance wished heartily he did but know who had treated him in that manner by leaving such an unwelcome legacy, as it were, in his very teeth, that he might punish them accordingly; which his customer observing when the conjurer demanded his business, "Nothing at all,"

said he, "for I'm sure if you can't find out who has defiled your own door, it is impossible you should discover anything relating to me," and with this caustic remark he left him.

[80] The Reverend and learned Thomas Gataker, with whom Lilly was engaged in a dispute, in his Annotations on the tenth chapter of Jeremiah and 10th verse, called him a "blind buzzard," and Lilly reflected again on his antagonist in his _Annus Tenebrosus_. Mr.

Gataker's reply was ent.i.tled Thomas Gataker, B.D. his Vindication of the annotation by him published upon these words, "thus saith the Lord,"

(Jer. x. 2) against the scurrilous aspersions of that grand impostor William Lilly; as also against the various expositions of two of his advocates Mr. John Swan, and another by him cited but not named. Together with the Annotations themselves, wherein the pretended grounds of judiciary astrology, and the scripture proofs produced to it, are discussed and refuted. London, 1653, in 4th part 192. Our author making animadversions on this piece in his English Merlin, 1654 produced a third piece from Mr. Gataker, called a Discourse apologetical, wherein Lilly's lewd, and loud lies in his Merlin or Pasquil for 1654, are clearly laid open; his shameless desertion of his own cause further discovered, his abominable slanders fully refuted, and his malicious and _murtherous_ mind, inciting to a general ma.s.sacre of G.o.d's ministers, from his own pen, evidently known, etc. London 1654.