Astrology (Gr., 'science of the stars') in early times was a comprehensive term for the study, both of the motions of the heavenly bodies, and of their supposed influence on human and terrestrial affairs. Now it has only the latter meaning, the term Astronomy having usurped the former. Astrology is one of the oldest superstitions, prevailing in very early times among the Egyptians,
Hindus, Chinese, Etruscans, and above all, the Chaldeans. Its rise may be regarded as produced by the impatient curiosity, and desire for harmony, of our race. Long ere any regularly operating laws were discerned in national or individual history, they could be seen in the more marked changes of material nature, among which the motions and influences of the heavenly bodies most conspicuously ranked. In the case of the sun, these ruled and vivified the earth. It was natural, then, to suppose that the overruling power which ordered the apparent chances of human life resided in the heavens, and that its decrees might be read there, the motions of the heavenly bodies proving, on trial, to be predictable. The astrology of the Egyptians was founded on solar theories. They connected each point of the sun's course with a stage of human existence. To them its rising, culmination, and gradual descent figured the progress of man's life in youth, maturity, and age. The Chaldeans, or Chaldaic-Babylonians, included in their system the other planets also. It was chiefly to their labours and fancies that the ancient world owed its astrology. Their name even became a synonym for astrologers, and continued long to be so, and on their system medieval astrology was principally founded. But their astrology was more noble in its conceptions than the degraded medieval and modern forms of the science. They considered the stars and planets not as the mechanical powers ruling men's destinies, but as a revelation of the Supreme Being. They held them as incarnations or emanations—sentient beings—proceeding from the absolute Being. Each planet was thus a visible deity. With this mythology, however, was gradually conjoined accurate observation of the motion of the heavenly bodies (see ASTRONOMY), producing a strange mixture of science and fantastic imagery. In Rome astrology found many adherents, though the educated were generally hostile; Cicero, the elder Pliny, and Tacitus declared against it. Seneca, however, believed in the influence of the stars on men; and astrology profoundly influenced the Alexandrian mystics and the Neoplatonists.
The spread of Christianity in the West, and later of Mohammedanism in the East, entirely altered the character of astrology. By both it was robbed of its polytheistic element. But the Arabs, as fatalists, found its tenets more congenial. Under the Califs Al Mansur and Almunazar it was diligently cultivated, and is still accepted by the Arabs everywhere. How inwrought in Mohammedan society it became may be seen by any student of the Arabian Nights. To Christianity it was less akin; though its influence appears in the beautiful story of the wise men of the East journeying to our Saviour's cradle. These were most probably Chaldean magi and astrologers. Some of the early fathers, however, accepted or modified the doctrine of astrology. Clemens Alexandrinus, Origen, and Augustine, all protest against it. By later church authority it was regarded as obnoxious, and several times publicly condemned. But by many zealous Catholics, and even churchmen, it was cultivated. Cardinal D'Ailly, in the 15th century, is said to have calculated the horoscope of Jesus Christ, and maintained the astrological predictability of the deluge. Louis XI. of France, among his many superstitions, numbered also this, and maintained for long the astrologer Galeotti. Nostradamus (q.v.) was the great astrologer of the 16th century; during which, though the most learned and powerful minds continued to cultivate the science, it gradually declined from its former position of credit and power. It could not endure the double assault of the Reformation and its accompanying spirit of true scientific inquiry. Tycho Brahé, Kepler, and Gassendi represent well this stage in its history. Their own discoveries, with those of Copernicus and Galileo, sapped its foundations, though they could not shake off its influence on themselves. Protestant theologians like Melanchthon cultivated the science. Paracelsus and Cardan combined astrology with alchemy and medicine. Burton, of the Anatomy, died about the date he had himself forecast. Robert Fludd and William Lilly in England represent the latest period of the public power of astrology. The latter especially is well known by his almanac, his prophecy of the great plague and fire of London, and his claim to foresee the fate of Charles I. He was even for a time pensioned by parliament for giving information. Dryden had his children's nativity reckoned. With Newton, astronomy emerged from mystery. His conceptions extended the terrestrial laws of the planets. The sun and stars—in his words, 'but great earths vehemently hot'—could no longer be viewed as rulers of destiny, and astrology thenceforth passed into the hands of quacks and pseudo-scientists, only an isolated effort being made here and there to rehabilitate it.
For great solitary minds, astrology has ever had an attraction. Wallenstein was a complete believer in it, and Napoleon I. often spoke of his star and his destiny, and through them was accessible to flattery. A modern astrologer declares that Napoleon and Wellington were born, the one under Saturn, the other under Jupiter, in the house of dignities. Hence Napoleon's dignities were misfortune to himself and others, Wellington's were beneficent, and finally superior. This astrologer was not a Frenchman. One of the last professed astrological authors of standing was Pfaff in Germany, who published his Astrologie in 1816. Amongst Parsees the wedding-day is fixed by an astrologer.
Natural astrology, the science by which the motions of the heavenly bodies were predicted so far as the knowledge of the time might allow, contained much of scientific value, and is now absorbed in Astronomy (q.v.).
The science of judicial astrology, which studies to predict terrestrial occurrences by means of the heavenly bodies, is simple. For its purposes the celestial sphere was divided into twelve sectors called 'houses of heaven.' The surface of a peeled orange appears divided in a manner which fairly represents these. Place the axis of the fruit horizontally in a north and south line, then the divisions of its surface will represent their position on the most common system. If its axis be inclined so as to point either to the pole of the equator or ecliptic, it will show the houses on other less common plans. These houses are supposed fixed, and the planets in their diurnal and orbital movements thus pass from one to another, traversing them all in a day. We shall use only the common system in explaining. On this, as the astrologer stood looking southward, he would have six houses dividing the visible heavens, in order from left to right, the horizon dividing these from the six below him. In three ways these houses differed. Their power depended on their position, the one containing the stars about to rise being most powerful. It was called the 'ascendant' (hence our expressions 'ascendency' and 'his star is in the ascendant'). Secondly, the houses differed in their subject matter, thus: (1) Life, (2) riches, (3) brethren, (4) parents, (5) children, (6) health, (7) marriage, (8) death, (9) religion, (10) dignities, (11) friends, (12) enemies. Thirdly, certain houses belonged to certain planets, which, when in them, had peculiar power. How the characteristics of a house were summed up may be seen from the following description, taken, however, from a work founded on the ecliptic scheme. 'Cancer (in this scheme the fourth house) is the sign of the tropic, particularly fruitful, but cold, watery, nocturnal, northerly, movable, weak, and mute. It is the house of the moon, and exaltation of Jupiter. It produces fair and pale complexions, round features, gray or mild blue eyes, weak voice, the superior portions of the body large, slender arms, and an effeminate constitution.' Three houses were assigned by the observer to each of the four ages of the person whose horoscope was drawn, and we can easily see how, having fixed the planetary configurations, he had the means of a pseudo-scientific prophecy at his disposal.
Usual Method, in drawing a Horoscope, of representing the Twelve Houses of Heaven.
From the above description it can also be seen how closely astrology was connected with physiognomy and observation of bodily appearance. Each planet—in some schemes each house—ruled certain parts of the world and of the human body, being thus productive or avertive of certain diseases, and specially ruling certain states. Mars was lord of iron and the blood. Aries ruled Great Britain, France, and Germany. A conjunction of Mars and Saturn (malignant in his influence) in Aries might then threaten war and pestilence to a great part of Europe. Gemini ruled the arms and shoulders. But different authorities, in a matter so much of fancy, differed much in assigning those properties, and fierce controversies have raged between them, now happily forgotten. Still, however, many accept this strange, but not unnatural, superstition. The astronomer royal is often annoyed by letters requesting him to draw the horoscope of children, or to help by the stars in finding lost property. Hence astrology is now a means of extracting money from the simple. The 'astrology man,' or sometimes 'woman,' still has a delineation of the zodiac in his darkened room, and conjures with it to the loss of curious servant girls and apprentices. Zadkiel's Almanac and the magazine Urania, by their existence show, too, that such credulity is not confined to the illiterate. But the chief interest of astrology to the educated is as an almost forgotten, but remarkable, development of the mind of man. Our everyday language, however, still testifies to the once widespread belief in astrology. We still speak of men as 'jovial,' or 'saturnine,' or 'mercurial' in temperament—an unconscious survival of a time when the planet under which a man was born per- manently influenced his life. Jupiter or Jove was the joyfullest star, hence those born when he was in the ascendant were jovial and joyous; while those born under Saturn were saturnine, grave, and gloomy; and those under Mercury as mercurial and light-hearted as himself. The words 'disastrous,' 'ill-starred,' 'ascendency,' and 'influence,' as well as such phrases as 'born under a lucky star,' point in the same direction. Long after astrology ceased to be a belief, it retained its power over the imagination. Thus allusions to it are frequent in Milton, Ben Jonson, and their contemporaries, though its claim to being a real science was by that time generally discredited. It is interesting to see that even Chaucer in his later tales had come to think it a delusion, though in earlier years he must have been a devoted student of it, as is testified by his learned discussion of the subject in his Treatise on the Astrolabe, written for his son and published in 1391.
Readers will find further information in Christmas's Cradle of the Twin-Giants—Science and History; Robuck's Astrology and Magic; Zadkiel's Handbook to Astrology; Raphael's Guide to Astrology, and in the valuable work of M. Lenormant.