Astrology
Those of your readers who are interested in Astrology would do well to peruse an article in the University Magazine for March, 1880, entitled “The Soul and the Stars,” by Mr. A. G. Trent. I am indebted for the reference to the current number of Urania,* an astrological monthly, recently established. The writer commences with an allusion to a discussion which has been carried on in the pages of that magazine on Traducianism and Metempsychosis. But the chief value of the article appears to consist in the evidence adduced of astral influences, evidence the force of which I think no unprejudiced person will deny. Twenty-three instances are given of notorious persons who have become insane, and in the nativity of each is found the Zodiacal “affliction” of the Moon or Mercury (usually both) which astrologically denotes the danger of mental disease. The aspects to the Moon are less to be regarded in these cases, as the hour not being given, her Zodiacal position at birth cannot be ascertained within an average of 6°, which would be about the variation in the 12 hours before and after noon. Mercury’s motion in the Zodiac during the day would not affect the aspects given for noon, and in 21 of the 23 cases Mercury is “afflicted.” Now I imagine that the number of conspicuous persons who have become insane, and whose birthdays are known, would not greatly exceed this list, or leave many cases unaccounted for. An induction must not be founded upon selected instances, leaving non-accordant cases out of sight, but when a particular class of person is exhausted (as in this enumeration, probably, which contains nine instances of sovereigns, and ten of men of genius, who became insane, and whose birthdays are known), the presumption of a connection between the planetary positions and the event is almost as great as that arising from a coincidence universally observed, at least until contradictory instances are adduced. That is to say, in the nativity of any other insane person we should confidently expect to find a similar indication. It may happen that some of your readers are able to supply the time and place of birth of persons thus afflicted, and should it be found on inspection of the nativity in such a case, so produced, as it were, at random, and free from all suspicion of its being adduced just because it was an accordant one, that similar indications are present, this would be a fact in the highest degree corroborative.
Temple, April 17th.
* Simpkin, Marshall & Co., 4, Stationers’ Hall Court. Price 6d.
Spiritualism Abroad
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Editor's notes
Sources
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London Spiritualist, No. 400, April 23, 1880, p. 196