Having discovered in the last Lecture the general principles of
Astrology, we are now in a position to discuss their application to
medicine. We have already found that every Zodiacal Sign and every
Planet has its own complexion, or pair of elementary qualities, as
hot and dry, hot and moist, cold and dry, or cold and moist, and that
each has, accordingly, power over the corresponding humour—yellow
bile, blood, black bile or phlegm. We must now remark that among the
powers of the Signs and the Planets are some, specially appertaining to
medicine, that were omitted in the previous review.
Each Planet has its own peculiar power over the developing fœtus, and
exercises this power at a certain period of pregnancy. Saturn has power
in the first month after conception, and by its own frigidity (Saturn
being cold and dry) infrigidates the fœtus, coagulates it, and drys it
up, so causing early abortions. Jupiter is potent in the second month,
and bestows on the embryo the _spiritus naturalis_. Mars, in the third
month, supplies the concept with bones, and generally composes, or, as
we should say, differentiates, the various internal organs. Sol, in
the fourth month, supplies the concept with blood, and perfects the
heart and liver. Venus, in the fifth month, gives to the concept ears,
eyebrows and pudenda. Mercury, in the sixth month, opens the nose and
mouth; and Luna, in the seventh month, causes the development of the
lungs, and divides the fingers and toes according to their places.
After birth, each Planet takes under its jurisdiction certain organs
and tissues of the body, and certain faculties of the mind; and has,
moreover, jurisdiction over certain diseases and certain modes of death.
Saturn, which is cold and dry, and therefore regulates the black bile,
presides also over the bones, teeth, cartilages, the right ear, the
spleen and the bladder; and over the memory. It has power, of course,
over the diseases of these parts, and in addition, over quartan
fever, scabies, lepra, tabes, melancholia, paralysis, icterus niger,
dropsy, cancer, cough, asthma, phthisis, deafness of the right ear,
and hernia. Under Saturn occur sudden and violent deaths by falls,
precipitation, ship-wreck, suffocation, hanging, lead-poisoning, and
death at the hands of the public executioner.
Jupiter has jurisdiction over the radical moisture, over the blood,
the liver, the pulmonary veins, the diaphragm, and the muscles of the
trunk; over the senses of touch and smell; over the judgment, and
the _appetitus concupiscibilis_; over the diseases of these parts
and faculties, and in addition over small-pox, angina, inflammation,
pleurisies and peripneumonias. Deaths due to the influence of Jupiter
occur in war, in duels, and by the command of Princes.
Mars has power over the yellow bile, the gall-bladder, the left ear,
the pudenda and the kidneys. He prompts the _appetitus irascibilis_.
The diseases due to his influence are acute fevers, plague, yellow
jaundice, convulsions, hæmorrhages, carbuncles, erysipelas, ulcers,
and phagedæna. He causes death by weapons of steel, from fire, from
projectiles, by beheading, mutilation, bites of animals, especially
venomous animals, by the slaughters and blood-letting of ignorant
surgeons, and death from burns.
Sol regulates the heart, the arteries, the right eye, the right side
in men and the left side in women; the vital spirits and the bilious
blood; the sight of the right eye in men, and of the left in women,
and all good desires. The diseases due to the influence of the sun are
ephemeral fevers, syncope, spasm, catarrhs, and diseases of the eyes.
When Sol causes death, it is by plague, by syncope, or on the field of
battle.
Venus presides over the pituitous blood and semen: over the throat,
the breasts, the abdomen, the uterus and genitalia; over taste and
smell, touch and the pleasurable sensations, and the _appetitus
concupiscibilis_. The diseases due to Venus are lues venerea,
gonorrhœa, priapism, barrenness from cold and moisture (Venus being
cold and moist), lientery, and abscesses. Deaths due to her influence
are those from poison and from sexual excess.
Mercury has jurisdiction over the animal spirits, over the legs and
feet, the hands and fingers, the tongue, the nerves, and the ligaments;
over taste and hearing, common sense, imagination and reason. The
diseases that he influences are erratic and relapsing fevers, mania,
phrenitis, deliria, insanity, epilepsy, convulsion, balbuties, and
cough with profuse expectoration. Under his influence occur deaths by
poison, by witchcraft, and by process of law for perjury, forgery, and
false money.
Finally, Luna presides over the phlegm, the brain, the left eye,
the right side in women and the left in men, the stomach, and the
membranes; over the sight of the right eye in women and of the left in
men; over fear; over quotidian fevers, epilepsy, apoplexy, fatuity,
vomiting, fluxes, such as diarrhoea and menorrhagia, dropsy, and cold
abscesses. She brings those deaths that occur from superpurgation and
from drowning.
It would seem, from the several jurisdictions here assigned to Mercury
and Luna, that those whom we call lunatics ought properly to be
called Mercurials, for though the moon rules the brain, Mercury has
jurisdiction, as we have seen, over mania, phrenitis, delirium, and
insanity; and, strictly speaking, no one with any of these maladies
ought to be called a lunatic. Lunacy in the strict sense is fatuity
interrupted by lucid intervals, as we shall find further on, and this
is the sense that it had in law down to the passing of the Lunacy Acts.
Until these enactments, the legal meaning of a lunatic was a fatuous
or demented person who had, nevertheless, intervals of lucidity;
and though in common speech the meaning became generalised, and the
term was used to include all insane persons, whatever the nature of
their insanity, and whether it was interrupted or continuous, yet
lawyers, who are always both more precise and more conservative in the
application of terms than other men, continued to use the term lunacy
in its strict sense till the middle of the last century.
With respect to the corporature, or the bodily configuration, which,
with the corresponding mental disposition, is aspected by the several
Planets, there is much misapprehension; and the true doctrine is
corrupted, and attenuated to a mere remnant. We are apt to consider
that a Saturnine person is taciturn, cynical, and disposed to be
malevolent; that a Jovial person is good-humoured and hilarious; that a
Mercurial person is restless and vagrant, not continuing in one stay;
that a Martial person has a soldierly bearing; and that a Lunatic is
out of his mind; and although we should not be wrong in attributing
these mental dispositions to the persons so denominated, we should
give them but a tithe of the mental qualities the names actually
connote; and we have forgotten altogether, not only that there is a
corporature, or bodily configuration, that accompanies and indicates
each mental temperament, but also that there are persons of Solar and
Venereal temperament as well as those that are Jovial, Saturnine, and
so forth. The corporature, and the mental disposition that accompanies
and is signified by it, are precise and detailed, so that the expert
astrologer can tell at a glance what sort of person he has to deal
with, and what Planet has jurisdiction over that person’s life,
fortunes, and health.
Those, for instance, who are Saturnine, may be known by the following
physical signs: they are moderately fleshy, of medium height, their
countenances are long, their eyes large and black, their teeth very
large; they are of dark complexion, have scanty straight black hair,
thin beards, are pigeon-toed, and of truculent bearing. When well
affected by the Planet, persons of such a corporature are profound
thinkers, investigators of mysteries, prudent, reticent, inclined
to solitude, suspicious, laborious, patient, persevering, lovers
of work, eager for gain, and masterful. When ill affected by the
Planet, they are sad, melancholy, austere, timid, miserly, querulous,
taciturn, solitary, followers of the Black Art, suspicious, untruthful,
malevolent, untrustworthy to the point of fraudulence, treacherous, and
often suffer the penalties of the law for their misdeeds.
The favoured of Jupiter are, in configuration, fleshy, with rounded
knees; they are of medium stature, elegant and majestic in bearing.
In complexion they are rosy; their eyes are dark and rather large.
They are prone to baldness, and have thick reddish beards. When
well affected by the Planet, such persons are simple, just, pious,
religious, faithful, humane, merciful, hilarious, gracious, open,
affable, liberal, splendid, magnanimous and law-abiding. When ill
affected, they have these qualities in excess. They are superstitious,
sentimental, humanitarian, prodigal and vain-glorious.
The subjects of Mars are thin and well-proportioned; they are pale,
with blue eyes and abundant curly hair, not only on the head but on
the body. They are of middle stature, with large heads, round faces,
small eyes, large nostrils, long teeth and military bearing. When well
affected, they are strong, robust, brave, greedy of fame, irascible,
given to hunting and games, vindictive, impatient of control,
domineering, delighting in war and battles, contemptuous of danger,
agile, ready, hasty, self-confident, and indifferent to religion. When
ill affected, they are impious, unjust, arrogant, merciless, seditious,
foolhardy, quarrelsome, brawlers, homicides, tyrants, incendiaries,
robbers, thieves and bandits.
Those under the jurisdiction of Luna are tall, pale, good-looking, with
light hair and eyes, and with becoming beards. When well affected, they
are ingenious, subtle, sincere, open, honest and well-mannered; when
ill affected, they are stupid even to fatuity, timid and restless. It
is very important to know that, as might be expected, it is when the
moon is waxing that they are well affected, and they are ill affected
when she is on the wane. Here we see the origin of the legal doctrine,
already alluded to, that a lunatic is a demented person who has lucid
intervals, these intervals being when the moon is in the first two of
her phases, while the periods of fatuity are the last two phases, when
she is past the full, and her light is waning.
The votaries of Mercury are characterised by medium stature, a
well-proportioned body, pleasing complexion, and yellow hair. They
are graceful, with very small hands, feet and teeth; they have scanty
beards, thin voices, and are rapid in their movements. When well
affected, they are witty, studious, quick to learn, even without
being taught; they are disputatious, wise, cautious, prudent, easily
accommodating themselves to persons and circumstances; sociable and
inquisitive. When ill affected, they are unstable, forgetful, apt to
have hallucinations and to talk nonsense, liars, parasites, flatterers,
deceitful, perfidious, perjurers, calumniators, forgers of wills,
coiners of false money, meddlers in things that do not concern them,
and dangerous counsellors.
Under the jurisdiction of Venus are those of medium stature, succulent,
with delicate and fair complexions, good-looking, with crisp brown or
blackish hair, dark eyes, narrow eyebrows, narrow chests, and thick
thighs. When well affected, they are indolent, bland, pious, religious,
merciful, peaceful, sociable, lovers of the arts of singing and of
music, elegant and graceful, and given to delicacies and pleasures.
They are lucky in love and in friendship, forgiving, and impatient
under misfortune. When ill affected, they are timid, imprudent,
effeminate, lecherous, and betrayers of women.
Lastly, the characters of those who are ruled by the Sun are a large
head, a round and glowing face, large eyes, long hair which at length
falls out and leaves them bald, and a sallow complexion. When well
affected, they are pious, just, upright, faithful, open, chaste,
worldly-wise, apt to anger, but magnanimous, honourable, splendid and
magnificent, warm in friendship, and lovers of their wives and children.
It will have been noticed that the descriptions of the bodily
configurations are not very definite, and we are warned by Maninius to
be very careful of judging of the dominant Planet by the configuration
of the body. This, he says, is a part of the science in which many
fail; and it is not yet fully ascertained. The knowledge is to be
attained by long experience only. Maninius had, indeed, good reason
to inculcate caution in interpreting the indications obtained from
Astrological lore, for he sought to clench the arguments with which he
was defending Astrology from the attacks of Gassendi, by predicting
the death of the sceptic upon a certain date. When the date came round
in due course, Gassendi unexpectedly refused to die, and Maninius then
discovered a mistake in his calculation which had led him to antedate
the event. He corrected the error, revised his prediction, and fixed
another and later date, beyond which Gassendi could not survive.
He seems, however, to have overlooked a second time some material
factor, for his opponent lived on, and laughed him to scorn, giving
much occasion to the enemy to blaspheme. Maninius, unfortunately,
lacked the resource of Dean Swift, who was confronted with the same
difficulty by the survival of the astrologer Partridge. Swift, under
the pseudonym of Isaac Bickerstaff, predicted that Partridge would die
“on the twenty-ninth of March next, about eleven at night, of a raging
fever”; and, when the date was past, published a circumstantial account
of the death, with a confession by Partridge of the imposture of his
predictions. In vain Partridge denied the facts, for Bickerstaff gave
five conclusive reasons for disbelieving these protestations, and for
holding that Partridge was in fact dead, and in denying the fact had
carried beyond the grave his proclivity for telling lies.
When it is remembered that any Sign of the Zodiac may be in any of
the Houses of Heaven; that any Planet may be in any House, and may
have any aspect, sextile, quartile, trine, or opposition, towards the
Ascendent and towards the other Planets; and that the various Planets
have by these means their powers reinforced or attenuated in the most
various degrees; and when we remember further the different powers that
different Planets have over different persons and different diseases,
it will easily be seen that the variations are virtually infinite, and
the whole scheme far too complicated to put to practical application.
In practice, however, the calculations of the physician were narrowed
down to a small number of factors. Arnaldus de Villanova, a physician
of great repute in the thirteenth century, limits these as follows:—A
perfect physician, he says, should constantly bear in mind eight
Astrological factors; and then we are disappointed to find that he
enumerates only seven. It is no doubt the want of the eighth factor
that has falsified the predictions that I have ventured to make in
accordance with his rules. Be that as it may, the factors that he
enumerates, as necessary for the perfect physician to consider, are
these: