DIVARICATING from the beaten track of all my predecessors in the
Celestial Art, whose method it hath ever been to leave the
interpretation of their symbolical prefigurements to be explorated and
divined by the subtlety of the ingenious reader himself,—by the which
they did shroud, in a tenfold tenebrosity of Cimmerian gloom, their
no-meaning mysteries, and ambiguous puzzlements;—deviating, I say, from
such a course, I do herewith not only present thee, as hath been my
custom, with an Hieroglyphic "adapted to the times," but lifting the
veil of obscurity, wherein it is shrouded from vulgar apprehension, lay
patent and exposed the hidden meaning thereof.
It hath in it the three grand postulates or requirements of a veritable
Hieroglyphic, _videlicet_,—It is Astroscopical, Astrological, and
Prophetical:—
It is _Astroscopical_, as it is founded on an observation of the Stars.
It is _Astrological_, as it is indicative of planetary potency and lunar
influence; and
It is _Prophetical_, inasmuch as it not only presenteth the present, but
futurizeth the future.
_Taurus_, the _Bull_ (egregious John!), having, through a plethora of
purse, fallen into a dreamy mood, yielded himself up to a somniferous
influence, which becloudeth, with a misty obfuscation, his natural
senses; whereupon the megrims of his crazy brain do set themselves to
work, and conjure up certain airy visions of speculative aggrandizement.
Floating _in nubibus_ before his fancy's eye, are sundry bubbles, blown
by an Imp of Speculation, who ruleth the phantasies which do take John's
imagination captive. _Gemini_ (the Twins) in the similitude of a
joint-stock Company proffer him wealth;—baseless castles, of
unsubstantial fabric, resting on ether, do shadow forth his
brick-and-mortar predilections;—and a rail-road betwixt Dover and
Calais, uniting that which nature had dissevered, accomplisheth that
propinquity, which John ever affecteth for good neighbourhood and
fellowship; while _Luna_, who hath established a reciprocity rail-road
with our planet, grinneth at his gullibility, and marketh him for her
own.
Descending from the clouds, note we the state of his household matters,
while he thus dreameth in complacent security.
Thou mayest observe, gentle Reader, certain satellites of _Mercury_ (the
planet of thieves), who, under the impersonation of rooks, by an
immersion of their long beaks into the profundity of his pockets, are
abstracting his treasure. At the right hand of the dreamer, a cutpurse
knave of Spades, the apt symbol of rail-road diggers and miners, hath,
by an undermining trick, possessed himself of his bullion; while the
Demon of Gin, in the likelihood of a crafty serpent, entwined round his
lower extremities, shadoweth forth the ruin with which the fiend spirit
threateneth the props of the body politic,—the Industrious Classes. The
rats, those rogues in grain, are devouring his corn; and his faithful
Tray is gnawing at his dinner.
Surrounded as he is by wealth and plenty, shall we marvel, that when the
master of the house sleepeth on his post, knaves will cheat, thieves
will steal, and servants will pilfer?