Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1889-04-21
Ms" The Aighans never give nor ask
quarter.
Divination I'm she seventeenth Gen.
tuvs.
- De-

National heyioW.l
Until the seventeenth century the as
trologcr was but little alluded TO In gene
raj literature, nor can find that he Was,
until then, represented upon the stage.
We may fairly conclude that the astro-
logical iargon which Congreve puts into
the mouth OF Foresight in "Love for
Love" would have been unintelligible to
the pit century earlier No sooner,
however, were they relieved from the
fear Of the priests than tho astrologers
hastened to put their skill at the dis
posal OF oil. OF high or low degree. who
were able to pay for it. In France, II We
may believe Pierre / Estoile, there were,
in the reign of Charles TX. no fewer
than 10000 persons openly engaged IN
the practice of divination and, even
after making allowance for much exag-
geration in an estimate which would ex-
hibit France as the most charlatan-rid-
den country of that or any other age, It
cannot be doubted that the belief had
there taken very firm root. We find
abundant evidence OF this in the me-
moirs Of Sully, who repeatedly COM
plains OF the spread of "the infection OF
trading in the occult sciences feml'
nine influence, always powerful IN
France, had rnuch to do with the success
OF the movement. Catherine de Medlci,
the patroness of Anger ferrier and Nos
tradamus, was herself On adept,
and La Belle Gabrielle, whom
Sully calls 1.-the weakest OF her
sex with regard to divinstion, "
surrounded herself with astrologers
whose gloomy predictions of an early
death caused her to pass whole nights IN
weeping. But perhaps the most striking
testimony of the great respect which was
then paid TO the art is the description
which Sully gives of the fear shown by
his roietolLe at the utterances OF an
astrologer VII he met by accident at
country inn, and TO whom he was
obliged" as he says, Ito show his
hands and to tell his age" tits amusing,
also, to notice that while Sully, IN his
character as an esprit fort, never loses
chance OF gliding at astrologers, be
never quotes an unfulflled prediction,
and frankly confesses that that OF In
Brosse concerning himself was never
absent from his mind. Many causes CON
tributed ut the same period to the
spread of the superstition in England
According 10 such authorities rs Mr..
Lecky and NJ. Maury, the revival OF
learning had brought with it a revival OF
the spirit and perhaps Of the practice OF
the ancient world. Others have thought
that the old Manichean faith in emana-
tions and intelligence faith which IN
volyed belief in the possibility Of
divination, and faint traces Of which
had been preserved by such sects as
the Waldenses- new life at
the reformation and entered largely
into some OF the new theoloGles
then promulgated. What is certain ID
that the wild doctrines OF Paracelsus'
among which astrology occupied a fore
most place, were quickly supplsntinG.the
system OF the Galenist physicians
throughout the kingdom, and that the
rapidly-increasng Puutanism OF the peo-
pie lent itself readily to predestinarian
ideas OF every kind. Hence the ideas OF
the learned and Of the vulgar were for
once in accord, and the age which found
Bacon and Sir Thomas Browne unable
TO reject astrology as n delusion saw the
soldiers Of Cromwell cheered to the onset
by the predictions of Lilly.