ASTROLOGERS AND THEIR FANCIES.

Lake County Press, Volume VIII, Issue 447, 4 December 1879, Page 3

ASTROLOGERS AND THEIR FANCIES.

There have recently appeared in the columns of a Dunedin contemporary some startling papers on the subject of wholesale disasters which, may be expected throughout the world in the period 1880—85, consequent upon certain planets coming into conjunction during these years. The following sensible letter from the AstronomerSydney, to a daily contemporary there, will be read with interest, and may tend to allay the fear which has taken hold of some sensitive minds:— Sib,- —" It is curious how the belief in astrology seems to linger in the public mind. Every now and then the Astronomer Royal gets a letter that shows him he is an astrologer still—at least in the estimation of some people in London, who think he can read the stars and tell them where lost watches, &c, are to be found ; but I am not so honoured, although I have been asked to compute star places for astrological purposes even in Sydney. True science has so often proved that there is nothing in astrology but a system of cunningly devised rules, by which the less informed of the human race might be misled and made use of for the benefit of the astrologer, that it is now generally considered waste time to go over the ground again ; but it may be worth while to mention one or two facts of the past. History tells us that time after time the world has been warned to prepare for a deluge or some equally dreadful catastrophe, and one astrologer went so far as. to say that the great deluge might have been predicted by a study of the stars. Each time the planets have been in conjunction in a watery or a fiery constellation, the inevitable prediction has come, but not its fulfilment, and the world slowly learned that the words of astrologers were not'wise ones. And yet, in spite of this experience in the past, and the truer teaching of astronomy, that the earth is not, as the astrologers taught, the centre of a grand system of planets whose influence as they moved through the " heavenly houses" was ever a source of terror to maukind, but is simply one of these very mischievous planets itself, still it seems there are some who believe that any conjunction of the planets bodes ill to human kind, and if any one, competent or incompetent, says there is going to be a " conjunction" they ask immediately what is going to happen. f: It is not worth while to multiply instances of absurd predictions. One, well known to readers on the subject, may suffice for the past, and we will take one of more recent date. •-„-.•• -• . ■ In the year 1524 it happenod, as~ it often bad before—did on the first of this month—and will happen again, that Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars were in conjunction, This fact, from an astrological point of view, meant woe to the family of man, and everyone looked to the learned to " read the signs of the times." Fortunately for the astrologer, who knew of the facility with which a deluge could be swallowed, the conjunction took place in the constellation Pisces, which represented something that was, or had been, in the water ; andthis was quite enough to justify the prediction of a deluge, which " Stoffler," an able mathematician and astrologer, said would take place in the month of February, 1524. People everywhere provided themselves with boats, in which they hoped to escape ; and one doctor, who had more money than wit, built a_ huge vessel after the Noah's Ark design, in which, with commendable forethought, he intended to keep alive all those animals which he thought most useful; but, alas for the " perversity of the matter !" the deluge came not, and February proved a very dry month. Now in this year of grace, '79, we are promised another deluge with certain accessories of interest to believers. The doctor who ventures to predict on such uncertain data hails from "Chicago," and he says between 1880 and 'BS Jupiter, Uranus, Saturn, and Neptune will each pass their perihelion, and, in consequence of this, there will be cataclysms, plagues (by-the-bye the deluge is not to be universal—people cannot believe that now-a-days), pestilences, &c, until he comes to the end of all the dreadful words in our language. The doctor's letter has been copied from paper to paper, until many are asking—what does it all mean ? The letter is written with such a semblance of science that it looks like truth, and many no doubt have been deceived by it; but upon carefulreading the doctor's object becomes apparent; great stress is laid upon the sufferings by disease, and upon the number- of deaths ; and the many dangers that will surround life are dwelt upon with an evident purpose. Now, what will " Paterfamilias " do in face of such risks ? Insure his life, of course, and it is evident that the doctor's letter is simply a clever insurance advertisement. Now the facts-are these: —Jupiter will be in perihelion next year in September, and at its nearest point to the earth, will be-nearly four Hundred millions of miles distant. Saturn will be in perihelion in August, 1885, and be-distant from the earth nearly-eight hundred millions of miles. Uranus-;will be in perihelion in April, 1882, and distant nearly one hundred and sixty millions of miles, while Neptune is not in perihelion, nor will he get to that point for eighty-three years.

Notice the dates—lßßo, 1852,1885—50 that even if there were anything' in the fact of j perihelion position, these planets come to it at intervals of two and three yeara; not all together, as people have been led to believe. And then, what are their positions in the sky P Or, as the astrologer saya, in the "heavenlyhouses." In 1882, there will be three hours between '' Jupiter " " and '' Saturn," eight between " Saturn " and T " Uranus," so that they oppose each other and leave no«just base even for an astrological prediction. But for the sake of argument, suppose they all came to the perihelion together, and were together in the sky, what would be the result? It would-be a-slightly increased attraction to the earth',- which it would affect to such an infinitessimal degree that no one could detect it without the most refined instrumental appliances, and this would he the only effect, and perfectly inadequate to influence the living beings on the earth.. As to other effects which astrology says are produced; the most careful investigations- made by generations of astronomers, including men of the most subtile minds, have failed to detect any such influence, or in fact any influence whatever except that of gravitation. If, then, the best of human intellect has failed to find " planetary influence" even when aided by the most refined methods, it is certain there is none of which ordinary sensation can take cognizance. H. C. RUSSELL." Observatory, Sydney, July 19. I