FRENCH HISTORY AND ARITHMANCY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XX, Issue 6829, 6 October 1883, Page 2 (Supplement)

FRENCH HISTORY AND ARITHMANCY.

" Asithm ANcr," or the science of divining by numbers, :is the subject of the following remarks in Harper's Magazine:—"ln 1866 many persons in France were looking to 1869 and 1870 as year* of possible catastrophes because of some curious arithmetical factß in past French history. Louis XVI. came to the thro no in 1774 ; adding theso digits together makes 19, which added to 1774 gives 1793, in which year he lost his crown and head. The next regnlar order of government began with the fall of Robespierre in 1794, and the Convention out of "which grew the First Empire. To 1794 add the sum of its digits, 21, and you have 1815, the year of Waterloo, ifche fall of Napoleon, and the return of Bourbon power with Louis XVIII. Again, add to 1815 the sum of its digits, ancE you have 1830, tho year of the revolution of July, the fall of Charles X., and accession of Louis Philippe. Here another rule in ariihwancy became operative. Louis Philippe waa born in 1773, the sum of whose digits is 18. His queen, Amelie, was born 1782. The sum of the digits is again 18, His accession was in 1830. Add 18, and the result is 1848, the date of his fall. Duiing

the reign of Louis Napoloon, French believers in arithmnncy were divided in methods of prognostication. Adding to 1848 the sum of its digits gave 1869., to which many looked as a year of disaster. Others counted from the year in which he was proclaimed emperor and married to Eugenie in* 1853. Louis Napoleon wan born in 1808, and the Empress was born in 1826,b0th which years give 17 as the sum of their digits. Following the rule, as in Louis Philippe's case, and adding this to 18.53, gave 1870. By a remarkable coincidence, the sum of the digits of 1853 wns also 17, and the old rule, as in the case of Louis XVI., also'gave the year 1870 for disaster, which camo with the ' German war and the fill of the Empire. That this was not an afterthought is shown by the publication of this prognostication for 1870 in 1866, as I have already cited it. Now, however, the French prophets, by help of the magic in mombers, are in the darkness whioh overhangs all lookers into the future.- Shall" they addilio 1870 the iium of its digits and expect tho end of the Republican 1886? Or must they take some one's birth year, and if so, j whose? Arithmetic is as good as any other method of divination :if you only know where 1 to begin aaid how much to add. Let us not ■ worry ourselves about; it." ;