CHAPTER 1
The Celestial Sphere
In the night if we direct our regard toward the starry sky, we can see, if theweather is clear, an enormous quantity of stars, more or less brilliant, and sooverwhelming that it seems impossible to even recognize anything at first. Whileobserving all these brilliant points in the sky more closely, we begin to noticethat some of them form distinct groups of stars separate from one another.
How to Recognize these in the Mass of Stars
In antiquity, people formed these groups of stars, figures to which theimagination of the wise ones assigned some shapes. Some are merely geometric,but most often people used the shapes of animals, of people, or of objects. Onegave the name of constellations to these clumps of stars, and there are someunique constellations in the Northern Hemisphere which are directly overhead inEurope, and some others unique to the Southern Hemisphere, on the other side theequator.
The Starry Route
One should also note, that besides some stationary stars that appear studded inthe sky like so many lights, there are also mobile bodies that promenade throughthe constellations. These stars are first the Sun, then the Moon. Of the rest,the planets, we will speak later. Let us hold on, for the moment, to theexterior sensations that they produce on the Earth. We will see that a lot ofobvious movements are actually due to the movement of the Earth, but we willignore this at present, because it would interfere with the clarity of ourdescriptions. Therefore, in observing the sky, people realized that in itscourse the Sun traversed the constellations, always the same; they noted thatthe Moon followed the same course, as well as all the other wandering stars, orplanets.
The Zodiac
This pathway followed by the celestial wanderers through the sky was called theway of the celestial animals, or the divine starry way or zodiac. This zodiac iscomposed of twelve constellations, and this study is most important for theastronomer, as much as for the astrologer. We will return to it for more detaillater.
Divisions of Sky
All the bodies in the sky therefore divide in two major types; first thestationary stars forming the constellations, then the wandering stars movingthrough the twelve constellations of the zodiac.
Stationary Stars
The word "fixed" applied to the stars is relative; these stars indeed don'tdisplace individually, this is what differentiates them from the wanderingstars. But the sky displaces around the Celestial Pole; behold why the ancientsconsidered the sky like a large ocean, within which the constellations rose orset.
The Celestial Sphere
A set of astronomical observations ancient and modern based on the rising andsetting of the constellations.
The Celestial Sphere (According to the Ancient System of Ptolemy)
In order to navigate, people divided the celestial sphere in a very simple andanalogous way to the division of the Earth. The celestial sphere has two Poles;a North or Arctic Pole, and a South or Antarctic Pole. Between these two Polesand in the middle of the sphere is the celestial Equator, parallel to the Poles;the zodiac, acting in the sky like the ecliptic on the Earth; cuts the Equatorin two places, in such a way that six signs of zodiac are above the Equator,toward the North or Arctic Pole, and six beneath the Equator, toward the Southor Antarctic Pole. The accompanying figure will clarify this situation of zodiacand Equator. (See figure 2 on page 4.)
The sign that is the most northern point of the zodiac is Cancer; the sign that
is the most southern, closest to the Antarctic Pole, is Capricorn.In addition to the equator and to the parallel circles in the celestial sphere,there is another circle that passes through Capricorn and is called the Tropicof Capricorn. (See figure 3 on page 6.)
The two signs of zodiac of which we have just spoken, Cancer and Capricorn,forming the extreme northerly point and the extreme southerly point of thezodiac, constitute the line of the solstices; two other signs, the eastern point(Aries), and the western point (Libra), constitute the line of the equinoxes.
These last two signs are exactly placed at the two points where the zodiac cutsthe equator. In the starry way, one finds, therefore, the grand celestial cross,defined by the line of the equinoxes and solstices, and constituted by foursigns, North-South, and East-West; Cancer-Capricorn, and Aries-Libra.
The astrologers call these four signs, the angular houses, because they occupythe four angles of sky, or the four cardinal points. (See figure 4 on page 6.)
These four angles indicate the beginning of the four seasons. It is necessarynow to memorize in order the names of the twelve zodiacal signs. These signs arethe following, with the corresponding months, because the astrologers' yearbegins in March:
These dates indicate the entrance of the Sun in the different signs in 1916.
In order to learn the signs of zodiac in sequence by heart, you may use thefollowing mnemonic:
In small doses, you will manage to memorize the succession of the signs of thezodiac, which is indispensable to memorize for astrological studies.
Each one of the twelve signs of zodiac is composed of groups of stars, which,united together, comprise geometrical figures. All of antiquity assigned to thezodiacal signs the symbolic figures of animals, personages, or objects whoresemble their name. Finally, each one of the zodiacal signs is also given aglyph (see figure 4), and we enlist the reader to combine the glyph and themnemonic formula above.
We will proceed, for the moment, but let's retain what we have learnedconcerning the zodiac, which will give us the opportunity to discuss it ingreater detail later.
CHAPTER 2
The Planets
The zodiac is the road followed by the planets or mobile stars. All the planetstraverse successively through the twelve signs of the zodiac, but each one witha different speed. Let us take as our first example the march of the Sun, whichserved as the basis for the establishment of a mass of allegorical stories inancient mythology.
We will give some elements of plain astronomy first, and it is only in afollowing chapter that we will bring back the astrological point of view ininterpreting the physical data of the astronomers.
First Hierarchy of the Plants
For the astronomer, the Sun is at the center of our planetary world. (See figure5, page 10.) If we move away from the position of the Sun, we have the planetsin the following sequence:
1) Sun
2) Mercury
3)...
