132 ADVANCBMENT OF LEARNING. [bOC»K III. 



tions let a just astrology be formed ; and according to these 

 alone should schemes of the heavens be made and inter- 

 preted. 



Such an astrology should be used with greater confidence 

 in prediction, but more cautiously in election, and in both 

 cases with due moderation. Thus predictions may be made 

 of comets, and all kinds of meteors, inundations, droughts, 

 heats, frosts, earthquakes, fiery eruptions, winds, gi-eat rains, 

 the seasons of the year, plagues, epidemic diseases, plenty, 

 famine, wars, seditions, sects, transmigrations of people, and 

 all commotions or great innovations of things natural and 

 civil. Predictions may possibly be made more particulai, 

 though with less certainty, if when the general tendencies of 

 the times are found, a good philosophical or political judg- 

 ment applies them to such things as are most liable to this 

 kind of accidents. For example, from a foreknowledge of 

 the seasons of any year they might be apprehended more 

 destructive to olives than grapes, more hurtful in distempers 

 of the lungs than the liver, more pernicious to the inhabit- 

 ants of hills than valleys, and, for want of provisions, to 

 monks than courtiers, &c. Or if any one, from a knowledge 

 of the influence which the celestial bodies have upon the 

 spirits of mankind, should find it would affect the people 

 more than their rulers, learned and inquisitive men more 

 than the military, &c. For there are innumerable things of 

 this kind that require not only a general knowledge, gained 

 from the stars, which are the agents, but also a particular 

 one of the passive subjects. 



Nor are elections to be wholly rejected, though not so 

 much to be trusted as predictions; for we find in planting, 

 sowing, and grafting, observations of the moon are not abso- 

 lutely trifling, and there are many particulars of this kind. 

 But elections are more to be curbed by our ndes than pre- 

 dictions ; and this must always be remembered, that election 

 only holds in such cases where the virtue of the heavenly 

 bodies, and the action of the inferior bodies also, is not tran- 

 sient, as in the examples just mentioned; for the increases 

 -^ the moon and planets are not sudden things. But punc- 

 itiality of time should here be absolutely rejected. And 

 perhaps there are more of these instances to be found in. civil 

 matters than some would imagine. 



