66 History of Nature. [BooK II. 



him, and that himself was born in it. And if we may con- 

 fess a Truth, a happy Presage that was to the whole World. 

 Some there he who believe that these Stars be perpetual, and 

 go their Course round ; but are not seen, unless they be left 



" (She) bore it upwards to its native skies : 

 Glowing with newborn fire she saw it rise : 

 Forth springing from her bosom, up it flew, 

 And kindling as it soar'd, a (sparkling star it) grew ; 

 Above the lunar sphere it took its flight, 

 And shot behind it a long trail of light." 



But the particular object of Augustus seems to have been to connect this 

 appearance of a star with his family in their claim of Divine honour, as 

 being directly descended from the goddess Venus, whose particular ensign 

 this was. Dalechamp mentions a Roman coin, bearing on the obverse 

 the head and inscription of the deified Caesar, and, on the reverse, a temple 

 of Venus, with a star, and a statue of Caesar in the augural dress, and an 



(From a Coin in the British Museum.) 



altar for offerings and vows, with the inscription, " Divo Julio." It was 

 because of this alleged consanguinity to the goddess, that at his funeral 

 the Repository was made in the form of the temple of this divinity. The 

 origin of this story of the star of Venus may be traced to a Phoenician or 

 Trojan source ; for we find, in the Fragments of Sanchoniatho, the fol- 

 lowing account : " But travelling about the world, she found a star fall- 

 ing from the sky ; which she, taking up, consecrated in the Holy Island 

 Tyre. And the Phoenicians say, that Astarte is she who is amongst the 

 Greeks called Aphrodite:' (Bishop Cumberland's Trans, p. 36.) This 

 Tyrian or Trojan deity was the Marine Venus, and is to be distinguished 

 from Venus Urania, the heavenly, the greatest ; who, according to Cicero, 

 (N. D. iii. 23.) and other authority, was the Syrian Astarte, and the 

 Ashteroth of sacred Scripture ; whose ensigns were : on her head, the 

 horns of a bull ; about her, thunderbolts ; and round her, many stars. 

 Lucian, describing her statue, which he had seen, says : " She had a splen- 

 did stone on her head, which was called xvxb, which in the night gave 

 much light to the temple, but shone weakly in the day-time, and looked 

 like fire. Nor were these, the Roman deities Venus and Juno, the only 

 powers that were designated by a star. The prophet Amos (chap. v. 26) 



