■ ^ AST 



ters of gond and evil hours, which gives them great au- 

 thority : tliey arc confulted as oracles ; and they have 

 taken care never to fell their anfwers hut at good rales. 



The fame fuperllition has prevailed in more modern ages 

 and nations. The French hiilorians remark, that in the 

 time of queen Catherine de Medicis, aftrology was in fo 

 much vogue, that the mod incoiilideraljle thing was not to be 

 done without confulting the ftars. And in the reigns of 

 king Henry III. and IV. of France, the prediftions of 

 allrologers were the common theme of the court conver- 

 fation. 



This predominant humour in that court was well rallied 

 by Barclay, in his Argrnis, lib. ii. on occafion of an allro- 

 loger, who had undertaken to inftruft king Henry in the 

 event of a war then threatened by the fattion of the Guilts. 

 Judiciary aftrology fliU retains its credit in the eaft, and 

 pretenders are always found ready to taki advantage of the 

 popular credulity. Some of the grandees retain an aftro- 

 loger among their dependents, and their learned men do 

 not appear to difpute the truth of their fcience, though the 

 chief dupes of the impollure are found among the populace. 

 The allrologers pretend to foretel future events from in- 

 fpeftion of the horofcope, and to predift wars, pcftilence, 

 and other public calamities ; but they are, in general, very 

 fupcrficially acquainted with the principles of the fcience 

 which they profefs. 



ASTROLUS, in Katural H'lllnry, a name given by au- 

 thors to a white and Iplendid ilone, fmall in fize, and of 

 a roundifh figure, refembling the eyes of fifhes. 



ASTROMETEOROLOGIA, the art of foretelling 

 the weather and its changes, from the afpefts and configu- 

 rations of the moon and planets. 



This makes a fpecies of ailrology, diftinguillied by fome 

 under the dcnominatiou of meteorological aftrology. 



ASTRON, in Ancient Ct-ography, a river of Alia Minor, 

 in the Troade. Pliny. 



ASTRONIUM, in Botany (xro nv y.T\'M), Jacq. Amer. 

 261. Lin. nil. Schreb. 1515. julf. 427. Clafs, dioccia 

 pentanilria. Generic Char. Male. Cal. perianth five-leaved, 

 coloured, fmall ; leaflets ovate, concave, obtule, fprcading. 

 Cor. petals five, ovate, vei-y obtufe, flat, fpreadmg very 

 much ; neftary five, roundiih, very fmall glands in the 

 difli of the flower. Stam. filaments five, fubulate, fprcad- 

 ing, the length of the corolla ; anthers oblong, incumbent. 

 Female. Cal. perianth five-leaved, coloured ; leaflets ob- 

 long, concave, obtufe, converging. C'r. petals five, fub- 

 ovate, obtufe, concave, eretl, lefs than the calyx, perma- 

 nent. Pift. germ ovate, obtufe ; ftyles three, (hort, reflex ; 

 ftigmas iubcapitate. Per. none. Calyx increaltd, co- 

 loured ; its leaflets at firft expanded into a pendulous ttar, 

 at length dropping the feed. SeeJ, one, oval, the length 

 of the calyx, laftefcent. 



Efl^. Gen. Char. Male, Cal. five-leaved. Cor. five-pe- 

 talled. Female, Cal. five-leaved. Cor. five-petalled. Styles, 

 three. Seed, one. 



Species, A. graveohns. A tree from twelve to thirty 

 feet in height, abounding with a tercbinthinate juice. The 

 leaves are unequally pinnate, with three pairs of leaflets, 

 which are oblong, ovate, acuminate, fmooth, veined, three 

 indies in length ; panicles lax, half a foot long in the fe- 

 males ; flowers fmall, red. A native of the woods about 

 Carthagena in New Spain, flowering in May and June. 



ASTRONOMICAL, fomething that relates to aftro- 

 nomy. 



Astronomical Calendar, CharaSers, Column, Horixon, 

 Hours, Month, ^ladrant, Ring-Dial, Sedor, Tahlcs, Tde- 

 fcopc, Time, Tear. See the feveial fubllantives. 



AST 



Astronomical Ohfervations. See Observations, Ob- 

 servatory, and Catalogue. 



Astronomical Place of a liar or planet, is its longitude 

 or place in the ecliptic, reckoned from the beginning of 

 Aries, in coiifequenlia, or according to the natural order of 

 the figns. 



ASTRONOMICALS, a name ufed by fome writers 

 for fcxagefinial fradtions, on account of their ufe in allro- 

 nomical calculations. 



ASTRONOMICUS Radius. See Radius. ■ 

 ASTRONOMY, formed of artip, _/?a'-, and »»/«:, law 

 or rule, is a mixed mathematical fcience, which treats of 

 the heavenly bodies, their motions, periods, eclipfes, mag- 

 nitudes, &:c. and of the caufes on which they depend. 



The early hiitory of this fcience, like that of many 

 other ancient difcoveries, is too much disfiguiid by fabulous 

 and aliegorical reprefentations, to admit ot any regnlai or 

 fatisfactory elucidation. It is probable, however, that fome 

 knowledge of this kind mull have been nearly coeval with 

 the hun;an race ; for befides motives of mere curiofity, which 

 are fufiicient to have excited men in all ages to examine the 

 magnificent and varying canopy of the heavens, it is evident 

 that fome parts of the fcience are fo connetSled with the 

 common concerns of life, as to render the cultivation of 

 them indifpenfably hccefTary. 



Many traces of it have accordingly been found among 

 various nations, which fliew that fevcral of the moft re- 

 markable celeftial phenomena, at Icall, mull have been ob- 

 fervcd, and a knowledge of them diileminated at a very re- 

 mote period. But in what age or country the fcience firll 

 originated, or by whom it was gradually methodized and 

 improved, is extremely uncertain ; nothing more being 

 known on this fubjeft than what can be obtained from the 

 fcanty and incidental information of ancient writers, whofe 

 accounts are often too extravagant and improbable to defervc 

 much attention. 



Among other relations of this kind, may be reckoned 

 what it mentioned by Jofephus in his Antiquities, who, in 

 fpeaking of the progrefs that had been made in allronomy 

 by Seth and his poilerity, before the deluge, aflerts that 

 they engraved the principles of the fcience on two pillars, 

 one of ftone and the other of brick, called the pillars of 

 Seth ; and that the former of thefe was entire in his time. 

 He alio afcribes to the Antediluvians a knowledge of the 

 aftronomical cycle of 600 years, which Montucia (in his 

 Hilloire des Mathematiques) thinks, with much greater 

 reafon, was an invention of the Chaldaeans ; and that what- 

 ever information was poflefled by the Jewifh annalift with 

 rcfpeft to this remarkable period, was probably obtained 

 either from that people, or from lome ancient writings which 

 no lunger fubfift. 



But not to infill upon this and other uncertain teftimoniea 

 of the ancients, it will be fufiicient to obferve that, not- 

 withftanding the contrariety of opinions which have pre- 

 vailed on this fubjeft, the greater part of authors are agreed 

 in fixing the origin of allronomy either in Chalda;a or in 

 Egypt ; both of which nations pretended to a very high 

 antiquity, and equally claimed the honour of producing 

 the firft cultivators of this fcience. Tlie Chaldjcans, in 

 particular, boalled of their temple, or prodigioufly high 

 tower, of Belus, which is thought by fome to have been an 

 aftronomical obfervatory, and of their celebrated philofo- 

 pher and ailronomer Zoroaftcr, whom they placed 5C0 years 

 before the deftruftion of Troy: while the Egyptians, with 

 fimilar oftentation, vaunted of their colleges of priefts, 

 which were the depofitaries of every fpecies of knowledge ; 

 and of the monument of Ofymandyas, in which it is laid 



thcrie 



