against the methods of interpreting the decrees of the stars which they give us to understand that the astrologers employ. Such objections might suffice to pierce the presumption of the ordinary popular astrologer but they fall back blunted from the system of Ptolemy.[1] If our sceptics thought that they were overthrowing the astrology of the man of learning by such arguments, they labored under a misapprehension, and in the eyes of one who really understood the art must have cut the figure of ignoramuses making false charges against a science of which they knew next to nothing.
As some of the arguments of our sceptics apply solely to defects in method of which the best astrologers were not guilty, so others do not deny the existence of sidereal influence over the life of man, but contend that it is impossible to determine with essential accuracy what will be the effects of that influence. Sextus, for example, seems to lay most stress upon such points as the difficulty of exactly determining the date of birth or of conception, or the precise moment when a star passes into a new sign of the zodiac. He calls attention to the fact that observers at varying altitudes, as well as in different localities, would arrive at different conclusions, that differences in eyesight would also affect results, and that it is hard to tell just when the sun sets owing
- ↑ For instance, the charge that astrologers disregard the differing aspects of the heavens in different regions does not hold true in the case of Ptolemy. Also the objection to the doctrine of nativities, that men born at different times often suffer a common fate in battle or some such general disaster, is a weak argument at best, for the fact that you and I are born under different stars does not necessitate that our careers have absolutely nothing in common, and it was nullified by Ptolemy's explanation that great general events like earthquakes, wars, floods and plagues overrule any contradictory destiny which the constellations may seem to portend for the individual. See Bouché-Leclerq, Rev. Hist., vol. lxv, p. 268.
