Note 2 — PREFACE
J. M. Ashmand translation
To this view of the case, the following remarks seem not inapplicable: they are taken from a periodical work of deserved reputation:—
“The study of astrology itself, as professing to discover, by celestial phenomena, future mutations in the elements and terrestrial bodies, ought, perhaps, not to be despised.† The theory of the tides, for example, is altogether an astrological doctrine, and, long before the days of Sir Isaac Newton, was as well understood as it is at this moment. The correspondence alleged by the ancient physicians to exist between the positions of the Moon and the stages of various diseases, is so far from being rejected by the modern faculty, that it has been openly maintained.”†† The writer then recounts sundry incidents, asserted by the astrologers to be dependent on the Moon, and he adds these words: “The fact of these allegations might be so easily ascertained, that it is surprising they should still be pronounced incredible, and denied rather than contradicted.”
† “Sir Christopher Heydon’s Defence of Astrology, p. 2, edit. 1603.”
†† “Dr. Mead on the Influence of the Sun and Moon upon Human Bodies. See also Edinb. Rev. vol. 12, p. 36—Balfour on Sol-Lunar Influence.” Blackwood’s Magazine for Dec., 1821, Part 2, No. 59.