The Evolution of Modern Medicine [54]
opinion of astrology has already been quoted, but who nevertheless, as court astrologer to Louise of Savoy, had a great contemporary reputation. After looking Panurge in the face and making conclusions by metoposcopy and physiognomy, he casts his horoscope secundum artem, then, taking a branch of tamarisk, a favorite tree from which to get the divining rod, he names some twenty-nine or thirty mantic arts, from pyromancy to necromancy, by which he offers to predict his future. While full of rare humor, this chapter throws an interesting light on the extraordinary number of modes of divination that have been employed. Small wonder that Panurge repented of his visit! I show here the title-page of a popular book by one of the most famous of the English astrological physicians, Nicholas Culpeper.
Never was the opinion of sensible men on this subject better expressed than by Sir Thomas Browne:[32] "Nor do we hereby reject or condemn a sober and regulated Astrology; we hold there is more truth therein than in ASTROLOGERS; in some more than many allow, yet in none so much as some pretend. We deny not the influence of the Starres, but often suspect the due application thereof; for though we should affirm that all things were in all things; that Heaven were but Earth Celestified, and earth but Heaven terrestrified, or that each part above had an influence upon its divided affinity below; yet how to single out these relations, and duly to apply their actions, is a work ofttimes to be effected by some revelation, and Cabala from above, rather than any Philosophy, or speculation here below."
[32] Sir Thomas Browne: Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Bk. IV, Chap. XIII. (Wilkin's ed., Vol. III, p. 84.)
As late as 1699, a thesis was discussed at the Paris Faculty, "Whether comets were harbingers of disease," and in 1707 the Faculty negatived the question propounded in a thesis, "Whether the moon had any sway on the human body."
The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw, among intelligent men, a progressive weakening of the belief in the subject; but not even the satire of Swift, with his practical joke in predicting and announcing the death of the famous almanac maker, nor contemptuous neglect of the subject of late years sufficed to dispel the belief from the minds of the public. Garth in the Dispensary (1699) satirizes the astrological practitioners of his day:
The Sage in Velvet Chair, here lolls at Ease To promise future Health for present Fees Then as from Tripod solemn Sham reveals And what the Stars know nothing of foretell. (Canto ii.)
The almanacs of Moore and Zadkiel continue to be published, and remain popular. In London, sandwich men are to be met with carrying advertisements of Chaldeans and Egyptians who offer to tell your fortune by the stars. Even in this country, astrology is still practiced to a surprising extent if one may judge from advertisements in certain papers, and from publications which must have a considerable sale. Many years ago, I had as a patient an estimable astrologer, whose lucrative income was derived from giving people astral information as to the rise and fall of stocks. It is a chapter in the vagaries of the human mind that is worth careful study.[33] Let me commend to your reading the sympathetic story called "A Doctor of Medicine" in the "Rewards and Fairies" of Kipling. The hero is Nicholas Culpeper, Gent., whose picture is here given. One stanza of the poem at the end of the story, "Our Fathers of Old," may be quoted:
Wonderful tales had our fathers of old-- Wonderful tales of the herbs and the stars-- The Sun was Lord of the Marigold, Basil and Rocket belonged to Mars. Pat as a sum in division it goes-- (Every plant had a star bespoke)-- Who but Venus should govern the Rose? Who but Jupiter own the Oak? Simply and gravely the facts are told In the wonderful books of our fathers of old.
[33] It is not generally known that Stonewall Jackson practiced astrology. Col. J. W. Revere in "Keel and Saddle" (Boston, 1872) tells of meeting Jackson
Never was the opinion of sensible men on this subject better expressed than by Sir Thomas Browne:[32] "Nor do we hereby reject or condemn a sober and regulated Astrology; we hold there is more truth therein than in ASTROLOGERS; in some more than many allow, yet in none so much as some pretend. We deny not the influence of the Starres, but often suspect the due application thereof; for though we should affirm that all things were in all things; that Heaven were but Earth Celestified, and earth but Heaven terrestrified, or that each part above had an influence upon its divided affinity below; yet how to single out these relations, and duly to apply their actions, is a work ofttimes to be effected by some revelation, and Cabala from above, rather than any Philosophy, or speculation here below."
[32] Sir Thomas Browne: Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Bk. IV, Chap. XIII. (Wilkin's ed., Vol. III, p. 84.)
As late as 1699, a thesis was discussed at the Paris Faculty, "Whether comets were harbingers of disease," and in 1707 the Faculty negatived the question propounded in a thesis, "Whether the moon had any sway on the human body."
The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw, among intelligent men, a progressive weakening of the belief in the subject; but not even the satire of Swift, with his practical joke in predicting and announcing the death of the famous almanac maker, nor contemptuous neglect of the subject of late years sufficed to dispel the belief from the minds of the public. Garth in the Dispensary (1699) satirizes the astrological practitioners of his day:
The Sage in Velvet Chair, here lolls at Ease To promise future Health for present Fees Then as from Tripod solemn Sham reveals And what the Stars know nothing of foretell. (Canto ii.)
The almanacs of Moore and Zadkiel continue to be published, and remain popular. In London, sandwich men are to be met with carrying advertisements of Chaldeans and Egyptians who offer to tell your fortune by the stars. Even in this country, astrology is still practiced to a surprising extent if one may judge from advertisements in certain papers, and from publications which must have a considerable sale. Many years ago, I had as a patient an estimable astrologer, whose lucrative income was derived from giving people astral information as to the rise and fall of stocks. It is a chapter in the vagaries of the human mind that is worth careful study.[33] Let me commend to your reading the sympathetic story called "A Doctor of Medicine" in the "Rewards and Fairies" of Kipling. The hero is Nicholas Culpeper, Gent., whose picture is here given. One stanza of the poem at the end of the story, "Our Fathers of Old," may be quoted:
Wonderful tales had our fathers of old-- Wonderful tales of the herbs and the stars-- The Sun was Lord of the Marigold, Basil and Rocket belonged to Mars. Pat as a sum in division it goes-- (Every plant had a star bespoke)-- Who but Venus should govern the Rose? Who but Jupiter own the Oak? Simply and gravely the facts are told In the wonderful books of our fathers of old.
[33] It is not generally known that Stonewall Jackson practiced astrology. Col. J. W. Revere in "Keel and Saddle" (Boston, 1872) tells of meeting Jackson