Astrological Musings...

In Britain in the 1800s, astrology was a subject of some concern: Church-minded people saw it as an affront to God, as outlined in His Bible; others were as accommodating of it as the seasons. Almanacs were big business and sold in the tens of thousands, earning publishers millions of pounds; attacks upon the prognostication business were viewed as much as an attack upon free-will and belief as upon pecuniary ambitions. The justice system saw things in a far more black-and-white fashion: under Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act of 1824, anyone receiving payment for “pretending or professing to tell Fortunes, or using any subtle Craft, Means, or any Device, by Palmistry or otherwise” was thrown unceremoniously into gaol for a minimum three-month term, with, or in preface to, a period of hard labour. Some argued that this was obviously meant as a deterrent to gypsies and thieves, but the ‘anti-astrologists’ saw it as a sanction by the Establishment in favour of their cause and made sure that all levels of society felt the lash of the Law.

Almanacs were commonplace throughout Britain and it was rare for any household, especially rural homes, to be without a copy of Old Moore’s Almanack which began circulating in 1697; by the early Nineteenth Century with a rising tide of interest in all things occult, other almanacs joined the throng with authors hiding behind mystical noms de plume in order to head off the vitriol and outrage of the moral majority. Inevitably, vicious in-fighting took place between the various astrologers themselves, who belittled each other’s claims as to accuracy and the quality of their predictions. Court cases were fought, legal definitions refined and reputations ruined while the public predilection for astrological insight refused to wane: furious condemnations of the astrologers’ art were, as often as not, printed alongside the daily horoscopes of such news organs as the London Times and the Daily Mail. Astrologers attempted to thwart exposure by calling themselves ‘astronomers’ and hiding behind companies claiming to be ‘telescope manufacturers’; they curried the favour of their more upper-class clients seeking public endorsement but, as the Twentieth Century loomed, many of these customers preferred not to have it known that they dabbled in the ‘quasi-science’ of stargazing.

After the Great War, there were more pressing concerns besetting the British community; post World War Two, very few people regarded astrology as a serious threat to moral correctness. In 1974, the Vagrancy Act was amended and its mystical clauses removed altogether; in all likelihood, very few people noticed or cared.

The following are a selection of the astrological publications which were prevalent in Britain and the United States from the Seventeenth- to the Twentieth Centuries; the various almanacs were published annually from the date of their inception until funds to print them ran out. Included are some of the strident attacks upon horoscopes and their casters, pamphlets in support of the ‘science’ of astrology and some predictive works of a more acceptable nature, based upon the Bible.

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Christian Astrology (aka An Introduction to Astrology)

Throughout the Seventeenth Century astrology was almost universally held to be an active force in peoples’ lives; at the height of the English Civil War, astrologers such as William Lilly (1602-1681, above) earned huge respect for their prognostications which were published widely and speculated upon by all levels of Society. Strangely enough, most of the astrologers at work at the time rallied on the side of the Roundheads and, with the Restoration of the Crown, most fell – along with their ‘science’ - into disrepute. By the start of the Eighteenth Century, astrology was the province of the lower classes, the uneducated and the illiterate. The practitioners were wielders of a craft not deep in its intricacies: signs and omens were interpreted, comets and eclipses were feared, the phases of the moon discussed in terms of the best times for planting cabbages and so forth. As a science it was homespun indeed and inextricably linked to the rural lifestyle.

William Lilly, the most famous astrologer of the English Civil War, wrote this manual as an introduction to the art in the Seventeenth Century and it became an English classic of the field. You’ll note that he used the ‘C’ word in the title to take the curse off the whole project. Much later on, as a sideline to his other literary endeavours, ‘Zadkiel’ (whom we’ll discuss shortly) took the opportunity to edit and reprint it with annotations and remarks: he retitled it An Introduction to Astrology and named himself co-author.

English; William Lilly; London, 1647; 0/1d2 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +1 percentiles; Occult +3; 6 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

English; William Lilly & Lt. Richard James Morrison, RN, ‘Zadkiel’; London, 1850s; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +3 percentiles per issue; 4 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

Moore’s Almanack (aka “Moore’s Vox Stellarum”, “Vox Stellarum”, “Old Moore’s Monthly Messenger” or “Old Moore’s Almanack”)

“It has been brought to my notice that in the higher circles of Society (unless I am borrowed from the kitchen or surreptitiously taken out of the pocket for private perusal) I am, in my humble garb of a penny or twopenny almanack, seldom permitted to shine forth (as I am told I ought to) in the upper parts of the mansion. This has determined me to put on once a month a fashionable coat; not exactly a court suit but garments that will shew due respect to my new clientele.”

-Old Moore’s Monthly Messenger

In 1697 Francis Moore (above, left) started his almanac – “Moore’s Almanack” – and it became the guiding manual for the lower classes, directing and diverting their lives on the basis of its prognostications and practical advice. It was destined to be a tome of the common people, forbidden ‘above stairs’ and largely unknown amongst the educated classes. By the Nineteenth Century and the arrival of such astrological superstars as ‘Raphael’ and ‘Zadkiel’, astrology began an upward rise and, in the hands of newer writers and publishers, “Moore’s Almanack” morphed through a number of title changes into a more sophisticated astrological journal and, as the above quote shows, more than certain of its burgeoning readership amongst the middle and upper classes.

English; Francis Moore, et.al; London, from 1697; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

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The Philosophical Merlin – A Complete System of Occult Philosophy

Robert Cross Smith was born in 1795 and came from a working-class background. Self-educated, he became enamoured of astrology and spent his life trying to find a way to make astrology pay its way for him. He moved to London and fell in with the occult underground, becoming friends with Rosicrucian Francis Barrett (author of The Magus) and John Denley owner of an occult bookshop in Covent Garden, who would later help publish and sell some of Smith’s many works.

Conceived by Smith (wjo later adopted the nom de plume ‘Raphael’) and balloonist/occultist George Graham, The Philosophical Merlin was released in 1822 through John Denley’s imprint. It claimed to be a translation of a manuscript once owned by Napoleon Bonaparte but was merely a pastiche of material cribbed from Barrett’s Magus, who, as a friend of the authors, obviously had no issue with their wholesale ransacking of his masterwork. The public were less inclined to be amenable to the book and it sold very badly, with the unsold copies being eventually remaindered.

English; Robert Cross Smith & George Graham; John Denley, 1822; 0/1 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +1 percentiles; Occult +3 percentiles; 10 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

“The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century” (aka “The Straggling Astrologer”)

 “The Straggling Astrologer” of 1824 (later re-named as “The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century”) was Smith’s first foray into the world of journals and was a weekly magazine with himself as editor: he is identified only as one of ‘the Mercurii’, a spurious group which he claimed was comprised of the brightest intellectuals in the land, indulging in occult matters. Complete with articles written by “HRH the Princess Olive of Cumberland”, supposedly the unacknowledged daughter of King George III’s brother, the magazine failed to attract much interest and folded after 22 issues. Smith’s new publisher Walter Charlton Wright, took the remaindered issues and bound them together as a book which was launched for sale in 1825. In this collection, Smith revealed his new nom de plume which would serve him for the rest of his career – ‘Raphael’.

Not discouraged, Wright and ‘Raphael’ decided to produce a second edition of the periodical, with colour plates and more edifying articles. Dedicated, somewhat unexpectedly, to Sir Walter Scott, the magazine covered such topics as invoking spirits, anecdotes of the dead and “wonderful prophecies by celebrated astrologers”. Sales tanked and Wright became bankrupt; he was forced to sell the magazine to another company – Knight & Lacey – who also lost magnificently on the project and who sold it off to another London bookshop, where it faded away.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; 44 issues: John Denley, 1824, Walter Charlton Wright, 1825; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

“Urania; or the Astrologer’s Chronicle, and Mystical Magazine”

“[This periodical] will be sufficiently authenticated to attract the attention of those who are believers in the doctrines of sidereal and occult influence, and to none other do we write.”

-from the First Issue

Returning to his first publisher John Denley, Raphael launched this monthly periodical in 1825, during his attempt to re-release “The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century” with Walter Wright. Its lofty claim to cater only to true believers was to be its downfall as there were few of the faithful to keep the project afloat for more than a year. The title “Urania” is a reference to the fact that the planet Uranus was seen to be especially associated with astrology.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; 12 issues: John Denley, 1825; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

“The Prophetic Messenger” (aka “Raphael’s Prophetic Messenger”, “The Prophetic Almanac” & “Raphael’s Astrological Almanac”)

“[May 1831] will be a month of disasters...One of an illustrious family is troubled or afflicted; something remarkable may happen to a Princess, or a Noble Lady; a great man dies, and there is evil news from foreign parts.”

-The Prophetic Messenger, May 1831

By 1826, Raphael had decided to abandon astrology and open a coffee house instead. In seeking funds to back this project he discovered that Walter Charlton Wright, the unlucky publisher of “The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century” was solvent again and, what’s more, willing to embark upon another magazine venture with Smith. They planned a more daring organ, an annual which would combine occult sensationalism along with predictions which were highly specific; most importantly, it included astrological forecasts for every day of the coming year. Surprisingly, probably for the publisher and editor as well, the almanac boomed and demand forced a reprint to take place. The formula of a daily advice chronicle designed for city-dwellers struck a chord with Britain’s middle-classes and they flocked to buy it: by 1831 there were over 8,000 subscribers.

The May 1831 prediction above was supposed to refer to George IV but was a month premature; instead, the “great man” turned out to be Raphael himself, who passed away due to complications surrounding tuberculosis in May of that year. An astrologer by the name of Dixon came forward to Raphael’s widow to ask permission to continue the journal, only to find that the astrologer had already handed over the reins to other editors in the form of two of his students, Palmer and Moody by name. In annoyance, Dixon, who had always been critical of Raphael’s predictions, printed “The True Prophetic Messenger of 1833” in opposition and then faded from the scene.

Wright continued to publish the “‘Messenger” and handed over the title of ‘Raphael’ to a series of astrologers: Palmer (now working solo) died at the helm in 1837 to be replaced by one Medhurst, who predicted as ‘Raphael III’. Wakely took over in 1853 to be replaced a year later by R. V. Sparkes who continued until his death in 1875. In 1876, the youngest ever ‘Raphael’, Robert T. Cross, took over at the age of 25 and kept the magazine flourishing until he died in 1923. By now renamed “The Prophetic Almanac”, Cross’s tenure saw circulation increase to over 190,000. The almanac is still in publication today as “Raphael’s Astrological Almanac” but it is a much reduced affair in comparison to the earlier iterations; copyright has remained with the Cross family ever since his death.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; Walter Charlton Wright, from 1826; 0/1 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

A Manual of Astrology

The success of his “Prophetic Messenger” magazine, led many other publishers to beat a path to Raphael’s door in order to convince him to write more books. He decided to do just that and released A Manual of Astrology in 1828. It is notable in that it contains a vindicating example of the powers of the stars at work, namely the correlations between King George III and a Mr Samuel Hemmings, of a much lower station in life, who were both born at the same time and on the same day in close proximity to each other, commenced their lives’ work on the same day, married at the same time on the same day and died on the same day. Raphael made sure in this instance to claim an advance for his book of £100 and he was wise to do so: being such a technical manual its sales were commensurately slow.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; Walter Charlton Wright, 1828; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +3 percentiles; 8 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

The Royal Book of Dreams

Between 1828 and 1831, Raphael lent his name to many hastily penned texts designed to ride on the back of his increasingly-popular almanac, “The Prophetic Messenger”. The publisher Walter Wright hit upon the idea of throwing the word ‘royal’ into each title to insinuate that the books were somehow sanctioned by the Royal Family. As a ploy it worked wonders and was even used to good effect by Raphael’s other publisher, John Denley. This work springs from the Book of Daniel and the story of Joseph in the Holy Bible and discusses interpretations of common dream scenarios.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; Walter Charlton Wright, 1828; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +2 percentiles; 3 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

The Royal Book of Fate, Destiny and Foreknowledge

“...Without writing or calculations of any kind, [it] contains four thousand and ninety answers to sixty-four questions of the most important subjects of human life.”

-from the Preface

In a fit of playfulness in 1829, Raphael claimed that this work was a printing from an ancient manuscript which he had edited after purchasing it from John Denley (who obviously published and sold it). It claims to deal with the most oft-heard queries from those having their horoscopes cast – such as “shall the enquirer ever become rich?” – but saves the reader the tedium of having to make complicated astrological calculations or to consult star charts.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; John Denley, 1829; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +0 percentiles per issue; 2 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

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“The British Almanac”

With a slew of innovations which meant that printing was cheap and marketable to the middle- and lower-class masses, publisher Walter Charlton Wright – whilst living high off the earnings of Raphael, his astrological almanac and associated writings – looked further afield to find other writers willing to see their work in print. He found Charles Knight, a bitter, anti-astrological polemicist and supporter of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (SDUK), and invited him to pen his own almanac, devoid of any hint of the ‘pseudo-science’. Knight set to with a will, seeing in the release of the annual “British Almanac”, a means of loosening the hold that “Moore’s Almanac” and its imitators had over the minds and actions of the British public.

English; Charles Knight for the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge; Walter Charlton Wright, 1829; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +0 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

*****

Raphael’s Sanctuary of the Astral Art: Being a Book for the Boudoir, Drawing-Room Table, and Evening Parties

A shameless bid for the public’s spare change, this book, instigated and published by Walter Wright, has only a passing acquaintance with the pseudo-science of astrology. Rather, it contains some fairly innocuous parlour games with a vague similarity to divination by tarot cards and a mild form of automatic writing. There is an introduction which discusses some astrological theory, but this can be safely skipped over by eager readers keen to get to the ‘boudoir’ bits.

This was the original Raphael’s last hurrah: Robert Cross smith passed away shorthly afterwards from the effects of tuberculosis. As discussed above however, there were plenty of others out there keen to assume his mantle.

The pen-name ‘Raphael’ was not lightly chosen. The Archangel Raphael appears in the Apocryphal Book of Tobit, where he heals the hero of the story by means of a fire-blackened fish (Biblical Cajun cuisine?). In Hebrew mysticism, Raphael is the keeper of a mysterious text entitled the Sefer Raziel, wherein all knowledge of the world and heavens is contained. According to Barrett’s The Magus, Raphael is also the Angel of Science and Intelligence, so it’s obvious that the choice of name was not an idle one.

English; Robert Cross Smith, ‘Raphael’; Walter Charlton Wright, 1831; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +0 percentiles; 1 week to study and comprehend

Spells: None

*****

“Zadkiel’s Almanac” (aka “The Herald of Astrology”)

“I regret to see that some fighting will still go on; yet the slaves are seen to be freed, and the nature of the quarrel will be entirely altered; and, after the month of May, it seems to die out by sheer exhaustion...I find Jupiter strong in the Ascendant, which will render the people pacific and reasonable, and disposed to peace, which, I have no doubt, will take place under the benefic influence of this Eclipse.”

-Zadkiel, in 1864, accurately predicts the end of the American Civil War

Newly retired from the Royal Navy, the pugnacious and self-righteous Lt. Richard James Morrison, decided to reject scientific and heretofore-accepted astrological dogma and strike forth, Quakerishly, on his own path of stargazing and cash generation. A prickly Biblical fundamentalist, he lectured widely through the industrial capitals of Britain, especially, Manchester and Birmingham, espousing his views on the state of the world and mankind’s place within it. A charismatic speaker, he convinced many working-class illiterates to follow his cause and, in this fashion, established his bona fides.

Having entered the game with his idiosyncratic views of prognostication, Morrison decided to launch his own almanac, patterned on Raphael’s version but designed to undercut its market presence. It was bolder, brasher and, more importantly, cheaper than the Raphael version and soon outsold it across the country: by 1867 “The Herald of Astrology” was moving over 44,000 units annually. Morrison chose to publish under the pseudonym ‘Zadkiel’ an angelic figure known as the standard-bearer of the Archangel Michael. In time his publication changed its name to “Zadkiel’s Almanac” and nearly became the pre-eminent fortune-telling organ in the country.

English; Lt. Richard James Morrison, RN, ‘Zadkiel’, et.al; London, from the 1830s to 1931; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

A Plea for Urania

Christopher Cooke was a young lawyer who attended a lecture given by Zadkiel and was, as a result, convinced of the truth of astrology. He offered to act as legal counsel and a kind of amanuensis for the famed astrologer and was fated to live to regret it. Zadkiel made abominable use of Cooke’s education and connexions, embroiling him and others in various financial schemes that inevitably crashed hard, leaving Zadkiel blithely unaffected. Cooke’s position as a lawyer was a tenuous one as, incontrovertibly under the law, astrology was illegal; however he devoted much of his life to fighting for a reform of the Vagrancy Act and to helping those who felt its sting. In 1854, he wrote this book which is a measured series of arguments acknowledging the anti-astrologists’ causes for complaint but reasonably countering these with strategies which would make them less offensive in their eyes. He ends by describing the ‘science’ behind the art, in a convincing description of its mathematical rigour. The book sold only 250 copies and was quickly remaindered; had it been less measured and more sensational, it might have performed somewhat better.

English; Christopher Cooke; London, 1854; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +2 percentiles; 4 week to study and comprehend

Spells: None

The Solar System As It Is, and Not As It Is Represented

Zadkiel’s highly idiosyncratic approach to the subject of astrology was outlined in 1858 by this and other similar works. According to this book, he describes the planets revolving around the Sun as we know them to do, with the exception of the Earth: apparently, the Sun and Moon in this model revolve around our planet. The Sun he says is 365,006 miles from the Earth and it revolves at a rate of 99,897 miles per hour; we know in fact that the Sun is 93 million miles distant and rotates at 558,000 miles per hour. Reviews of this work were confused and generally poor; despite this, Morrison lectured on the subject to almost 1,000 people in March of that year at the London Mechanics’ Institute in Manchester. The incident only served to prove - to Morrison at least - that the critics were very much his intellectual inferiors.

Morrison died of heart failure in 1874. His mantle as ‘Zadkiel’ was passed on to R. V. Sparkes who was, in what was more than somewhat a conflict of interests, also ‘Raphael V’. With his death in 1876, Alfred James Pearce took over as ‘Zadkiel III’ and re-invented the magazine, successfully boosting sales beyond the 100,000 subscribers mark by the time of his death in 1923. Without him at the helm however, the almanac quickly dwindled and folded by 1931.

English; Lt. Richard James Morrison, RN, ‘Zadkiel’; Manchester, 1858; 0/1d2 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles; 3 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

*****

Forty Future Wonders of Scripture Prophecy

With the rising acceptance of Darwin’s theories and the increasing numbers of astrological publications, the Rev. M. Baxter decided that he wasn’t going to take it any more: returning to the ‘Good Book’, he re-calculated the actual age of the Earth from Bible sources (a little over 3,000 years) and began to dig into the books of Daniel and The Revelation to definitively prove that God-botherers had been prognosticating long before ‘Raphael’ and his ilk and that Darwin was just an uppity, turncoat ‘Undergroundologist’.

In this book, which had a phenomenal impact upon the reading public, the good Reverend combs methodically through the Bible (including some “ancient ones” kept in the British Museum) and identifies every prophecy, explaining painstakingly what they mean and when they will come to pass; he admits that the dating is tenuous, given that calculating years depends upon the interpretation of differing calendrical systems, and therefore, for most prophecies he gives two absolute dates, or a range of years wherein, he assures us, they will come to pass. Obviously, Biblical prophesying is an inexact art. And to spice things up even more, there are 50 funky illustrations!

English; The Rev. M. Baxter; “Christian Herald” Office, London, 1866; 0/1d3 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles; 6 weeks to study and comprehend

Spells: None

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When Were You Born?

With the advent of the Twentieth Century, astrology and its various transatlantic snake-oil salesmen were still hard at work, and dumbing-down the art, or ‘pseudo-science’, to make it more palatable to the next generation of almanac buyers. One of these was the ever-mysterious “Cheiro” (pronounced “KI-RO”) and his slew of publications such as this one, which commands “‘Know Thyself’ and Thy Friends” (whee!). Cheiro generated quite a bit of street cred by hanging out with members of the SPR, notably Harry Price and Eric John Dingwall.

With his spooky scowling photograph to kick things off, a confident declaration that your marriage partner will be selected and the promise of engravings illustrating “Life’s Mysterious Triangles”, who wouldn’t shell out 2/6- for this little gem?

English; ‘Cheiro’; Herbert Jenkins Ltd., London, 1925; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +1 percentiles; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

*****

“Raphael’s Ephemeris”

Produced as an adjunct to “Raphael’s Astrological Almanac”, this yearly guide to the positions of heavenly bodies in relation to the Earth is an annual necessity for astrologers across the British Isles and dates from the end of Raphael VI’s tenure – 1923.

English; ‘Raphael’, et.al; London, from 1923; 0/0 Sanity loss; Cthulhu Mythos +0 percentiles; Occult +0 percentiles per issue; 1 week per issue to study and comprehend

Spells: None

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The following is a list of other astrological publications extant throughout the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century, some by Raphael or Zadkiel and their supporters, competitors and detractors. I have not been able to track down all of them for their publication details and so forth, apart from some scraps here and there, but intrepid Keepers may choose to flesh them out into full-on Mythos texts for their players to stumble over if they so desire.

The Astrologer’s Magazine

Astrology For All

Astrology in a Nut-Shell

The Book of Fate

The British Journal of Astrology

Companion to the Prophetic Messenger

A Complete Refutation of Astrology...in Reply to the Arguments of Lieutenant Morrison and others

“...This system of imposture has lately been gaining ground in the British Empire...the present work may, in some degree, be instrumental in checking its progress.”

-T. H. Moody

Defence and Exposition of the Principles of Astrology

Esoteric Astrology

The Familiar Astrologer

The Grammar of Astrology, containing All Things Necessary for Calculating a Nativity

The Hand-Book of Astrology

The Horoscope

The Key to Your Own Nativity

Modern Astrology

The Textbook of Astrology

A Treatise on Zodiacal Physiognomy

“With respect to the vision of the Ghost of the Flea, seen by Blake, it agrees in countenance with one class of people under Gemini, which sign is the significator of the Flea; whose brown colour is appropriate to the colour of the eyes in some full-toned Gemini persons. And the neatness, elasticity, and tenseness of the Flea are significant of the elegant dancing and fencing sign Gemini. This spirit visited his imagination in such a figure as he never anticipated in an insect. As I was anxious to make the most correct investigation in my power, of the truth of these visions, on hearing of this spiritual apparition of a Flea, I asked him if he could draw for me the resemblance of what he saw: he instantly said, 'I see him now before me,' I therefore gave him paper and a pencil, with which he drew the portrait, of which a facsimile is given...in this work.”

The Voice of the Stars

“[Astrology] has been sick, but not dying; silent, but not destroyed. Struck down by foul calumny, fettered by ignorance, slandered by falsehood, pressed to the earth by prejudice; yet lo! it lives, moves, and rises again...”

-Zadkiel

The Stars Are Right!