HOW TO LEARN ASTROLOGY


Chapter One

WHAT IS A HOROSCOPE?



A horoscope is like a picture, or a map. It is not like a page of printing. The way to get at the meaning of a horoscope is to "look" at it, exactly as anyone "looks" through a window, or "looks" over a situation.

Astrologers speak of "reading" a horoscope, but this word often throws the beginner off the track. He thinks he has to learn a series of symbols, like letters to put together in words, and that astrology strings ideas out on a line, like sentences and paragraphs. He tries to store up ideas, ready to link together in this way, and soon gets confused, simply for lack of a correct understanding at the start.

Letters have been invented by men, and words are different in every language, but the elements of astrology actually exist in the heavens. The situation of the stars is transferred, with mathematical correctness, to the sheet of paper. Thus the horoscope is the actual picture of a life as it is represented in heavenly motion.

The astrological "chart," or "figure," or "map," or "wheel," as the horoscope is variously called, is examined in much the same way as the person it represents. Special things may be sought out by the eye, as to see whether the chart has many planets in one place, or whether the person has a large nose (two things that have no astrological connection), but usually any individual is first seen with a whole-view, and a horoscope is handled in the same manner.

The astrological chart uses symbols for the planets. It also identifies certain sections of the heavens as "houses of the horoscope" in one measure of motion, and as "signs of the zodiac" in another. These astrological elements are not many, and they are really easier to learn than many things commonly recognized in seeing a friend, such as the meaning of a smile, a glance or a gesture. The child learns to look at other people by beginning to "look," and to draw conclusions. These conclusions are simple at first. They get more complex only as he grows, and keeps on looking. The astrologer starts in the same way, unless he wants to make everything hard.

The purpose of this book is to help the student to "look" at a chart, accurately and competently, even from the beginning of his study. His first conclusions will be simple, or general, but they will be useful and correct. This will give him confidence, and speed him on his way to a more detailed capacity for judgment.

Here is the regular form of horoscope for a certain resourceful lady. Her husband, a professional man of reputation but great unreliability, left her penniless with four children ranging in age from infancy to seven. She then won a spectacular success, wholly by her own efforts and initiative, and in time became nationally well-known. The beginner, however, will shake his head as he sees this chart.

"How can I look at it and tell anything about it? I don't know what any of the marks mean. All I can see is a sort of large circle, cut up in sections like a big pie, with a small central circle containing information about the place and date of birth."

A similar objection might be made by the baby beginning to "notice" things.

"How can you expect me to tell what's what, when there isn't anything I can recognize, when nothing has any meaning to me?"

The baby goes right ahead however, and begins to make progress. The astrological infant can do as well, and in the same way.

What is puzzling in this horoscope is the presence of many unfamiliar marks. The symbols for twelve signs of the zodiac are given around the wheel, together with the number of degrees of each which lie on the "house cusps" or spokes of the wheel. Then the symbols for ten planets are found in the houses, with their zodiacal degrees and minutes.

The beginner may well protest, "I'll have to learn the symbols for those twelve signs, right now, and for the ten planets too, and learn what the houses are, and how to use degrees and minutes."

Not at all! The baby doesn't have to learn a lot of facts about this mysterious life around him before he starts to look at it intelligently, and to know things. Life makes him wait, lets him get the details as he needs them. First he is aware of everything as a gigantic blur, more or less. Then he begins to recognize vague patterns that make sense. He builds his knowing step by step. The beginner in astrology should do likewise. As a help to him the chart of the resourceful lady can be given in a different form. This will enable him to get a preliminary grasp of its meaning. Since the symbols for the signs of the zodiac and for the planets and the figures for degrees and minutes are quite unintelligible, simple black marks can be substituted, and the horoscope presented in this elementary but graphic fashion.

At once a simple characteristic of the chart stands out. The black marks actually inside the wheel, "in the houses" as astrologers express it, are as a whole towards the left of the central line. This has a very real meaning in the life of the "native," as astrology calls the person for whom the horoscope is "cast" or "erected." It shows that she can dictate the course of her own career quite completely.

In astrological language, the planets are "east." Thus the beginner must observe that horoscope directions are the exact reverse of those in a map, with east to the left, west to the right, south to the top and north to the bottom.

The native in this case was left absolutely helpless, with her four children, but she didn't waste energy complaining. Instead, she looked around to see what she could do. She was in the artistic quarter of the city, and there she found an unused attic in the hundred-year-old shack occupied by a candy store. In this she opened a tiny shop, selling only cake and coffee but specializing in atmosphere, discussion and psychological encouragement. She helped struggling writers and painters, and charged double prices to a conventional clientele for the privilege of first-hand association with bohemian individuals. In a few short years she had become famous.

This self-direction of the destiny is always shown, one way or another, when the planets are east in a chart. "East" is the section of the heavens where the sun rises, and the area of experience where everything has its start. Now, for a contrast, the beginner can look at the horoscope of Woodrow Wilson, simplified in the same way.

Here the planets as a whole are to the west, which means the exact reverse situation in life. President Wilson was a product of his times, and never the real author of his own destiny. The political developments in the state of New Jersey, with which he had nothing to do directly, were responsible for putting him into public life in the first place. The nature of the contest in the Democratic National Convention, rather than his own efforts, really led to his initial nomination for the presidency. His first election was due to the split in the Republican party, and his second was only made a fact at the very last minute by the California vote, a surprising outcome of special conditions in the state with which he was wholly unconcerned in any personal way. His international prominence came from the world war, equally apart from his own basic initiative; indeed, his direct efforts for the League of Nations were ultimately unsuccessful to a tragic extent. This is a typical illustration of the life-pattern when the planets lie to the west in the horoscope. Here is where the sun sets in the heavens, and the area in experience where everything has its completion.

To simplify the distinctions made so far, it can be said, somewhat superficially of course, that the emphasis in the eastern half of the chart gives an a la carte life, and in the western hemisphere a table d'hôte existence. The first type of individual selects his own meal throughout; the other takes what is served him, with only minor choices by comparison.

North and South Distinction

If it is possible to make a distinction between east and west "hemisphere emphasis," as the overbalance of half the wheel is known in astrology, it should be equally possible to distinguish between south and north, or to divide experience on the basis of a sun high in the heavens, or far below the earth. An example of south hemisphere-emphasis is found in the horoscope of Queen Victoria.

When the planets as a whole are south, or above the central line of the horoscope, the life is said to be entirely objective, or concerned only with practical and visible things. This was not only true of Queen Victoria, but of the whole age in which she was a central figure; so that her name has contributed the word "Victorian," or more specially, "mid-Victorian," to the language. The popular idea of this era was that everything must have an outward respectability at the least, and that the under or inner side of life must never be mentioned unnecessarily, or even admitted.

An example, by contrast, of north hemisphere emphasis is found in the horoscope of Martin Luther.

When the planets as a whole are north, or below the central line of the chart, the life is entirely subjective, or primarily concerned with spiritual and invisible matters. This was dramatically true of Luther. His major achievement was a reaction against superficial religion, mere outer show of piety, surface conformity to ritual. He definitely stimulated an inner or more true devotion, a faith which would actually be felt and lived. This is demanded by the basic pattern of his chart.

These four cases of hemisphere emphasis are extreme examples, to illustrate the general distinctions. In the charts of Queen Victoria and Martin Luther the planets are actually all on the proper side of the central line. In the case of the resourceful lady, the one planet at the bottom is really on the west side, although by only half a degree, and in the horoscope of Woodrow Wilson the one planet at the top is eight degrees over on the east side. Neither of these variations changes the general situation. In other words, distinctions of this sort are broad generalities. They make it possible to look at a horoscope with an all-at-once or whole view, and so get a first or over-all impression of the person.

The beginner will learn that the characteristics will hold to a lesser extent when the planets have merely a tendency to be all east, west, south or north. It is the same proposition as in life itself. When "tall" or "short" people are picked out, or "fat" and "thin" ones, it then becomes possible to describe others as "somewhat tall," or "slightly fat," and so on. The young astrologer, as he goes on, will have other equally broad means for sorting out people, or describing them in these first complete "looks." He will see that this is the most natural of all ways to approach the interpretation of the horoscope.

Summary

In summary, what has the beginner learned in this first chapter? He has been shown that the way to begin looking at a horoscope is just to look at it, that is, to observe whatever makes sense to him, and to pay no attention to details which he does not as yet understand. He has found that the planets have a tendency to form patterns, and that at least some of these patterns can be recognized or interpreted even before he knows what the planets are, or what the houses and signs mean. As an example, he has been shown how to describe people whose charts have their planets lying to the east, west, south or north.


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