en with
angels as vultures, a silver heaven with angels as horses, a
golden and a pearl heaven each peopled with angel girls, a crystal
heaven with angel men, then two heavens full of angels, and
finally a great sea without bound, each sphere being presided over
by a chief ruler, the names of all of whom were familiar to the
learned Arabs. The Syrian kosmos corresponded closely to the
foregoing. It soared up the mounting steps of earth, water, air,
fire, and innumerable choruses successively of Angels, Archangels,
Principalities, Powers, Virtues, Dominations, Thrones, Cherubim
and Seraphim, unto the Expanse whence Lucifer fell; afterwards to
a boundless Ocean; and lastly to a magnificent Crown of Light
filling the uppermost space of all.25

It is hard for us to imagine the aspects of the universe to the
ancients and the impressions it produced in them, all seemed so
different then, in the dimness of crude observation, from the
present appearance in the light of astronomic science. Anaximander
held that the earth was of cylindrical form, suspended in the
middle of the universe and surrounded by envelopes of water, air,
and fire, as by the coats of an onion, but that the exterior
stratum was broken up and collected into masses, and thus
originated the sun, moon, and stars, which are carried around by
the three spheres in which they are fixed.26 Many of the Oriental
nations believed the planets to be animated beings, conscious
divinities, freely marching around their high realms, keeping
watch and ward over the creation, smiling their favorites on to
happy fortune,

25 Dupuis, L'Origine de tous les Cultes, Planche No. 21.

26 Arist. de Coel. ii. 13.

fixing their baleful eyes and shedding disastrous eclipse on
"falling nations and on kingly lines about to sink forever." This
belief was cherished among the later Greek philosophers and Roman
priests, and was vividly held by such men as Philo, Origen, and
even Kepler. It is here that we are to look for the birth of
astrology, that solemn lore, linking the petty fates of men with
the starry conjunctions, which once sank so deeply into the mind
of the world, but is now wellnigh forgotten:

"No more of that, ye planetary lights! Your aspects, dignities,
ascendancies, Your partite quartiles, and your plastic trines, And
all your heavenly houses and effects, Shall meet no more devout
expounders here.

The joy of Jupiter, The exaltation of the Dragon's head, The sun's