Chapter IX.—Existence of Evil on Astrological Principles.

Then I answered:  “Since, therefore, I have to deal with one who is skilled in astrological science,⁸⁵⁹⁸⁵⁹    [Comp. book ix. 15, 17, etc.  The question of astrology is much more prominent in the Recognitions; but comp. Homily XIV. 5, and elsewhere.—R.] I shall treat the matter with you according to that science, that, taking my method from those things with which you are familiar, you may the more readily acquiesce.  Listen now, therefore:  you confess that those things which we have mentioned are evils, such as fevers, conflagrations, and such like.  Now these, according to you, are said to be produced by malignant stars, such as the humid Saturn and the hot Mars; but things contrary to these are produced by benignant stars, such as the temperate Jupiter and the humid Venus.  Is it not so?”  My father answered:  “It is so, my son; and it cannot be otherwise.”  Then said I:  “Since you say, therefore, that good things are produced by good stars—by Jupiter and Venus, for example—let us see what is the product where any one of the evil stars is mixed with the good, and let us understand that that is evil.  For you lay it down that Venus makes marriages, and if she have Jupiter in her configura195tion she makes the marriages chaste; but if Jupiter be not regarding, and Mars be present, then you pronounce that the marriages are corrupted by adultery.”  Then said my father:  “It is even so.”  Then I answered:  “Therefore adultery is an evil, seeing that it is committed through the admixture of evil stars; and, to state it in a word, all things that you say that the good stars suffer from the mixture of evil stars, are undoubtedly to be pronounced to be evil.  Those stars, therefore, by whose admixture we have said that fevers, configurations, and other such like evils are produced,—those, according to you, work also murders, adulteries, thefts, and also produce haughty and stolid men.”